Community | April 15, 2010 | 17 comments

Bayer admits GMO contamination out of control

source: http://www.naturalnews.com/028585_GMOs_Bayer.html

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Vierotchka
Drug and chemical giant Bayer AG has admitted that there is no way to stop the uncontrolled spread of its genetically modified crops.

"Even the best practices can't guarantee perfection," said Mark Ferguson, the company's defense lawyer in a recent trial.

Two Missouri farmers sued Bayer for contaminating their crop with modified genes from an experimental strain of rice engineered to be resistant to the company's Liberty-brand herbicide. The contamination occurred in 2006, during an open field test of the new rice, which was not approved for human consumption. According to the plaintiffs' lawyer, Don Downing, genetic material from the unapproved rice contaminated more than 30 percent of all rice cropland in the United States.

"Bayer was supposed to be careful," Downing said. "Bayer was not careful and that rice did escape into our commercial rice supplies."

The plaintiffs alleged that in addition to contaminating their fields, Bayer further harmed them financially by undermining their export market. When the U.S. Department of Agriculture announced the widespread rice contamination, important export markets were closed to U.S. producers. A report from Greenpeace International estimates the financial damage of the contamination at between $741 million and $1.3 billion.

Bayer claimed that there was no possible way it could have prevented the contamination, insisting that it followed not only the law but also the best industry practices. The jury disagreed, finding Bayer guilty of carelessness in handling the genetically modified crops. The company was ordered to pay farmers Kenneth Bell and Johnny Hunter $2 million.

"This is a huge victory, not only for Kenny and me, but for every farmer in America who was harmed by Bayer's LibertyLink rice contamination," Hunter said.

According to Hunter, the company got "the wake-up call they deserved."

Bayer is still being sued by more than 1,000 other farmers from Missouri, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi and Texas.
  1. groups:
    Community,   Human Rights,   FOODIES: UNITE,   Organic,   2 more
  2. tags:
    Agriculture,  Farming,  GMO,  Farmers,  3 more
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17 comments // Bayer admits GMO contamination out of control

  • jubal
    • +1
      jubal  

    • Hurray for these farmers, There is justice from time to time when you have a jury. Some juries can see the truth and decide fairly.

    • 2 years ago
  • artemis6
  • bocky10
    • +2
      bocky10  

    • Every time I read something with these types of implications (ie., contaminating a major food source) I think about the fact that humanity has advanced technologically to the point where we could very easily destroy ourselves in any one of a million different ways.

    • 2 years ago
  • observer2121
  • CaptB
    • +2
      CaptB  

    • Has anyone ever heard of I.G. Farben? It is a conglomerate that Bayer belonged to back in the early 1900's that drove the European economy. The I.G. Farben conglomerate had some work factories in Dachau and Auschwitz. The Nuremberg trials let the 75 I.G. Farben CEO's off the hook, and the S.S. officers involved with the I.G. Farben corporation dealing with the working conditions at the camp didn't fair so well.

      Bayer was forced to produce aspirin and things that helped the world for 50 or so years after their little mistake. It doesn't surprise me they were careless in their handling of these genetic crops.

    • 2 years ago
  • Vierotchka
  • CaptB
    • +2
      CaptB  
    • Vierotchka:

      Ah yes, good old Zyklon B. The Bush family is disgusting in their accumulation of wealth. However, there are many more families that have done the same thing in the pursuit of millions. It often makes me wonder if you become a millionaire do you have to do unethical and immoral things to make it?

    • 2 years ago
  • jubal
  • CaptB
    • 0
      CaptB  
    • jubal:

      I don't know at what level wealthy is for a dastardly deed to take place. But lets just say over $100,000,000 is the level of wealth that something was done that is questionable. Oprah and Tom Cruise may be a few that are good people. Donald Trump has definitely ruined people and he may have done unethical things, but not a bad person? Bill Gates has ruined companies and people in the rise to the top. Wal-Mart, enough said. Bayer corporation. I.G. Farben and the conglomerate. I hate to tax them and take their money away to spread it out, we do need capitalism to an extent. Ugh, no easy answers.

    • 2 years ago
  • JanforGore
  • JanforGore
    • +3
      JanforGore  
    • Image
    • JanforGore:

      http://current.com/news/92094688_bayer-must-pay-1-5-m-to-ak-ms-rice-farmers-for-...

      Hopefully we will see more farmers filing suits. It was a given that transgenic contamination would occur thus putting many small organic farmers out of business and cross pollinating crops and these companies knew it.

      Just think of all the GM industrial pharma crops that are not food blowing on food crops.

      And soon to come, GE trees.

      Disturbing? Yes.

      Insidious? Yes.

      Are there major implications for the survival of species in regards to killing biodiversity?

      No doubt, as we are already seeing it playing out.

      However, the few of us who have been SCREAMING about this and persevering are still ignored by the media in America.

      This is a Vanguard story if ever I saw one.

    • 2 years ago
  • JanforGore
  • bailey78
    • +2
      bailey78  

    • They must be getting ready to ask for some kind of Bail-out. Just wait in six to eight months they are going to ask for something from US.

    • 2 years ago
  • fun_size
    • +1
      fun_size  

    • See i love it when people argue in favor of privatization. Sure the government sucks and is corrupt to a certain extent. But corporations? Corporations have NO directive other than making a profit. Thanks Bayer and Monsanto and all those other corporations out there for poisoning people and the Earth itself with your GMO crops.

    • 2 years ago
  • onechance
  • ampersand
    • +2
      ampersand  

    • "According to the plaintiffs' lawyer, Don Downing, genetic material from the unapproved rice contaminated more than 30 percent of all rice cropland in the United States."
      Bayer claims that they followed "industry best practice" in introducing this strain of genetically modified rice resistant to Bayer's own pesticides.
      As industry sets it's own "best practice" that suits them very well.
      In terms of its implications, this is probably one of the most disturbing news stories I've ever seen.

    • 2 years ago
  • fun_size
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