Food and farming.

FROM THIS MONTH'S EDITOR

CHARLES DE GAULLE once said of France: 'How can you govern a country that has 246 varieties of cheese?' Diversity in food and farming systems has never been so popular with the public, and yet so far off the policy agenda. Too often those who question industrial agriculture are blackmailed into silence by accusations that they are denying progress to the malnourished poor.

Famine is caused by many factors -- war, debt, poverty, soil degradation, unequal terms of trade... never by asking questions. As famine threatens millions in Southern Africa, and even greater numbers suffer daily malnourishment in South Asia, asking difficult political questions is more, not less of a duty.

Why did the International Monetary Fund tell Malawi to slash its grain reserves? Should corporations patent staple food crops? Is a free-trade economy that takes control away from the majority of rural people really the best model we've got?

Voices -- many belonging to activist farmers from the South -- speaking of diverse agricultural alternatives have been left out of these discussions for far too long.

Pass the cheese.

Katharine Ainger

for the New Internationalist Co-operative

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