We are what we eat.
But how many of us know what we are actually eating?
How many of us know
what food does to the environment before it comes to our plate.
How many of you know
what food does to the farmer who is producing that food?
Do you know? Have you ever thought?
How many of you think, when you are eating food,
about the farmer who has produced it or the fate of the farmer who has produced it?
These are some of the questions
which grappled me when I was studying agriculture.
While doing my Ph. D. in agriculture, I had a choice.xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxseparate line
Like every young boy in the 90's,
I was also crazy about getting into Indian Civil Service.
I really understood about the Indian economy
by reading for an exam.
Finally, by the time I got into the services, I was selected for Indian Revenue Service.++++++++++
But I also had a choice of joining as an Agricultural Research Scientist.
It was a tough choice.
I made my choice and joined as an Agricultural Research Scientist.
I thought, I should continue working with farmers.
(Applause)
But that didn't last long, I'll come to that.
Before I come to that, let's understand: what is our food?
What we are eating? How safe is our food?
All of you saw this news, some time ago.
Pesticides residues in soft drinks and bottled water.
But forgotten the next day.
Have you ever thought
how pesticides residues got into this bottled water or soft drinks?
If bottled water and soft drinks had pesticide residues,
the water you used to make tea or coffee also must be having.
But we never worry about it.
The news is short, the next day we forget about it.
At least this must be in your memory: noodles having heavy metals.
How many of you thought,
how did these heavy metals reach the noodles?
If lead has to be added to the noodles,
probably lead is more costly than the noodles.
Nobody will add it, but it came. How did it come?
If ingredients used to make noodles had the lead,
then the 'aata' which you used to make your 'chapati' also must be having.++++++++++++++++
Or the 'samosa' which you're eating also must be having. Right?
But we don't connect the dots.
Same is the story when we hear about pesticide residues in vegetables.
You all get horrified, but forget it in the evening.
We all think, if we buy food at a good place, or eat it in a good hotel, it's safe.
Food is only as safe as it is grown.
End of pipe solutions don't work.
The pesticides which are used in agriculture,
less than 1% actually kills the insects, 99% gets into the water,
gets into the air, and comes back into your food.
We look at it very casually.
Everything happening around us, we look at it very casually.
I'll give you an example.
While having the lunch, I saw people painting there.
What is that? Spray Paint.
Where does it go?
Part of it goes onto the board, part of it into the air.
You were all eating there. It comes there.
We are all educated, we feel we can make connections.
We never make them.
We expect that the farmer will make those connections
and produce safe food for all of us.
I think that's there is a disconnect
between what we observe, what we know, and how we act. It is a serious problem.
It's not only about the pesticides.
Do you know the eggs that you buy in the market,
what kind of eggs are you buying?
They are half cloyed eggs.
Half cloyed means they are produced without male and female meeting together.
That's why if you hatch the eggs, they won't make chickens.
But how they are produced? They are produced by using estrogens.
And what happens to those estrogens?
When you eat those eggs they'll come back to you.
That's one reason today the puberty in girls has advanced.
Gynecological problems in women have increased.
Breast development in men has increased.
Last year's India Today's survey shows
that the largest number of plastic surgeries done in India are to remove breasts in men.++++++++++++++++
You got into the situation where fruit, which is supposed to be healthy,
is creating all these problems.
It's not just the pesticides, or antibiotics, or growth hormones
which are used in production, but also how they are processed. !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
You might have heard the last one week 10 days doing rounds in all the media
artificially ripened fruits.
But why fruits are ripened artificially?
if all of you want to fruits in off season.
How will they do it?
If you want mangoes in May, how do you get mangoes?
You have to cut unripened one's ripen it artificially and sell it.
Banana's which are seeing uniformed yellow
What are they? They all are carbon ripen.
The apples the shiny apples which you see,
What are they? When were they produced? Where were they produced? Do you know?
California apples, you get apple from California
Can you keep it fresh? They are coated with wax.
Go back to your home, take apple from your fridge.
Just scratch it. You'll see the wax.
We are eating all that.
The watermelons which are red in color,
they are injected with injections, color.
