-Caveat Lector- <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/"> </A> -Cui Bono?- Dear Frito-Lay: The letter below is confusing, but reading between the lines, I understand that you have come under "regulatory agency" pressure to include GE/FrankenFood corn in your products? I am writing on behalf of a loose coalition of concerned food consumer groups. Regrettably, for the time being - we shall be forced to place your products firmly within the DO NOT PURCHASE list, along with the recommendations of Deutsche Bank - who recommends that it's investment clients divest themselves of ANY and ALL holdings in the dangerous and extremely CONTROVERSIAL biotech farce, which is supported primarily by Monsanto and a few others with well-greased politicking in the U.S - support which has ALREADY cost Monsanto MORE THAN ONE-THIRD of it's stock value in the last 14 months! They have now changed their name in attempting to evade reaping the crop they've planted by trying to fool consumers into accepting untested and unsafe products through political bullying and bad-science proclamations where some egghead is paid to drivel on about how "safe" this insanely UNSAFE and UNTESTED plan to feed people with potentially mutagenic FrankenFood is. I understand that your corn comes from growers under contract to you, and you should have the right (in fact you DO have the right, and the RESPONSIBILITY) to make a decent and honorable decision to allow consumers to purchase food in the supermarkets, NOT UNTESTED FRANKEN-"food." May I ask which agencies were involved and what form this pressure took? Perhaps we can help you to find the courage of your convictions in standing up to this pressure; if you will name some names, we will do all we can to help you resist the pressure, and exercise your earlier, more honest, responsible and truthful decision NOT to include untested and potentially dangerous FrankenFoods in your products. I have reproduced, below your reply, an excerpt from an article in the Washington Post which you may wish to consider before numbly giving in to bullying tactics that place you within the ranks of demonic corporate criminals such as Monsanto, purveyor through politicking, fraudulent "scientific" reports and other criminal means of the deadly poison Aspartame - in diet sodas and dozens of other "food" products thus rendered poisonous. Dave Hartley http://www.asheville-computer.com/dave -----Original Message----- From: Affairs, Consumer [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Sent: Friday, March 10, 2000 1:09 AM To: Dave Subject: Re: FrankenFood / GE corn Thank you for contacting Frito-Lay. We are always pleased when our consumers take the time to share their thoughts with us. Now that there is a renewed interest in biotechnology by regulatory agencies and some consumer concern exists, we did not feel it appropriate to ask our growers to include bt crops in what they sell us. Just like other food companies, Frito-Lay relies on and supports the regulatory agencies charged with safeguarding our food supply when sourcing ingredients for our products. These agencies continue to report that genetically modified ingredients are perfectly safe. Since we are also a large buyer of agricultural commodities, and more than a quarter of the North American crop is derived from biotechnology, just like other food companies, we could have biotechnology ingredients in our products. Thank you for taking the time to contact Frito-Lay. We hope this information is helpful. Frito-Lay Consumer Affairs Reference #: AAAA-4GL5ME ____________________________________________________________________________ ____ _ http://wpni.com/wp-srv/business/daily/oct99/monsanto26.htm Crop Busters Take On Monsanto By Justin Gillis and Anne Swardson Washington Post Staff Writers Tuesday, October 26, 1999; Page E1 The face on the giant video screen looming above the hotel conference room was drawn and ashen. Robert Shapiro, chief executive of Monsanto Co., was admitting corporate sin to his worst adversaries. "We have probably irritated and antagonized more people than we have persuaded," he told a conference organized by Greenpeace, the environmental group. "Our confidence in this technology and our enthusiasm for it has, I think, been widely seen--and understandably so--as condescension or indeed arrogance." It was an extraordinary admission for the chief executive of one of America's proudest companies. Shapiro promised to stop lecturing and start listening in Monsanto's campaign to sell the world on the benefits of genetically modified food. As a concession to his critics, he promised never to deploy a gene dubbed "terminator" that might have protected Monsanto's commercial interests by producing sterile seeds after one generation. No company has bet more than Monsanto on genetically modified foodstuffs. No company believed more deeply in their value--and potential profitability. And now no company is suffering more, in terms of finances, stock price and image, from the international debate about the safety of those products. Concern about gene-altered food is spreading from Europe, where it has bordered on panic for more than a year, to North America and Asia. Baby-food producers in the United States, grocery chains in Europe, even a Mexican tortilla maker have sworn off the use of genetically modified corn and soybeans. Monsanto is a profitable company, thanks in part to a pharmaceutical unit that has launched the most successful new product in the history of the drug business. But nervousness about the long-term future of agricultural biotechnology seems to have overwhelmed whatever short-term regard investors might have for the company's income statements. Monsanto stock has lost more than a third of its value in the last 14 months, and analysts believe that unless there's a sharp upturn in the stock price soon, company executives could be forced into radical changes, possibly including breaking Monsanto into pieces. That would shatter the company's strategy of using its broad platform of genetic research to make simultaneous headway on better crops and improved human drugs. "Their big shareholders are making a stink," said James Wilbur, a managing director at Salomon Smith Barney Inc. who follows Monsanto