- An ill-wind blew across Percy Schmeiser's land in 1996.
Today in his 70s, the third-generation Saskatchewan, Canada, farmer has
been growing and improving his own canola (oil seed) crops for 40 years.
Each year, he would save some of his harvested seed for planting the following
year. Though some farmers in the surrounding area were growing Monsanto's
patented, genetically modified (GM) Roundup Ready canola, Schmeiser was
not. He was growing his own, but the wind blew and bees flew, both apparently
carrying grains of GM pollen from neighboring fields into Schmeiser's crop.
Or maybe it was GM seed transported from surrounding farms that often blew
off trucks traveling the roads adjacent to Schmeiser's land. No matter.
Without his knowledge or consent, errant, patented Monsanto genes had
apparently been incorporated into some of the Schmeiser family's 1997-harvested
canola seed.
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- In 1998, the farmer planted over a thousand acres of
his land with the seed he had saved from the previous year's crop. A hired
Monsanto investigator analyzed samples of canola plants taken from Percy
Schmeiser's land, and the company found evidence of its patented genes
in the plant tissue. When Schmeiser refused to pay Monsanto fees for use
of its patented herbicide resistance technology, technology he neither
bought nor wanted, Monsanto sued him. According to a report on the trial
(<http://www.percyschmeiser.com/www.percyschmeiser.com), Monsanto sought
damages for patent infringement totaling $400,000. This included about
$250,000 in legal fees, $13,500 for technology fees, $25,000 in punitive
damages and $105,000 in the profits Schmeiser realized from sale of his
contaminated 1998 crop.
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- Monsanto vs. Percy Schmeiser was heard in a Canadian
court June 5 - 20, 2000. According to reports, Monsanto never directly
tried to explain how their genes got into Schmeiser's field. In fact,
the Western Producer, a Canadian agriculture magazine, quoted Monsanto
attorney, Roger Hughes, as saying, "Whether Mr. Schmeiser knew of
the matter or not matters not at all." In other words, Schmeiser's
fields were contaminated by Monsanto's GM technology, and it didn't matter
if Schmeiser was aware of the contamination or not. They were going to
make him pay for it! Percy Schmeiser said, "It was a very frightening
thing because they said it does not matter how it gets into a farmer's
field; it's their property.......if I would go to St. Louis (Monsanto headquarters)
and contaminate their plots--destroy what they have worked on for 40 years--I
think I would be put in jail and the key thrown away."
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- On March 29, 2001, nearly three years since the contaminated
canola was discovered in Schmeiser's field, Canadian Judge W. Andrew MacKay
agreed with Monsanto that it did not matter how its genes got onto Percy
Schmeiser's fields; the farmer was still guilty of having them without
having paid for the privilege. (You can read the entire decision at http://www.fct-cf.gc.ca
). Sadly, as part of the damages, the farmer also lost 40 years of work
improving his own canola seed line, as his crop was confiscated.
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- As you might imagine, the decision has had a chilling
effect on farmers here and around the world. The Washington Post reported
that a National Farmers Union spokesman said the organization has been
following the Monsanto vs. Schmeiser case "...with apprehension.
We're extremely concerned by what liabilities may unfold for the farmer,
particularly with cross-pollination of genetically modified plants."
The National Farmers Union represents 300,000 U.S. farmers and ranchers.
Monsanto has filed hundreds of similar patent infringement lawsuits against
farmers in the U.S. and Canada. Some of those farmers in North Dakota
and Illinois are counter-suing the company for deliberately causing genetic
pollution and then suing its victims. Win or lose, many face financial
ruin from the court battles alone.
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- The Percy Schmeiser case, and others ongoing and to come,
does not bode well for farmers, or even backyard gardeners, here or abroad.
The idea that individuals can be held legally and financially responsible
for the fate of patented pollen and seed blown by the wind or carried by
insects in open field conditions is simply absurd. In fact, Monsanto knows
it and maintained that all a farmer has to do if he or she discovers Monsanto's
patented plants growing on their land is to call the company and they will
come out and take care of the problem.
