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Monsanto Runs Into Wall. Yes!!


Say NO to Monsanto, GMOs,
and the patenting of life

The frustration about this company – Monsanto – and others like it has been running higher and higher over the last few years. (The free flow of information on the internet is a wonderful thing in this regard – corporate-bought media is no longer our only news option….) I think it may well be the most hated corporation on the web and on popular user-driven sites like Digg and Reddit. I would personally take great pleasure in seeing their buildings worldwide bulldozed and their fields razed – leaving behind only stone statue memorials that celebrate the greed and stupidity of man.

Today, however, I can share a beacon of hope. Read on!

Federal Court Upholds Ban on Genetically Engineered Alfalfa

Appeals Court Rules Planting of Biotech Crop Can Cause Irreversible Harm to Organic and Conventional Crops, Farmers, and the Environment. Monsanto’s Petition to Rehear Denied in Full.

San Francisco, CA – June 24, 2009 — In a decision handed down here today, the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit has re-affirmed its previous decision upholding a nationwide ban on the planting of genetically-engineered (GE) Roundup Ready alfalfa pending a full Environmental Impact Statement (EIS). The Court determined that the planting of genetically modified alfalfa can result in potentially irreversible harm to organic and conventional varieties of crops, damage to the environment, and economic harm to farmers.

Although the suit was brought against United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), Monsanto Company and Forage Genetics entered into the suit as Defendant-Intervenors. In September 2008 the Ninth Circuit affirmed the lower court’s ruling, but the Intervenors continued to press the appeal alone, requesting the appellate court to rehear the case. Today’s decision denied that request and re-affirmed the earlier decision in full.

“This ruling affirms a major victory for consumers, ranchers, organic farmers, and most conventional farmers across the country,” said Andrew Kimbrell, Executive Director of the Center for Food Safety. “Roundup Ready Alfalfa represents a very real threat to farmers’ livelihoods and the environment; the court rightly dismissed Monsanto’s claims that their bottom line should come before the rights of the public and America’s farmers. This ruling is a turning point in the regulation of biotech crops in this country.”

Today’s decision again upholds District Court Judge Charles Breyer’s earlier ruling of May 2007, in which he found that the USDA failed to address concerns that Roundup Ready alfalfa will contaminate conventional and organic alfalfa. The Ninth Circuit decision affirms that USDA violated national environmental laws by approving GE alfalfa without a full Environmental Impact Statement.

The Center for Food Safety represented itself and the following co-plaintiffs in the suit: Western Organization of Resource Councils, National Family Farm Coalition, Sierra Club, Beyond Pesticides, Cornucopia Institute, Dakota Resource Council, Trask Family Seeds, and Geertson Seed Farms. For more information, please visit www.centerforfoodsafety.org.

Whatever people may think about GMOs, ethics dictate that they should never be released anywhere – period – as they cannot be controlled. If one farmer decides he wants to farm with GMOs, he is essentially making a decision that the world will farm with that same GMO, and that through horizontal gene transfer we’ll see these genes showing up in other plant species. Such an imposition is obscene in the extreme – even without the environmental and health consequences.

With the U.S. Court of Appeals (finally) standing firm against this mega-corporation, I hope to see the beginning of a new era – one that sees us backtracking on this dangerous and unnecessary reductionist technology, in favour of natural plant breeding techniques that: cost nothing but a little observation to implement, can be done in a far faster time frame, and enable people to produce strains suited to particular and peculiar soil types and micro-climates, etc.

Genetic modification actually cuts the productivity of crops, an authoritative new study shows, undermining repeated claims that a switch to the controversial technology is needed to solve the growing world food crisis.

The study – carried out over the past three years at the University of Kansas in the US grain belt – has found that GM soya produces about 10 per cent less food than its conventional equivalent, contradicting assertions by advocates of the technology that it increases yields.

