News | Competing with reality
Two major biotech companies, which should b locking horns in 'healthy' competition to win the agri-GM race, seem to be holding hands instead.
Monsanto and BASF are entering into a long-term joint venture, supplying three quarters of a million dollars each, to develop high-yielding and drought resistant crops. A second agreement is falling into place to research nematode (root-worm) control. The crops targeted are maize, soya, cotton and oilseed rape. By working together the companies hope to generate a greater number of viable research projects , accelerate the development of new products and bring a greater number of traits to the market at a faster speed. Once all this has happened, by the first half of the next decade, Monsanto will commercialise the successful products and receive 60% of the profits.
In another, rather unusual move, Monsanto has asked the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to increase regulations in connection with one of its GM products.
The reason seems to be the new US consumer trend of avoiding dairy from cows injected with Monsanto's recombinant bovine growth hormone, usually referred to as rBGH or rBST (see BYE, BYE, BST – News, March 2007). The biotech company was finding its competitors able to make claims like:
- “By not using rBST, we protect the health of our cows, their milk and our customers.”
- “We treat our cows with love not rBGH
- milk drinkers are to be “congratulated” for “the decision to go rBGH free”.
Monsanto's complaint is that this is unfair and has asked the FDA and FTC to act to restrict such labeling.
Fair? Judge for yourself.
Milk from cows treated with rBGH contains traces of rBGH, elevated growth factor IGF1, differences in nutrient (long-chain fatty acids and amino-acid) composition, and is often contaminated by antibiotics. These artifacts might be the reason the milk has been linked to ovarian hyperstimulation, thyroid cysts and prostate enlargement. There is a (very reasonable) perception that it is implicated in premature puberty and the epidemic of breast, colon and prostate cancers in the US during the last decade. Europe has banned its use because of known links to lameness, mastitis, digestive problems, reduced fertility and burn-out in the cows treated.
OUR COMMENT
The biotech industry is finding itself competing with reality at last. The promises of GM are now emerging as the baseless hype they have always been.
GM crops are too inefficient to withstand any competition:
- they are too expensive
- they take too long to develop
- they will never be good enough to sell on their own merit, leading to an endless cycle of very expensive marketing campaigns (hence the 60% profit share to Monsanto for this part of the venture), and an endless drive to redesign, repackage and replace the GMOs on the market with something different before anything can be seen to go wrong (see GM FADS – News, April 2007).
- the only options will remain the same four crops destined for an undiscriminating commodity non-food, market
- health-conscious consumers don't want them, and this sentiment is spreading.
And all this even with the benefit of US agricultural subsidies plus the patents with which the biotech industry grips the market (see PATENT INSANITY – News, April 2007)
OUR COMMENT
If you have friends or relatives in US, encourage them to source rBGH-free milk. They can check out the companies which supply hormone-free dairy at www.foodandwaterwatch.org.
They might like to read a book on the subject, described by Arpad Pusztai as 'exciting reading for all': Samuel Epsteind's What's in your Milk?
SOURCES
- Associated Press 21.03.07
- Monsanto and BASF Press Release 21.03.07
- Journal of Reproductive Medicine May 2006
- OpEdNews 7.04.07
- Food and Water Water Watch 5.04.07