Monsanto's Greatest Hits
As industrial and chemical innovations of the 20th century came and went, Monsanto was there

San Jose Metro, May 11, 2000

MONSANTO has spent the entire 20th century in pursuit of profit through science, from Saccharin to aspirin, from Agent Orange to Round Up. Here's a chronology of company pursuits over the past 100 years.

1901--Founder John Francis Queeny names Monsanto Chemical Works after his wife, Olga Mendez Monsanto.

1902--The company manufactures its first product, Saccharin. The U.S. government later files suit over the safety of Saccharin, but loses.

1917--Monsanto starts producing aspirin.

1929--Monsanto acquires Rubber Services Laboratories

1935--Monsanto goes into the soap and detergents industry, starts producing phosphorus.

1938--The company goes into the plastic business.

1939-1945--Monsanto conducts research on uranium for the Manhattan Project in Dayton, Ohio. Dr. Charles Thomas, who later served as the company's chairman of the board, was present at the first test explosion of the atomic bomb.

1943--Massive Texas City plant starts producing synthetic rubber for the Allies in World War II.

1955--Monsanto buys Lion Oil refinery, starts producing petroleum-based fertilizer.

1959--Monsanto sets up Monsanto Electronics Co. in Palo Alto, begins producing ultra-pure silicon for the high-tech industry, in an area which would later become a Superfund site.

1969--Produces Lasso herbicide, better known as Agent Orange, which was used as defoliant by the U.S. Government during the Vietnam War. "[Lasso's] success turns around the struggling Agriculture Division," Monsanto's web page reads.

1976--RoundUp is commercialized, becoming the world's top-selling herbicide.

1976--Monsanto produces Cycle-Safe, the world's first plastic soft-drink bottle. The bottle, suspected of posing a cancer risk, is banned the following year by the Food and Drug Administration.

1981--G.D. Searle gets FDA approval for NutraSweet (Monsanto completes its acquisition of Searle in 1985).

1982--Monsanto scientists genetically modify a plant for the first time.

1986--Monsanto found guilty of negligently exposing a worker to benzene at its Chocolate Bayou Plant in Texas. It is forced to pay $100 million to the family of Wilbur Jack Skeen, a worker who died of leukemia after repeated exposures.

1986--At a 1986 congressional hearing, medical specialists denounce a National Cancer Institute study disputing that formaldehyde causes cancer. Monsanto and DuPont scientists helped with the study, whose author provided results to the Formaldehyde Institute industry representatives nearly six months before releasing the study to the EPA, labor unions and the public.

1986--Monsanto spends $50,000 against California's anti-toxics initiative, Proposition 65. The initiative prohibits the discharge of chemicals known to cause cancer or birth defects into drinking water supplies.

1987--Monsanto is one of the companies named in an $180 million settlement for Vietnam War veterans exposed to Agent Orange.

1988--A federal jury finds Monsanto Co.'s subsidiary, G.D. Searle & Co., negligent in testing and marketing of its Copper 7 intrauterine birth control device (IUD). The verdict followed the unsealing of internal documents regarding safety concerns about the IUD, which was used by nearly 10 million women between 1974 and 1986.

1990--EPA chemists allege fraud in Monsanto's 1979 dioxin study, which found exposure to the chemical doesn't increase cancer risks.

1990--Monsanto spends more than $405,000 to defeat California's pesticide regulation Proposition 128, known as the "Big Green" initiative. The initiative is aimed at phasing out the use of pesticides, including Monsanto's product alachlor, linked to cancer and global warming.

1991--Monsanto is fined $1.2 million for trying to conceal discharge of contaminated waste water into the Mystic River in Connecticut.

1993--The Food and Drug Administration approves Posilac bovine somatropin (BST).

1995--Monsanto is sued after allegedly supplying radioactive material for a controversial study which involved feeding radioactive iron to 829 pregnant women.

1995--Monsanto ordered to pay $41.1 million to a waste management company in Texas due to concerns over hazardous waste dumping.

1995--The Safe Shoppers Bible says that Monsanto's Ortho Weed-B-Gon Lawn Weed Killer contains a known carcinogen, 2,4 D. Company officials argue that numerous studies have found no link to cancer.

1997--The Seattle Times reports that Monsanto sold 6,000 tons of contaminated waste to Idaho fertilizer companies, which contained the carcinogenic heavy metal cadmium, believed to cause cancer, kidney disease, neurological dysfunction and birth defects.

