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Monsanto Wins Case Over Patented Canola
c writes "The Supreme Court of Canada says that you're liable if a plant with a patented gene infects your property. If you recall, Schmeiser claims (and research supports) that Roundup Ready canola seeds infected his own crops. Monsanto prosecuted him for patent infringement." Some other links: Monsanto's press release, Globe and Mail story.
I got the impression from the article that the seeds blew into his land from a neigboring farm... probably before they germinated at all. i dont think this is a cross polenation issue.
"In America, first you get the sugar, then you get the power, then you get the women..." -H. Simpson
The Schmeissers admitted that they were aware it was RoundupReady Canola (having tested it specifically), and then they saved the seeds & sowed it the next year in their fields. THIS is what they were being sued over, not the fact that the seeds that blew onto their property germinated on their own. It was the seed saving, of known patented seeds that was considered an infringement.
And you may note, if you read the opinion, that the issue addressed was only the patentability of genetically modified seeds.
Thalia
Canola is the very definition of hearty crop. It is a 3 foot high plant with yellow flowers and once it is established in an area it is almost impossible to get rid of. One of my earliest memories is listeneing to my dad complain about what the canola field across the road did to our lawn. I have absolutely no doubt that this poor guy never touched "Roundup Ready" seed in his life, he didn't have to.
The other interesting factoid is that the damages awarded were $0 because the Schmeissers did not spray their crops with RoundUp, thus they did not receive any benefit from the gene.
please check the article -- this farmer had more than 1000 acres planted and 95% was roundup ready canola. You still think it just "blew there"?
It's already happening:
7
http://www.cropchoice.com/leadstry.asp?recid=87
You've got to laugh. Who would have thought that evolution would be developing it's own roundup resistance. Damn that Charles Darwin.
Maybe the Monsanto executives are creationists.
Deleted
I followed this case quite closely. Despite our highest court ruling in favour of Monsanto, all it would take is this to become an issue in our upcoming federal election (will be called this Sunday), and our patent law will be changed. Once the law is changed, the Monsanto case's precedent will be tossed aside, and we will get back on the right track.
Our (Canada's) patent law is quite out of date, it does not address the issues regarding patenting of genome, plants, organisms, and other living matter. Once it is brought up to date (not when, it would be political suicide for all parties not to protect farmers like Schmeiser), we will get things right.
All parties which are running in every riding have to deal with this the correct way.
- The new Conservative Party of Canada will stand to loose grassroots support if they do not protect the rights of farmers to save seed. Although I wouldn't vote for them because they have yet to release their platform... shuuush... they don't want people to know that yet.
- The Liberal Party of Canada will stand to loose support in Ontario where Schmeiser was situated, although it is slipping because the provincial government did a 180 in the first budget.
- The NDP hates GE food, says there is no viable market for the stuff, it should be labelled, etc etc. They would definitely protect the rights of the farmer to save the seed.
- And the Green Party. This is a given, they don't like GE foods, they don't like GE anything, because it destroys biodiversity.
This is just a temporary setback. The justices here did not fully comprehend the severity of their decision, but they were forced to work within the framework of the laws given to them by Parliament in 1985. Things have changed, and this act of Parliament will be apart of our next election, and will be dealt with the next government.
It's refreshing to see slashdotters responding (for the most part) on the obvious absurdity of this situation.
IM(not so)HO, Monsanto is crap.
Their Roundup Ready agreement, required for people to use their seed, includes the following provisions:
1) a $5/lb. "technology fee" for using the seed.
2) the right for Monsanto to come onto your property, unannounced, and investigate your crops for three or so years after you start using their seed.
3) a ridiculous liability for any damage due to violations of the agreement. The farmer is liable for 10s of times of damage actually caused. I think it is 100, but I'm not 100% sure on this point. This includes accidental cross-pollination of others' crops.
(What's even funnier is that research shows these crops neither require fewer pesticides nor produce greater yields.)
Additionally, because of the new trade regulations and the exporting of Western-style trade and intellectual property agreements across the world, six corporations (Cargill, Monsanto, etc...) virtually control the world grain trade. For example, most countries now, including the UK, there are seed registries from which a farmer must choose seed to grow. Trading of seed, a long-time tradition and promotion of biodiversity, is now illegal in the countries that subscribe to these agreements.
Also, after a "mysterious" adulteration too big for any one farmer to orchestrate in India, millions of livelihoods were lost because the government outlawed traditional mustard seed in favor of imported oils... All the while Monsanto is also engineering seeds that genetically terminate after one generation of crops, which would bankrupt the farmers in poorer countries bound by corporate legislation.
