Monsanto continues to be the target of protests and demonstrations as they seek to standardize agriculture markets around the world.
Companies like Monsanto create their own patented seeds that have been genetically modified to withstand biocides used to kill pests and weeds. Not only does this jeopardize the long-term health of soil, it interrupts the necessary biodiversity of local environments that allow natural pollination.
Activists from 52 nations around the globe organized under the ‘March against Monsanto’ umbrella in May of last year. All together protests against Monsanto took place in around 400 cities worldwide, and a couple weeks ago more than 120 organizations joined the fifth annual ‘We are Fed Up!’ demonstration in Berlin, taking a stand against the importation of American agricultural practices.
Protests have taken place in Argentina to resist Monsanto’s potent biocides used with their genetically-engineered seeds. In Brazil, farmers are calling for reimbursement for crops that were killed by pests that didn’t die. Guatemala’s highest court has also suspended a controversial ‘Monsanto Law’, “a provision of a US-Central American trade agreement, that would insulate transnational seed corporations considered to have ‘discovered’ new plant varieties.”
In the United States, Monsanto has been working with other multinational biotech, agribusiness, and food production companies to prevent states from labeling whether or not food is comprised of GM ingredients.
The ballot initiative to require GMO labeling was recently defeated in Oregon. Monsanto and Dupont spent more than $21 million on the anti-labeling campaign, where as proponents were only able to raise $9 million for their campaign. And in Hawaii, Maui County has been sued by the company for passing a temporary ban on the cultivation of genetically modified organisms.
Aside from the environmental hazards that accompany GMO cultivation, soybean workers in a recent study were found to have elevated DNA and cell damage. The study, which was published in the journal, Mutation Research/Genetic Toxicology and Environmental Mutagenesis, involved 81 individuals exposed to biocides while working in the Brazilian soybean industry, and 46 individuals used as a control group who were not exposed.
According to researcher Danieli Benedetti and his team, the group exhibited an elevated level of cellular apoptosis, as well as DNA damage.
“Our findings indicate the advisability of monitoring genetic toxicity in soybean farm workers exposed to pesticides,” the researchers said.
The team focused on glyphosate and ‘2,4-D’, the two top biocide components in American biotechnology farming culture. Glyphosate is the main ingredient in Round-up, and ‘2,4-D’ was used in making Agent Orange.
Public prosecutors in Brazil are seeking to suspend the use of glyphosate, which studies have shown is linked to fatal kidney disease which has affected poor farming regions.
Monsanto has recently won approval to use their new genetically-modified soybeans and cotton in the US, both of which are designed to withstand a dominant biocide that is already in use.
Monsanto has experienced a 34 percent drop in earnings during its first fiscal quarter, and has lost $156 million in the fourth quarter of last year.
Sources:
McAdam, Sophie. True Activist. Nov 18, 2014. (http://www.trueactivist.com/just-when-you-thought-you-couldnt-hate-monsanto-any-more-this-happens/)
RT. Jan 22, 2015. (http://rt.com/usa/225247-monsanto-glyphosate-damage-soybean/)
RT. May 24, 2014. (http://rt.com/news/161184-march-against-monsanto-updates/)
I just wanted to ask you to get rid of that grey scrolling headline leader bar at the top of your pages. It makes article text bounce up and down on Smartphone browsers, making them difficult to read.
Thats hilarious as before I read your comment, I was going to say, “I would love to read and comment on this story, but I am getting very angry at my page moving due to your IDIOTIC GRAY MARQUEE AT THE TOP OF YHIS PAGE!! Come on now, you represent my clique, please fix your tech glitch!
Oh my gosh. I came to ask the same thing. Very difficult to read with the jumping text. Thanks!
Seriously get rid of the Scrolling header it makes reading your articles exceedingly annoying. I’ve clicked away on two or three articles now because I just can’t keep the text in my field of view. Come on ANON you can hack a Government agency or a Gaming Co sole server but you can’t make a Functional article page??
Agreed. Fix the stupid stroller bar. Makes it impossible to read anything!
And the ad is for Google plus no less. SMH
If you are Anonymous, good work on most of what you do. But you picked the wrong side on the gmo thing, as a cursory read of any high school science textbook could tell you.I used to enjoy Mother Jones when they were about politics, before they went all New Agey Crystal Quantum Vibrational Woo. Don’t go down the same road.
Maybe instead of crying about the header and the ads, go and donate money to the site, so they don’t need ads.
Hence what you are saying is ANON is an organization funded by advertisements; no different from Facebook or Google.
Sorry to bash, but some of what I have seen in older videos is against the “Organizational Cooperate America” Concept….
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=su0om5L4Bhg#t=233
I use to be a big organic only guy. I thought that GMOs would be terrible and hold a bunch of chemicals that are carcinogenic. The fact is that GMOs just have extra DNA that produce certain proteins. If you eat these proteins they become amino acids which you need. I do think that GMOs can be misused and I’m definitely against spraying our food with shit tons of chemicals but that doesn’t just happen because they are GMOs. I’m working now in a lab that is making transgenic tobacco that has an included gene from a vampire bat for breaking up blood clots. This could be a potential game changer for people that suffer from strokes, but we are a university level group. I do think that the big agro companies do use this technology purely for profit and don’t care about the side effects but to say all GMO is bad is completely ignorant.
To think anything made by Monsanto is edible is completely ignorant, you gonna trust a company that pays millions to keep people ignorant, its food ffs, kind of a big deal…..now that’s ignorance in its finest form!