… The Nebraska study suggested that two factors are at work. First, it takes time to modify a plant and, while this is being done, better conventional ones are being developed. This is acknowledged even by the fervently pro-GM US Department of Agriculture, which has admitted that the time lag could lead to a "decrease" in yields.

But the fact that GM crops did worse than their near-identical non-GM counterparts suggest that a second factor is also at work, and that the very process of modification depresses productivity. The new Kansas study both confirms this and suggests how it is happening…. – Independent

Europeans are standing against these companies. If U.S. citizens would join together and boycott GM products in their food supply, we could see the damage already done ameliorated and stopped in its tracks.

It’s really very easy: 1) push your local political representative to ensure labelling of GMOs, or vote for the man that will, and 2) don’t buy any products containing GMOs.

18 Comments

  1. Well thank you for the time and the effort to stand up to the single bottom line illusion. May this be the start of a more conscious choice for our present and future biosphere.

  2. Win!

    I, too, would like to see their buildings worldwide bulldozed and their fields razed. In fact, I’d go so far as pay to be able to participate in such a thing.

    We need to fight on. I won’t be satisfied until Monsanto is no more.

  3. What a great way to start the day! GM Canola trials have recently started here in Western Australia, so it is fantastic to have information like this, and the many previous articles, to hand on to people so they can make educated decisions and choices. Thank you for your unfailing commitment to providing these resources. I hope there are many more great news articles like this one in the future for you to pass on! At the end of the day it is knowledge and unity that will take down corporations like Monsanto, so keep educating the people. Thanks!!

  4. I as a farmer dispute everything you have stated. First give me facts and figures not your hopes and dreams.

  5. Hi Jerry. Thanks for stopping by.

    There are plenty of facts and figures out there. Browsing the ‘Why Permaculture/GMOs‘ section of our site will give you a good start on the issues. Reading such books as Seeds of Deception (which shows clearly how industry manipulation and political collusion are trumping sound science), and Genetic Roulette (which very well documents proven health issues) would be even better.

    There are many reports on how GMOs are in no way living up to the well-financed hype and PR. Here’s one (PDF) to get you started. It asks the question “who benefits from GMO Crops?” It is a report on worldwide GMO use, its results, and is very well referenced.

    Additionally, last year a 400 scientist strong, four year study came to the conclusion that GMOs are not the answer to our serious and growing problems – soil erosion and organic matter depletion, water loss and contamination, the pesticide treadmill, the major loss of biodiversity that puts us in a very vulnerable position (diversity is stability), and the fact that our food is increasingly empty of nutrition, etc.) – but that reversing the extractive globalised model is a necessity, returning to low-input, closed loop true organic systems is. Here’s a brief summary PDF on the report, or click here to access the full thing.

    Whatever you may think about GMOs, one thing is clear – if you choose to farm with them, you are effectively dictating that your neighbours and ultimately everyone farms with them also. This alone, even putting aside all the documented health and environmental issues, is an indefensible stance to take. It is ethically obscene.

    Additionally, with major (emphasis on major) problems all conspiring against us – we cannot afford to have win-lose-lose scenarios urged upon us by industries with vested interests in sweeping problems under the mat (the first ‘win’ being mega-profits for a few, at the expense of the many).

    If you’re not into reading, watch this.

  6. Good Morning and Good News!
    The facts and figures have been out there for over 20 years. As a farmer you must have heard of this before. A little research will convince you, or even see a few movies on the subject.
    We who oppose GMOs have not done so for nothing – to support or oppose without having done research is sheer ignorance. But we now just want to support and acknowledge this small victory. Yeah!
    Monsanto is the Antichrist – pure evil and greed. Millions all over the world know it by now.

  7. After checking out Monsanto on Wikipedia and your website, one comes to the conclusion, that this company in concert with other like-minded companies worldwide (which Monsanto either buys up or works in conjunction with) seem to be the direct spawn of hell.

    Their work seems to be bent on the destruction of the whole planet, just so they can line their pockets for a short while. In the scheme of things even a couple of hundred years is not a very long time. It appears, that obesity and overweight alone (with all their accompanying sicknesses) can be traced largely to this and other like-minded companies.

