Monsanto

Bayer and Monsanto: A Marriage Made in Hell

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by Martha Rosenberg and Ronnie Cummins

The two multinationals that teamed up during the Vietnam War to poison millions of people with their Agent Orange herbicide—St. Louis, Mo.-based Monsanto and Germany’s Bayer AG—are looking to become one.

Bayer has announced a bid to buy Monsanto in a deal that would expand Bayer’s GMO and pesticide holdings and add drugs to Monsanto’s global portfolio. Monsanto has rejected the latest bid, but the two are still in talks.

If Monsanto, perhaps the most hated GMO company in the world, joins hands with Bayer, one of the most hated Big Pharma corporations on Earth (whose evil deeds date back to World War I and the Nazi era), the newly formed seed-pesticide-drug behemoth would have combined annual sales of $67 billion.

That’s a staggering figure. But here’s another, even more alarming: Combined, the new mega-chemical/seed company would control 29 percent of the world’s seed market and 24 percent of the pesticide market.

Monsanto’s Glyphosate Blankets GMO Crops Near Schools

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Monsanto’s Glyphosate Blankets GMO Crops Near Schools

Genetically engineered crops, or GMOs, have led to an explosion in growers’ use of herbicides, with the result that children at hundreds of elementary schools across the country go to class close by fields that are regularly doused with escalating amounts of toxic weed killers.

GMO corn and soybeans have been genetically engineered to withstand being blasted with glyphosate – an herbicide that the World Health Organization recently classified as “probably carcinogenic to humans.” The proximity of many schools to fields blanketed in the chemical puts kids at risk of exposure.

But it gets worse.

Monsanto, Factory Farms, Climate Change and You

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Monsanto, Factory Farms, Climate Change and You

Monsanto loves to claim that its GMO crops are needed to feed the world.
But what the Gene Giants don’t want you to remember is that the chemicals they sully our food, soil, air and water with were originally developed to make bombs.
When the Big War ended, in order to keep the profits rolling in, Monsanto convinced farmers that the only way to grow food is Monsanto’s way—with GMO crops, and millions of tons of toxic chemicals.
Fast-forward to today, and the impact of Monsanto’s GMO crops can be measured in terms of degraded soil, nutrient-deficient foods, billions of sick animals on factory farms, an increasingly obese and chronically ill human population and, last but surely not least, global warming.
And we can all agree that if global warming, with its droughts and storms, continues unabated, farms and food are in trouble.
Up against multi-billion dollar corporations, what can one consumer do? Start by avoiding not only GMO-tainted foods, but all meat, eggs and dairy from factory farms. Because most GMO grains go to feed animals in factory farms, or what the industry calls CAFOs (Confined Animal Feeding Operations).
We can’t turn global warming around solely by transitioning away from fossil fuels. But we can turn it around by using nature’s natural ability to return all that carbon to the soil. And we can only do that if we abandon the factory farm model and return to sustainable, organic farming and ranching practices.

Five New Reasons Monsanto’s ‘Science’ Doesn’t Add Up – Small-Scale, organic farming needed to feed the world

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By Katherine Paul and Ronnie Cummins – Organic Consumers Association, February 27, 2014 How long can Monsanto ignore the mounting actual scientific evidence that their technology is not only failing to live up to its promises, it’s putting public health at risk? Jim Goodman, farmer, activist and member of the Organic Consumers Association policy advisory […]

Supreme Court Sides With ‘Notorious Patent Bully Monsanto’

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Supreme Court Sides With ‘Notorious Patent Bully Monsanto’

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday denied a group of farmers the right to challenge Monsanto’s seed patents, a decision critics charge allows the biotech giant’s “reign of intimidation” to continue.

The plaintiffs in the suit, Organic Seed Growers and Trade Association (OSGATA) et al v. Monsanto, sought to protect themselves from lawsuits by the corporation for patent infringement should Monsanto’s genetically engineered seed contaminate the farmers’ crops.

Monsanto has sued over 100 farmers for patent infringement.

Jim Gerritsen, president of lead plaintiff OSGATA, previously explained, “We are not customers of Monsanto. We don’t want their seed. We don’t want their gene-spliced technology. We don’t want their trespass onto our farms. We don’t want their contamination of our crops. We don’t want to have to defend ourselves from aggressive assertions of patent infringement because Monsanto refuses to keep their pollution on their side of the fence. We want justice.”

BRAVO — Our Voices Were Heard!

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BRAVO — Our Voices Were Heard!

The Monsanto Protection Act, otherwise known as the Farmer Assurance Provision rider, was wedged into a stop-gap budget bill that passed earlier this year and signed into law by President Obama in March.

The rider was the source of outrage by many and quickly dubbed a form of “corporate welfare” that benefited large biotechnology corporations firms such as Monsanto and Syngenta as it barred US federal courts from being able to prevent the sale or planting of GMO crops even if they failed to meet federal safety standards or were discovered to be harmful to humans or the environment.

However, according to a statements released by the offices of Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) and Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-MD), the provision will not be extended and has now been removed from the Senate’s version of the bill.