from naturalsociety.com: Last month, Monsanto executive Robert Fraley received the World Food Prize.
This highly esteemed prize, considered among many to be the “Nobel
Prize” of food, was given to the chief technology officer of the
chemical company who is ironically working to diabolically destroy
agriculture as we know it. As Anthony Gucciardi puts it, the “blatant
act of transgression” isn’t only obvious to those of us in the natural
health world, but to scientists, and food and agricultural advocates
around the world as well.

In response to the award (and two other highly questionable World
Food Prize awards), 81 Councillors of the World Future Council penned a
statement blasting the World Food Prize. These dignitaries are described
as “a network of global luminaries who ‘form a voice for the rights of
future generations’.” The statement also included names of Laureates of
the Right Livelihood Award, or the “Alternative Nobel”. In other words,
the statement was written by some esteemed and globally recognized
folks—people you don’t necessarily want on your bad side.

In their statement, published in its entirety on Huffington Post,
the Council says this year’s World Food Prize recipient “betrays the
award’s own mandate to emphasize ‘the importance of a nutritious and
sustainable food supply for all people’.” They call out Monsanto Exec
Fraley and say he and the other two award recipients played crucial
parts in the development of genetically modified organisms which threaten the global food system.

“Almost twenty years after commercialization of the first
GMO seeds, by far the most widely used are not engineered to enhance
nutrient content, but to produce a specific pesticide or to resist a
proprietary herbicide, or a combination of these traits. Even in
reducing weeds, the technology is failing, for it has led to
herbicide-resistant “super weeds” now appearing on nearly half of
American farms,” the Huffington Post reports.

The statement goes on to blast GMOs for perpetuating an unhealthy
dependence on fossil fuels and minerals as well as water waste. They
point out that although the award is designed to commend those behind
nutritious and sustainable food practices, Monsanto’s GMOs actually do
the opposite, taxing the environment far more than organically grown
crops.

The claims by Monsanto and others who support GMOs are that these
franken-seeds can help solve world hunger. But, as the Council points
out, these seeds are largely used to produce crops for livestock feed,
processed foods, and fuel, not to feed the hungry.

In addition, they write that the practices by these companies in
getting farmers to subscribe to their devastating philosophy is making
it even more difficult for such farmers to make a living. In India, for
example, 270,000 farmers committed suicide between 1995 and 2012 to get out from under debt accumulated by purchasing these high-dollar seeds and chemicals.

In closing, they write:

The choice of the 2013 World Food Prize is an affront to
the growing international consensus on safe, ecological farming
practices that have been scientifically proven to promote nutrition and
sustainability. Many governments have rejected GMOs, and as many as two
million citizens in 52 countries recently marched in opposition to GMOs
and Monsanto. In living democracies, discounting this knowledge and
these many voices is not acceptable.