1999--Monsanto opens its Beautiful Sciences exhibit at Disneyland.

1999--After international criticism, Monsanto agrees not to commercialize "Terminator" seeds.

2000--Merges with Pharmacia & Upjohn, changes its name to Pharmacia Corporation.

Monsanto, the world's dominant biotech company and a leader of the reported $6 million effort by corporate special interests to defeat Measure 27, is one of the most reviled and controversial companies in the world.

Now, the company that made Agent Orange and PCBs wants to convince Oregonians that we shouldn't know what's in our food. Should we let them make that decision for us?

Check the links below to find out what kind of trouble Monsanto has gotten itself into in recent years.

The horrific saga of
Anniston, Alabama: Conduct "atrocious and utterly intolerable in civilized society"

From Washington Post article, February 23, 2002, page A1:

"An Alabama jury yesterday found that Monsanto Co. engaged in 'outrageous' behavior by releasing tons of PCBs into the city of Anniston and covering up its actions for decades, handing 3,500 local residents a huge victory in a landmark environmental lawsuit.

"The jury in Gadsden, Ala., a town 20 miles from Anniston, held Monsanto and its corporate successors liable on all six counts it considered: negligence, wantonness, suppression of the truth, nuisance, trespass and outrage. Under Alabama law, the rare claim of outrage typically requires conduct 'so outrageous in character and extreme in degree as to go beyond all possible bounds of decency so as to be regarded as atrocious and utterly intolerable in civilized society.'" Read the full story

Monsanto hid decades of pollution / PCBs drenched Alabama town, but no one was ever told -- Washington Post, Jan. 1, 2002

"The people are dying. Even the houses are dying."
80-year-old African-American resident of Anniston, Alabama, while observing the bulldozing of houses in his neighborhood as a result of PCB contamination caused by a Monsanto factory

Anniston: The people vs. Monsanto -- Guardian (UK), June 5, 2000. "Problem: Damage to the ecological system by contamination from polychlorinated biphenyl (PCB). Legal liability: Direct lawsuits are possible. The materials are already present in nature having done their "alleged damage". All customers using the products have not been officially notified about known effects nor [do] our labels carry this information." Memo from Monsanto committee studying PCBs, 1969

Senators assail EPA on Alabama PCB cleanup -- Washington Post, April 20, 2002." A bipartisan Senate tagteam piled on the Environmental Protection Agency yesterday for its handling of PCB-saturated Anniston, Ala., blasting Bush administration officials for conflicts of interest and accusing the agency of ignoring the city's problems for years."

Ashcroft and his donors: Did Monsanto buy itself an attorney general? -- St. Louis Post-Dispatch, April 2, 2002. "As a U.S. senator, John Ashcroft received more than $50,000 in campaign contributions from Monsanto and its spin-off chemical company, Solutia Inc. So last week, when Attorney General Ashcroft's Justice Department and Solutia announced a deal for the cleanup of toxic PCBs in Alabama, the people suing Solutia were quick to make a connection."

Monsanto liable for the world's worst PCB contamination -- Monsanto Sucks.com, Feb. 2002

PCB contamination trial against Monsanto, Solutia begins -- AP, Jan. 10, 2002

Report: Anniston's Monsanto discharged mercury -- AP, July 23, 2001

The inside story: Anniston, Alabama -- from Chemical Industry Archives, a project of the Environmental Working Group. "The Anniston Collection consists of 4,000 pages of court records and EPA Superfund documentation concerning Monsanto's PCB poisoning of Anniston, Alabama."

Environmental justice case study: The People of Anniston, Alabama vs. Monsanto -- University of Michigan

PCBs

Conspiracy of silence / For more than 50 years, three of America's largest corporations have known that PCBs are deadly. But they were too busy making money to tell you -- Sierra Magazine, 1998

Monsanto's PCBs to be here a long time / The damage spreads beyond our borders -- Anniston Star.com opinion by John Peterson Myers of ourstolenfuture.org.

Monsanto hit big for PCB liability -- National Law Journal, March 7, 1994. Jury verdict of $9.7 million in Transwestern Pipeline Co. v. Monsanto Co.

Arctic pollution causing polar bears to change sex -- Independent (UK), Oct. 2, 2002. "Polar bears, Arctic foxes and Inuit peoples are under threat from man-made toxins such as polychlorinated byphenyls (PCBs) that build up in the food chain, new research reveals."

