Monsanto: Unchecked White-Collar Crime
Within our food today exists genetics that are not found naturally on our earth. Human tampering, and a large portion of greed, has created “Genetically Modified Organisms”. Most genetic modification, especially of consumer crops, is made possible by the multinational corporation, “Monsanto”. The corporation has a pledge on their website that states: “We will respect the religious, cultural, and ethical concerns of people throughout the world. The safety of our employees, the communities where we operate, our customers, consumers, and the environment will be our highest priority” (Monsanto.com). However, it is brought to light through the film “Food, Inc.” that this corporation is lacking much in their promises. I believe that continuing to allow Monsanto to produce genetically modified foods and dangerous chemicals is a hazard to our economy, our health, and the environment.
Monsanto owns ninety percent of all genetically modified crops, creating a near monopoly on the food industry. Although many farmers may start out organic, a nearby farm that has Monsanto’s seeds may germinate in the organic farmer’s land, giving Monsanto “rights” to the now previously organic farmer’s seed. The problem is “When you genetically modify a crop, you own it” (Pollan. ‘Food, Inc.’). Many farmers now suffer from, what some would call, corporate abuse. The corporation is demanding that farmers never save any seed for the next years crop, being entitled to their “property”. If a farmer does save seed, or seed accidentally got in their crop, or they do not turn over their records, Monsanto will sue the farmer, if they do not comply.
Statement from a farmer regarding Monsanto’s legal practices:
“Monsanto falsely accused us of violating their patent and breach of contract. None of it was true. You go into a market, you find a dominant farmer and if you can ruin them, you scare the rest of them to following in line. My family spent $400, fighting the battle, pretrial. And we were told it would take another million to take the thing to trial. We settled out of court. The way the system appeared to work to me was, Lady Justice had the scales and you piled cash on the scales and the one that piled the most cash on the scales, hired the most experts and was most willing to tell the biggest lies, that was the winner. That seems to be how our justice system functions now. It's terrible. It's terrible. How can a farmer defend himself against a multinational corporation like Monsanto?” (Roush. Food, Inc.)
Since the start of genetic engineering there has always been someone to stand up against it. Today, there is seemingly not enough “conclusive evidence” to show that GMO is bad for one’s health, but should we really need “evidence” before our human tampering of genetics is too messed up to fix? One can surmise that new cancers, human genome defects, shortened life-spans, and an array of health problems could arise from humans trying to make our food “better”. Is it not already nutrient rich? Is not the problem the dietary intake and cultural imbroglio of the west? “A 2009 review in Nutrition Reviews found that although most studies concluded that GM foods do not differ in nutrition or cause any detectable toxic effects in animals, some studies did report adverse changes at a cellular level caused by some GM foods, concluding that ‘More scientific effort and investigation is needed to ensure that consumption of GM foods is not likely to provoke any form of health problem’”(Nutrition Reviews).
Genetically modified foods, as those produced by Monsanto, propose a significant risk to the ecosystem. A study conducted in the United Kingdom concluded that the use of genetically modified crops decreases biodiversity, especially on the farm environment (The Guardian Newspaper). With these GMOs we have a seen an exponential growth of “super-pests” that resist the chemicals that were used originally on both insect and plant pests, resulting in more toxic chemicals and more money for Monsanto.
What can we do to combat health dangers, ecological dangers, economic dangers, and greed from corporations that sell GMO? Buy local, organic foods. If it is certified organic, then it does not contain genetically modified anything. In doing this, we effectively boycott Monsanto. One of the other biggest things we can do is take political action. Vote out the politicians that put Monsanto into governmental positions. (The Clinton, Bush, and Obama administrations all appointed an official from Monsanto into FDA leadership positions. Conflict of interest much? Yep.) The most important thing we can do is know that power to make the choices we make are within us, no matter how big a corporation.
“The idea that any corporation
could own a food crop is a very new idea. It wasn't until the 1980s that the Supreme Court said you could patent life. And that opened the floodgates-- efforts to patent the most valuable parts of life, which is to say the crops on which we depend.”- Michael Pollan