-Caveat Lector-
----Original Message Follows----
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Rich Winkel)
To: undisclosed-recipients:;
Subject: TRADE: Seed Companies Hauled Into Court
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 1999 01:00:16 -0500 (CDT)
/** ips.english: 472.0 **/
** Topic: TRADE: Seed Companies Hauled Into Court **
** Written 9:07 PM Sep 24, 1999 by newsdesk in cdp:ips.english **
Copyright 1999 InterPress Service, all rights reserved.
Worldwide distribution via the APC networks.
*** 24-Sep-99 ***
Title: TRADE: Seed Companies Hauled Into Court
By Mario Osava and Gumisai Mutume
MEXICO CITY (IPS), Sep 24 - Activists from 30 countries have taken
action against the world's biggest life science companies by
taking them to court over the question of genetically-modified
food which, they say, represents an attempt to free agriculture
from the control of a few.
"The action reflects humanity's growing pre-occupation with its
future," says professor Sebastian Pinheiro of the Federal
University of Rio Grande in Brazil. "Genetically-modified crops
represent an economic threat to agriculture and put humanity's
survival at risk."
Spearheading the drive against big business is US biotechnology
activist and head of the Foundation on Economic Trends, Jeremy
Rifkin. He is leading a campaign that will see activists and
farmers from Asia, Europe, North America and Latin America
challenge the power of the world's most dominant genetic food
engines later this year.
"Transnational companies such as Monsanto and Dupont are not
worried by world hunger or the quality of life of the rest of
humanity. They want power, to dominate the politics of food and
are merely driven by commercial interests," says Pinheiro.
"When the lawsuit gets underway either in the United States or a
foreign court it is billed to become the biggest anti-trust action
in the world with the exception of the Microsoft case."
The activists claim that the likes of Monsanto, DuPont, Pioneer
Hi-Bred, and Novartis are exploiting bio-technology unfairly and
in such a way that they gain control of global agricultural
markets.
Modified crops are protected by patents and contracts. Farmers
who plant them must promise not to keep seeds for future use.
Using new bio-technologies the big corporations are attempting to
extend control to the 45 percent of the world economy that is
based on biological products by using a patent system designed for
machines and making it work with plants and animals, activists
say.
Monsanto, dubbed the "Microsoft of micro-biology", together with
other seed companies also is developing ways to genetically alter
plants so they do not produce usable seeds. This could force
farmers to buy seeds year after year and give these companies
power to dictate the future of plant breeding, activists say.
"A central concern will be that, throughout the history of
civilization, farmers have been able to grow food and sow their
own fields with their own seeds. These companies are trying to
change that," declared US attorney Rich Lewis, one of the many
lawyers involved in the case.
Law firms, operating on a no-win-no-fee basis, are looking for
some provision of anti-trust or contract law that would let Rifkin
challenge the seed restrictions in a state, federal or foreign
court.
Agricultural analysts say that a few big corporations now own 30
percent of the global trade in seed, valued at 23 billion dollars
annually - roughly the gross domestic product of Vietnam.
Five of these companies Monsanto, Novartis, AstraZeneca, Aventis
and DuPont virtually control the entire genetically modified crops
sector, analysts say.
When Monsanto last year bought the seed operations of Cargill in
Africa, Asia, Latin America and Europe for 1.4 billion dollars it
gained control of seed research and production centres in 24
countries and distribution systems in more than 50 others.
The law-suit comes at a time when there is growing concern over
the implications of genetically modified crops and resistance from
certain economic blocs such as the European Union towards the
consumption and import of such crops.
Developing countries have adopted differing positions to genetic
crops, some such as Argentina and Mexico embracing the technology
while others especially in Africa hesitant about the safety of the
science.
In India, Vandana Shiva of the Research Foundation for Science
Technology and Ecology (RFSTE) says the anti-trust action would be
a useful addition to local campaigns like the "Monsanto Quit
India" movement which is over a year old. However, by itself the
action would not be able to do more than create awareness among
farmers who are targets of Monsanto and Cargill.
RFTSE is one of several pressure groups that challenged India's
new patent act in the country's supreme court earlier this year.
The act grants monopolies and marketing rights to drug and agro-
chemical transnationals.
Hundreds of cotton farmers in India's southern Andhra Pradesh
state committed suicide last year following crop failures. They
had bought costly pesticides but could not afford to buy another
batch of seeds.
Brazil, one of the worlds 10 largest economies, has been against
commercialising the biotech sector of the economy. The country's
environment ministry says more studies need to be carried out and
Brazil also is fearful of losing strategic European markets.
At the World Trade Organisation summit in Seattle, scheduled for
November, Africa has lodged a challenge to the patenting of life
forms citing that it could have a devastating impact on
agriculture, the mainstay of the majority of its economies.
To drive the point home, Rifkin currently is seeking a patent on
using DNA splicing to create human-animal hybrids. This is so he
can create mutants with the hope that the U.S. Supreme Court will
then ban the issuance of patents on human life.
"The biotech revolution will force each of us to put a mirror to
our most deeply held values, making us ponder the ultimate
question of the purpose and meaning of existence," notes Rifkin.
In the pending lawsuit, Rikin is assisted by 20 U.S. law firms
including Washington-based Cohen, Milstein, Hausfeld and Toll
which recently won a case that forced Swiss banks to pay 1.25
billion dollars to holocaust survivors.
"The action of these 30 countries can be beneficial to Brazil if
it stimulates the creation of mechanisms to prevention
monopolies," says Antonio Donizeti Beraldo of the National
Confederation of Agriculture which represents farmers rights.
If successful, the challenge will be beneficial to all developing
countries, according to activists.
When the WR Grace firm in the United States took out a patent a
few years ago on a soybean species, it took with it the rights to
control a food crop worth 27 billion dollars in developing
countries. (END/IPS/gm/mo/mk/99)
Origin: ROMAWAS/TRADE/
----
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