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Monsanto Loses Millions as Indian Cotton Farmers are Switching Back to Indigenous Seeds

Monsanto is making the news these days for losing. They have lost three court cases in which Roundup has been linked to cancer. In India, they are losing, too. After years of pushing a strain of Bt Cotton, Indian farmers have had enough and are switching back to native seeds for the cotton industry. It’s been a hard road for cotton farmers in India dealing with Monsanto. To begin with, Monsanto illegally began open field trials of its GMO Bt cotton in 1997 and announced it would begin selling seeds the following year. In turn, the Indian Supreme Court would not allow the biotech giant to sell seeds until 2002. Since then, over 300,000 Indian farmers have committed suicide. It is believed that many of these suicides were linked to major debts incurred by the systematic control of Monsanto and Bt cotton. Expensive seeds and the pesticides needed can only be bought from Monsanto. The agricultural ministry of India stated, “Cotton farmers are in a deep crisis since shifting to Bt cotton. The spate of farmer suicides in 2011-12 has been particularly severe among Bt cotton farmers.” Monsanto’s Bt cotton seeds have been dubbed “Seeds of Suicide” by residents in India. And now, India is waking up and ready to fight back. The Indian government has begun to promote the use of native varieties of cotton, seeds more specific to each area. In the time that farmers have begun switching back to indigenous seeds, Monsanto has seen a loss of $75 million.

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New USDA “Mandatory” GMO Labeling Rule Allows Loopholes to Let Companies Hide GMO Ingredients

The USDA has released its final GMO labeling rule, and it’s not good. As we feared when the agency released its proposal earlier this year, the so-called GMO labeling law will apply only to a narrow set of foods. Congress and the USDA have offered a number of loopholes and exemptions to food companies, undermining any semblance of a consumer’s right to know. It’s as if the USDA asked the food industry to write the rule themselves.

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Big Ag Fail: 70% of World Fed by Small-scale Farmers

We are told that big agribusiness, with its GM crops, flashy techno-fixes and financial clout, will save the world from widespread hunger and malnutrition and help food systems weather the impacts of climate change. However, a report from ETC Group shows that in fact, it is a diverse network of small-scale producers, dubbed the Peasant Food Web, that feeds 70% of the world, including the most hungry and marginalized people. The flagship report, "Who Will Feed Us?", is a data-driven report full of unexpected statistics that reveal a tale of two food systems. This is the third edition, and most complete synthesis, of a research exercise that ETC Group has been undertaking for several years. "Who Will Feed Us?" upturns common assumptions about who feeds whom in a hungry world.

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GMO Dicamba Herbicide Spreading to Non-GMO Crops

A dicamba/glyphosate herbicide mix is being sprayed on Monsanto's GM soybeans that are tolerant to both herbicides. The herbicide is drifting and volatilizing onto neighbouring non-target plants, including non-GM soybeans and a wide variety of food crops, garden plants and wild plants, resulting in massive damage to those crops and plants and even a decline in honey production. In an attempt to reduce off-target spray damage next year, the US EPA has issued new tighter use restrictions that are displayed on the herbicide product labels.

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“Miracle” Weed Killer Dicamba was Supposed to Save Farms – Instead it’s Devastating Them

The damage here in northeast Arkansas and across the Midwest - sickly soybeans, trees and other crops - has become emblematic of a deepening crisis in American agriculture. Farmers are locked in an arms race between ever-stronger weeds and ever-stronger weed killers. The dicamba system, approved for use for the first time this spring, was supposed to break the cycle and guarantee weed control in soybeans and cotton. The herbicide - used in combination with a genetically modified dicamba-resistant soybean - promises better control of unwanted plants such as pigweed, which has become resistant to common weed killers. The problem, farmers and weed scientists say, is that dicamba has drifted from the fields where it was sprayed, damaging millions of acres of unprotected soybeans and other crops in what some are calling a man-made disaster. Critics contend that the herbicide was approved by federal officials without enough data, particularly on the critical question of whether it could drift off target.

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Africans Do Not Want to be Used as Guinea Pigs for Untested American GMO Technology

The Alliance for Food Sovereignty in Africa has called for an immediate ban on the importation into South Africa of Monsanto’s high-risk second-generation gene-silencing GM maize destined for human consumption. In an open letter to African biosafety regulators, AFSA rejects and condemns US corporation Monsanto’s plan to exploit millions of Africans as unwitting human guinea pigs for their latest genetic engineering experiment.

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CRISPR-induced Mutations – What do they Mean for Food Safety?

A new study published in Nature Methods has found that the genome editing technology CRISPR introduced hundreds of unintended mutations into the genome of mice. In the study, the researchers sequenced the entire genome of mice that had undergone CRISPR gene editing to correct a genetic defect. They looked for all mutations, including those that only altered a single nucleotide (DNA base unit). They found that the genomes of two independent gene therapy recipients had sustained more than 1,500 single-nucleotide mutations and more than 100 larger deletions and insertions. None of these DNA mutations were predicted by the computer algorithms (software packages) that are widely used by researchers to screen the genome (the total DNA base unit sequence) of an organism to look for potential off-target effects. While this study was conducted in the arena of gene therapy, it has clear implications for the regulation of food plants and animals derived from CRISPR and other genome editing techniques.

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Frankencitrus Coming to a Store Near You?

A new ruling is expected to pave the way for genetically modified citrus to enter your local stores—but a loophole allows the food industry to keep you in the dark about the nature of the fruit you’re purchasing. The trees are treated with a genetically modified virus that makes them resistant to citrus greening disease, which has caused major problems for citrus growers in Florida. But according to the government’s definition, neither the trees nor the fruit will be considered genetically modified (an assertion that is patently absurd), so once again consumers will be in the dark about what kind of food they’ll be eating.

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GMO: The Truth about the Science

Earlier this month, major biotech and agriculture groups sent a letter to key members of the House and Senate Appropriations Committee supporting the inclusion of $3 million in the fiscal year 2017 budget to “better inform the public about the application of biotechnology to food and agricultural production.” In plain English, these groups are asking for taxpayer dollars to fund propaganda efforts on behalf of the biotech industry. For those interested in real answers to questions about GMOs, we’ve recently updated and revamped our GMO Fact Check site. We’ve included the most up-to-date information on the safety of GMOs, the facts about GMOs and pesticide use, the epidemic of cross-pollination of GMOs with conventional (and/or organic) crops, the myth that GMOs increase crop yields, and much more. Our information is science-based and fully cited. Since industry has systematically attempted to corrupt so many government agencies, universities, and researchers working in this field, simply having accurate, scientific data is an accomplishment.

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EPA Review of Glyphosate: Can a Truly Independent Panel of Scientists be Found?

The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) recently released a draft report finding that glyphosate—the active ingredient in Monsanto’s popular Roundup weed killer—is not likely to cause cancer in humans. This finding is preliminary, to be followed by the agency’s final review of glyphosate, which has been delayed until spring of 2017. The EPA decided to address the potential cancer-causing effects of glyphosate after the United Nations’ International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) announced last year that the chemical was a “probable carcinogen.” An “independent” panel of scientists will review the EPA’s report this month. But as our readers know, Monsanto and other biotech giants have so deeply corrupted the science of this issue that finding independent scientists would be a very tough challenge.

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