The Gary Null Show

Today's guest is Dr. Vandana Shiva and she is an internationally renown environmental and social activist, and was formerly one of India’s top nuclear physicists. She has been credited as the principle founding leader of India’s ecological and ecofeminism movement. In 1982 Dr. Shiva founded the Research Foundation for Science, Technology and Ecology in New Delhi, which led to the creation of Navdanya (again, all “a”s are softly pronounced) – an organization dedicated to the restoration of organic farming across India and the preservation of indigenous knowledge and culture. She is also one of the leaders on the board of the International Forum on Globalization with Ralph Nader, Maude Barlow and Jerry Mander. For several decades, Vandana has fought for changes in the globalized practices of agriculture and food. She has traveled the world speaking against biopiracy of indigenous foods and their medicinal properties by large agricultural and pharmaceutical corporations. Her activist efforts have created grassroots organizations throughout the developing world to counter genetic engineering of crops, as well as empower women throughout the third world. Dr. Shiva has received numerous international awards, including the Alternative Nobel Prize (the Right Livelihood Award), the UNEP’s Global 500 Award and the UN’s Earth Day International Award. Among her more important books are “Earth Democracy: Justice, Sustainability and Peace”, “Manifestos on the Future of Food and Seed”, and her most recent “Soil Not Oil” Environmental Justice in an Age of Climate Crisis”. Also, we David Korten, Naomi Klein and Jeffrey Smith during the second half of the program to participate in a panel discussion. Dr. David Korten has become of our nation’s important visionary economists, historians and critics of free-market globalization in the progressive community. He is former professor of Harvard University’s School of Business. For several decades he has lived on different continents in international development projects , mostly in south and southeast asia. David is the founder of Yes Magazine and the Positive Futures Network. He has written many important books, and most recently “The Great Turning: From Empire to Earth Community” and “An Agenda for a New Economy.” His website is www.GreatTurning.org Naomi Klein is an awarding winning journalist and author of the New York Times and international bestseller, “The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism”, which has also been made into a documentary film. In a 2005 internet poll, Naomi was ranked 11th of the top global intellectuals living today and in a listing of top thinkers by Foreign Policy Magazine, was the highest ranked woman. She is a former Miliband Fellow at the London School of Economics and holds an honorary Doctor of Civil Law from the University of King’s College in Nova Scotia. Recently she has teamed up with environmental activist Bill McKibben, who has appeared on this program many times, to promote the 350.org to reduce carbon emissions. Jeffrey Smith is one of our foremost experts on the health and environmental risks of genetically modified organisms, and is a leading watch-dog over corporate agricultural industry’s manipulation of GMO genetic science and public opinion. He is the founding director of the Institute for Responsible Technology, a research and corporate watch organization devoted to informing the public about the truth of GMO foods and technology. His two books -- “Seeds of Deception” and “Genetic Roulette” -- have become international best-sellers for critiquing GMO science and the industry.