    Wouldn’t a worldwide class action against these companies be something nice to see? A total collapse of these companies can only benefit the world as a whole. Every last cent ever made by these companies should be taken from them. If one were as evil as the Company chiefs, one would say: feed them all Agent Orange.

    BTW, I feel sorry for the employees who end up with all kinds of diseases, simply because they are trying to make a living … but don’t realise, that they are slowly killing themselves and their families by doing so.

  8. Thank god for small mercies! We need all the help we can get to stop these money hungry beasts that parade as one who is working for the good of mankind. Monsanto and the codex alimentaris should be stopped along with their tampering with nature. Nature is perfect as god intended it, it is our meddling that creates problems. There are no problems in nature, only things WE as humans want to change for our own gain. It is great to see articles like this, I don’t feel so alone in my distaste for these corporations. The best thing we can do is to educate our friends, family and communities. We are losing our sense of community and that’s just what they want. Divide and conquer! We must be close in our communities and stand up as a whole and refuse to buy ANYTHING at all from these companies.

  9. This is the best news I’ve seen this decade. I can only hope that we all stick together – work as a team and permanently destroy this company. Raise your kids with a genetic trait of YOUR own creation – a hatred towards monsanto.

  10. I have raised GMO crops and have neighbors who raise Non GMO crops. There are no Monsanto police around here for the last 15 years. Most of these reports are from people who don’t want to pay tech fees for seed. I guess if you want a communal world where many live off the backs of a few who want to work have at it. I want my work ethic to pay. I am tired of the entitlement mentality of you who live in ivory towers.
    Jerry who farms with Monsanto products and has increased my yields to feed you slackers by over 35% in the last 20 years.

  11. ‘Most of these reports are from people who don’t want to pay tech fees for seed.’

    So does demonizing the critics make you feel better? Are you familiar with the Percy Schmeiser case in Canada?

    I’m not in an ivory tower, I’m on the ground farming to feed people who get sick eating the GMO junk that passes for food these days. I have friends who’ve had to stop farming corn because of the GMO contamination. We demand and deserve the right to save seed from our own genetics and to do so free of GMO contamination.

  12. Thank you Mr Halcomb, for your input on this issue. In the approximate 6 years I’ve been on Forums for this topic of GMOs, you are probably the first or second farmer who has openly admitted to planting GMOs and making money off them. Now, my second question is: Do you eat them? If not, do you grow animal feed or what, to be sold to others?

  13. p.s. Mr Halcomb, I grow my own organic veggies on a small scale, and eat them about 8 months of the year, so no slacker here, and not eating off your back the other 4 months as I buy organic. Why are you calling people slackers anyway? Thank you

  14. To Jerry Halcomb
    You don’t farm with Monsanto for the good of mankind, but to make more profit. The way I see it, this should entitle people who get sick from your products, to sue you as well as Monsanto itself.
    Do you eat your own products out of sheer ignorance, or do you just help to reduce the world’s population quicker? What does it feel like, to let greed run your life? Do you realise, that Monsanto also produced Agent Orange?

  15. Wow.

    I’m so glad this stuff is finally getting out in the open. If Monsanto thinks it can maintain the illusion that it is helping the world in some way, and not entirely interested in making a lot of money in the most insidious ways possible, it has got another thing coming. It monopolises every industry it has put it’s insidious trendrils into, pushing out everyone else, suing farmers and destroying their lives, damaging the environment and the integrity of natural genetics, and literally making people sick (particularly through the milk industry).

    Get lost.

    That there is a world community coming together who have become aware enough to say: “Hey, that’s not cool, we will not support what you are doing.” is the best thing ever. Bring it on.

  16. You DO NOT FEED ME!!! And I am no slacker!!
    The only thing Monsanto is interested in helping
    is to line it’s own pockets…pure and simple…GREED!!

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