In short, corporations have seriously fucked entire local economies with gestapo policies like the one this article is reporting. It's less than funny, and a little bit more than serious.
If you want more information on this topic, I suggest Vandana Shiva's Stolen Harvest. She is a leading activist on these issues, and the book is a fascinating read.
Dismantle globally, renew locally.
FWIW, Percy Schmeiser denies deliberately planting Monsanto seed, and states that Monsanto is lying outright about the percentage of his crops that were contaminated:
m
http://www.percyschmeiser.com/Monsanto%20Lying.ht
He said, she said?
I very strongly disagree with the idea of being able to patent genetically altered crops, and I'm very suspicious about the motives of companies like Monsanto, but Schmeiser is obviously lying here. A few seeds from your neighbours field blowing across the road can't grow into the volume of crop that he had.
I'm from the same province as Schmeiser and I heard about him long before this whole Monsanto business. A friend of mine worked on a construction project around the area where Shmeiser lives, and Schmeiser was part of a coalition that was concerned about the effects of this project. He was completely uninformed about the entire project, and was an embarassment and liability to the people that were on the same side of the argument as him. Also, if you've ever seen any of the TV interviews with other farmers from around his area you can watch them roll their eyes and shake their heads in digust as soon as his name is mentioned.
Regardless of how you feel about this case, this guy wasn't caught with a few plants that had blown into his field. He was collecting the seeds from the patented plant and planting them himself.
True, but he wasn't actually using the patented genes. If I understand correctly, the genes provide resistance to herbicides, and he wasn't using the herbicide. I always thought that technology was patented for a particular purpose. Evidently not.
Surprised isn't the word. Try pissed. For close to a decade, now. You're thinking about Monsanto's PR-failing terminator seeds. The doo-doo started hitting the fan for them in 1998. They were the ones that would produce sterile seed unless treated with a Monsanto-owned chemical. The problem was that it was possible for the new gene to cross via pollen into neighbors crops. It's one thing to have your organic corn become valueless (and get a hefty legal judgement against you for "stealing") because the wind blows your neighbor's crop pollen your way. It is a completely different thing to discover what happened only next spring, when the only thing coming up in the back 40 is weeds because your saved organic seed *somehow* became sterile.
To their credit, Monsanto DID voluntarily declare they wouldn't use the terminator genes. For an undeclared period. But they've have been granted the patents on them, so it's an ace they can still play.
In a related story, the IRS has recently ruled that the cost of Windows upgrades can NOT be deducted as a gambling loss.
Roundup is not patented, IIRC. The active ingredient is glyphosate. It's marketed under other names like glyphos and touchdown.
Even though all these chemicals are essentially the same, Monsanto has their contracts written in such a way that if you don't use roundup, the seeds have no warranty, and perhaps other "bad things"
My dad farms, grows roundup ready soybeans, and used to sell ag chemicals, as well as being a professional agronomist.
That most excellent champion of justice and personal role model to everyone here on /., Antonin Scalia
"There is no basis in text, tradition, or even contemporary practice for finding in the Constitution a right to demand judicial consideration of newly discovered evidence of innocence brought forward after conviction."
"If the system shocks the dissenter's conscience perhaps they should doubt the calibration of their consciences."
Dyolf Knip
I would also point out this informed sounding post that says that they are not currently using "terminator" or "suicide" genes in the seeds that are sold.
Kinetic stupidity has a new brand leader: Allen Zadr.
Before I say this and start an attack on me let me preface with; I hate Monsanto, they are pretty much pure evil, I come from a farm near Percy's and have had to deal with Monsanto my whole life. That having been said... Percy Schmeiser is full of it, it's really a shame that this case was the first one to test these laws as it was a waste. Let me tell you what Percy did, he GREW Roundup Ready Rapeseed WITHOUT a contract to do so. Monstanto found out (through really really nefarious ways, more on those if anyone cares to know) and nailed him. He said that the seed must have BLOWN into his crop from the neighbor... the only problem there is it's a little tough to believe that an entire field's worth of RRR blew over at once, and planted itself underground, into nice, neat rows... and just enough for that one field with ZERO spillover into ANY adjacent field. I've seen the field, I know Percy, he's nice, if a little odd, but is totally full of it. I sheeepishly add once again... Monstanto sucks. Cosine
It's called the Terminator gene and was pulled from the commercial market by Monsanto in 1999, if I recall correctly.
There were several arguments for and against the commercial use of the terminator gene.
Pro: It would prevent the propagation of potentially dangerous or foreign genes in plants from being passed generation to generation. Theoretically it should have formed a method of controlling where genetically modified plants would be spread.
