A three-day national seminar on ‘Health, food, and agro-biodiversity changing paradigms’

A three-day national seminar on ‘Health, food, and agro-biodiversity changing paradigms’ began at the Cosmopolitan Club here yesterday . It is being organised as part of Annam, a national food and agro-biodiversity festival. Environmental activist Vandana Shiva, who delivered the keynote address at the seminar, said the scientific community, which takes great pride in having invented the genetically modified (GM) crops, should also have the moral responsibility to categorically tell the people how safe such food variants are. “The onus is on the same scientific community to tell the people categorically that the GM crops would not negatively affect man or Earth,” she said. Shiva said mass production of any homogeneous crop would erode food security and threaten food safety. Only the preservation and promotion of heterogeneous food crops and vegetables would, in the long run, ensure food security of people, she said.