Kids at risk -- U.S. News & World Report, June 19, 2000. "The studies strongly suggested that
substances like PCBs and mercury didn't just cause cancer or birth defects—the only problems for which they were tested in the United States. They also suggested that even at extremely low levels, these substances could affect the developing human brain."

DDT

DDT: a banned insecticide -- Oxford University Department of Chemistry

Pesticide Action Network UK section on DDT

DDT and birds -- Stanford Alumni association

DDT and Africa's war on malaria -- BBC, Nov. 26, 2001

DDT use in U.S. linked to premature births in the 1960s -- National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences press release, July 12, 2001

Extension Toxicology Network write-up on DDT

Agribusiness, biotechnology and war / Wartime profiteering and the disturbing expansion of chemical agriculture -- tompaine.org article by author Brian Tokar, Sept. 2002

Taking control of natural resources

GM wheat portends disaster for Great Plains -- AlterNet, Sept, 9, 2002. "If Monsanto and other biotech companies succeed in their push to allow genetically modified (called GE, GM or GMO) wheat on the market, Leake is afraid he may see his profits based on decades of work go down the drain."

Meet the company that would privatize nature itself -- The Age, Australia, Dec. 15, 1998

Monsanto: Visionary or architect of bioserfdom? / A global socio-economic examination of genetically modified organisms -- By Andrew Hund, Graduate Student of Sociology at Humboldt State University

Monsanto moves to control water resources & fish farming in India & the Third World -- By Vandana Shiva, June, 1999

An interview with Dr. Vandana Shiva -- "The deeper you can manipulate living structures, the more you can control food and medicine"

Caring in agriculture / We need to move away from the violence of science -- Vandana Shiva, Resurgence. "Syugenta and Monsanto are rushing ahead with the mapping and patenting of the rice genome. If they could, they would own rice and its genes, even though the 200,000 rice varieties that give us diverse traits have been bred and evolved by rice farmers of Asia collectively over millennia. Their claim to inventing rice is a violence against the integrity of biodiversity and life-forms; it is a violence against the knowledge of Third World farmers."

Letter on Monsanto -- Vandana Shiva, The Hindu, May 1, 1999. "OVER THE past few years, Monsanto, a chemical firm, has positioned itself as an agricultural company through control over seed - the first link in the food chain. Monsanto now wants to control water, the very basis of life."

Monsanto is now trying to establish its control over water -- Natural Law Party, Wessex

Monsanto attacks an environmental icon, Rachel Carson

The Common Ground Interview with John Robbins -- "When Rachel Carson first wrote Silent Spring, a book which started the environmental movement in this country by exposing the dangers of pesticides, Monsanto tried to destroy her. They mounted a tremendous advertising campaign to discredit her and invalidate her work. They wanted to ruin her in every possible way they could. Now they are trying to do the same with me and others who are voices for the common good and general welfare."

Two women of the soil / A tribute to Lady Eve Balfour and Rachel Carson: inspirations to the organic movement -- Resurgence. "Many agrochemical companies launched a serious offensive trying to rubbish her. One of the most vocal critics was a name now familiar to most of us — Monsanto. And among the attacks were the predictable personal ones. Rachel Carson was denigrated as an 'emotional female alarmist'".

Time Magazine names Rachel Carson among top 100 scientists and thinkers -- "A huge counterattack was organized and led by Monsanto, Velsicol, American Cyanamid--indeed, the whole chemical industry."

Industry attacks on dissent: From Rachel Carson to Oprah -- Laura Orlando, AlterNet.org. "One chemical industry leader, the Monsanto Company, has a long record of going after its critics ... A billion-dollar company when "Silent Spring" first appeared, Monsanto published a parody of Carson's work, called 'The Desolate Year,' in the October 1962 issue of Monsanto Magazine. Since then, Monsanto has become a corporate role model in sugar-coating unpalatable facts and silencing dissent."

Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring and the Beginning of the Environmental Movement in the United States -- "An executive of the American Cyanamid Company complained, 'if man were to faithfully follow the teachings of Miss Carson, we would return to the Dark Ages, and the insects and diseases and vermin would once again inherit the earth.' Chemical manufacturers began undertaking a more aggressive public relations campaign to educate the public on the benefits of pesticide use. Monsanto, for example, published and distributed 5,000 copies of a brochure "parodying" Silent Spring entitled 'The Desolate Year'..."

