Lewitt 1
David Lewitt[U1]
Dr. Williams
Philosophy of Food
December 8th, 2014
GMO Monopolies
For centuries farmers have successfully and unsuccessfully produced crops through cross-breeding to create better produce for the consumers. Major corporations have taken this idea even further by genetically engineering crops. Through genetic engineering major corporations such as Monsanto and Dupont/Pioneer have become large monopolies. These monopolies have positive and negatives influences in world societies. I will argue that GMO monopolies are problematic in world societies. The problems GMO monopolies create are the industrialization of naturally occurring products that have negative effects on the farming economy, their goals to globalize to take advantage of countries’ agriculture, the world’s food supply, the political power influencing trust and fear in consumers, and the use of consumers as “guinea pigs[U2].”
The industrialization of naturally occurring products or crops destroy local farming economies, causing farmers to suffer and become dependent on monopoly corporations such as Monsanto. We should enforce more regulations and laws to prevent local farming economies from suffering. The four major biotech seed corporations Monsanto, Dupont/Pioneer, Syngenta, and Dow AgroSciences sell and own, due to their patents, 70% of the soybean and 80% of US corn market (GM Education). When few companies own more than half of the marketplace with their own patented products they become powerful monopolies. These companies use the Intellectual Property Rights laws or (IPR), laws protecting the rights of patent owners, to control the market and then use international trade laws enforced by the World Trade Organization to force their produce on consumers (Adam 1). Through their control of the market biotech seed corporations industrialize farming into a means of making a profit. The control of the marketplace can be seen through the farmer’s perspective. The farmer who buys GMOs has to sign license contracts and has to buy seeds every year. Even if the farmers manage to afford yearly seeds and grow these crops, other farmers are at risk. The risk is the chance of GMOs pollen breeding with neighboring farms by accident through wind or simply an animal transferring the seed such as birds. The problem with that is the non-GMOs are contaminated with patented genes, thus making it illegal for that neighboring farmer to have these crops, due to Intellectual Property Rights, and can be sued by these monopolies.
Many farming and patent organizations have attempted to file lawsuits against Monsanto like PUBBAT or the Public Patent Foundation who “challenge the chemical giant's patents on genetically modified seed. The organic plaintiffs were forced to sue preemptively to protect themselves from being accused of patent infringement should they ever become contaminated by Monsanto's genetically modified seed, something Monsanto has done to others in the past” (PUBPAT Organic Seed v. Monsanto) The monopolies ability to sue farmers for accidental transfer of patented genes is wrong. The farmers should have every right to protect themselves from patent seed contamination through law yet the US Supreme Court dismisses most of these cases. This real fear of contamination convinces farmers to give in and have no choice but to purchase GMO crops to avoid the chance of a lawsuit by patent infringement taking away the farmers freedom of the marketplace. Now that the neighboring farmer is a customer of these patent crops he needs seeds to grow more to earn his livelihood.
The monopolies’ growing control over the past ten years have allowed them to create higher prices for their seeds. Research professor, Charles Benbrook, at the Center for Sustaining Agriculture and Natural Resources at Washington State University “noted that as GM soybeans started to take over the market (2000-2010) the price for seed increased 230% [and] the cost for Monsanto’s Round up Ready2 soybeans in 2010 was $70 per bag, a 143% increase in the price of GM seed since 2001” (GM Education). These unnecessary price spikes make it risky and harder for farmers to make their livelihood and take care of their families. Once the crops are grown the farmer cannot spike his prices without losing business. Farmers are also losing money through these monopolies when buying GMOs that are glyphosate tolerant or resistant to pesticides and herbicides. These GMOs sound helpful for the farmer but when a farmer continues to use pesticides and herbicides like roundup ready, courtesy of Monsanto, they create resistance to weeds and bugs. This resistance causes farmers to continue to lost more crops and invest more of their money in more pesticides and herbicides. The yearly purchasing of seeds and pesticides/herbicides result in farmers losing more money with less returns and they are stuck on this cycle because many farmers “fear of infringing ‘intellectual property rights’ by having residual crops in their fields” (GM Education). This is very problematic for our economy because the farmers now become dependent on these corporations who care more about making money themselves than if the farmers have any money left over to spend in other markets.
One way we can prevent the farmers from falling into this vicious cycle is to establish more laws dealing with intellectual property rights and patent laws that prevent the monopolies from controlling the farmers. Otherwise there will be no one left to buy all the farming equipment from other businesses if the farmers have no money left to spend because it’s all going to the GMO monopolies. The problem with establishing laws to prevent monopolies from taking advantage of farmers is that the monopolies have a large influence on world organizations and governments through Lobbyists and incentives. The monopolies take advantage of their influence and power to industrialize the farming economy. The farmers who are stuck in the monopolies vicious cycle become “industrial employees, and small farms are being wiped out, both locally and globally, which in turn leads to the losses of diversity, control, indigenous knowledge’s and local food cultures” (Davion 86). The monopolies do not only effect the farming economies but they also effect global aspects of the food industry.
Globalization of these monopolies a huge problem and world organizations should have more control supporting the countries the monopolies are trying to take advantage of. The monopolies use their influence to push global trade laws making it “difficult or impossible for people in many nations to reject importation of foods created in ways they find immoral or unsafe” (Davion 86). When the only food available are GMOs, that’s what people will eat. People who are forced to eat food that they find immoral or even unsafe is ethically wrong. The countries should give the people the freedom to choose foods they find morally or safe to eat but cannot do so because of the monopolies influence and power on global trade laws.
