Importing Corn, Exporting Labor: The Neoliberal Corn Regime, GMOs, and the Erosion of Mexican Biodiversity

Abstract

When genetically modified (GM) imported corn was found growing in Oaxaca and the Tehuacán Valley of Puebla, Mexico (2000, it intensified the debate between activists, academics, and government officials about the effects of trade liberalization on Mexican corn farmers and maize biodiversity. In order to understand the challenges faced by corn farmers and in situ diversity, it is important to contextualize GM corn within the recent neoliberal corn regime and its regional manifestations. This essay offers a case study of how indigenous corn farmers from the southern Tehuacán Valley have adapted to such neoliberal reforms and economic crisis by combining local corn production with US-bound labor migration.

Social Impacts of GM Crops in Agriculture: A Systematic Literature Review

“…The iterative searches showed that while some papers of relevance to the topic (such as [28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36][37]) were indeed not captured in the search, these were sufficiently few not to challenge the overall findings presented here and did not address other topics than those also addressed in the reviewed literature. The iterative searches also showed that in particular, literature addressing cultural heritage impacts of GM crops in agriculture fell outside the search.…”

“…The iterative searches also showed that in particular, literature addressing cultural heritage impacts of GM crops in agriculture fell outside the search. Examples of relevant studies are [32][33][34][35][36][37]. However, even taking into account the additional papers found in the iterative searches, such studies remain few in comparison with the other impact groups (see Section 3.2).…”

Agricultural Land Use Change after NAFTA in Central West Mexico

“…Small-scale studies on socioeconomic and environmental changes have shown that maize farmers continue planting maize for socioeconomic and cultural reasons and how they have adapted to this economic context [4,45]. However, we believe that there are other crops such as beans that have been affected by those policies.…”

“…Neoliberalism is characterized by strong market integration and trade liberalization between countries and a change in the role of the government as an economic agent [3]. International free-trade agreements such as NAFTA (North American Free Trade Agreement) are instances of such neoliberal policies [4]. NAFTA created a free-trade zone among Canada, the USA, and Mexico.…”

Institutional support and in situ conservation in Mexico: biases against small-scale maize farmers in post-NAFTA agricultural policy

“…More recent observations of international migrants from maize-growing regions in the state of Puebla (Fitting 2006(Fitting , 2004 suggest that, while migration may initially lead to reinvestment in traditional maize production in the form of remittances or the investments of returned migrants, only older migrants are likely to return to their communities and establish their own milpas. Younger migrants, in contrast, are less likely to have worked for a significant period of time in agriculture before migrating, and are also less likely to learn seed selection practices or common local-language agricultural terms describing maize cultivation when they return.…”