Reluctant crusader -- Guardian (UK), May 18, 2002. "It made no difference. Carson was well prepared for the attacks; not only would she not be intimidated, she even refused to go out of her way to defend her position, saying the book could look after itself. "

Rachel Carson's Silent Spring -- Environmental History Review, 1993. "The president of Monsanto Corporation set the tone of the ensuing debate, calling Carson 'a fanatic defender of the cult of the balance of nature.'"

Corporate junk science in the media -- by Edward S. Herman

The revolving door: Are Monsanto and the government too cozy?
A growing concern / As biotech crops come to market, neither scientists - who take industry money - nor federal regulators are adequately protecting consumers and farmers -- Mother Jones, January 1997

The revolving door: Monsanto employees and government regulatory agencies are the same people! -- MonsantoSucks.com, 1999

Monsanto and G.W. Bush administration: Who will own the store? -- Robert Cohen of notmilk.com

The world recoils at Monsanto's brave new crops / The St. Louis company's political clout has turned the president and Cabinet secretaries into pitchmen -- St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Dec. 28, 1998. "A $ 7.5 billion company with 25,000 employees needs to be well-connected, and Monsanto works to keep it that way. The company plies political parties equally and recruits people with deep ties in Washington. By virtue of a friendly relationship between Monsanto chief operating officer Robert B. Shapiro and Clinton, Monsanto is identified in Washington as 'a Democratic company.'"

Aspartame
Aspartame is NOT safe -- dorway.com. From the author: "DORway is my WAY of paying back the Internet for the small, hard-to-find (and oblique) article that I almost didn't read... but that literally saved my life. That file was the 1996 FDA list of 92 symptoms of aspartame poisoning. It saved my life where 21 of 21 clueless doctors had failed over a period of ELEVEN years.. "

Aspartame (Nutrasweet) toxicity info center

Abuse of the scientific method seen in Monsanto Aspartame research -- holisticmed.com

sweetpoison.com -- "The danger of aspartame exposed!"

A tale of two sweeteners: Aspartame & stevia -- by Gail Davis. "For more than 20 years, a war has been silently waging in this country. The battlefield is the billion dollar artificial sweetener industry. The combatants are the giant agri-chemical industry and its allied forces, the FDA against a handful of small private companies and concerned citizens on the other. The casualties are the 200 million men, women, and children who regularly consume more than 5,000 food products artificially sweetened with saccharin, acesulfame k, and aspartame."

Saccharin
Saccharin still poses cancer risk, scientists tell federal agency -- Center for Science in the Public Interest press release, 1997

The history, synthesis, metabolism and uses of artificial sweeteners -- Emory University

Saccharin not a cancer agent, expert panel says -- CNN, 1998. "The Center for Science in the Public Interest, a consumer health group, criticized the decision, saying government regulators are being unduly influenced by the diet-food industry."

Panel recommends that saccharin remain on U.S. list of carcinogens -- National Institutes of Health press release, 1997

Roundup

From Pesticide Action Network North America (PANNA):

Roundup—Roundup (active ingredient glyphosate) is Monsanto’s flagship weed killer (or herbicide), accounting for 67% of the company’s total sales or about $2.6 billion annually.1 The amount of Roundup sold has grown by around 20% each year over the past five years.2 Monsanto has expanded its capacity to produce Roundup nearly five-fold since 1992.3

While Monsanto maintains that Roundup is safe, many others disagree, including the New York State Attorney General. Based on its investigation, the Attorney General’s office filed a lawsuit arguing that the company’s advertising inaccurately portrayed Monsanto’s glyphosate-containing products as safe and as not causing any harmful effects to people or the environment. As part of an out-of-court settlement, Monsanto agreed to discontinue use of terms such as “biodegradable” and “environmentally friendly” in all advertising of glyphosate-containing products in New York state and paid US$50,000 toward the state’s costs of pursuing the case.4

There are a number of environmental and human health problems associated with glyphosate. For example, in studies of people (mostly farmers) exposed to glyphosate, exposure is associated with an increased risk of miscarriages, premature birth and the cancer, non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma.5

In one case, Monsanto paid a US$225,000 fine for having mislabeled Roundup containers on 75 separate occasions. It was the largest settlement ever paid for violation of U.S. Worker Protection Standards. The labels had claimed that the restricted entry period after application of Roundup was four, rather than the actual 12 hours.6

