Blog Posts: Monsanto

By Genna Reed

Last week, the USDA announced that an Oregon farmer was unknowingly growing glyphosate-resistant wheat in his non-GE wheat field. This was quite shocking considering Monsanto ended its GE wheat research program in 2004 and its field trials in 16 states in 2005. If this happened in one farm in Oregon, who’s to say that there are aren’t similar incidents in Arizona, California, Colorado, Florida, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, Kansas, Minnesota, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota, Washington or Wyoming? Not only could there be incidents from years ago, but according to USDA data, Monsanto is currently field testing new varieties of GE wheat in North Dakota and Hawaii. These experimental GE crops could be contaminating neighboring wheat fields this very moment.

Monsanto claims that its process for ending its Roundup Ready wheat program was “rigorous, well-documented and audited” and the USDA claims that all field trials are inspected once a year. Yet, at a December 2011 USDA stakeholder meeting I attended, a USDA representative from the Biotechnology Regulatory Services branch announced that only 800 inspections were performed that year even though there were 2,500 new permits in addition to older permits that still needed to be inspected. That means that not even a third of permitted GE field trials are inspected by the USDA every year.

The jig is up—USDA and biotech companies were unable to reign in the GE technology a decade ago, and they still can’t control it today. This isn’t the first time an unapproved GE trait has made it past the field trial stage into the food system, with serious economic ramifications.

The Government Accountability Office (GAO) identified six known unauthorized releases of GE crops between 2000 and 2008. In 2000, Japan discovered GE StarLink corn, which was not approved for human food, in 70 percent of tested samples, even though StarLink represented under 1 percent of total U.S. corn cultivation. After the StarLink discovery, Europe banned all U.S. corn imports, costing U.S. farmers $300 million. In August 2006, unapproved GE Liberty Link rice was found to have contaminated conventional rice stocks. Japan halted all U.S. rice imports and Europe imposed heavy restrictions, costing the U.S. rice industry $1.2 billion. In 2007, Ireland impounded imported U.S. livestock feed that tested positive for GE, unapproved in the country.

Half of U.S. wheat is exported to countries with strict labeling restrictions, and since 90 percent of Oregon’s wheat is exported, it is likely that some of the unapproved GE wheat made it overseas. This could mean millions of dollars of costs for farmers and the U.S. government if that is indeed the case. To avoid any more of these GE contamination fiascos, tell Agriculture Secretary Vilsack to place a moratorium on field trials of GE crops.

This Saturday, May 25, tens of thousands of activists across six continents, 41 countries and more than 330 cities are expected to “March Against Monsanto.”  Instigated and driven completely by grassroots activists, this global day of action hopes to demonstrate that, when many people ban together for justice and transparency, they can fight back against the powerful few. Watch this InfoWars news alert about Monsanto’s CEO feeling threatened by grassroots efforts, particularly social media.

Food & Water Watch supports the solutions that March Against Monsanto advocates for – the need for mandatory GE food labeling and further scientific research on the health and environmental impacts of GE food and repealing the Monsanto Rider that slipped into the recent budget bill (also known as the Monsanto Protection Act).

We too call for more transparency about the undue influence that Monsanto and other biotechnology seed corporations hold over our government and recently released a stunning report about how the U.S. State Department works to promote Monsanto and the biotech seed industry on the taxpayer’s dime. Link to that report as well as a corporate profile on Monsanto and a primer on GE food, below.

Food & Water Watch is proud to be supporting March Against Monsanto activities in various cities across the country – New York City; New Brunswick, New Jersey; Miami, Florida; Portland, Maine; Mystic, Connecticut; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; Detroit, Michigan (check out these great pictures from a sign and costume making party earlier this week); Chicago and Springfield, Illinois; Des Moines and the Quad Cities, Iowa; Cincinnati, Ohio; Denver, Colorado; Albuquerque and Santa Fe, New Mexico; Portland, Oregon; and Seattle and Ramond, Washington.

Whether or not you’re planning to March Against Monsanto this weekend, arm yourself with the facts. Food & Water Watch reports, fact sheets, blogs, press releases and sharable images can all be found here: http://www.foodandwaterwatch.org/food/genetically-engineered-foods/monsanto/, and more information on GE foods here: http://www.foodandwaterwatch.org/food/genetically-engineered-foods/.

By Patty Lovera

Read the report, “Monsanto: A Corporate Profile”

If you’re following what Monsanto’s up to these days, it’s a truly mixed bag. Today, the Supreme Court ruled unanimously that a farmer had infringed on Monsanto’s patent by saving biotech seeds and replanting them. The farmer, Vernon Hugh Bowman, was ordered to pay Monsanto $84,000. Thus, Monsanto’s bullying of farmers who don’t play by their rules continues.

