| | 22/March/22
| | “Definitive historical account” of Monsanto provides motherlode of valuable material With jury selection soon starting in the latest Roundup cancer trial, Monsanto’s lawyers have been arguing that the company should be “entitled to put forth mitigating evidence supporting its good character”. But if the Court allows the company now owned by Bayer to introduce such testimony, we’d suggest the plaintiffs counter by calling to the stand Bartow J. Elmore. Elmore teaches environmental and business history at Ohio State University and his deep dive into the history of Monsanto was published towards the end of last year. Given that Seed Money: Monsanto's Past and Our Food Future packs a hefty 80 plus pages of notes, you might fear it’s some turgid academic tome, but it’s anything but. Despite being deeply researched, the book provides a lively and lucid account of the massive toxic impact Monsanto has had on our world, as well as the company’s unsuccessful attempt to escape its toxic legacy by shapeshifting into the world’s largest seed company and a pioneer in genetic engineering in agriculture. GMWatch Stores selling banned herbicide glyphosate will be fined, says Montreal mayor Montreal Mayor Valérie Plante says retail outlets caught selling the weedkiller glyphosate and other banned pesticides will face stiff fines, after Radio-Canada revealed seven Rona outlets in Montreal still had the herbicide Roundup on its shelves. As of Jan 1, 2022, the sale and domestic use of 39 pesticides, for a total of more than 100 separate products, have been illegal in Montreal. Despite that ban, Radio-Canada discovered that glyphosate is easy to find. Aside from the Rona outlets, a Canadian Tire store in Saint-Léonard was also selling Roundup, although it pulled it from its shelves after being contacted by Radio-Canada for comment. "This is unacceptable," said Mayor Valérie Plante. "It's a toxic product that has no place on our shelves." CBC Iowa and Minnesota get dicamba cutoffs On March 15, EPA announced that it has approved federal label amendments that further restrict the use of over-the-top dicamba herbicides in Iowa and Minnesota. "These restrictions are intended to reduce the likelihood of volatility and offsite movement of over-the-top dicamba by avoiding application on days with high temperatures," EPA explained in a news release accompanying the decision. Both Iowa and Minnesota reported high numbers of off-target dicamba injury reports in 2021, the agency noted. The news release reiterated that EPA is uncertain that over-the-top dicamba use is sustainable, given continued allegations of off-target injury in the 2021 season. DTN Progressive Farmer UK council acts to reduce glyphosate use across city Sheffield City Council has committed to reducing its use of glyphosate across all its service areas, including trialling glyphosate free areas in some parts of the city. Change is already happening and in recent years, the council’s parks and countryside teams, as well as the highways service, have relaxed mowing cycles to increase biodiversity, lessening the use of commercial weedkillers. Around 20% of highway grass verges are now on a biodiversity mowing regime and this has already allowed for rare species to establish in verges, even in the most unexpected of places. SheffNews Cutting biofuels can help avoid global food shock from Ukraine war The war in Ukraine has already caused food prices to shoot up as global markets anticipate a loss of wheat and maize exports from one of the world’s largest producers of these crops. But Europe and the US could more than compensate for the loss of Ukraine’s exports by diverting crops destined to be made into biofuels into food production instead. This would bring food prices down and help prevent a major global food shock. New Scientist DONATE TO GMWATCH __________________________________________________________ Website: http://www.gmwatch.org
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