The Winner in Argentina? Transgenic Soy

...SEPTEMBER / OCTOBER 2008 The Winner in Argentina...

...Enormous monocul- the campo and the government, it is the soy industry that has ture soy plantations—between 95% and 99% planted with emerged as the clear winner in the fight...

...With the degradation of soil and heated struggle over the soybean...

...3...

...production has emerged, combining financialization and large-scale monoculture, and it is spreading to other coun- Christy Thornton is NACLA’s director and publisher...

...Soy prices are so high that many small with pity when I responded that, as a vegetarian, the only lence of the “growing pools” that dominate Argentina...

...most of it is bound for livestock June...

...and El Tejar, own no land at all—they lease all of For months, Argentina’s central government and agricultural sector battled over an increase This has meant that as the price of land suitin export taxes announced by President Cristina able for soy production has risen dramatically Kirchner in March, which would have, among in the last few years, so has the cost of living in other things, changed the export tax rate on soy the countryside...

...And genetically modified soy from a fixed rate to a sliding rate pegged to com- is among the least labor-intensive crops, leading modity prices—an increase from about 33% to 44...

...As both the food and financial crises show no signs and small farmers established roadblocks to prevent the of abating, the paradox of this meat-loving country’s devotransportation of goods to the cities, creating food short- tion to soy production becomes clear: In a country that is the ages throughout the country...

...Indeed, the transgenic variety of soy that takes up rebates, but the rural associations refused to sell goods for more than half of Argentina’s agricultural land isn’t suitable export until the proposal was sent to Argentina’s Congress in for human consumption...

...posal was meant to encourage farmers to diversify their crops One obvious result has been large-scale displacement of and move away from monoculture production of soy, and the campesinos at the new “soy frontier” in provinces like increased tax revenues were to be redistributed, Kirchner said, Chaco, Salta, and Santiago del Estero...

...transgenic soy in Argentina...

...But as deed, the financial and agribusiness firms are I set out to find Buenos Aires’s vegetarian under- Financialization increasingly one and the same: Some of the largest belly, Argentina was coming to a near standstill in agricultural interests in Argentina, like Los Grobo a confrontation that centered on the soybean...

...and large-scale monoculture have created a new “Argentine model...

...The pro- some to call soy farming “agriculture without farmers...

...As the political essayist Raúl Vice President Julio Cobos cast the deciding vote in the Sen- Zibechi recently commented, “The region is being placed in ate against the measure in July, leading the government to its position in an international division of labor, as provider drop the proposal altogether...

...Transgenic Soy taking note it from small- and medium-size farmers...

...But Argentine of enterprises, has lost more than 12 million acres while Argentines now celebrate the end of the battle between to soybeans in the last five years alone...

...of agricultural commodities as feed for factory fed animals in So why, in country famous for its beef, was there such a the northern hemisphere...

...In a stunning defeat for the Kirchner administration, feedlots in Europe and Asia...

...will now be able to do to stop the march of transgenic soy What many now consider an “Argentine model” of soy across the country...

...Insteaks I’d be eating would be made of tofu...

...It is now uncertain genetically modified variations bought from Monsanto and what the Kirchner administration, reeling from this defeat, other multinationals—now dominate the countryside...

...But another, perhaps even more serious, consequence is In response, rural organizations comprising both large looming...

...Today, soy is Argentina’s top During the crisis, many on the left argued that the inexport and is the most widely planted crop in the coun- crease in export taxes would have done little to reverse this try—taking up more than half of Argentina’s agricultural situation, and that the revenues generated would have only land, according to most estimates...

...by Christy thornton Abest beef I would ever eat, and shook their heads businesses and financial speculators, increasing the preva- agri ge lar to land their leased or sold simply have farmers t f o e l t i e m l a g e a l d n s d f s r ie i n pre a pared co l f e or g u a e s r r ecen e t d trip w to th a a rg s ent in h a e , tries in the region...

...in poverty alleviation programs and food subsidies...

...Cattle ranching, that most transferred wealth from one sector of capital to another...

...The central government then third-largest producer of soybeans in the world, no one eats introduced compensations for small farmers, including tax the stuff...

...The story begins at the groundwater, the loss of forested land, and the displacement height of the neoliberal 1990s, when then president Car- of campesinos together with increasing inflation and financial los Menem authorized, for the first time, the production of instability, this new Argentine model may prove disastrous...