New Weapons in the Grain Arsenal
Henry Kissinger made a long speech at the World Food Conference; it bears re-reading nearly four years later. Two things he mentioned which largely escaped notice at the time were these:
(1)We also plan a number of new projects. Next year (1975), our space, agriculture and weather agencies will test advanced satellite techniques for surveying and forecasting important food crops. We will begin in North America and then broaden the project to other parts of the world.
(2). . . There is no substitute for additional investment in chronic food-deficit countries. (Some of the several investments needs can be) financed locally. But substantial outside resources will be needed for some time to come. The United States believes that investment should be concentrated in strategic areas ... (one) major priority must be to reduce losses from inadequate storage, transport and pest control. Tragically, as much as 15% of a country's food production is often lost after harvesting because of pests that attack grains in substandard storage facilities.
Kissinger touches here on two matters we will discuss in turn: the US "early warning system" via earth satellites and the food-saving strategy now designated by the term "Post-Harvest Technology."
Up to now we have concentrated on everything that is sucked into the US food system from the underdeveloped world and have scarcely mentioned the importance of grain exports to the US economy. Agricultural exports now earn over $26 billion annually for the United States and keep its trade balance deficit from being even worse than it is. Staying ahead of the competition in this area requires copious and faultless information and the satellite program Kissinger spoke of is part of the vital information gathering network. Earth satellites make an inventory of the entire planet every nine days and they are the basic instruments for the Large Area Crop Inventory Experiment (LACIE) sponsored jointly by the USDA, NASA, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). Beneath these layers of acronyms lies a powerful new tool serving American domination of world grain markets. "USDA's goals in LACIE are to develop and test a system for predicting foreign crop production through the use of advanced satellites and computer technology together with current and historical weather and agricultural data." This is not quoted from a critic but from the official year- end report on LACIE to the USDA steering group.75 The program started off gradually, doing inventories of wheat on the Great Plains which could be ground-checked for accuracy. Since these results were judged satisfactory, the program was next extended to Canada and the Soviet Union and is now overflying and analyzing the wheat crops of China, the USSR, India, Brazil, Australia, Argentina, Canada and of course the USA. The seven other countries are all major clients or competitors of the US for wheat sales. Canada has agreed to be overflown and exchanges information with the USDA, but the other countries have not given their consent. The LACIE steering group,
however reaffirmed an early decision to proceed with the experiment without multilateral or bilateral agreements with other wheat producing countries except Canada. The decision was taken mainly in the interest of timeliness and in consideration of the experimental nature of the undertaking. This approach also conforms to the US position of open use of space for peaceful purposes.76
It may be peaceful and yet not entirely innocent! Multinational grain traders are clients for LACIE-generated data and are perfectly well equipped to digest and use this information quickly. This is not always the case for other who may receive the data—not even for a State like Canada which cooperates in the program. A Canadian Member of Parliament I contacted on this question wrote to me that one problem is "the sheer quantity of information which must be processed by the user. The Canadian government official I spoke to admitted that in the joint US-Canada program, they simply were not able to digest all the data they received on US crops."The US, on the other hand, is devoting all the necessary skilled personnel to this activity and at the beginning of 1976 "USDA had assembled the nucleus of its LACIE staff. A total of 40 permanent and four temporary employees were on board."77 This does not count participating experts from NASA or NOAA. Some of them have given their views on LACIE to the Press. The chief LANDSAT scientist who directs satellite data processing at NASA's Goddard base in Maryland
emphasized that wheat data will not be used by the United States for its own economic advantages. He expressed the hope that the satellite information eventually would become a factor in stabilizing world food prices and lead to a more equitable distribution of the crop.78
Some people might better stick to data-processing!
LANDSATs are not the only "spies in the skies." The most complete satellite photography is done for the CIA by the Air Force. The intelligence photos are undoubtedly much more detailed—cleardown to a foot or so."79 Firms can not only take advantage of the data collected by the U S government; they can also use tecnniques as sophisticated as those of the Air Force for their own purposes. A new minor industry has sprung up that deals in satellite and distance photography data for agribusiness and other industrial clients. LAAD, for example, has established the Remote Sensing Engineering Ltd. (RSE) as a subsidiary whose "services are now being offered in nine Latin American countries." What remote sensing is capable of doing—if one has the money to subscribe—is phenomenal. Essentially, it "reads" and interprets electro-magnetic "signatures.""Corn, for example, has an electro-magnetic signature distinct from that of rice or bananas. Healthy corn has a different signature from diseased corn and mature corn ... from immature corn." A sampling of services Remote Sensing Engineering can perform for its clients includes yield forecasting for any crop long before harvest "for regions or entire countries;" determination of the optimum moment for harvesting; identification of overgrazed, undergrazed or under-irrigated pastures; detection of insect infestations or plant diseases before they become visible to the naked eye, detection of plant deficiencies in any mineral nutrient; monitoring of soil humidity, salinity or erosion; plus similar services for forestry or fishery enterprises. Some of Remote Sensing's clients have included Goodyear, Upjohn pharmaceuticals, Ralston-Purina, CPC, Cargill, Central Soya and a number of large sugar estates in Central America. The company points out that its surveys are "valuable as a tool for determining inventory requirements, storage space, pricing policies, government support programs and for assisting banks with large crop-financing portfolios."80
The Central American peasant with a farming problem is not in the same league with Ralston Purina when it comes to access to RSE- type technology. Blight on his plot and on the neighboring estate will be detected and treated at different times—for the peasant's perhaps too late. Such services can improve yields for agribusiness and make the smallholder even less able to sustain competition. When the company explains that its services are useful for deciding "pricing policy" or "inventory requirements," the cynic may wonder if such policies and requirements cannot be used against the peasant under contract to a firm, both in times of plenty and in times of scarcity. There is a good deal of pious rhetoric to the effect that "science is free, accessible to all." This is nonsense. Knowledge costs money and tends to flow towards those who already have wealth and power; the knowledge gap is another aspect of the development gap and the class gap. Of course, satellite technology could be used to find locusts before they breed into swarms; it could help Sahelian countries map ground water resources, and maybe it will. But there is no legislation or international body governing the proliferation of private teledetection firms—much less State undertakings like LACIE—that are quite free to sell their studies on countries to agribusinesses without the knowledge or consent of the countries concerned; and certainly nothing to stop large nations like the US from making their own definitions of the "peaceful" uses of space.