Notes
1 Agrow: World Crop Protection News, March 2, 2001.
2 Agrow: World Crop Protection News, January 1, 2000.
3 Monsanto, “A Single Focus,” 2000 Annual Report, http://www.monsanto.com.
4 “Monsanto Agrees to Change Ads and EPA Fines Northrup King,” PANUPS, January 10, 1997; “Monsanto Strategies,” The Guardian (UK), September 17, 1997.
5 Herbicide Factsheet: Glyphosate (Roundup), Journal of Pesticide Reform, Fall 1998, updated November 1998. (http://www.pesticide.org)
6 “EPA reaches settlement with Monsanto over labeling violations,” EPA press release, March 24, 1998.

Monsanto booms - but is heavily dependent on Roundup -- New York Times, Aug. 2, 2001

Studies show Roundup herbicide to be hormone disruptor -- CropChoice News, Sept. 25, 2002

Controversial milk: Bovine Growth Hormone
The dairy debate: Bovine Growth Hormone

Milk, rBGH and cancer -- Rachel's Environment & Health Weekly, #593, April 9, 1998

Milk and the cancer connection -- by Hans R. Larsen, MSc ChE

Monsanto concealed potential rBGH hazards from public -- Rachel's Environment & Health Weekly, #621, October 22, 1998

Monsanto's hormonal milk poses serious risk of breast cancer -- by Samuel S. Epstein, M.D., Professor of Environmental Medicine at the University of Illinois School of Public Health

Terminator Seeds
Monsanto terminator technology: Worldwide famine & starvation -- ethicalinvesting.com

Monsanto's genetically modified seeds threaten world production -- projectcensored.org's top 25 censored stories of 1998

Monsanto puts terminator seeds on the shelf -- Environment News Service, Oct. 6, 1999

Web sites
Corporate Watch -- profile of Monsanto, including sections on influence and lobbying, corporate crimes, and more

Monsanto: World's most unethical and harmful investment -- ethicalinvesting.com

Monsanto's World Wide Web of Deceit

Monsatan: Famine * Plague * Despair -- "Santa or Satan? You decide!" Home of the downloadable song, Food 'n' Health 'n' Hope

Monsanto Corporation Sucks

Monsanto vs. Schmeiser -- "Percy Schmeiser is a farmer from Bruno, Saskatchewan Canada whose Canola fields were contaminated with Monsanto's Round-Up Ready Canola. Monsanto's position is that it doesn't matter whether Schmeiser knew or not that his canola field was contaminated with the Roundup Ready gene and that he must pay their Technology Fee."

Monsanto in the McSpotlight -- From the McSpotlight web site

Monsanto's Crimes -- "Site Aims: to promote concerns where Monsanto actions are detrimental to the environment, and where Monsanto tries to silence such critical exposure.

Foxbghsuit.com: Hidden danger in your milk? Reporters win lawsuit to thwart Monsanto/Fox TV cover up -- Web site of news reporters Jane Akre and Steve Wilson. "Here you will find behind-the-scenes details about how a large share of America’s milk supply has quietly become adulterated with the effects of a synthetic hormone (bovine growth hormone, or BGH) secretly injected into cows…and how pressure from the hormone maker Monsanto led Fox TV to fire two of its award-winning reporters and sweep under the rug much of what they discovered but were never allowed to broadcast."

Organic Consumers Association -- News articles and more about Monsanto

Play the Monsanto shell game / Can you track down Monsanto? -- Environmental Working Group. "When big companies get enough bad publicity what do they do? They change their name, of course ... or do they?"

Ghost town: Times Beach, Missouri
From PRWatch.org: "Monsanto's past record as a chemical manufacturer does not inspire confidence in its environmental stewardship. Witness Times Beach, Missouri. The town was so contaminated with dioxin that in 1982 the federal government ordered it to be evacuated. Monsanto has continually denied any connection with the catastrophe, yet laboratory documents were found showing that large concentrations of PCBs in town soil samples were manufactured by Monsanto."

Why is EPA ignoring Monsanto? -- Rachel's Environment & Health Weekly, #563, Sept. 11, 1997

Venting anger: Another accidental release of dioxin at Times Beach heats up debate over the incinerator's safety -- Riverfront Times, St. Louis, May 15, 1996

Dangerous ground: PCB contamination continues to be overlooked or denied by public regulators and Monsanto -- St. Louis Riverfront Times, Feb. 14, 1996. "First, hundreds of birds started dropping from the rafters like so many miners' canaries. Then dogs and cats began to die. By September 1971, seven horses had perished at the Shenandoah Stables in Moscow Mills, Mo. Before the scourge abated, scores more would die."

