1.Advice to Bush: Break up Monsanto
2.Safeway ditches GM hormone in milk
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1.How the World Works: Advice to Bush: Break up Monsanto
Andrew Leonard
http://www.salon.com/tech/htww/2007/01/23/break_up_monsanto/

Alexei Barrionuevo's roundup of all things ethanol in today's New York Times, setting the stage for an expected announcement tonight by President Bush calling for significantly increased ethanol consumption in the United States, is a generally good introduction to the topic. But one fragment caught my eye:

Responding to concerns that there just isn't enough corn to supply expected future demand, Agriculture Secretary Mike Johans was described as "confident that more corn will emerge to ease the pain of higher grain prices, as seed companies improve yields."

Seed companies? Now, who might that be? As of 2005, worldwide, 10 companies controlled about 50 percent of the global seed business. At the top of the heap are just three companies, Monsanto, Dupont and Syngenta. Industry concentration is continuing to proceed apace. Monsanto is currently waiting for antitrust approval to complete its merger with the 11th largest seed company, Delta Pine & Land. All three companies have been snapping up smaller firms at every opportunity.

All three are also huge chemical and pesticide conglomerates that are aggressively pursuing advanced genetic modification technologies. So when Secretary Johans talks about seed companies improving yields, what he's really saying is that a tiny group of huge multinational chemical companies will be introducing a steady stream of new transgenic corn strains, in a frantic attempt to keep innovating humanity's way out of an energy crisis.

Let's take a break today from worrying about whether scientists are properly evaluating the potential risks to human health and the environment from transgenic research. I've only just started reading Denise Caruso's "Intervention: Confronting the Real Risks of Genetic Engineering and Life on a Biotech Planet," a clear contender for best book yet on that topic, and so we'll save a more detailed discussion of the problem for later.

Here's a different angle: A few years back, the USDA publicized research that found that seed industry consolidation had led to a decrease in research and development intensity. In a classic display of what happens when a market is locked up by a small number of players, competition suffers and the pressure to innovate slackens: "...increased competition in R&D," concluded the researchers, "as indicated by low levels of market concentration and the participation of more competing firms in the GM crop approval process, is positively related to R&D intensity. As the number of firms declined through mergers and acquisitions, the intensity of R&D fell."

If President Bush and Mike Johans want to put some muscle behind their faith that new breeds of corn will deliver ever-higher yields, maybe they ought to do something about the continuing consolidation of control over the seed industry. Stop Monsanto's merger with Delta Pine & Land, which will give the St. Louis giant effective control over cotton seed. Even better, break it up. Let a hundred seed companies bloom, instead of just a few.

Just trying to be helpful here. President Bush has some really low poll approval ratings going into tonight's State of the Union speech. It's time for bold moves!
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2.Safeway ditches artificial [GM] hormone in milk
The News-Review, January 22 2007
http://www.newsreview.info/article/20070122/NEWS/70122003

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) - Got Milk? Safeway does but it doesn't have a controversial artificial growth hormone anymore.

The grocer chain said milk suppliers for the grocer's Northwest processing plants have stopped using recombinant bovine growth hormone, or rBGH.

The announcement comes shortly after Starbucks confirmed that milk products in its company-owned coffee shops in Oregon and Washington are free of rBGH.

The artificial hormone is injected into dairy cows to make them produce more milk. It has been tied to increased udder infections and the resulting antibiotic use by dairies, and it has raised fears of greater cancer risks among humans.

Monsanto Co. markets rBGH under the brand name Posilac. Monsanto and many dairy farmers who want increased yields from their herds contend that milk from cows treated with the hormone is identical to that from untreated cows.

In the past two years, however, major dairy names in the Northwest have stopped using the hormone. The Tillamook County Creamery Association started the trend when association’s members upheld a ban on injecting cows with the hormone in a hotly contested vote in March 2005.

The issue resonates with consumers such as Nancy Pulone, a Beaverton mother of two who frequently buys organic milk and produce.

"There's just not enough long-term information that use of this hormone is going to be safe for my children," she said.

Teena Massingill, a Safeway spokeswoman, said some milk jugs in stores already carry labels proclaiming them free of the artificial hormone. All the chain's fluid milk products under its Lucerne brand are expected to carry the labels in the next few months, she said.

"Consumers in the Portland and Seattle area have been very vocal about the issue of rBGH," she said. "So this is basically a response to customer concerns."

Safeway’s decision affects milk supplied to processing plants in Clackamas, Ore., and Bellevue, Wash. Those plants process and package milk circulated in more than 100 Oregon stores and about 170 in Washington, as well as stores in Idaho and Alaska.

The Oregon chapter of Physicians for Social Responsibility has led the fight against the artificial hormone in the Northwest. Rick North, who has run the physicians’ campaign, has made presentations to companies and coordinated letter-writing by individuals.

North said the only remaining major milk processor in Oregon without a ban on rBGH is Fred Meyer -- a contention disputed by the chain.

Melinda Merrill, a Fred Meyer spokeswoman, said that for the past several years the company has requested -- and received -- assurances from its suppliers that they are not using the hormone.

Merrill said the company has chosen not to label its products as free of the artificial hormone because that might lead consumers to think the milk they had bought previously was inferior.

Unlike Safeway and Tillamook, Fred Meyer does not require its milk suppliers to sign a sworn statement that they are not injecting cows with the hormone.