Of course, this was argued as simply a way for Monsanto to sell new seeds to the farmers year after year, creating a reliance of the farmer upon Monsanto seed. (The thought of all future seed carrying the terminator gene is highly improbable.)
"Brown bag" seed (seed from the previous year's crop) can actually be used to very good effect by farmers. The good ones know their land and their micro-environment much better than any Agriculturalist or lab tech in a Monsanto lab.
There were also questions of efficacy of the terminator gene. A spontaneous mutation (let's pull a number out of my ass, 0.00001%) of plants can add up to an awful large number of viable seeds over an entire field of crops.
More importantly, the selection process for those viable seeds remains as easy as leaving the land untouched for the subsequent year and harvesting any crop that re-grows.
Probably for the best that we didn't put our hopes on the terminator gene commercially, although it does remain a very important tool in crop research.
- Zarq
Words often have different meanings depending on the domain in which they are used. One such word is "organic". In chemistry, it refers to compounds based on carbon. In agriculture, it doesn't mean that.
Quoth m-w.com:
Monsanto is evil. Very very evil. You think Microsoft or the RIAA are evil? Multiply that by about 200,000 and you might get some idea of how evil Monstanto and ADM are. GM "food" is going to wind up being the next black plague...
All's true that is mistrusted
Quite simply a farmer claims tht Monsanto's seeds had spread to his farms without his knowledge. The case was not whether or not he should pay for seeds blown on to his crop, but whether he acquired these seeds illegally or not.
His crop was about 95% Monsanto wheat. That's why he lost.
Corporations: your universal scapegoat for all society's ills.
whoever without authority makes, uses, offers to sell, or sells any patented invention, within the United States or imports into the United States any patented invention during the term of the patent therefor, infringes the patent (emphasis added).
The Good news is that here in Australia, the Populus have rejected GM Canola from Monsanto.m l/gm_food.c fm
http://www.fremantle.wa.gov.au/news/ht
The Federal "Liberal" (Actually Conservative) Government want GM foods so they can get thier Kickbacks, or whatever, The National Party (Country), who are in Coalition with the Liberal Party, want GM Foods so they can have more say in what the Liberal Party Do. The Federal Branch of the Labor Party are against GM, simply because they are the Federal Opposition, and therefore must oppose the Federal Government.
Meanwhile, the State Labor Governments, and non-alligned Local Governments have put Local Bans on Monsanto GM Canola, so even though the Federal Govenment wants it, there is no State, Shire or City in which to legally grow it!
Reading through the comments, it's clear that people don't understand what this case is about. This isn't a case where a farmer had some Monsanto seeds blow into his field and suddenly was facing a lawsuit by Monsanto. He deliberately saved the seeds from the plants and admitted in court he knew they were from a Monsanto plant. Then he replanted the next year with those seeds.
"The market alone cannot provide sufficient constraints on corporation's penchant to cause harm." -- Joel Bakan
You are mistake about the case. It was not whether or not he should pay for seeds blown on to his crop, but whether he acquired these seeds illegally or not. His crop was about 95% Monsanto wheat. That's why he lost.
Corporations: your universal scapegoat for all society's ills.
His crop was about 95% Monsanto wheat. That's why he lost.
Wow! That must have been a trick. (especially since he was growing canola)
WRONG !!!!
A patent gives you NO RIGHT TO ANYTHING. I quote my IP Law professor: "A patent is a grant from the government that confers upon the inventor the right to exclude others from making, using, selling, importing, or offering an invention for sale for a fixed period of time."
This means that a patent only gives exclusion rights. It does not give you the right to use, sell, import, or offer an invention for sale. A simple example to show how that works is as follows:
Say Boeing has a patent on the airplane (it's a hypothetical situation ok). Now you invent a new type of airplane wing that's cannot be produced without a plane (and that is useless without said plane). The fact that you have a patent for that new wing does not mean you can produce, sell, import, etc. To do that you'd have to produce the plane also and that would infringe on Boeing's patent.
What you can do is prevent Boeing from producing a plane with your wing on it. Then you can enter in an agreement with Boeing to either share your IP or sell it to them, among other options.
Your logic for the plant reproduction not being an infringement is also incorrect. Say I have a patent in the US for a certain invention but I don't in China. I can't exclude a Chinese company from making, selling, importing or offering for sale a copy of my invention if anything of that is done outside of the US. However, if they try to do any of that in the US I can sue them for infringement. I can also sue YOU for infringement if you buy a copy of my invention in China and bring it back to the US to use, sell, import, or offer for sale.