Dioxins

Center for Health, Environment and Justice dioxin pages -- Resources include dioxin news, science updates, dioxin contaminated communities and more.

Chemicals that won't go away -- National Wildlife Federation

Criminal investigation of Monsanto Corporation -- EPA memo

Dioxin home page -- Articles and resources

Our Stolen Future -- "This is the official website for Our Stolen Future, the book that brought world-wide attention to scientific discoveries revealing that common contaminants can interfere with the natural signals controlling development of the fetus."

Agent Orange

Agent Orange: The poisoning of Vietnam -- The Ecologist, 1998. "Monsanto was heavily involved in, and was the major financial beneficiary of one of the most shocking scandals of our age."

Monsanto's Agent Orange: The persistent ghost from the Vietnam War -- by Meryl Nass, MD

The legacy of Agent Orange

Monsanto protects itself from product liability -- Rachel's Hazardous Waste News, #383, March 31, 1994

Agent Orange: The poisoning of New Zealand

The Agent Oran age Trials -- Multinational Monitor, 1991

Can we trust the maker of Agent Orange to genetically engineer our food?

Monsanto and the 'drug war' -- Earth Island Journal, Winter 2001-2002. "Agent Orange Redux?"

US in no hurry to resolve Agent Orange legacy -- Asia Times, March 19, 2002

Agent Orange no mystery for some Vietnam children -- Reuters, 2002

Monsanto bullies farmers and others

Monsanto vs. Schmeiser -- Percy Schmeiser is a farmer from Bruno, Saskatchewan Canada whose Canola fields were contaminated with Monsanto's Round-Up Ready Canola. Monsanto's position is that it doesn't matter whether Schmeiser knew or not that his canola field was contaminated with the Roundup Ready gene and that he must pay their Technology Fee.

Percy Schmeiser vs. Monsanto -- news links from biotech-info.net

Monsanto's biotech bullying continues -- ISIS, Oct. 4, 2001. "Giant agbiotech companies such as Monsanto are aggressively imposing a new form of serfdom on North American farming practices. By patenting both naturally occurring gene sequences and genetically modified forms of life, Monsanto can use aggressive lawsuits to ward off any potential rival. At the same time, insidious forms of surveillance and barely concealed threats are whittling away any options farmers have for getting seeds from other suppliers."

Blowin' in the wind -- CBC TV's coverage of Monsanto vs. Percy Schmeiser

Corporate screw job: Monsanto vs. Percy Schmeiser

Lotsa Bull -- populist.com article by Margot Ford McMillen. "Monsanto has now admitted that canola seed --including, perhaps, the seed planted by Schmeiser's neighbor --contains genetic material that should never have left the laboratory. That's right. Monsanto's canola seed planted in Canada and the US contained "GT200," a gene that was never approved for human consumption. Monsanto says it never sold GT200-seed in Canada and wonders how it got there. Clearly, Monsanto can't keep the biotech bull on its side of the fence."

Can I see your license for those plants, sir? -- slashdot.org

Monsanto sues Midwest farmers for saving soybean seeds -- Columbia (Missouri) Daily Tribune, April 5, 2000

Canadian TV documents Monsanto bullying of farmers -- CBC TV, January 10, 2002

Monsanto continues persecuting farmers -- CropChoice News, May 21, 2001

Monsanto used private eye, spies to check on Saskatchewan farmers -- Canadian Press wire, June 6, 2000

Mississippi farmer fights Monsanto over seed saving -- CropChoice News, April 6, 2001

Nelson Farm - A fight against a giant -- Monsanto sues North Dakota
farmer over biotech crop dispute

Monsanto's legal thuggery -- Adbusters article by Michael Colby, 1998

Monsanto and Fox and consumers' right to know -- The Global Citizen. "Well here's a howdy-do. TV station in Florida prepares hard-hitting series questioning safety of grocery-store milk. Large biotech company threatens station with libel suit. Station cancels broadcast, orders reporters to rewrite series. Reporters refuse. Station fires reporters. Reporters sue station."

General Articles/Links
Biotech behemoth in serious trouble / Monsanto admits to mistakes -- Washington Post, Nov. 1, 1999. "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.'"