The good news? Last Friday, the USDA announced that it would be doing environmental impact statements for crops tolerant to dicamba and 2,4-D—the chemical that Monsanto and Dow, respectively, are seeking to commercialize to deal with superweeds that have evolved to become tolerant of applications of Roundup. The industry currently estimates that at least 60 million acres of crops are now resistant to at least one herbicide.

This more rigorous review of the chemicals is good news and shows that the USDA can be pressured to do the right thing if enough people speak up.

The USDA received over 400,000 petitions against Dow’s applications to deregulate 2,4-D corn and soybeans, and 500 individual comments and 31,000 letters on Monsanto’s petition to deregulate dicamba-tolerant soybeans and cotton. Food & Water Watch supporters submitted more than 50,000 comments opposing the approval of these crops.

This delay in commercialization is a victory for people concerned about industrial agriculture. So far, the Department has failed to address the critical need for a new approach to evaluating biotech crops and the chemical use that accompanies them. To fully address all of the environmental impacts of crops engineered to withstand applications of harsher herbicides, USDA must also review the evolution of superweeds that become resistant in droves to any and all herbicides matched with these biotech crops and the danger posed to the environment, farmer and farm worker health and neighboring crops that could be damaged by drift.

Finally, stay tuned tomorrow for the release of our new report that analyzes State Department diplomatic cables between 2005 and 2009. You’ll be interested to see how many times the name Monsanto comes up in official State Department communications about biotech crops.

By Genna Reed

A new review of hundreds of scientific studies surrounding glyphosate—the major component of Monsanto’s Roundup herbicide— sheds light on its effects within the human body. The paper describes how all of these effects could work together, and with other variables, trigger health problems in humans, including debilitating diseases like gastrointestinal disorders, diabetes, heart disease, obesity and Alzheimer’s disease.

Glyphosate impairs the cytochrome P450 (CYP) gene pathway, which creates enzymes that help to form and also break down molecules in cells. There are myriad important CYP enzymes, including aromatase (the enzyme that converts androgen into estrogen) and 21-Hydroxylase, which creates cortisol (stress hormone) and aldosterone (regulates blood pressure). One function of these CYP enzymes is also to detoxify xenobiotics, which are foreign chemicals like drugs, carcinogens or pesticides. Glyphosate inhibits these CYP enzymes, which has rippling effects throughout our body.

Because the CYP pathway is essential for normal functioning of various systems in our bodies, any small change in its expression can lead to disruptions. For example, humans exposed to glyphosate have decreased levels of the amino acid tryptophan, which is necessary for active signaling of the neurotransmitter serotonin. Suppressed serotonin levels have been associated with weight gain, depression, and Alzheimer’s disease.

This paper does not claim to yield new scientific discoveries. Instead, it looks at older studies in a new light. Critics will say the links between glyphosate and health problems made in this paper are purely correlational, but this work is important because it brings all of the possible health effects of glyphosate together and discusses what could happen: something the USDA, EPA and FDA have failed to do.

Just as Monsanto attempted to discredit Seralini’s study on rats fed GE corn, the company called this peer-reviewed journal article “another bogus study” due to its “bad science.” In a classic pot-calling-the-kettle-black scenario, what Monsanto doesn’t mention is that the majority of research showing glyphosate’s safety has been done by Monsanto itself, which could be called bad science as well due to its limited and biased nature.

The authors of the new review call for more independent research to validate their findings, stating that “glyphosate is likely to be pervasive in our food supply, and, contrary to being essentially nontoxic, it may in fact be the most biologically disruptive chemical in our environment.” If the body of independent research on GE foods and the herbicides used with them shows one thing, it is that there are unanswered questions begging for unbiased research. And while these questions remain unanswered, Americans have the right to know how their food was produced – take action to tell your members of Congress to support mandatory GE labeling.

By Genna Reed

Early this week, USDA announced the availability of a petition for a new GE alfalfa, marking the 20^th GE crop currently awaiting USDA’s approval and eventual commercialization. Since the introduction of GE crops, the USDA has never denied a single petition for commercialization.

Touted as “low-lignin” to make it easier for livestock to digest, Monsanto and Forage Genetics’ new alfalfa variety will likely be stacked with Monsanto’s Roundup Ready trait (already approved for alfalfa in 2011). Throughout the petition, the companies cite the fact that “extensive review” has already been performed on GE alfalfa with the 2010 Environmental Impact Statement for Roundup Ready alfalfa.

Back then, the Environmental Impact Statement pointed to some negative economic impacts for organic and conventional alfalfa farmers, including increased costs needed to prevent contamination, reduced demand and lost markets due to contamination—which didn’t stop USDA from approving the crop. Those contamination costs are even more pronounced now. Alfalfa is an open-pollinated crop, meaning it is much more likely than corn or soybeans to contaminate nearby non-GE fields with the help of wind or insects. This crop poses special risks for organic alfalfa and for organic dairy farms whose crops may be contaminated.

