GENETIC THREAT ALERT - AFGHANISTAN ! (MF DOGS !!!)

[mriko]

Greetings & Love everyone !

Oh my, these are terrible news i read this morning. Some nasty fungus is attacking the Afghan poppy crop, at large scale. Fact is that this thing (if Fusarium o. it is, which I am 99.99%sure of) doesn't attack only poppies, but also coca or cannabis. No coca there, but lots of our beloved green.
Could that be a man-made attack ? DEA uses it a lot in South America and this could be the latest move in getting the farmers to replace their fields of dope with monsanto seeds (among other things...).

Great danger my friends, cherish you pure afghan seeds and if you know anyone who's serving overthere, make them send you beans ! Just make sure they are labelled with precise origin.

Fungus hits Afghan opium poppies

A serious disease is affecting opium poppies in Afghanistan, Antonio Maria Costa, the head of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) has said.

Mr Costa told the BBC that this year's opium production could be reduced by a quarter, compared with last year.

He said the disease - a fungus - is thought to have infected about half of the country's poppy crop. Afghanistan produces 92% of the world's opium.

Mr Costa said opium prices had gone up by around 50% in the region.

That could have an impact on revenues for insurgent groups like the Taliban which have large stockpiles of opium, he added.

The fungus attacks the root of the plant, climbs up the stem and makes the opium capsule wither away.

It was affecting poppies in the provinces of Helmand and Kandahar, the heartland of opium cultivation and the insurgency in Afghanistan, he said.

Nato 'blamed'

Some local farmers believe Nato troops are responsible for the outbreak, but Mr Costa denied that this was the case.

"I don't see any reasons to believe something of that sort," he said. "Opium plants have been affected in Afghanistan on a periodic basis."

Mr Costa also said this was an opportunity for the international community to bring in support to try to persuade farmers to turn away from planting opium.

He said the amount of opium produced by one hectare (2.47 acres) had almost doubled to 56kg (123lb) in the five years to 2009.

"Nature really played in favour of the opium economy; this year, we see the opposite situation," he added.

Mr Costa said that farmers now grew opium poppies in only five or six Afghan provinces, as opposed to all 34 five years ago.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/8679203.stm

Irie !

 

[elmanito]

Mriko, thanks for posting!!

I'm sure of it that this is man made, bloody bastards.
There was never a Fusarium attack before and now suddenly.There are happening some nasty things at this moment.This will effect the whole country.Big shame for humanity if the genetics are lost forever.

Instead of destroying the genetics, they should buy the opium stock from the farmers for medicinal use in the west, but that is not happening.

Namaste

 

[mriko]

Instead of destroying the genetics, they should buy the opium stock from the farmers for medicinal use in the west, but that is not happening.

This is such a shame, morphine is lacking everywhere. In haiti after the last hearthquake, dozens of amputation where done without anaesthesic, no pain killer. These people sure would have appreciated some "made in Afghanistan" morphine. The stuff is lacking, thus making prices high, and some want to keep them high so they can fill their pocket some more. Can't do that with a legal afghan opium production !

I might be going far in here, but... could there be also some link with the maybe soon-to-be-legal cannabis industry of some Western country ? I don't know... It's the second thing after monsanto which popped in my mind reading the article, and I know to well this kind of popping...

Irie !

 

[HeryRhom]

Merci Mriko pour l'info!
Worrying! One more reason for us to preserve and reproduce our pure ghany ganja!

However I have trouble believing an attack anti-drugs, U.S OTAN are in Afghanistan as the Mountain of money related to heroin, they have too much to lose I think! The fungus may be simply linked to climate change in this region? A culture may be too intense since the real terrorists NWO occupied this land?

Anyway wa have to reproduce f2 brothers before doing crosses

 

[Dr_Tre]

Bad news indeed, but the whole gene pool to be lost is very exaggerated.There is no disease that can destroy every single plant in Afghanistan and there are very few diseases that can destroy most of the crop in the country.You know, these are extremely hardy plants grown outdoors in the desert for centuries, perfectly adapted to the local environment, not your basement-grown super-duper hybrid that would not survive a heavy rain let alone any disease.Besides we live in the chemical century I'm sure farmers could easily get their hands on some fungicides.

 

[elmanito]

Climate change is not the cause imo.

http://www.sunshine-project.org/publications/bk/bk3en.html

In haiti after the last hearthquake, dozens of amputation where done without anaesthesic, no pain killer.

Big shame for humankind if you have tons of a natural painkiller at the other side of the world.

The Dutch government sponsored for millions of tax payers money the saffron project so that the farmers will cultivate saffron instead of opium poppies.

http://www.crocussativus.nl/index.php?page=51

Namaste

 

[Rinse]

This shit makes me mad I want to blow up monsanto!