What else don't they know? / Monsanto reveals that GM soybeans contain 'unexpected gene fragments' -- by Craig Winters, The Campaign to Label Genetically Engineered Foods

Biotechnology food: From the lab to a debacle -- New York Times, Jan. 25, 2001. Gigantic expose detailing how Monsanto has bungled its job of promoting genetically engineered foods, even though it wields enormous power in Washington, D.C.

Playing God in the garden / Fried, mashed or zapped with DNA -- New York Times Magazine article by Michael Pollan, 1998, about Monsanto and the pesticidal potato

Canadian organic farmers sue Monsanto for genetic pollution -- Independent Dispatch, Saskatchewan, Jan. 11, 2002

A biological apocalypse averted -- Earth Island Journal (Winter 2001-02) excerpts from John Robbins' book, The Food Revolution. "...the scientists discovered something else in these experiments, something that sent chills down their spines. They found that the genetically modified bacteria were able to persist in the soil, raising the possibility that, had it been released, the genetically engineered Klebsiella could have become established - and virtually impossible to eradicate."

The fake persuaders / Corporations are inventing people to rubbish their opponents on the Internet -- The Guardian column by George Monbiot, May 14, 2002. "Monsanto knows better than any other corporation the costs of visibility. Its clumsy attempts, in 1997, to persuade people that they wanted to eat GM food all but destroyed the market for its crops. Determined never to make that mistake again, it has engaged the services of a firm which knows how to persuade without being seen to persuade."

Corporate ties and campus labs -- Christian Science Monitor article, June 19, 2001. "The credibility of university research is on the line as industry steps up its funding."

Italian police raid illegal Monsanto GM stockpile -- BBC, March 28, 2001

Biotech soybeans plant seed of risky revolution -- Los Angeles Times, July 1, 2001. "The experience of biotech soy also points up the lack of federal regulation, especially compared with other countries. The soy appeared in processed food even before the manufacturers knew it was there. And though Monsanto conducted extensive safety tests, critics warn that they were inadequate and raise questions about the enormous economic power that a company such as Monsanto wields in this new world."

Monsanto: A profile of corporate arrogance -- by Brian Tokar for Say No to GMOs.org

Monsanto's greatest hits / As industrial and chemical innovations of the 20th century came and went, Monsanto was there -- San Jose Metro, May 11, 2000. "1986--Monsanto found guilty of negligently exposing a worker to benzene at its Chocolate Bayou Plant in Texas. It is forced to pay $100 million to the family of Wilbur Jack Skeen, a worker who died of leukemia after repeated exposures. "

Monsanto doesn't love you -- saviorass.com

Monsanto corporate fact sheet (Available also as a printable PDF file) -- Pesticide Action Network North America (PANNA). "Monsanto is known for producing the dioxin-containing defoliant Agent Orange, which was used extensively in the Vietnam War; for forcing the evacuation of the community of Times Beach, Missouri, by contaminating it with dioxin; and for refusing to accept full responsibility for the PCB contamination of an Alabama town. Monsanto has also gained notoriety for suing a Canadian farmer who unintentionally grew genetically engineered (GE) Roundup Ready canola after pollen from GE seeds drifted into his fields and contaminated his crop. Monsanto’s disregard for corporate social responsibility is summed up in a quote from Phil Angell, Monsanto’s director of corporate communications, to the New York Times, October 25, 1998:'“Monsanto should not have to vouchsafe the safety of biotech food. Our interest is in selling as much of it as possible. Assuring its safety is [the U.S. Food and Drug Administration]’s job.'"

Monsanto is evil -- "These guys are so evil, it's hard to even describe. Monsanto apparently hired a PR company whose employees pretended to be scientists in order to discredit work that made Monsanto look bad."

African scientists condemn Monsanto's latest tactics and call for European support -- Press release, 1998. "More than 24 leading African agriculturalists and environmental scientists representing their countries at the UN have issued a statement to counter Monsanto's arguments. They say Monsanto is using the poor to emotionally blackmail skeptical Europeans by making claims that are blatantly untrue and unproven."