They are injected with growth hormones.
The milk which is sold, we have seen in news last several years,
the reports which say, "The milk is contaminated with synthetic milk."
If you want to have milk at 40 rupees a liter thats what you get.
We want food cheaper,
and there is competition between the companies
They pay low to the farmers,
They also contaminate it and get away with that.
All brands of milk sold in Hyderabad,
prone to have contaminated with synthetic milk
GM Foods, How many of you know about this? How many of you've heard about this?
BT Brinjal, to tell you simply, what BT Brinjal is?
when pesticide is sprayed from outside it damages the environment.
Like I said,"99% goes into the environment only 1% kills the insect."
So scientist thought why not we produce pesticide in plant itself.
So plant produces insecticides. So which ever insect eats plant will die.
But what happens to us? Who eats that.
So there are several bio safety questions in front of us which were never addressed.
What you see here, yellow, white, golden rice which is going to come soon
You know why it was done?
They say "vitamin A deficiency is serious problem, so we will produce
vitamin A in the plant."
If you eat that rice you can have as much as vitamin A as possible.
But do you know vitamin A is fat soluble vitamin.
So it's not just enough to have vitamin A, but you also need to have enough fat.
But if you have enough fat in your food you don't need golden rice.
In 2005 we came across a farmer in Guntur,
Who was cultivating BT Bhendi.
We were shocked.
I said "How did you get it?"
He said,"Company gave me the seeds."
We went to the company. They said,"We are doing a trial."
We went to the government. Government said,"Yeah, That is seen."
They said, "You are not permitted." Those were taken off in 2005.
2013, similarly we came across a cotton,
Kerbside tolerant cotton which is grown. No permissions.
In 2009, when BT brinjal was permitted there was public discussions.
But It was the only time there was for public discussion,
to introduce whether we need a food or not And it was banned.
Sometimes, some wise politicians take better decisions.
But by this we would have flooded with GM foods.
Today there is case pending in Supreme Court,
there is expert committee appointed by Supreme Court.
Which said, "We don't need this for next 10 yrs. Let's wait."
There is parliament standing committee
which was appointed it also said "We don't need."
But, you don't know how they are going to come into your plate.
Food is not only useful energy but also good for your health.
It can treat many of the deceases. Food is a medicine.
It can act as preventive medicine and It can also act as a curative medicine.
I know many people who are working on treating autism with good food.
Many of the problem which you are seeing
Obesity, diabetes, blood pressure all are because of the food which you eat.
You need to make right choice about your food.
Second, What food does to the environment.
Let's look at ecological footprints.
How many you have seen rice fields? Almost all, right.
What comes to your mind when we think of rice fields?
Full of water. How much water it takes to produce an acre of rice?
6 million liters.
6 million liters per acre of rice.
Which is equal to 100 families annual consumption.
1 family of 5 members eats about a Kg of rice a day.
Which is equivalent to tanker of water. 180 showers.
All of us want to eat rice, more and more water you need
in production of rice.
You were making calculation
how much 1 meal of rice in Hyderabad costs an environment?
It's probably as big as, all over a dam.
We need to worry about, the ecological footprints.
It's not just about the water, about pesticides, about growth hormone.
Everything. What agriculture leaves before it comes to you plate?
Not just that. What it does to farmers?
The more and more pesticides you spray insects get resistance. They don't work.
First time you spray, second time you spray
third time you spray it, fifth time you drink.
That's what we have seen along farmer suicides.
The fall outs of such things is increasing cost of cultivation,
but prices are not increasing.
You know 1 Kg of rice costs Rs. 2100/- as per government calcuations
But today price is on 1400 for farmers.
Today a ton of sugarcane is Rs. 2000/-
A ton of firewood is Rs. 4000/-
How farmers can live?
The policies are also lop sided.
Today average income of 83% of farmer in this country is only Rs. 5000/-
Only Rs. 5000/-
So farmers have lost their economic independence.
Not just economic independence, physical independence as well.
This were photographs taken farmers were standing in queue for fertilizers.
Standing in queue for seeds.
Seeds which they can produce.
Fertilizer which they can make by composting.