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- For starters, how would a farmer even know his field
had been contaminated with Roundup Ready GM canola? The plants are often
visually indistinguishable. The only way he'd know is by spraying his crop
with Monsanto's Roundup herbicide to see if it had resistance. Obviously,
he wouldn't do that because the herbicide would kill his own non-resistant,
non-GM crop! Percy Schmeiser and other farmers regularly spray Roundup
around telephone poles surrounding their fields to keep them clear of crops
and weeds. When Schmeiser had sprayed around his telephone poles in 1997,
he was surprised to see that some of the canola plants did not die. He
suspected contamination.
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- If a farmer does identify GM plants in his field, according
to Ann Clark of Plant Agriculture, University of Guelph, Guelph, Ontario,
Monsanto would likely come out and spray the offending plants with the
herbicide of choice, 2,4-D. But, as a farmer, would you call the company
if their offending plants were interspersed with your own crop, the latter
likely to be killed or damaged by the toxic herbicide? Such treatment
would be especially catastrophic for an organic farmer whose field could
no longer be certifiable as organic for years to come.
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- For some perspective on the potential scope of the GM
gene pollution problem, in the year 2000, Monsanto's GM seed was planted
on 103 million acres worldwide, accounting for 94% of the global area sown
to genetically modified seed (RAFI). The potential for the GM contamination
of millions of more acres of land and for thousands more victim farmers
is simply mind-boggling. In fact, in June, 2001, Canadian CBC radio reported
that genetically engineered canola plants had spread across the Canadian
prairies. University of Manitoba plant scientist, Martin Entz said that
GM canola had spread much more rapidly than originally thought and that
it was "absolutely impossible to control."
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- Impossible to control also describes another 2001 GM
debacle--the contamination of U.S. food supplies with StarLink corn, a
GM corn intended by French parent company, Aventis, for animal consumption
only. StarLink contains an insecticidal toxin, Cry9C protein, 50-100 times
more than that in GM corn intended for humans. The protein had the potential
to trigger severe allergic reactions. Aventis had assured EPA officials
that StarLink would only be sold to farmers growing it for livestock.
Dealers selling the corn would see to it that each farmer signed an agreement
to provide a 660-foot buffer strip around his or her StarLink fields to
prevent contamination of nearby cornfields with StarLink pollen. Grain
elevators were also to be told at the time of sale that the corn was not
for human consumption. Sadly, virtually every level of the program to
protect humans failed miserably.
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- During the year 1998, 10,000 acres in the U.S. were planted
to StarLink. In 1999, it had grown to 250,000 acres. By 2000, StarLink
corn was planted on 350,000 acres in the U.S. and co-mingled with other
corns by 2200 farmers in 12 states, according to Seed Savers Exhange.
During 2000, 98 of Iowa's 99 counties grew StarLink! About 10% of all corn
stored in the U.S. is now contaminated with StarLink corn.
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- In 2001, the USDA earmarked up to $20 million of taxpayers'
money, money originally intended for natural disaster relief for farmers,
to help buy back 300,000 to 400,000 bags of contaminated seed. Containment,
not control, was the only possible solution, as the damage to the U.S.
seed stocks is permanent. The genes are "out there", replicating
themselves in the chromosomes of other corn varieties meant for human consumption,
and likely finding their way into any food containing corn products such
as corn syrup and corn starch--nearly every sweetened, thickened product
in the "modern" diet. If there is any reassuring news in this
new reality, it is that the concentration of Cry9C is likely to be so low
in current and future foods contaminated with the original StarLink genes
that allergic reactions to this particular protein are highly improbable.
That is, however, very small comfort given the scope and biological significance
of this single genetic event.
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- August, 2001, was a particular low point in the battle
for a ban on the Terminator gene technology. Terminator technologies use
genetic engineering techniques to program a plant's DNA to kill its own
embryos (suicide seed) thus forming sterile seed. The plant-to-seed-to-plant-to-seed,
etc, cycle of life is broken, preventing a farmer from saving harvested
seed to grow next season. It will ensure that farmers must return to the
seed company year after year to purchase expensive seed, often with heavy
GM seed technology licensing fees added. The first Terminator was created
and announced by our own U.S. Department of Agriculture in partnership
with a U.S.-based cotton seed company, Delta & Pine Land Company.
They were granted a U.S. patent on the technology in 1998. (See June,
1998 Food Supply Update at www.arkinstitute.com). In August, the USDA announced
that it had agreed to license the technology to its corporate partner,
the first step toward commercialization. Delta & Pine Land Co. has
said it has every intention of commercializing it.
