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HomeMy WebLinkAboutCOM 0385.066 2012-2014 Murashige, Laura From: Troy Benjegerdes [dahozer @gmail.com] Sent: Monday, September 02, 2013 7:59 PM To: counciltestimony@co.hawaii.hi.us Cc: richard @hamakuasprings.com Subject: Testimony against bills 109 and 113 Several years ago, I visited Richard Ha's farm on the big island, and I was impressed then, and continue to appreciate his commentary, particularly on energy issues. I am a conventional farmer on the mainland, and one of my long-term goals is to be able to develop a direct market to consumers so I can stop depending on multinational seed companies that promote and market GMO seed traits that end up costing more in license fees for the seed than what the 'trait' is supposed to replace. I oppose bills 109 and 113 because I like Hawaii ' s local farmers, and I think an outright ban on GMOs will just give farmers on the mainland (and the multinational GMO seed companies that operate a lot of seed corn farms on Oahu and Kaui) an unfair advantage, and the end result will be bankruptcy of your farmers, and sale of the real estate to developers for cheap. By passing a GMO ban, you will be creating a situation that will allow large corporations to purchase big-island farmland and fire-sale prices, and then, once title to the land is secured, I'm sure the strategic plan will be to pay the campaign contributions for new representatives who will reverse the ban. If you want to do something meaningful about GMO foods, figure out how to apply a sales tax on any GMO product sold, or **produced** on Hawaii, and give that money back to Hawaii-resident owner-operators (like Richard Ha and all your local farmers) to offset the high energy costs they must pay for imported energy by funding farm loan programs for building renewable energy generation sources. If you did that, you'd be doing us farmers on the mainland a favor by increasing the costs for multinationals to grow seed corn in Hawaii and then ship it to Iowa for planting, and address some of the environmental degradation caused by intensive seed-corn growing practices. Troy Benjegerdes Iowa farmer, and concerned consumer of Hawaii's agricultural products CZ C75 ©t7 10 n 57,= Comm. No. 385. 44 Ref. To: llrsl7 . Ref. Date SEP 9 4 ZU13 1