Assault on Iraqi Agriculture

control the food and you control the people.
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original

The Assault on Iraqi Agriculture ---
U.S. Agribusiness Targets the Fertile Crescent
By Daniel Stone

August 2006
Blessed with abundant fertile land and water, Iraq, the cradle of civilization, the center of the Fertile Crescent of ancient Mesopotamia, the birthplace of agriculture 13 centuries ago, has, in the past, not only been able to feed itself, but to supply other areas of the world with its bountiful harvest of grains, pulses, dates and vegetables.
How unfortunate that now these proud people are receiving most of their food as "aid." Over the past 20 years, due to the Iraq-Iran war, the two U.S. Gulf "wars," and the brutal, illegal, U.S.-driven sanctions over 13 years, during both Republican and Democratic administrations, Iraq's agricultural sector has been devastated.


20 Years of Bombing, Sanctions, Oil-for-Food, and Depleted Uranium

In 1991, the U.S. deliberately bombed Iraq's civilian infrastructure of water purification and electrical plants, and then prevented Iraq from rebuilding same by imposing sanctions (more accurately a "military blockade" - an act of war). In both 1991 and 2003, "US bombing raids targeted cattle feed lots, poultry farms, fertilizer warehouses, pumping stations, irrigation systems, fuel depots and pesticide factories ---the very infrastructure of Iraqi agriculture." It will take years to restore these operations under good conditions.

Under the U.S.-driven sanctions' rubric of "dual use," the most common and necessary materials were blocked from entering Iraq. For instance, some parts for irrigation systems were banned, thus preventing the repair and use of irrigation. Consequently, only half the irrigable southern part of Iraq is now irrigated and properly utilized. Similarly, parts and materials for water-purification systems were banned by the U.S., resulting in widespread disease and death, particularly among children under age five. The lack of the most basic medicines during the years of blockade compounded the deaths, estimated as high as two million, mostly children. The hundreds of tons of depleted uranium the U.S. illegally expended in weapons' discharges in Iraq both in 1991 and in 2003 account for many anomalous birth defects and soil contamination. Our aerial bombing of, and sanctions on, Iraq over the past 15 years are perhaps the world's most blatant example of state terrorism in recent history. Two heads of the Oil-For-Food ("OFF") Program --- Denis Halliday and Hans von Sponek --- quit in disgust, refusing to be a part of what they saw as a genocidal process of slowing murdering Iraqi civilians by sanctions.


The Oil-For-Food Program --- Agribusiness Disguised as Aid

As the OFF Program related to Iraqi agriculture, it was a severe disincentive to farmers. Except in the northern region, the OFF Program was prohibited from purchasing locally-produced food. The OFF Program was characterized by some critics as a scheme to guarantee oil supplies to the west, and to create food dependency in Iraq. Now over half of Iraq's food is imported, and a significant part of the population is dependent upon government-financed food rations for survival.
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