 

[yesum]

good excuse to buy more mazar and afghan seeds. darn you mriko!

 

[Pseudo]

tick tock tick tock, every day i get one step closer.... fuck monsanto, every day jesse ventura looks smarter, we need to band together people, all 41,000,000 of us

 

[ptg]

Fuck them.They no more want anything to be natural.No natural dope.Just pills.No natural food.Just pills too.Nobody have heard of the INICON project?We are fucked...it's time to get again the guillotine on public places.

 

[mriko]

However I have trouble believing an attack anti-drugs, U.S OTAN are in Afghanistan as the Mountain of money related to heroin, they have too much to lose I think!

There might be more bucks to be made if seriously reducing poppies culture and replace al the stuff with monsanto evil-beans. with farmers, year after year, being forced to buy same seeds from same supplier, being "advised" to use this pesticide or herbicide again and again.

Bad news indeed, but the whole gene pool to be lost is very exaggerated.There is no disease that can destroy every single plant in Afghanistan and there are very few diseases that can destroy most of the crop in the country.You know, these are extremely hardy plants grown outdoors in the desert for centuries, perfectly adapted to the local environment, not your basement-grown super-duper hybrid that would not survive a heavy rain let alone any disease.Besides we live in the chemical century I'm sure farmers could easily get their hands on some fungicides.

I haven't talked about the whole genepool being wiped out. But whole populations of locally bred strains could be indeed. Some family strains, bred for generations could be lost, phenotypes you can find only in some remote and single place might be lost. Certainly not all the cannabis population is at risk, but definitely a lot of it, too much of it.

Climate change is not the cause imo.

I strongly doubt that too...

We are fucked...it's time to get again the guillotine on public places.

Qu'on leur colle la tête au bout d'une pique, et leurs carcasses aux cochons ! bordel !

Some updated article, locals are talking about aerial spraying...

Fungus hits Afghan opium poppies
A serious disease is affecting opium poppies in Afghanistan, Antonio Maria Costa, the head of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) has said.

Mr Costa told the BBC that this year's opium production could be reduced by a quarter, compared with last year.

He said the disease - a fungus - is thought to have infected about half of the country's poppy crop. Afghanistan produces 92% of the world's opium.

Mr Costa said opium prices had gone up by around 50% in the region.

That could have an impact on revenues for insurgent groups like the Taliban which have large stockpiles of opium, he told the BBC's Bethany Bell.

The fungus attacks the root of the plant, climbs up the stem and makes the opium capsule wither away.

It was affecting poppies in the provinces of Helmand and Kandahar, the heartland of opium cultivation and the insurgency in Afghanistan, he said.

Nato 'blamed'

But farmers in Afghanistan are unsure about what is damaging their crops.

Some believe Nato troops are responsible for the outbreak, but Mr Costa denied that this was the case.

"I don't see any reasons to believe something of that sort," he said. "Opium plants have been affected in Afghanistan on a periodic basis."

Farmer Haji Mohammad in Nawzad told the BBC that he had seen a dramatic reduction in the amount of opium he was able to harvest. He described the fungus as an "aerial spray".

He said that last year he harvested 450kg (990lb) of opium - but this year he had so far only been able to harvest 4kg.

"[It]... has affected my wheat cultivation and my chickens and other animals as well," he said.

"The powder sprayed has a white colour and I think it is chemical and if you squeeze it in your hand, water comes out of it."

A number of farmers in southern Afghanistan told the BBC they observed a white substance on their crops. They also reported extensive crop damage and also that livestock had been affected.

Opium economy

Mr Costa said this was an opportunity for the international community to bring in support to try to persuade farmers to turn away from planting opium.

He said the amount of opium produced by one hectare (2.47 acres) had almost doubled to 56kg (in the five years to 2009.

"Nature really played in favour of the opium economy; this year, we see the opposite situation," he added.

Mr Costa said that farmers now grew opium poppies in only five or six Afghan provinces, as opposed to all 34 five years ago.
from http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/8679203.stm

Irie !

 

[Chamba]

He said the amount of opium produced by one hectare (2.47 acres) had almost doubled to 56kg (123lb) in the five years to 2009.


what's happening there is probably not some evil DEA or CIA plot but perhaps rather of a combination of several factors (but is this disease new to Afghanistan? if so then it does get very fishy)

I think the current problem is probably caused by several factors... poppies are being planted much closer together, they are probably planting high yielding strains not suited to the area, combine that with a wetter or warmer than usual growing season and lots of inexperienced growers planting in less than ideal areas and various plant diseases like molds can be a problem.

by the way, I know nothing abnout opium growing, but hey, farming is farming isn't it.