Additionally, the review was performed three years ago and a lot has changed since then.

Since 2010, the number of Roundup-resistant weeds has grown from 11 to 14 and the amount of land infested with these weeds has grown from a reported 2 million acres in 2010 to industry estimates of more than 60 million acres in 2012. These numbers should raise a red flag, but Monsanto continues to petition for the introduction of more and more glyphosate-tolerant crops.

Herbicide use has escalated since the introduction of GE crops, and will only continue to grow as more of these GE crops are introduced. As the “superweed” problem worsens, the USDA must seriously consider the environmental, health and economic ramifications of this new GE alfalfa, and the agency’s overall system of blanket approvals on herbicide-tolerant GE-crops.

To weigh in on the rocket docket containing seven petitions for approval of new, herbicide-tolerant crops, sign this petition.

By Patty Lovera

If there is one thing you can count on with this Congress, it’s drama over money. The month of March has seen plenty of funding fights, with sequestration in the beginning of the month and an ugly process to prevent a federal government shutdown at the end.  

One of the many problems with operating this way is how many opportunities for mischief are available when Congress is dealing with a huge package of “must pass” legislation. That’s exactly what happened last week when Congress passed a “continuing resolution” to fund the federal government for the rest of the year (the President signed it into law this week). This continuing resolution was necessary because Congress did not complete the normal process for setting budgets for federal agencies and the government has been running on an extension of the previous year’s budget that was about to run out. Read the full article…

Last week, a condensed version of Andy Bellatti’s interview with Wenonah Hauter on her new book Foodopoly ran on Grist: Aisle be damned: How Big Food dominates your supermarket choices. We thought our blog readers would appreciate seeing the entire interview, which goes into the specifics on how fractured our food system really is,  how it got that way and what we can do about it.

1. In Foodopoly, you make a very convincing argument that, unlike what many in the “good food” movement think, crop subsidies are not the problem to solve, but rather the symptom of a much larger problem. Can you expand on that concept? Read the full article…

By Tim Schwab

This post originally ran on Civil Eats

Unfortunately, today these public institutions are increasingly serving private interests, not the public good. Hundreds of millions of dollars are now flowing from corporate agribusiness into the land-grant university to sponsor buildings, endow professorships and pay for research. One land-grant university, South Dakota State, is headed by a man who sits on Monsanto’s board of directors.  

The influence this money purchases is enormous. Corporate money shifts the public research agenda toward the ambitions of the private sector, whose profit motivations are often at odds with the public good. It strips our public research institutions of the time, resources and independence needed to pursue public-interest research that challenges the status quo of corporate control over our food system or that offers farmers alternative agricultural systems to monocultures and factory farms.

Industry-funded research routinely produces results that are—surprise, surprise—favorable to industry. This “funder effect” produces a well-documented bias on research while weak conflict-of-interest policies throughout academia (including at many scientific journals, which don’t require full disclosure of funding source) mean agribusiness’s pervasive influence over public research is basically unchecked. Read the full article…

Frankencorn Says: "GE Food Good!"

By Darcey Rakestraw

This week Kellogg’s unveiled a new cereal named “Totes Amazeballs,” as recently suggested by a musician in a tweet to the company. Apparently, it’s just the latest in a trend of celebrity-inspired cereals in the UK.

This got us here at Food & Water Watch thinking about the fact that most people don’t realize their favorite breakfast cereals may contain potentially risky genetically engineered ingredients. So we jumped on the bandwagon and created our own cereal as well.

Genetically engineered (GE) corn and soy have been around for years in processed foods from cereals to cookies, candy bars, snack chips and beyond. And genetically engineered sugar beets now provide GE sugar used in some processed foods like cereal. Last year, the Cornucopia Institute tested several breakfast cereals—marketed as “natural,” no less—and found they contained high levels of GE ingredients. (Here’s a tip: one way to avoid GE cereals is to stick to those labeled certified organic —genetically engineered ingredients are not allowed under the certified organic label.) Read the full article…

By Royelen Lee Boykie

Give Walmart An Earful — Tell Them to Reject Monsanto GE Corn

Walmart’s customer service got so overloaded with calls from Food & Water Watch activists this morning — their phone lines got temporarily shut down. We can see why. In just two hours, activists from the VERY committed Food & Water Watch supporter list got busy calling Walmart — over 900 times in just two hours.

Walmart was able to restore its telephone service and our activists are continuing towards our goal of 2000 calls in this National Call-in Day to fight genetically engineered (GE) sweet corn.

Customer service representatives report that they are getting a lot of calls on this issue. It’s no surprise. People don’t want GE corn. Here’s why:

Read the full article…