Now this is a oversimplification of IP law but I don't have the time to teach you all of it. If you wish to learn more you can go take classes in college/university or contact a IP Lawyer.
I know I saw something a while back about there being places that specialize in maintaining old seed strains. The problem is that they can't just keep the them on ice. Every so often, they have to plant them and then harvest a new generation of the seeds for storage. Now if the genetically engineered stuff is sterile and we find out something is wrong, then we can still go back to the unaltered variety. If the geneticaly modified stuff is fertile, even the supposed original strains being kept in storage could get polluted and there would be no going back.
The difference truly comes down to more than just sensitivity over the name "rapeseed." In fact, rapeseed is still commonly used.
The true difference between "canola" and "rapeseed" lies in the amount of erucic acid in the oil from the seed. This makes a very significant difference to the farmer.
Canola, grown as a food oil source, has a very low quantity (less than 2%) of erucic acid. Rapeseed grown for industrial purposes may have up to 45% erucic acid instead.
How about a better source than me?
Ag Marketing Resource Center has a good explanation.
According to the actual Supreme Court decision, which you can read at the following location:
Here at Lexum
Tests of their 1998 canola crop revealed that 95-98 per cent was Roundup Ready Canola.
I hardly think that seed "infected" the farmer's crop. If more than 90% of the Canola seeds were genetically modified, it seems obvious to me (as it was to the courts) that the farmer knew or ought to have known that the seeds he was using were the roundup-ready variety created by Monsanto.
I was shocked to consider the possibility that the Canadian Supreme Courts (whose opinions I find I've almost always agreed with after reading the decision) would do such a thing, and was relieved to find that Slashdot was, yet again, being Slashdot and over-sensationalising the issue.
I would also like to note that the patent does NOT cover the plant, only the specific gene involved, and that, according to the decision, the farmer may have had available to him a useful defense of innocent intention. Read:
Thus, a defendant in possession of a patented invention in commercial circumstances may rebut the presumption of use by bringing credible evidence that the invention was neither used, nor intended to be used, even by exploiting its stand-by utility.
Seems obvious to me.
The cool part was that the farmer didn't have to pay Monsanto's significant legal expenses.
Move to Canada--we're free here, and our courts don't fuck us unless we fuck someone else first!
To be honest, most Roundup (glyphosate) resistance is a byproduct of installing another gene. What happens is that the plants are transformed for one reason or another, and a linked gene for Roundup resistance is added.
So, when you try to transform, say, 1000 plants, you take the progeny and grow them on media with glyphosate in them, or spray the seedlings with glyphosate or whatever. The ones that survive *should* have the other gene along with it.
As a result, the plants have resistance to glyphosate AND a pesticide in every cell (BT gene, like Cry or something), or whatever. It's leftover from the transformation of the plants.
Now there are other options- other herbicides that can be used, although most work off of a similar mechanism that involves inhibition of ammonia detoxification (so the plants literally die in their own waste). Another option is to throw in antibiotic resistance (kanamycin, etc.) which will kill plants at a set level- unless they have the resistance gene in them.
Glyphosate resistance is handy, and Roundup is a "nice" herbicide in that it has low toxicity and relatively low environmental life, and it frickin' kills EVERYTHING... that doesn't have artificial resistance, of course. There have been one or two really weird plants discovered that don't have glyphostae resistance, but they're exceptions. The gene comes from a bacterium, IIRC. But there are other herbicides, and they can be employed- they're just a little more expensive, or have some effects that aren't always desirable- like all pesticides.
Deleted
Let's say that he sprays all of his land with RoundUp so that the only thing left is 100% patented plants. Legal? Of course.
What crack are you smoking? This has nothing to do with this case, tard.
The Supreme Court didn't rule on this foolish hypothetical situation you just pulled out your arse--they ruled on THIS PARTICULAR CASE, and laid down clear groundrules for what would constitute deliberate abuse and use in the future, so your "Legal? Of course" crap is already dealt with and answered.
Have you even read the decision yet?