 

[mriko]

good excuse to buy more mazar and afghan seeds. darn you mriko!

Darn me ? why ?? I'm not into seed business as a matter of fact.

By the way...

Don't Let Congress Poison People
Tuesday, April 4, 2006

Congress is considering a drug war idea so bad that even Drug Czar John Walters is against it. The House has authorized, and the Senate is considering, a proposal to revive research on the use of toxic, mold-like fungi called mycoherbicides to kill drug crops in other countries.

Tell Congress it's a bad idea!

Mycoherbicides have already been extensively studied over the last thirty years - and the results make it clear that they are not an option for controlling crops of coca or opium poppies. They attack indiscriminately, destroying fruit and vegetable crops, and sickening animals and humans as well. The toxins mycoherbicides produce contaminate soil for years, so that nothing can grow where they have been. Mycoherbicides are so destructive that governments have even stockpiled them as weapons!

Incredibly, the proposal now before Congress advocates using mycoherbicides in "field studies" in countries such as Colombia and Afghanistan - something the world would certainly see as an act of biological warfare.

Office of National Drug Control Policy head John Walters spoke out against further mycoherbicide research last year, but this terrible proposal is now part of the ONDCP Reauthorization Act. We need to make sure the Senate removes the mycoherbicide research language from the bill before it passes! Let your Senators know that renewed mycoherbicide research is both unnecessary and dangerous!

Take action now!

For more information on mycoherbicides, read the new report commissioned by DPA, "Repeating Mistakes of the Past: Another Mycoherbicide Research Bill" (PDF).

From : http://www.drugpolicy.org/news/040406mycoherbicide.cfm

pdf is attached to this post

what's happening there is probably not some evil DEA or CIA plot but perhaps rather of a combination of several factors (but is this disease new to Afghanistan? if so then it does get very fishy)

I think the current problem is probably caused by several factors... poppies are being planted much closer together, they are probably planting high yielding strains not suited to the area, combine that with a wetter or warmer than usual growing season and lots of inexperienced growers planting in less than ideal areas and various plant diseases like molds can be a problem.

I've never heard about any fungus outbreak in Afghanistan. I know someone who's a master in opium geopolitics, will ask him what he thinks about it.
But still, i strongly doubt this is something natural. This crap is also killing livestock, and making locals ill. Just like what happened with all the deadly sprayings of Plan Colombia...

Irie !

 

[csedge]

That's crazy man!

 

[ngakpa]

Chamba - yes, there are many crop diseases which affect all ancient crops - worms, root rots, blotches, fungi, aphids and other insects, affect opium and cannabis

but aerial spraying of mycotoxins has been a part of US-led War on Drugs strategy for years (with corporate support from Monsanto and DynCorp)

fusarium spraying has been done deliberately in South America as part of Plan Colombia in 1999, with devastating consequences on the ecosystem, including humans (plus use of banned-in-the-US chemicals such as Monsanto's Roundup SL and Cosmo-Flux 411F)

poppy fungus - Pleospora papaveracea - development and trials were first done in Uzbekistan with UNODC, UK and US funding, then trialed further in Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan

the US have been pressuring Afghanistan to allow aerial spraying of poppy crops for years (via DynCorp)

---

and as the newspaper reports indicate, the result of any succesful eradication campaign is simply to increase prices, with a proportional increase in planting in other areas in the following growing season

it's the established dialectic of prohibtion: successful eradication leads to increased prices, leads to an expansion of production

the only thing which can defeat that dialectic is the kind of coercive powers which exist only under a massively powerful totalitarian state

the end result of succesful eradication in Afghanistan is for the UN, UK and US drug policy to ultimately fill the coffers of the likes of the generals in Burma (who are already expanding their poppy fields into NE India) and to cause expansion of poppy planting in the other 'Stans in Central Asia, and within India... and in Mexico etc. etc. etc. and so on it goes, the mad round of brutally stupid puritanical cruelty

 

[PoopyTeaBags]

pretty soon monsanto and companies like them will own are whole food supply...

the future is bright.

 

[Thule]

I don't think that's gonna happen. Only in America are they close to achieving that, but everywhere people are preparing to rise up.

Time for a green revolution?

 

[Dr_Tre]

That's right!In Bulgaria the government was about to allow sowing of Monsanto's GMO strains, but people demonstrated furiously against GMO, so politicians were forced to step back.

 

[Sam the Caveman]

Agricultural sabotage.

 

[elmanito]

pretty soon monsanto and companies like them will own are whole food supply...

the future is bright.

I wouldn't count on that

http://www.treehugger.com/files/2010/05/haitian_farmers_refuse_monsantos_seeds_and_instead_commit_to_burning_them.php

Namaste