THE "rock star" of the global movement opposing Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs), Vandana Shiva, has been taking on the "Big Six" producers of GMOs even as their agricultural use is banned or restricted in some countries, and they are fighting court cases in others.

The Indian professor-activist, Dr Shiva, got "rock star" credentials from the former press secretary to President Lyndon Johnson, Bill Moyers, who referred to her as one when he interviewed her in 2012. The 67-year-old Dr Shiva holds a PhD in philosophy from the University of Western Ontario, and has received honorary doctorates from universities in Paris, Oslo, and Toronto, among others. She founded in 1982 the Research Foundation for Science Technology, and Natural Resource Policy, devoted to developing sustainable methods of agriculture, and has written several books on biopiracy and food security.

Her work has put her in opposition to the "Big Six" pesticide and GMO corporations - BASF, Bayer, Dupont, Dow Chemical, Monsanto, and Syngenta - that are known for their absolute domination of the agricultural input market through their ownership of the world's seed, pesticide and biotechnology industries.