ABSTRACT
In September 2002 at the World Earth Summit in Johannesburg, hunger stricken African nations including Zambia, Ethiopia, Mozambique and Zimbabwe voiced opposition to GM food aid and rejected US Government claims that they were ‘letting people starve through misplaced concern over GM food’ (Martin, 2002). Prior to the Earth Summit the United States Government had been pursuing options through the World Trade Organisation that would require such nations to accept GM food aid. This included the drafting of an agreement for the Earth Summit that would have given the WTO the power to override the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety that currently gives developing countries the right to reject GM food (discussed in chapter four). On 13 May 2003, the Bush Government launched its case in the WTO against the European Commission seeking billions of dollars in damages for lost revenue caused by the so called ‘European Moratorium’ on US GM food. This chapter seeks to further the criminological debate by exploring a case
study involving the exploitation of hunger in Zambia and the processes and outcomes of the WTO case mentioned above. Elsewhere I have noted that a social and political analysis of the complex
debates involving GM food requires a ‘criminological knowledge capable of transcending disciplinary boundaries in order to critique the multifaceted dimensions of international biotechnology’ (Walters, 2004: 165). This necessitates an engagement with international trade and environmental law, environmental and trade politics, discourses on the political economy of hunger and food, debates about biotechnology, food science and agriculture, as well as an understanding of the sociology of development. This chapter also examines the ways in which third world hunger has been
exploited by pro-GM countries for commercial profit. It also identifies how sovereign nations, such as Zambia, rich in untapped biodiversity, seek to protect their natural resources against the exploits of Western trade powers, such as the United States. In doing so, it highlights how eco crime,
masquerading in the form of world trade and food aid, seeks to destroy environmental sovereignty and compromise the international programmes of sustainable security.
