El costo humano de los agrotóxicos The human cost of Agrotoxins – Pablo E. Piovano

Kehrer Verlag, Wieblinger Weg 21, 69123 Heidelberg, www.kehrerverlag.com

This book (english/spanish) makes me fucking angry and leaves one speechless at the same time. Piovano traveled the rural northeast of Argentina to document what happens to the people there. In 1996 the government approved the use of GMO (genetically modified organisms) soy beans and other modified organisms (corn, cotton, tobacco) as well as the use of Glyphosat-herbicides. Not only does the use of these products change the environment/landscape in the area and destroys the possibility for small farmers to survive, it also makes the people living there very ill. A lot of them suffer from congenital malformation, miscarriages and cancer. Apart from „great“ b/w photos that do document the disaster, there is several text from various authors that proof that the chemicals are the reason for the problems.

Foreword by Guillermo Saccomanno, Carlos Rodriguez tells the story of Dario Gotin and his family, Jan-Christoph Wichmann interviews Fabián Tomasi, there is a chapter with the captions followed by interesting and shocking texts by the author, Damian Marino, Darió Aranda, Patricio Eleisegui and Wendy Watriss. The chemical corporations obviously are destroying parts of south america, kill the people and don’t give a fuck – it seems they think they have a giant experimental territory there. And it has not stopped, it is still going on. Anybody who is still in favor of companies like Monsanto and their product glyphosat should have this book shoved right in their face, maybe then they understand what are the consequences.
At the end of his text, Damián Marino writes: „The readers of this book may perceive in the images captured by Pablo E. Piovano ‚the cry of invisibles‘ – people who have seen their lives, their social conditions and their environments altered; who have been robbed of their health and their history as a result of an ambitious and capitalist world which seeks to develop at any cost, including human.“
What will stop these criminals? Obviously the death of people does not. I wish books like this would not be necessary, but they are! Hardcover, 144 pages, 38,00 Euro (dolf)

Isbn 978 3868287677

[Trust # 187 Dezember 2017]