The book is comprised of 22 chapters and addresses the introduction of the GM model in Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay, Uruguay, and Bolivia; the growing use of agrotoxins linked to these seeds; science at the service of the model; concentration of lands and criminalisation of peasants; attempts to modify seed laws to establish a system of patents; destruction of ecosystems and regional economies; oligopolistic market control by a handful of corporations; the impact of agribusiness on the bodies of women; and Agroecology as an alternative to this predatory model.
As Damián Verzeñassi, director of the Universidad Nacional’s socio-environmental health institute in Rosario (Instituto de Salud Socioambiental de la Facultad de Ciencias Médicas de la Universidad Nacional de Rosario), states in the prologue, this Atlas “without doubt will be continually nourished and updated with the contributions of the communities that embrace it and transformed into a tool to strengthen their struggles, resistances, and sowing. Because this Atlas, a fruit of collective work, is already searching for fertile territories to germinate a healthy world.”
Meanwhile, Marielle Palau, member of Bases Investigaciones Sociales, highlights in the second prologue that, “much material about the issues addressed here exist in the countries of the region. However, none has such a complete regional perspective [as this one], demonstrating that we are experiencing – suffering from – a regional strategy from agribusiness companies that violate human rights and the rights of nature, at the same time that we are – without prior consultation – a large field test.”