Subvertise.org -- Links to spoof advertisements and graphics such as "Monsanto's Beast Milk" and "Monsanto's beef chunks in a steroid sauce"

Leopards changing spots or foxes in the hen house? / Monsanto officials join leading consumer, environmental groups -- Corporate Crime Reporter (Volume 13, Number 19, May 10, 1999, page 1)

Global opposition causes Monsanto to face uncertain future -- St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Nov. 14, 1999

Monsanto gets pie in the face -- The Global Citizen, Donella Meadows column, March 18, 1999. "As near as I can tell, one trouble with Monsanto is that it is full of brilliant geneticists with no sense of ecology. So serious concerns about the effects of transgenic crops in nature -- the inevitable development of resistance, the possible spread of traits that should not spread -- are waved away."

Monsanto's canola seed contaminated with unapproved varieties -- Center for Food Safety press release, April 17, 2002. "This is genetic pollution of our food supply," explained Joseph
Mendelson, Legal Director for the Center for Food Safety. "And now Monsanto and Aventis are asking the USDA for a cover-up. We are
demanding a full criminal investigation of two the companies, and an inquiry into USDA's actions in not making this matter public."

Biotechnology corporate giants -- CBC TV, 1999. "Since the time the company was founded in 1901, it has produced a number of industrial-use products that in the course of events have been proven to be toxic to human and animal health and the environment."

The Kenmer Brief / Monsanto is striving to take over the world by taking over the biology of food production. They promise us it's perfectly safe. But the company has a disturbing history that is not being reported in the media -- A Planet Waves special report, 1999

Monsanto: A checkered history -- The Ecologist, Sept./Oct. 1998

Monsanto's public relations boomerang -- Synthesis/Regeneration 18 (1999). "Nineteen ninety-eight was a hell of a year for Monsanto and for Monsanto watchers. The company that environmental activists love to hate rolled out a worldwide blitz designed to put a happy face on agricultural biotechnology. But its clumsy efforts often seemed only to further fuel anti-Monsanto anger."

Monsanto: The chemical giant experimenting with our food -- A Greenpeace Report, 1997

Monsanto leaked memo reveals global scope of Frankenfoods -- Genewatch UK, Aug. 17, 2000

Monsanto makes pledge to appease critics -- Reuters, Nov. 27, 2000

Monsanto under attack / Setbacks from Brazil, to Canada, to the U.K. -- In Motion magazine, Nov. 9, 1998

New Monsanto and GMO propaganda -- Le Monde diplomatique, July, 2001. "Multinationals like Monsanto are facing real grassroots opposition in the world, especially over agro-chemicals and GMOs. Monsanto has led the big corporations towards diversionary tactics: they have issued codes of conduct and ethical charters to conceal their real objective of creating value for their shareholders. They are promoting their products as cures
for third world hunger and disease, and as an alternative to the dangers of pesticides. They hope to win over a hostile public with advertising."

Seeds of death / Farmers in India are fighting to ban Monsanto's GM cotton -- Organic Consumers Association. "As Americans continue to consume large quantities of genetically modified foods, farmers across the globe are rising up to block biotech corporations
like Monsanto from pushing engineered crops into their countries."

Toxic drift: Monsanto and the drug war in Columbia -- CorpWatch, June 21, 2001

Amazing disgrace: Monsanto up to its old dirty tricks again -- The Ecologist, May 2002

No new chemical wonders until they clean up the old ones -- Keene Sentinel (NH) column by John Peterson Myers, July 1, 2000. "Monsanto, a company that desperately needs to convince the public that genetically modified organisms represent a boon and not a bane for humanity, had an opportunity recently to demonstrate its good intentions regarding another of its products. Unfortunately the corporation did nothing, leaving the world to wonder whether its pretensions of good citizenship are fiction."

The Monsanto machine / Is Monsanto sowing the seeds of change or destruction? -- Resurgence, Issue 195, by Jennifer Kahn. "Monsanto once manufactured virtually all the world’s PCBs — as well as Agent Orange. But, these days, “life sciences” are more profitable than chemical weapons, so, in 1997, Monsanto spun off its chemical division and has, since 1996, spent $6 billion acquiring seed companies like Cargill International Seed ($1.4 billion) and DeKalb Genetics ($2.3 billion)."

The Monsanto Machine -- In These Times article by Jeffrey St. Clair, March 7, 1999. "Monsanto always has been able to count on the aid of the U.S. government to sedulously promote its products. With the ceaseless encouragement of the Department of Agriculture, American farmers have planted more than 50 million acres of Monsanto's genetically engineered crops over the past four years. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has also played along, acceding to the company's demand that genetically engineered crops not be labeled as such."