But they are not subsidized.
If you buy it in a market, they are subsidized.
Lop sided policies from government.
All these are lead to farmer suicides.
In last 20 yrs 3,00,000 farmers have committed suicide.
Everyday about 48.
What is the point about just discussing dark side of the picture?
How much and we can do to change the situation.
Some of us working in agriculture. Various institution came together
we started organization called Center for Sustainable Agriculture in 2004
We started working with farmers,
telling them, "How they can move away from
the high external input base agriculture to low external input based agriculture?"
It was not easy.
But what we found is across the country there were wonderful experiences.
But all those experiences were thought in ideological framework.
They don't talk to each other.
There are good things, bad things but if they discuss with each other
it would have been good but they never talk to each other.
Main stream institutions never worried about them.
So we brought all practices together.
Evolved what we called as sustainable agricultural practices.
The first success came in Kulukulla.
Kulukulla is village in Kamang district which became completely pesticide free.
The village which was speinding 60 LPA, they completely stopped using pesticides.
(Applause)
Agriculture minister came. He said, "Wonderful. What do you want?"
Farmers said, "Make Andhra Pradesh pesticide free."
He was amazed. He said, "Certainly I'll do. But what do you want?"
They said,"We are happy with what we have. But change all the agricultural practices"
He brought all agriculture university scientists of
department of agriculture together to see and then make a change.
They said,"Sir, this is one village we can't do it. It's not possible."
Then came Enabavi this is 80 km from here, compeltely organic village.
The last three years over 10000 people have visited the village to know
"How they are doing farming?"
"But this has also not changed anything under government."
But consumers have changed.
Many people have started understanding what is good for them.
This is an advertisement which is The Hindu uses for itself.
This is the village called Dorli.
Dorli is in Vardha. After Telanagana, you hear lots of suicide from Vardha.
In 2005 the village was put up for sale. Farmers decided, we can't do farming.
They put up village for sale.
We went there in 2006 and said "Can we start working together?"
Today all of them have repaid their loans.
All of them are back to farming.
(Applause)
It's possible. It's possible. It's possible.
All examples are in front of us.
We also side by side worked with woman self fill groups in Andhra Pradesh.
These are cover stories of "Down To Earth" magazine which tracked the whole change.
We started with 225 acres in 2005.
Today its 35,00,000 acre in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana together pesticide free.
(Applause)
50% use of pesticide in state has come down.
We were 3rd in country in terms of pesticide used
today we are 20th in the country.
(Applause)
This was part of a show on Satyamev Jayate
some of you might have seen.
In this show we had interesting discussion
On the other side was person who was largest pesticide seller in country
Towards end Amir Khan asked me a question,
"I am fully convienced with what you're saying and what you're doing
It is possible to do it India. But how to convince man who is sitting here?
I said ask his brother, His brother is largest organic exporter in this country.
(Applause)
And he said, "Yes."
That shows people see it as business.
If they sell pesticide, will sell pesticide if they sell organic, will sell organic.
You buy pesticides or our organic pesticides
or certificate from us, saying "you haven't used any of these things."
Farmers are made into consumers.
But what our consumers are doing?
Then what we did is we brought some consumers in Hyderabad together
to form a consumer cooperative called Sahaja Aharam.
We also brought all farmers together to form farmers cooperative
So that they can market directly.
Today we've 20 farmer cooperatives
who produce organically and directly sell in the market.
While many of you worry about organic food prices.
The oraganic Sahaja Aharam prices are 20% lower than the market prices.
And 75% of what consumer pays go to farmer.
In the regular market just 20% which goes to farmer.
(Applause)
What do I see from here?
I see a ray of hope.
It's possible.
If all of us can join together we can make a change.
But it's long way to go in terms of Government Policies.
Still there is serious crisis in agricuture.
Yesterday you might have seen about farmer's suicide.
Today mornings newspaper, you might have seen.
Number of farmers are dying.
It's a responsibility of all of us.
Business as usual is not an option.
We need to change as consumers we need change as farmers
We all need to come together to pressurize government
to make a change.
Otherwise, the future is very very glee.
Thank you.
(Applause)