closely. "Monsanto has talked about whether their model as a life-science company is going to work anymore." Monsanto won't comment on specific restructuring scenarios raised by analysts. Nicholas Filippello, the company's chief economist, said in an interview with Reuters that it would be premature to adopt big changes just because the stock price is depressed. "We have been receiving a lot of free advice from Wall Street recently," he said. "We are always looking at strategic options." Monsanto's customers, including America's farmers, have been watching the growing controversy with alarm. Over the past three years they had enthusiastically embraced gene-altered crops. Now many of their overseas buyers are balking. Agricultural economists are scrambling to offer guidance. Hearings are under way in Congress. Environmental and industry groups are locking horns in a pitched public-relations battle. This fall and beyond, farmers will make decisions that will largely determine the future of Monsanto and other companies involved in agricultural biotechnology: Should they stick with genetically modified crops for the next few years or abandon them in favor of more traditional varieties? Seeds of Change It was only a few years ago that some of the world's leading chemical and agricultural firms peered into the future and concluded that new knowledge about the workings of genes would transform the planet's food supply. At least a half-dozen major chemical companies, long players in the market for pesticides and herbicides, rushed to remake themselves. Some shed chemical businesses that had been their lifeblood for a century and adopted a new emphasis on genetic research. But none went farther than Monsanto, of St. Louis, whose scientists had pioneered much of the new technology. Monsanto snapped up seed companies, took on debt, sold off its chemical unit and put itself through other wrenching changes to bring new crops to market. Farmers soon heard sales pitches about the benefits of gene-altered crops from companies such as Monsanto and Novartis AG, and they bit hard. By industry estimates, 55 percent of the soybeans and 35 percent of the corn produced in the United States this year contained genetic alterations. There were rumblings of dissent from environmental and food-safety groups early on, but Monsanto was aggressive in dismissing such concerns. The company printed glossy color brochures tracing its decades of gene research, and recent annual reports were hymns to the benefits of biotech. In its 1997 annual report, the company went so far as to publish "Monsanto's Law," a genetic corollary of a famous Silicon Valley maxim about computer chips. Monsanto's Law posited a skyrocketing level of genetic discovery--and implied that Monsanto's fortunes would be heading for the sky, too, if only investors would be bold enough to come along for the ride. Fast forward to 1999, and it looks like somebody turned the charts upside down. The company's shares took a nose dive a year ago when a merger deal fell apart. The deal with deep-pocketed American Home Products Corp. might have helped Monsanto, heavily in debt from restructuring, weather the present storm. The shares have been held down all this year by worries about biotech crops. Wilbur, of Salomon Smith Barney, estimates that Monsanto's pharmaceutical unit, G.D. Searle & Co., is worth about $32 a share, in part because it is enjoying blockbuster sales of a new drug called Celebrex, which treats arthritis pain and may be useful in other ailments. If Wilbur's estimate is right, investors are valuing the rest of Monsanto, an enterprise with revenues in the billions, at a little less than $8 a share. (Monsanto stock, which in August 1998 peaked at $62.72 1/2, closed yesterday on the New York Stock Exchange at $39.18 3/4.) To put it another way, Monsanto's association with agricultural biotech has led investors to ignore most of the value of the company's parts. Wilbur--who believes Monsanto shares have taken an unjust beating--suggests that selling off Searle might be one way to unlock value for shareholders. At the very least, the growing controversy is likely to dampen the willingness of investors to pour new money into agricultural biotechnology and to slow down the expected returns from already completed research. By all accounts, Monsanto executives are determined to continue pursuing biotech crops while figuring out a kinder, gentler way to sell the public on the benefits. At most, the change heralded by Shapiro's Greenpeace speech on Oct. 6 was one of tone, not substance. As he himself said, "we continue to believe in this technology." "It's important for us to understand what people are thinking and feeling and saying," said David A. Fischhoff, a former Monsanto executive who runs a gene-research venture funded by the company. "But I don't hear anything in Monsanto that would indicate that people don't still see the tremendous promise that the technology has." Critics of Monsanto, including some generally supportive of the company's goals, aren't convinced that Shapiro's mea culpa will produce even a tone change, must less a substantive change of direction. "We have never come across a company where the barriers were so strong," said John Elkington, who runs a London firm, SustainAbility, that spent 18 months trying to help Monsanto find common ground with its critics before finally quitting in January. "They are happy to invite the outside world in to discuss, but there is still a barrier to really listening to what people are saying." The trait, he added, "is hard-wired. It's almost genetically programmed." 