Organic Farmer Lawsuit Against Monsanto
Photo Credit: Lily Hoads
One would have to be living under a rock to have not heard
about the Occupy Wall Street movement over the last year. But now we have a new
movement starting “Occupy the food system”, brought to us by Willie Nelson and
the 99%. For those of us unfamiliar with Willie Nelson, he is a famous
singer/songwriter, as well as the president of the Farmer’s Aid Foundation.
Willie was likely unaware of the implications that his song “crazy”, recorded
years ago, would have on the current situations of American farmers.
It truly has become
crazy with over 300,000 organic farmers, organic seed growers, and organic seed
businesses beginning a lawsuit against Monsanto. The lawsuit addresses the
bizarre but not recent issue of Monsanto harassing and threatening organic
farmers with lawsuits of "patent infringement". This “patent infringement”
is threatened if any organic farmer ends up with any trace amount of Monsanto’s
genetically modified seeds on their organic products. Nelson recently made a
request to the national Occupy movement, to declare an "Occupy the Food
System" action against Monsanto and other monopolised farming giants such
as Tyson.
Not only does this lawsuit debate the issue of Monsanto
potentially ruining the organic farmers’ pure seeds and crops with the
introduction of Monsanto’s genetically modified seeds anywhere near the organic farms, but
additionally the use of Monsanto’s
Roundup herbicides, further contaminating the nearby organic farms. This is an
interesting tip of the scales in favour of the cherished farmers of America
considering that not long ago Monsanto made it a practice to take organic
farmers to court, with the claim that these farmers are attempting to steel
Monsanto’s patented seed.
The farmers of course don’t want anything to do with the contaminated
Monsanto seed in the first place. Genetic modification and use of heavy pesticide
are far from organic… the whole reason they are certified organic farmers. They
even have to go to extreme lengths from keeping their crops from being
contaminated by spending allot of extra money and land for buffers which are
hardly effective in deterring the contaminated seed from being swept in by the
wind. But to add on to all of the trouble they go to grow organically now they
have to worry about being sued by the very monster they detest. At this point,
they even have to resort to not growing soybeans, corn, cotton, sugar beets, or
canola what so ever.
As of yet there is no rulling on the pending cases against Monsanto,
but It will be very interesting to see how it all turns out, if the American
Farmer underdogs will finnaly make a comeback against the monopolized giants of the agricultural world, or if their voices will be silenced by expensive lawyers and out of court
settlements. Several documentaries have been made concerning this issue, specifically regarding Monsanto's unethical practices. You can find two of the documentaries as well as a youtube video of Willie Nelson and his wife reading a poem wrote in solidarity of occupy bellow:
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