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Is the notion of globalization still a little mysterious to you? Is it hard to understand how everyday people are affected by corporations’ growing power over the world economy?

Think rice. And then let Indian environmental activist Vandana Shiva break it down for you.

'Rice . . . to many of the people of Asia, is life itself,' Shiva writes in The Ecologist (Jan. 2001). 'This is why the ongoing corporatization of rice varieties is such a tragedy. Rice must be owned and controlled by the small farmers—the people—and not by foreign corporations.'

That’s why Shiva led opposition to a Texas corporation that had gained a U.S. patent for basmati rice, a crop grown throughout India for centuries. As a result of protests, the U.S. patent office greatly narrowed the company’s patent, which Shiva claims as a victory although she adds that farmers will continue to oppose any corporate claims upon their traditional crops. Europe also has thrown out a patent on the neem tree, a source of traditional Indian medicine for many ailments, she notes.