The second problem with GMO monopolies involving globalization is their control of world’s food supply. Only a few monopolies make up the majority of the world’s seeds suppliers. Monsanto alone is close to 50% ownership. These monopolies sell their patent products all around the world controlling and taking advantage of the world’s food supply. Through IPR World hunger cannot be solved with GMOs. World hunger is caused by poor allocations of the world’s food supply. When major monopolies control the means of producing the world’s supply of food it will only be allocated to the countries that can afford to buy their patent seed every year. They will only give it to those who are willing to pay for it. They are not a charity unlike the Red Cross Organization that gives large amounts of food to countries in need each year. The World Trade Organization deals with world trade rules and “has aggressively protected the rights of GMO producers to sell their goods, prevent labeling, and protect their patents” (Adam 5). With their help the monopolies can thrive in foreign countries. The World Trade Organization supports the Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property which “requires that food and medicine that was once under the public domain must now be privatized through global patent law.”(Adam 5) The TRIP allows monopolies to take advantage of indigenous crops grown in foreign countries. They can change and patent the genetic make-up of indigenous crops and sell them to the indigenous farmers who had always grown them for free (Adam 5). For example in India a new form of basmati rice was patented and farmers buy basically the same seeds they’ve used for centuries (Adam 5). The monopolies are able to pass many political boundaries to access unfair means of profiting due to The World Trades Organizations protection through IPR. These monopolies take advantage of countries around the globe to increase their profits and power not to help world hunger. Ethically they should use their relationship with The World Trade Organization to help end world hunger. An objection can be made that if Governments and World Organizations say it’s safe to produce and consume GMOs and is beneficial to country’s rich or poor we should trust and support these monopoly corporations.
The problem with the monopolies is their ability to influence governments and organizations to provide insufficient evidence concerning safety concerns, enforce laws that violate the rights of nation’s people, and take advantage of consumers. In America the FDA has a large influence in what foods consumers can buy at retail stores and under their laws “food must be thoroughly tested unless it is “generally regarded as safe,” (GRAS) which is a legal determination”(Adam 1-2). Starlink, a GM corn, was found to be unsafe for consumers yet was found in grocery stores. There is a chance of later discovering that GMOs are actually dangerous, but until there is evidence from the corporations themselves they will continue to produce their product putting their profits before any safety concerns for the public. Labeling laws should be enforced upon the monopolies so the consumers do not have to rely on their trust of the government or organizations in which the monopolies have influence over. They can choose to eat it whether the government or organization says it’s bad or good with labeling laws. Since there are no labeling laws enforced on GMOs most of the consumers are the monopolies’ guinea pigs due to insufficient public knowledge of GMOs. We do not know the long term effects of GMOs yet monopolies will continue to sell their products to consumers until sufficient evidence proves their product to be dangerous. That evidence may not appear for several decades so the consumers therefore are guinea pigs in the monopoly’s experiment.
In this sense, most consumers are unknowingly taken advantage of and being used as a means to the monopolies’ goal of producing profit. This violates the Kantian theory in which using a rational being for one’s own gain without the rational being knowing is morally and ethically wrong. Some could argue the monopolies are being utilitarian and use the consumers for the greater good of GMOs to prove to the world GMOs are really safe. If proven safe it would promote countries with food shortages to no longer fear GMO health risks and buy the monopolies GMOs to end the food shortage. Those monopolies fail to realize the solution to that greater good, being world food shortages, is food allocation. The monopolies promote their product as a tool to end world hunger but they fail to realize that world hunger is caused by how the food is allocated. The monopolies will only give their product to those who will pay, only making their products beneficial to the richer countries that can afford it. Therefore, the poorer countries have no reason to support these monopolies unless the monopolies provide ways for the products to be beneficial and affordable to the poorer countries.
The monopolies use world organizations to promote that their GMOs are beneficial to societies but some do not agree, more specifically India and Argentina. They used to ignore IPRs when dealing with food to prevent monopolies from controlling their agriculture. The idea behind this is that if no one specific party owned the GMO seeds, the public could distribute it equally to those who needed, it not to those only licensed to grow it. India and Argentina no longer ignore these IPRs because The World Trade Organization has made it illegal. This example shows that with the WTO’s rules of IPRs they “undermine the ability of governments to respond to and protect the need and right to food” (Adams 5-6). With the help of the WTO, monopolies have more control over a countries agriculture than its own government making it more beneficial for the monopolies than the starving countries.
The GMO Monopolies are very problematic for world societies. Their influence in world organizations and politics contribute to their success. We need to create laws that prevent world organizations and politics from favoring GMO Monopolies to prevent any further industrialization of crops to save the farming economy and to prevent the Monopolies from taking advantage of other countries through globalization. Labeling laws should also be enforced everyone should have the right to know what they are eating to allow consumers to make their own decisions and not be dependent of their trust in the government.
Organic Seed v. Monsanto." PUBPAT News. N.p., n.d. Web. 07 Dec. 2014.
"GM Education - Citizens Concerned about GM. Making Sense of Science and Evidence." GM Education - Citizens Concerned about GM. Making Sense of Science and Evidence. N.p., n.d. Web. 07 Dec. 2014.
and GMOs." Mindful Constructions. N.p., n.d. Web. 07 Dec. 2014.
Adams, Frederick. Ethical Issues for the Twenty-first Century. Charlottesville, VA: Philosophy Documentation Center, 2005. Print.
DesAutels, Peggy, Rebecca Whisnant, and Victoria Davion. "Food Fights: A Femisnt Perspective." Global Feminist Ethics. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2010. 82-94. Print.
[U1]Grade: 95
[U2]awk