This kind of story makes me sick. I remember reading about this case awhile back. An old farmer who has had the same land for many many years and grows ORGANIC CANOLA gets flanked by his neighbours growing Monsanto seeds. One day he notices some strange looking Canola growing in a ditch, he sprays it with Roundup (which he just coincidentally happens to use) and the plant doesn't die. He does some research and finds that the Rounup is a Monsanto product specifically designed not to harm Monsanto produce. He realizes that some Monstanto product has floated over to his farm from one of his neighbours (very possible seeing as 5 people around him grow Monsanto Canola) so he starts spraying futher and further into his field and sees more and more of his Canola perish. This seems obvious: The Monsanto product was being blown in by the wind and the further away from the host field it flew, the less dense the infection. One of his neighbours (obviously not too neighbourly) tips off Monsanto that this guy is illegally growing the seeds without purchasing the license. One day in the near future, a plane flys low over his field and dumps a bunch of Roundup (or a similar product) on his field to test for Monsanto product. Monsanto says they didn't do it (I'm sure some random guy felt like renting a plane and buying a bunch of herbicide to spread on a random field). Now Monsanto sues the old farmer for scamming them - enough to put this guy out of business and leave the farm. The guy grows ORGANIC FUCKING CANOLA. The Monsanto strain NEGATES THE ABILITY TO SELL THE CANOLA AS A STRAIGHT ORGANIC PRODUCT. His field was not entirely Monsanto. There is no reason for this guy to use Monsanto - he makes a good living selling organic products. The Monsanto product not only fucks him over legally but now he can't sell his organic product - Monsanto has INFECTED his field and now he has to pay them?! They should be sued for infecting his organic field with their genetically modified garbage. Famers like this guy take the seeds from this years harvest and use them again next year - no need to purchase a Monsanto license every year because he ALREADY HAS THE SEEDS. This is corporate trash at its lowest. It seriously does make me sick - I hope this can be turned around.
You create your own reality - Leave mine to me.
I've posted about this before, but, it's even more pressing now. there is a Documentary about to come out called The Future of Food that covers this case (interviews with Percy, his lawyer, footage of his farm, how he works, etc), others like it, and the entire GMO scene in great detail. After seeing the film, knowing that Monsato has won is quite chilling.
The film has made me change what I eat both from political and heath standpoints. It's very sad that Percy lost his case, not jsut for him, but for what it means Monsanto (and Dupont, etc) can do with the full backing of the law.
The film is showing at Silverdocs in DC (June 16, 2:30pm), the Telluride Film Festival (unknown showtime), and a film festival in Hawaii who's name I can't recall. Future showings will be posted on their website, along with DVDs for purchase.
(Disclosure: My girlfriend is the Associate Producer, Assistant Editor, and Narrator)
My life is dedicated hosting
sudog, in message #9220976, wrote:
Thanks for providing that link. I read it, and the details of what happen appear to be halfway down the page at paragraphs 59 through 67. After reading that, I see a little behind the Mr. Schmeiser's (the defendent's) intent, but not all of it.
It appears that Mr. Schmeiser's 1997 crop may have been polluted by Monsanto's patented Canola. After he sprayed a patch of his crop with the Roundup herbacide, approimately 60% lived on. He then did what farmers have been doing since intelligent farming began: he took the best of his 1997 crop and saved it for future planting.
Monsanto tested plants growing in public road allowances bordering Mr. Schmeiser's fields in 1997. In March of 1998 Monsanto told Mr. Schmeiser that they thought he was was growing their patented plants. Despite this notice, Mr. Schmeiser still used the seed he had saved from his 1997 crop in his 1998 planting. Those fields, when tested by independent authorities, were shown to be 95% to 98% "Roundup resistent". (I bothers me that the the decision uses that term instead of "contains the Monsanto-patented gene". It pre-supposes [maybe rightfully, I don't know] that this resistence could not possibly come from a different gene or natural process.)
Now, you speak of "innocent intent". Even assuming Monsanto offered to compensate Mr. Schmeiser for polluting his 1997 crop, what kind of a position would that have put him in if he accepted it? He would be setting the precident of having Monsanto approving or disapproving of his seed he harvested from his land. One could reasonably assume that if this pollution occured in 1997, it may very well occur in future years. Would Monsanto compensate him each year this happened? Or, would they eventually say they don't care if he cannot use his own crop the way he sees fit, and he'll just have to sue them for compensation.
That is assuming, of course, Monsanto offered to compensate him in 1997 for polluting his crop. If they did not, can you blame him for telling them to bugger off? If they cannot keep their seed/pollen on the land of the farmers to whom they sold their seed, I think it is tough. That's part of the problem with patenting genes & lifeforms compared to physical inventions: life finds a way to spread, whereas a better mouse trap doesn't replicate itself.
Umm they pulled the terminator gene 5 years ago. You've been lobbying against GM foods? Yet you don't even know the terminator gene program has been abandoned? If your going to protest something at least be informed about the subject, it helps you cause a lot better than making ignorant statements.
Monsanto pulls terminator gene
Have you ever been to a turkish prison?
The write-up is inflammatoy and flat-out wrong. Whether you are for or against genetically engineered/modifed foods, please get the facts right and don't mislead people about a very important legal decision.
Woz