Monsanto Suing Farmers Over Piracy Issues

[Guest guest]

Monsanto is at it again.

 

They have been caught bribing an official in Indonesia to block

environmental impact studies of the planting of their GM cotton seeds.

 

http://www.newmediaexplorer.org/chris/2005/01/13/more_monsanto_shenanigans.htm

 

and they are continuing to sue farmers over patent violations.

Perhaps people are starting to get a bit restless...

 

Kind regards

Sepp

 

 

 

http://home.peoplepc.com/psp/newsstory.asp?cat=news & referrer=welcome & id=20050113\

/41e60050_3ca6_15526200501131585117613

 

Monsanto Suing Farmers Over Piracy Issues

 

Thursday, January 13, 2005

 

SAN FRANCISCO - Monsanto Co.'s " seed police " snared soy farmer Homan

McFarling in 1999, and the company is demanding he pay it hundreds of

thousands of dollars for alleged technology piracy. McFarling's sin?

He saved seed from one harvest and replanted it the following season,

a revered and ancient agricultural practice.

 

" My daddy saved seed. I saved seed, " said McFarling, 62, who still

grows soy on the 5,000 acre family farm in Shannon, Miss. and is

fighting the agribusiness giant in court.

 

Saving Monsanto's seeds, genetically engineered to kill bugs and

resist weed sprays, violates provisions of the company's contracts

with farmers.

 

Since 1997, Monsanto has filed similar lawsuits 90 times in 25 states

against 147 farmers and 39 agriculture companies, according to a

report issued Thursday by The Center for Food Safety, a biotechnology

foe.

 

In a similar case a year ago, Tennessee farmer Kem Ralph was sued by

Monsanto and sentenced to eight months in prison after he was caught

lying about a truckload of cotton seed he hid for a friend.

 

Ralph's prison term is believed to be the first criminal prosecution

linked to Monsanto's crackdown. Ralph has also been ordered to pay

Monsanto more than $1.7 million.

 

The company itself says it annually investigates about 500 " tips "

that farmers are illegally using its seeds and settles many of those

cases before a lawsuit is filed.

 

In this way, Monsanto is attempting to protect its business from

pirates in much the same way the entertainment industry does when it

sues underground digital distributors exploiting music, movies and

video games.

 

In the process, it has turned farmer on farmer and sent private

investigators into small towns to ask prying questions of friends and

business acquaintances.

 

Monsanto's licensing contracts and litigation tactics are coming

under increased scrutiny as more of the planet's farmland comes under

genetically engineered cultivation.

 

Some 200 million acres of the world's farms grew biotech crops last

year, an increase of 20 percent from 2003, according to a separate

report released Wednesday.

 

Many of the farmers Monsanto has sued say, as McFarling claims, that

they didn't read the company's technology agreement close enough.

Others say they never received an agreement in the first place.

 

The company counters that it sues only the most egregious violations

and is protecting the 300,000 law-abiding U.S. farmers who annually

pay a premium for its technology. Soy farmers, for instance, pay a

" technology fee " of about $6.50 an acre each year.

 

Some 85 percent of the nation's soy crop is genetically engineered to

resist Monsanto's herbicide Roundup, a trait many farmers say makes

it easier to weed their fields and ultimately cheaper to grow their

crops.

 

" It's a very efficient and cost-effective way to raise soy beans and

that's why the market has embraced it, " said Ron Heck, who grows 900

acres of genetically engineered soy beans in Perry, Iowa.

 

Heck, who is also chairman of the American Soybean Association, said

he doesn't mind buying new seed each year and appreciates Monsanto's

crackdown on competitors who don't pay for their seed.

 

" You can save seed if you want to use the old technology, " Heck said.

 

The company said the licensing agreement protects its more than 600

biotech-related patents and ensures a return on its research and

development expenses, which amount to more than $400 million annually.

 

" We have to balance our obligations and our responsibilities to our

customers, to our employees and to our shareholders, " said Scott

Baucum, Monsanto's chief intellectual property protector.

 

Still, Monsanto's investigative tactics are sewing seeds of fear and

mistrust in some farming communities, company critics say.

 

Monsanto encourages farmers to call a company hot line with piracy

tips, and private investigators in its employ act on leads with

visits to the associates of suspect farmers.

 

Baucum acknowledged that the company walks a fine line when it sues farmers.

 

" It is very uncomfortable for us, " Baucum said. " They are our

customers and they are important to us. "

 

The Center for Food Safety established its own hot line Thursday

where farmers getting sued can receive aid. It also said it hopes to

convene a meeting among defense lawyers to develop legal strategies

to fight Monsanto.

 

The company said it has gone to trial five times and has never lost a

legal fight against an accused pirate. The U.S. Supreme Court in 1980

allowed for the patenting of genetically engineered life forms and

extended the same protections to altered plants in 2001. Earlier this

year, a Washington D.C. federal appeals court specifically upheld

Monsanto's license.

 

" It's sad. It's sickening. I'm disillusioned, " said Rodney Nelson, a

North Dakota farmer who settled a Monsanto suit in 2001 that he said

was unfairly filed. " We have a heck of an uphill battle that I don't

think can be won. "

--

 

 

 

--

 

 

The individual is supreme and finds its way through intuition.

 

Sepp Hasslberger

 

 

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[Guest guest]

That people from Monsanto breathe air, is dangerous to all living things.

 

Sepp Hasslberger <sepp wrote:

Monsanto is at it again.

 

They have been caught bribing an official in Indonesia to block

environmental impact studies of the planting of their GM cotton seeds.

 

http://www.newmediaexplorer.org/chris/2005/01/13/more_monsanto_shenanigans.htm

 

and they are continuing to sue farmers over patent violations.

Perhaps people are starting to get a bit restless...

 

Kind regards

Sepp

 

 

 

http://home.peoplepc.com/psp/newsstory.asp?cat=news & referrer=welcome & id=20050113\

/41e60050_3ca6_15526200501131585117613

 

 

 

 

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