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- "USDA's decision to license Terminator flies in
the face of international public opinion and betrays the public trust,"
said RAFI research-director, Hope Shand. "Terminator technology has
been universally condemned by civil society; banned by international agricultural
research institutes; censured by United Nations bodies....and yet the U.S.
Government has officially sanctioned commercialization of the technology
by licensing it to one of the world's largest seed companies." Silvia
Ribeiro, also of RAFI, added, "USDA's role in developing Terminator
seeds is a disgraceful example of corporate welfare, involving a technology
that is bad for farmers, dangerous for the environment, and disastrous
for world food security."
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- The USDA and Delta & Pine Land Company, at last count,
own three Terminator patents. This is an egregious use of U.S. taxpayers'
dollars to support corporate profits instead of public good, to advance
the portfolios of restrictive corporate patents on life instead of improving
the lives and livelihoods of U.S. farmers and the consumers they serve.
Terminator technologies will not be a boon to U.S. farmers or struggling
Third World farmers who are considered prime targets for Terminator seeds.
It will make them ever more dependent on the corporate seed and chemical
companies.
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- Remember, once the genetic genie is out of the bottle,
you can't put it back. If Terminator genes pollute surrounding fields
and wild plants, the consequences will be far greater than the corn debacle.
Neighboring farmer's crops may produce sterile seed. What if that farmer
is a seed grower, growing seed stocks for the country's next crops? Multiply
that scenario by tens of thousands of farmers. Can Terminator eventually
terminate all seeding plants? No one, not a single corporation or government
official, can assure you it will not. Remember Percy Schmeiser! Remember
StarLink!
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- Here is a rundown of Terminator patent holdings current
to 2001: Syngenta (Novartis) has two Terminator patents. Syngenta (Zeneca)
has four. Delta & Pine Land/USDA have three. BASF (ExSeed Genetics,
LLC/Iowa State University) have one. DuPont (Pioneer Hi-Bred) has one.
Pharmacia (Monsanto) have one. Cornell Research Foundation has one.
Purdue Research Foundation (with support from USDA) has one.
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- It is important to take stock of where we have been in
the big food picture in recent years because it speaks volumes about where
we might be going this year and beyond. In light of the September attacks
on the U.S., it is critical that we pay attention to every aspect of our
food supply system with unprecedented vigilance. The truth about security
with respect to food and terrorism is simple, really: there is none. The
Schmeiser decision, StarLink tragedy and Terminators all point to a future
in which individuals will have little or no control over the content of
the food they eat, and little control over production. If individuals
are discouraged by court decisions from feeding themselves--if they abdicate
all rights to control the ways and means of livelihood and food production,
turning control over, like serfs, to their corporate lords, then we are
lost.
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- For years these Food Supply Updates have discussed the
insanities of a food production system growing ever more concentrated,
technology, oil and chemical dependent, biologically and chemically contaminated,
remote from its nearly 300 million completely dependent consumers, and
controlled, from seed to mouth, by a relative handful of very powerful
people. The long list of cumulative observations and warnings voiced in
this newsletter over the years (read earlier Food Supply Udates archived
at www.arkinstitute.com ) could just as easily be viewed as an ongoing
tutorial for those determined to ferret out our vulnerabilities. Our vulnerabilities
can easily become someone else's opportunities.
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- We must keep one watchful eye on our current food supply
security system, a "blanket" riddled with holes, and the other
on the ongoing, ominous shift in the control of food from the farmer and
consumer, to governments and a few very powerful, multinational corporations.
How might our new agricultural technologies be used against us? Is Terminator
gene technology a potential terrorist weapon? What is the relationship
between "X" government with "Y" corporation? What
is their global agenda? See what I mean? It is a daunting task, but more
than ever, our lives may depend on it.
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- Stay tuned.
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- Geri Guidetti The Ark Institute
-
- Note: This and all Food Supply Updates may be reprinted
or distributed electronically, only in their entirety, including attributes
and contact information. They must be offered free of charge. Edited versions
must receive prior consent of author. Food Supply Updates are archived
at The Ark Institute's web site at www.arkinstitute.com.
-
- The Ark Institute PO Box 142 Oxford, Ohio 45056 www.arkinstitute.com
arkinst@concentric.net
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