Looks like a good case for class action lawsuit for all the surrounding farmers that have suffer damage from this.
There are scientific proof, clear documented $$$ damage, etc.
Any idea why it has not initiated yet?
There are scientific proof, clear documented $$$ damage, etc.
Any idea why it has not initiated yet?
Let's say you sue for an entire year's worth of crops and you win. Then you win the appeal. And you win the appeal of the appeal. All the way up the chain. For 10 years, you win on every level.
But you never plant another crop and you go out of business. At this point, Monsanto owns the world of agriculture. If you are planting something that is not owned by Monsanto, you are losing. Monsanta-engineered crops have such a higher yield that to plant anything else would wipe out your profit margin. The higher yield is magnified by the fact that non-Monsanto crops planted anywhere near Monsanto crops are dying from Monsanto herbicides.
It's simple math. No farmer can survive 10 years of losses due to inferior production. The giants like ADP won't go after Monsanto because they have not been affected. They are already using Monsanto seed. Young independents won't go after Monsanto because the only way they can compete against the ADPs is to use Monsanto.
So you have a few handfuls of old farmers who are ready to retire and have no family who want to carry on. They are going to sell out to some cookie-cutter subdivision developer anyway, so maybe they could be enticed into an otherwise suicidal court case. Or maybe they don't have the energy for it.
Those who win (iffy at best) will not win a real windfall. No court is going to give Monsanto a death sentence. And the farmers will have a hardtime arguing too much harm when they still got 50% of their crop harvested and made $millions$ by selling the land. Mansanto can absorb a million dollar settlement here and there.
If I'm Monsanto, I'm not worried.
If I'm a no-holds-barred in-it-for-the-buck securities advisor, I'd say "buy Monsanto." I might also say, "short Whole Foods" because their supply is dwindling and their prices have to go up. If I'm a save-the-world stop-injustice activist, I'm looking for new sources of significant capital to stem the tide. And I'll keep fighting on because it was a dim prospect from the beginning anyway.
Herein lies the beauty of a class action suit. Let the lawyers finance and worry about the lawsuit while you go on your merry way running your farm.
I don't think it's an option to consider alternatives in this case.
If Monsanto think they can stop selling you their wares because they don't like you they should be dissolved today.
There are many more than 1,000 separate seed companies that supply the many types of commercial seeds globally, and hundreds of seed companies that sell corn and soybean seed to American farmers. In fact, aggregate commercial sales by all seed companies account for only about 40 percent of the total volume of seeds used globally in 2014 (not sure of the last seasons). Of those commercial seed sales, roughly 2/3 of the seed volume comes from private breeding programs and significantly 1/3 comes from national or public institutions.
The remaining non-commercial seed volume is seed saved and replanted by farmers. Monsanto participates in only a few crops, with the two largest being corn and soybeans. While Monsanto is one of the largest commercial seed companies, even in those crops their output probably accounts for less than one-third of global commercial volume.
Therefore, if a farmer wants to plant seed from someone other than Monsanto, it’s very easy to do that. People use Monsanto products because of the genetics/profitability not out of intimidation or fear.
> While Monsanto is one of the largest commercial seed companies, even in those crops their output probably accounts for less than one-third of global commercial volume.
These are very specific quantitative statements. Can you provide your sources? it seems like whatever this is from is overall very interesting to read.
I would have read it as a typo, but they did use it twice.
There are many other examples. Often, they are mixed with sentimentalism or sensationalism (and these examples might be, too-- they're the result of 5 seconds of Googling). But beneath the ones I've read/watched, there's clearly some truth.
[0] https://modernfarmer.com/2015/09/seeding-fear-the-story-of-a... [1] https://www.rt.com/news/206787-monsanto-india-farmers-suicid...
But as a footnote, the sibling comment here happens to also be correct: like any truly effective propaganda outlet, RT leverages a mix of largely legitimate / mundane news along with a certain proportion of fake or distorted news. But for the sake of simplicity it's best to stop citing RT or feeding it attention of any other form, altogether.
Monsanto is a modern day Mafia cartel, it's insane.
http://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2012/10/18/163034053/top...
This is not true. This NPR article, written by the same author as top link, was already linked above: http://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2012/10/18/163034053/top...
This whistleblower guy at the University of Missouri, his career is over. Monsanto will see to that through either withdrawing its funding to their research programs, or by funding them even more, with the quid-pro-quo that this guy is fired for some unrelated reason, like phony performance reviews, or perhaps allegations of him sleeping with a student.
Hire extremely attractive men and women to go to farms and sell some 'Santo Seed.
According to one of the side bars, disputes between farmers have already led to one death.
https://www.dtnpf.com/agriculture/web/ag/news/article/2016/1...