A GMO nightmare...
Engineered by chemistry industry giant Monsanto...
Organic seed producer Frank Morton has been warning people for years that genetically modified organisms pose a serious threat to the Willamette Valley’s vegetable seed industry.
Now he thinks his worst GMO nightmare may be coming true.
Roundup Ready sugarbeets — a patented variety engineered by Monsanto to tolerate the company’s widely used Roundup herbicide — have turned up in a soil mixture being sold to gardeners at a Corvallis landscaping supply business just a few miles from Morton’s fields.
He fears some of those roots may now be sprouting in area gardens. If so, they could soon start to bolt, sending out clouds of pollen that could fertilize his crop of golden chard — a closely related plant — and render it worthless for the organic seed market. It would also negate years of breeding that went into producing an especially cold-hardy line.
http://www.gazettetimes.com/...
Monsanto, it seems, is quite the chemical industry pioneer:
The 1940s saw Monsanto become a leading manufacturer of plastics, including polystyrene, and synthetic fibers. Since then, it has remained one of the top 10 US chemical companies. Other major products have included the herbicides 2,4,5-T, DDT, and Agent Orange used primarily during the Vietnam War as a defoliant agent (later proven to be highly carcinogenic to any who come into contact with the solution), the ... aspartame (NutraSweet), bovine somatotropin (bovine growth hormone (BST), and PCBs. Also in this decade, Monsanto operated the Dayton Project, and later Mound Laboratory in Miamisburg, Ohio, for the Manhattan Project, the development of the first nuclear weapons and, after 1947, the Atomic Energy Commission.
http://en.wikipedia.org/...
Not to mention DDT, which Monsanto began manufacturing in 1944... to be challenged by environmentalist Rachel Carson in her book Silent Spring ... Monsanto is also to be associated with the 1947 accidental explosion of ammonium nitrate fertilizer load on a French ship, the S.S. Grandcamp, which destroyed an adjacent Monsanto styrene manufacturing plant as well as much of the port at Galveston Bay, the unforgettable Texas City Disaster, the largest industrial accident in US history, the highest death toll from such an accident.
Then, there are the various genetic patenting lawsuits, info also from Wikipedia:
Throughout 2004 and 2005, Monsanto filed lawsuits against many farmers in Canada and the U.S. The lawsuits have been on the grounds of patent infringement, specifically the farmer's sale of seed containing Monsanto's patented genes–which require the farmer initial purchase of the seed and its technology–unknowingly sown by wind carrying the seeds from neighboring crops. These instances began in the mid to late 1990s, with one of the most significant cases being decided in Monsanto's favor by the Canadian Supreme Court. By a 5-4 vote in late May 2004, that court ruled that "by cultivating a plant containing the patented gene and composed of the patented cells without license, the appellants (canola farmer Percy Schmeiser) deprived the respondents of the full enjoyment of the patent." With this ruling, the Canadian courts followed the U.S. Supreme Court in its decision on patent issues involving plants and genes.
As of February 2005, Monsanto has patent claims on breeding techniques for pigs which would grant them ownership of any pigs born of such techniques and their related herds. Greenpeace claims Monsanto is trying to claim ownership on ordinary breeding techniques. Monsanto claims that the patent is a defensive measure to track animals from its system. They furthermore claim their patented method uses a specialized insemination device that requires less sperm than is typical.
Among Monsanto's other corporate accomplishments are: being identified by EPA as being a "potentially responsible party" for 56 contaminated sites in the United States, numerous lawsuits against Monsanto for damaging the health of its employees or residents near its Superfund sites through pollution and poisoning.
What an atrocious misnomer! Superfund sites as a cover-up for sites of toxicity and contamination.
Ugh! Monsanto! Now as I look with monstrous discontent upon my store of white sugar (from Monsanto-genetically-modified sugarbeets?), my dear little bottle of canola oil (remember Percy Schmeiser!), various plastic containers scatttered around my household, my happy childhood memories of dear Bossy the Red Poll milk cow surrounded by clouds of DDT now tarnished beyond redemption...
Curse you! Monsanto!
Recommended to readers: Read Wikipedia article on Monsanto, see Monsanto flicks, The World According to Monsanto, the latest flick, Food, Inc., and check out the other blogs on Monsanto in Kos.