Vandana Shiva: We Must Fight Back Against the 1 Percent to Stop the Sixth Mass Extinction

Bless Vandana Shiva and all who devote their lifetimes to courageously acting out of the consciousness of a higher good for all! Bless the truth-tellers and Love Warriors! They are all so vitally needed AND we need to join them! And now I want to go out tomorrow and get Vandana Shiva's newest book! In this interview and in her new book, we hear not just about Trump and Jeff Bezos, but also about the great harm generated by the likes of Bill Gates and Barack Obama. We need to shed our illusions and trade in propaganda for truth and facts. It's the only way we will save ourselves and our planet. The only way. — Molly

New research finds at least a third of the Himalayan ice cap will melt by the end of the century due to climate change, even if the world’s most ambitious environmental reforms are implemented. A report released earlier this month by the Hindu Kush Himalaya Assessment warns rising temperatures in the Himalayas could lead to mass population displacements, as well as catastrophic food and water insecurity. The glaciers are a vital water source for the 250 million people who live in the Hindu Kush Himalaya range, which spans from Afghanistan to Burma. More than a billion-and-a-half people depend on the rivers that flow from the Himalayan peaks. We speak with world-renowned environmental leader and ecologist Dr. Vandana Shiva about climate change, seed sovereignty and her new book, “Oneness vs. the 1%.” Shiva is an Indian scholar, physicist, and food sovereignty and seed freedom advocate. She was was born in Doon Valley in the Himalayan foothills.

AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report. I’m Amy Goodman. A shocking new report finds at least a third of the Himalayan ice cap will melt by the end of the century due to climate change, even if the world’s most ambitious environmental reforms are implemented. The report released Monday by The Hindu Kush Himalaya Assessment is the culmination of half a decade’s work by over 200 scientists, with an additional 125 experts peer reviewing their work.

It warns rising temperatures in the Himalayas could lead to mass population displacements, as well as catastrophic food and water insecurity. The glaciers are a vital water source for the 250 million people who live in the Hindu Kush Himalaya range, which spans from Afghanistan to Burma. The region is home to the most ice in the world, after Antarctica and the Arctic. And over a billion-and-a-half people depend on the rivers that flow from the Himalayan peaks.

We turn now to the world-renowned environmental leader and ecologist, who was born in Doon Valley in the Himalayan foothills, Dr. Vandana Shiva. She’s an Indian scholar and physicist, as well as a food sovereignty and seed freedom advocate. Dr. Shiva is also an alternative globalization author who’s written more than 20 books. Her latest, Oneness vs. the 1% and Who Really Feeds the World? She founded Navdanya, “nine seeds,” a movement promoting diversity and use of native seeds. In 1993, Dr. Shiva was recipient of the Alternative Nobel Peace Prize, the Right Livelihood Award.

Vandana Shiva, welcome back to Democracy Now!

VANDANA SHIVA: My joy to be with you again, Amy.

AMY GOODMAN: It’s great to have you with us. The title of this book, Oneness vs. the 1%, explain.

VANDANA SHIVA: Well, oneness is the recognition that, A, we are part of one planet, and we are one humanity. And unless we live with that consciousness and shape every moment of our production and consumption with that consciousness, we are going to destroy ourselves, which we are. The melting of the glaciers is one of the very severe indicators.

The 1 percent, of course, is the symbol of the concentration of wealth under the rules of the neoliberal economies, that are basically, on the one hand, turning every natural resource into a war zone. Even the Venezuelan issue is really a war over oil.

But war over seeds, that’s my life’s work, to keep seeds free, because they literally are a war over control of seeds, by a poison cartel of three—Monsanto and Bayer, Syngenta and ChemChina, Dow and DuPont—all of them with their roots in Hitler’s Germany and finding chemicals to kill people. No wonder they’re still killing people. No wonder they’re killing our butterflies and our bees and our pollinators.

And every indicator is showing we are not just in a severe climate catastrophe; we are in the sixth mass extinction. And both the species extinction and the climate catastrophe are two sides of the same coin.

Please continue the transcript here: https://www.democracynow.org/2019/2/22/vandana_shiva_we_must_fight_back