Once upon a time, human food was grown by local farmers who used no chemical pesticides, and many countries still practice this very gentle and ALL-NATURAL way to farm.This is a natural farming technique that humans have been practicing for thousands of years – slash and burn.
Ever since modern-day corporations created “mega-corporate farming” and GMOs, humans now find themselves in the middle of a global food crisis. We’ve boxed ourselves into a corner, and if we don’t slash and burn our way out of this, our natural food supply will soon be gone. We are seeing this happening today with the death of honeybees and in the number of fish and sea mammals washing dead upon our shores.
This is a serious global issue, and I posted a blog about our world’s food crisis on my extinctiontheory.com blog. If humans don’t stop interfering with Nature, we just might find our species in a true threat of extinction – and this is no joke. TIme is running out because we, humans, are messing in our own nest.
Slash And Burn
Slash and burn agriculture is an age-old process of cutting down the vegetation on a particular plot of land, setting fire to the remaining foliage, and using the ashes to provide nutrients to the soil for planting food crops.
The cleared area following slash and burn is known as swidden, and is only used for a relatively short period of time. Then the plot of land is left alone for a longer period of time so that the natural vegetation can grow again.
Today, slash and burn agriculture is practiced mostly in places where open land for farming is not readily available because of dense vegetation. These regions include central Africa, northern South America, Southeast Asia, and typically within grasslands and rain forests. But, before corporate farming, slash and burn was practiced in every country all over the world, in open fields, and definitely in the US, where they called it “letting the fields lie fallow.” Before Big Corps took over our food, American farmers used slash and burn techniques to allow their fields to restore naturally, and they still provided their communities with a continuous source of food and income.
Today because of our modern agricultural technology, slash and burn is primarily used by tribal communities, but humans have practiced this method of farming for over 12,000 years. When humans stopped hunting and gathering as their main source of food, they started growing crops and became less nomadic. Today, between 200 and 500 million people still use slash and burn agriculture, and with the onslaught of chemicals polluting our foods and soils today, these are the people who will not suffer through a food crisis.
Time To Return To The Old Ways
The PUSH for GMOS throughout the world has brought into the light a very lethal mistake that some of us, humans, have made. The makers of GMOs are playing a dangerously omnipotent game, and their desires to manipulate Nature’s food supply will be their demise – at least for the countries that no longer practice slash and burn techniques.
Slash and burn techniques have gotten much scrutiny and prejudice from the more technological and arrogant countries, and this is primarily a problem with education and greed. Conversely to what corporate farmers may think, slash and burn techniques do far less harm than injecting toxic and deadly chemicals into the soil and into the seeds of the food we eat.
The countries that practice more natural farming like slash ad burn do not require the gluttonous acreage common to the more technological countries. Wildlife is NOT threatened because they move onto the tracts of land now fallow; honeybees and butterflies, worms, and toads are not poisoned by farm chemials. The wildlife helps reseed and restore the former growing fields; there is no wildlife on corporate farms.
Hungary Destroys GMO Crops
According to Hungary’s Deputy State Secretary of the Ministry of Rural Development, Lajos Bognar, Hungary burned 1000 acres of maize they discovered was grown with genetically modified seeds. Hungary is a nation where genetically modified (GMO) seeds are banned. In a similar stance against GMOs, Peru has also passed a 10 year ban on GMO foods.
My Point
This brings us to the point of this article. The best solution to the frightening reality that the spread of GMOs will pollute and destroy our global natural food sources is to slash and burn the GMOs before they have a chance to propagate.
Hat’s Off to you, Hungary, for following your basic instincts! When the global food crisis devastates the countries dependent on GMOs, you will be able to grow your own food!
