Bill Gates Leveraged Philanthropy: Corporate Profit versus Humanity

via: Mercola
by: Dr. Mercola
July 31, 2012

A recent commentary in Education Week takes a fresh look at the Gates Foundation’s philanthropy. The money it spends on all kinds of projects around the world is no small chunk of change–$26 billion since its inception in 1994 has been donated to help developing countries and the United Nations fund world health goals¹.

Unfortunately, some of the chosen projects appear to clash with the Foundation’s underlying goals, such as its partnership with the biotech giant Monsanto. Besides questionable partnerships, the foundation and Gates himself also have personal investments in some of the projects they fund.

Philanthropic Leverage

The featured article discusses “philanthropic leverage,” or “the idea that you can use a little money to access a lot of money,” stating that this is exactly what the Gates Foundation is doing²:

“Gates’ leveraged philanthropy model is a public-private partnership to improve the world, partly through targeted research support but principally through public advocacy and tax-free lobbying to influence government policy. The goal of these policies is often to explicitly support profitability for corporate investors, whose enterprises are seen by the Gates Foundation as advancing human good. However, maximum corporate profit and public good often clash when its projects are implemented. “

I have already gone on record stating Bill Gates might be one of the world’s most destructive do-gooders. He seems completely oblivious of the fundamental flaws in the science behind genetically engineered (GE) foods, for example. GE crops have been shown to be far less nutritious than conventional and organic counterparts, in addition to destroying soil composition (to learn more, see my interview with Dr. Don Huber). How is that alleviating global malnutrition and disease?

Conflicts of Interest Rampant in Gates’ Charitable Work

The featured article also highlights the many obvious conflicts of interest plaguing the Gates Foundation and its founder. As already mentioned, the Gates Foundation has partnered with Monsanto—a company that seeks to replace sustainable agricultural practices with its own patented genetically engineered seeds, which must be re-purchased each planting season.

The global agricultural “charity” work performed by these two is far from charitable; rather the end result will be a monopoly of the food supply and entire nations, as they effectively strip poor nations of their food sovereignty.

Another partner is GlaxoSmithKline (GSK)—the same company that just plead guilty in the largest health fraud case in US history. Through their partnership with the Gates Foundation, GSK “centrally controls enormous world funds for purchase, pricing, and delivery of vaccines for world public health,” the featured article states³.

Both the Foundation and Bill Gates also own stock and profit financially from their partner corporations. For example, in the second quarter of 2010, the Gates Foundation purchased 500,000 shares of Monsanto stock with an estimated worth of $23.1 million—a decision that met with heavy criticism once it leaked out.

Furthermore,

“[T]he Foundation owns a profit-generating portfolio of stocks which would seem to work against the Foundation’s declared missions, such as the Latin American Coca-Cola FEMSA distributorship and five multinational oil giants operating in Nigeria,”the featured article reveals⁴. “These corporate investments, now moved to a blind trust whose trustees are Bill and Melinda Gates, are collaterally supported by the Foundation’s tax-free lobbying and advocacy activities.”

The “Hidden” Media Influence of the Gates Foundation

The Foundation also funds large media organizations like ABC and The Guardian, thereby influencing the health related stories that end up seeing the light of day. According to an article published last year in the Seattle Times⁵:

“To garner attention for the issues it cares about, the foundation has invested millions in training programs for journalists. It funds research on the most effective ways to craft media messages. Gates-backed think tanks turn out media fact sheets and newspaper opinion pieces. Magazines and scientific journals get Gates money to publish research and articles. Experts coached in Gates-funded programs write columns that appear in media outlets from The New York Times to The Huffington Post, while digital portals blur the line between journalism and spin.

The efforts are part of what the foundation calls “advocacy and policy.” Over the past decade, Gates has devoted $1 billion to these programs, which now account for about a tenth of the giant philanthropy’s $3 billion-a-year spending.”

Uncritical support of genetically engineered crops and an emphasis on technological fixes for health problems, such as vaccines instead of improved hygiene and sanitation, are examples of the one-sided propaganda the Gates Foundation promulgates. It’s not all bad, of course. Bill Gates’ money has certainly gone to some worthy projects along the way, but it appears what began as a sincere attempt to help society has, in more recent years, given way to primarily supporting the status quo of the richest and most powerful industries on the planet, to the detriment of those they claim to be the beneficiaries of their “charity.”

Continue Reading At: Mercola.com

Monsanto weeds have taken root throughout academia

via: NaturalNews
Saturday, July 14, 2012
By: Jonathan Benson

[NaturalNews] The highly respected publishing group Oxford University Press (OUP), which is considered to be the largest university press in the world, appears to be actively diluting its rigorous publishing standards at the behest of corporate interests. A recent report by Frances Moore Lappe over at AlterNet explains how one OUP published book in particular that promotes the use of genetically-modified (GM) crops lacks even basic citations — and OUP apparently sees absolutely nothing wrong with this.