'Frankenstein Food' Monsanto's biotech crops are the fruit of a technology developed in the 1970s that allowed scientists to directly manipulate DNA, the substance that regulates all life. The new technique offered a quantum leap over the old method--selective breeding--whereby people created desirable changes in crops and animals. Scientists would no longer be constrained by species barriers; they could take a gene for a fish and try it in a plant, or a gene from a firefly and stick it in a cow. Researchers have created scores of potentially useful foods containing genetic alterations. But so far only a handful have gained wide acceptance in the marketplace. One of them involves a germ found in soil, Bacillus thuringiensis, that produces a toxin that destroys the digestive tracts of worms but is harmless to people and other mammals. Anyone can buy powder containing the toxin at garden shops. But it is expensive, and it is destroyed by sunlight and washed away by rain. So scientists at several companies decided to produce a continuous supply of toxin in the crops themselves. They isolated a gene that tells the bacterium how to produce worm toxin, then inserted that gene directly into plants. The ultimate result: varieties of corn, cotton and potatoes that produce their own insecticide. Another genetic change that has won farmers' favor involves Roundup, Monsanto's popular, relatively safe weedkiller. Farmers can use it to attack weeds before they plant, but after a crop is in the ground they generally can't spray. Researchers at Monsanto and elsewhere changed that by making genetic modifications in soybean, corn, cotton and canola plants that allow them to resist Roundup. Company-sponsored studies have found these crops safe for people and animals, though critics note there is no long-term research. Starting in 1996, many farmers adopted these changes without hesitation. Genetically modified corn and soybeans moved quickly into export channels. Then came the backlash. European environmental groups were protesting even before ships carrying genetically modified products began arriving in 1996. Their concerns were shared by a public that, while not very well-educated about what gene-alteration was, was deeply concerned about food too far removed from nature. Headlines about "Frankenstein Food" appeared in the British tabloid press. In France and Germany, polls--including private polls commissioned by Monsanto--showed overwhelming majorities against genetically modified food. No less a personage than Charles, Prince of Wales, weighed in. In an opinion article, the future king of England wrote that genetic alteration "raises crucial ethical and practical considerations. I happen to believe that this kind of genetic modification takes mankind into realms that belong to God, and to God alone." Under pressure, European food producers and grocery chains swore off genetically modified ingredients. In some cases, U.S. imports were pulled from grocery shelves. Late last week, a European panel decided that foods containing more than 1 percent gene-altered ingredients will be subject to mandatory labeling. Recently, European environmental groups have joined forces with compatriots in the Americas and Asia to mount a worldwide assault on gene-altered crops. In a few recent instances, radical environmentalists have vandalized U.S. crop-testing plots. After one act of vandalism at the University of California at Davis, a group calling itself Reclaim the Seeds issued a communique that read: "We proclaim these acts as self-defensive measures on behalf of all beings against Monsanto, UCD and the university system's corporate boot-licking and the global genetic engineering takeover." A Culture Clash In the view of analysts in Europe, some controversy there was probably inevitable, given European sensitivities over food. But as these analysts see things, Monsanto made matters worse by its conduct. The company was widely seen as uninterested in European tastes, opinions and culture. An expensive Monsanto advertising campaign backfired amid the perception that the company was talking down to people. Monsanto's strategy "was a total gift to the environmental pressure groups here," said British environmental consultant Simon Propper. Shapiro, Monsanto's chief, basically acknowledged this point in his recent speech. U.S. farmers began feeling the heat in earnest this year, when large grain processors such as the Archer Daniels Midland Co. asked them to separate genetically modified crops from older varieties. The processors want to be able to offer their customers grains and beans free of genetic alterations, and they are even willing to pay a small premium for such commodities. But the request is difficult for farmers, who often don't have the facilities or the extra operating funds to segregate their crops. That has prompted many farmers to consider dropping or cutting back on genetically modified crops next year. How worried farmers are depends, though, on where they're located. In many states, most corn and soybeans are used for domestic animal feed, and so far meat producers have no qualms about genetically modified grain. But in states such as Iowa and Illinois, which send a high proportion of their crops overseas, farmers are worried. Indeed, corn and soybean growers in these states seem to have cut to the core of the present issue faster than the executives of big corporations. "We have a product we need to sell," said Mark Lambert, spokesman for the Illinois Corn Growers Association. "If the customer is not willing to buy it, we'd better find out what they are willing to buy." © 1999 The Washington Post Company reproduced for private non-profit informational use only <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/">www.ctrl.org</A> DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. Proselytizing propagandic screeds are not allowed. Substance—not soap-boxing! These are sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory'—with its many half-truths, misdirections and outright frauds—is used politically by different groups with major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought. That being said, CTRL gives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and always suggests to readers; be wary of what you read. CTRL gives no credence to Holocaust denial and nazi's need not apply. Let us please be civil and as always, Caveat Lector. ======================================================================== Archives Available at: http://home.ease.lsoft.com/archives/CTRL.html http:[EMAIL PROTECTED]/ ======================================================================== To subscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email: SUBSCRIBE CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED] To UNsubscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email: SIGNOFF CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Om
