Coffee Hour 4/28 - GMO Corn in Mexico
Coffee Hour Presentation
Saturday, April 28
10:00 - 11:30 am
La Conexión de las Américas
3019 Minnehaha Avenue, Suite 20
Minneapolis, MN 55406
612-276-0788
View or print our legal size 2012 March & April Coffee Hours Poster here.
Topic: The Effects of and Fight Against GMO Corn in Rural Indigenous Mexico
With the lifting of the ban on GMO corn in 2009 by Mexican President Calderon, over 50 landrace corn strains in Mexico are at risk of being contaminated. Contaminated landrace corn has been reported across the country, including in Chiapas and Oaxaca, two Mexican states with the highest indigenous populations in the country.
Mexico’s most important staple food that has deep cultural and spiritual importance to the country, is at great risk of contamination due to companies like Monsanto lobbying for the planting of GMO corn in the heart of the world’s birthplace of corn. The culture, identity, spirituality, health and livelihoods of the People of Corn have already been greatly altered in this battle. Maria’s presentation will take a deeper look into how the recent history of US-Mexico commodity trade relations, NAFTA and Mexico’s Federal Biosecurity Law on Genetically Modified Organisms has changed the lives of the rural and indigenous community members in Mexico and what grassroots action is being taken to defend a country so intimately dependent on corn.
Speaker: Maria Regan Gonzalez
La Conexión de las América’s current Community Programs Coordinator, Maria Regan Gonzalez, has a diverse education, professional and personal background in both local and international food justice and community food systems. Maria’s food justice work ranges from organizing farmers in greater Minnesota interested in selling value-added organic products, building culturally competent community food handouts for Minnesota cities and counties to helping build family and school gardens in the Andes Mountains. During her year long stay in Mexico as a 2009-2010 Rotary International Ambassadorial Scholar, Maria visited a number of indigenous and rural communities building alternatives to capitalist focused development, and shared stories of struggle and success in the fight for food justice in inner city United States. Maria shares information with communities in the United States about the struggles and successes of these communities in hopes of breaking down cross-cultural walls of misunderstanding, fear and prejudice.
Maria has her bachelor’s degree in Global Studies: Environment and Sustainable Development and Spanish from the University of Minnesota- Twin Cities and a Certificate in Rural Sociology from the Autonomous University of Chapingo in Mexico.
For more information on this topic contact Maria at maria.reganglz (at) americas.org or 612-276-0788 ext. 5.
This event is free of charge, but donations are gladly accepted. Thanks to Glaciers Cafe for the donation of coffee and muffins!