Food Politics: What Everyone Needs to Know by Robert Paarlberg claims to take an honest look at major issues of relevance concerning food production in the modern world, including matters of food shortages and safety, agricultural technology, factory farming, and GMOs. But when it comes right down to it, Paarlberg’s book lacks even basic references to any sort of concrete evidence whereby readers can fact check and verify his many claims.

“The book’s subtitle suggests coverage of essential food issues and its back cover indicates Food Politics is not just another example of ‘conflicting claims and accusations from advocates,’ but rather ‘maps this contested terrain,’” writes Lappe. “Yet, I was finding only one piece of the ‘map’ with key issues at the center of the global food debate omitted altogether.”

While expressing his support for GM crop systems and vouching for their supposed safety throughout the book, Paarlberg fails to disclose the fact that he used to be an advisor to Monsanto’s CEO, according to Lappe. Paarlberg also gives a shout out to the infamous Gates Foundation for supporting his work, also failing to mention that the Gates Foundation has a vested, financial interest in Monsanto, having invested in the company back in 2010. (http://www.seattleglobaljustice.org)

Oxford University Press not concerned about erosion of its academic standards

The lack of proper citations and deliberate non-disclosure of the author’s potential conflicts of interest should have raised some serious red flags for OUP when publishing Food Politics. But it appears as though OUP, like much of modern academia, has been heavily influenced by Big Ag interests, which are apparently eroding its integrity.

When questioned by Lappe about the many apparent problems in the book, the heads of both OUP in New York and OUP in England insisted that the book met the publishing group’s standards. In both instances, OUP officials refused to meet with Lappe to discuss the issue further.

This is hardly surprising in light of the fact that many agricultural research institutions across the U.S. have also been taken over by the likes of Monsanto, and now promote corporate agricultural interests at the expense of incubating honest inquiry into good crop practices. (http://www.naturalnews.com)

Even though OUP is not an agricultural group by any means, its publishing standards appear to be following the same toxic route as many other institutions of higher learning that are becoming nothing more than mouthpieces for the biotechnology industry.

Sources for this article include:

http://www.alternet.org

http://www.naturalnews.com/033462_National_Public_Radio_Monsanto.html

Read More At: NaturalNews.com

Gates Foundation Depopulation Summit Demands Global Approval

via: ActivistPost
by: Susanne Posel
Thursday, July 5, 2012

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF) are focusing on population control through their Global Health Development Programs. By using citizens in underdeveloped nations, like Africa and India, as guinea pigs for their research and development for “new interventions such as vaccines, drugs and diagnostics”, these globalists hope to ensure their family planning schemes are effective.

Melinda Gates has made family planning and the population control agenda her personal mission. She justifies her cause by claiming that 100,000 women die in child birth from unintended pregnancies. Although this statistic has no scientific basis, since it sounds good and mainstream media does not check facts, it has helped the BMGF team up with the British government to raise more than $4 billion to fund depopulation programs under the guise of bringing contraceptives to underdeveloped nations.

The BMGF assert that by 2050 “the global population is expected to grow to over 9 billion people” and this is unacceptable to them. By applying pressure to social programs and resources, the BMGF want to use family planning as an investment for all national governments globally.

Strategies to accomplish their goals include:

• Using financial influence to force governments and policymakers to implement their family planning schemes.
• Empower NGOs who promote family planning propaganda.
• Coerce the integration of family planning into all “humanitarian” efforts by using funds from the UN Global Fund.
• Pour money into efforts that further family planning through national policy controls that adhere to the UN’s Millennium Development Goals.

BMGF has partnered with drug corporations like Shanghai Dahua Pharmaceuticals in China to develop implantable fertility controls that will be used in over 20 developing countries to curb population growth.

The injectable Depo-Provera is being sold to underdeveloped nations and is being administered by healthcare workers and nonmedical providers, or by the women themselves. Policy and training systems are underway to ensure these drugs are utilized in areas like the sub-Saharan Africa. By using these areas as testing grounds for new fertility drugs, as well as forcible sterilization schemes, the BMGF are focusing on preventative situations over dealing with abortable pregnancies that have complications.

On July 11th, the BMGF will attend the UK’s Department for International Development Family Planning Summit (FPS). Ministers of State and leaders from over 60 countries will join with major non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and the private sector to make firm commitments to addressing the global short-fall in family planning provisions to be agreed upon so that population growth issues can be dealt with by the global Elite.

Prior to this summit, the International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF), the modern version of the eugenics program founded by Margaret Sanger and Bill Gates’ father in the 1950s, will focus their efforts on coercing young people into supporting their family planning scheme by debating teenage pregnancy, unwanted births and maternal morality as defined by the eugenics ideal.

Continue Reading At: ActivistPost.com