What's Up, Doc?            May 2008 Gallup POLL of U.S. consumers/drivers:  54% say they expect gas prices to reach $6 a gallon in the next five years. Earliest remains of human settlements in the Western hemisphere:  14,000 years (Oregon and Chile)   Mexican law prohibits children under 14 from working, and those 14 to 16 can work only in jobs that do not "jeopardize their development." Nevertheless, children under 15 make up 20% of Mexico's migrant farmworkers, the Mexican Labor Secretariat says. They tend to be less educated and less healthy than the population at large. Less than 10% of these children attend school, and 42% suffer from some form of malnutrition, government studies show. The ban on child labor is difficult for the government to enforce because in most cases the children do not appear on the farms' payroll Because adult workers earn bonuses for picking more than their daily quota, parents with "helpers" bring home more money. Farms save money because they do not have to pay social security for the youngsters. In many farms, children as young as 5 scoot on their hands and knees along rows of vegetables, cutting weeds. In the central state of Puebla, children work as "burros," carrying buckets of coffee beans down from the mountains.   Archives of News Stories:  [Winter 2007]   [Winter 2006]  [Winter 2005]   [Winter 2004]   [Winter 2003]  [ Winter 2002]  [Winter 2001]   Newspapers OnLine

Course Description

Agribusiness & Biotechnology Law introduces legal principles ("gems") applicable to a broad array of everyday legal issues facing agribusiness in Missouri as well as in the global marketplace.

The topics to be covered include judicial process, the rule of law, torts, products liability, statutes of limitation, warranties, agricultural production contracts,  intellectual property  and agricultural biotechnology laws and policies (patents, trade secrets, copyrights, trademarks), conflicts of interest, and ethical issues facing agribusiness. 

The knowledge and thinking skills in Agribusiness and Biotechnology Law this semester should significantly improve your chances of avoiding legal disputes and of getting timely legal advice.

Course Objectives:   Building Respect for the "Rule of Law" 

1. To develop the analytical legal skills necessary to become effective decision-makers from the standpoint of agribusiness entrepreneurs
2. To gain a global perspective of the impact law and politics can have on agribusiness competitiveness.

_______________________________________________________________________________________________

Point System

Seven Quizzes (@50 points each)... . 350

Final Exam  ...........................................(100)  (comprehensive)  (*Optional IF you took all seven quizzes)

"Just-In-Time" (JIT) Homework ..........   75 

Total Points . . . . . . . ...... ......... . . .     425

Grades may be assigned using + and -.  

_________________________________________________________________________ 

Attendance and Participation

I will record attendance.   Arriving late or leaving early counts the same as an absence.

There are no excuses for absence.  If you're not in class, you're absent.  No exceptions.

You are allowed four absences.   After that, missed attendance will reduce your course percentage by one percentage point for each additional absence.   No excuses.

If you miss ten or more classes, you will be assigned an "F" in the course.

If your grade lies at the border between two grades, I will consider your record of participating in class, both asking and answering questions, in deciding whether to "bump" your grade up a level. 

__________________________________________________________________________________________

Instructor

Stephen Matthews, PhD, JD
Email address:  MatthewsS@missouri.edu
Office:  210 Mumford Hall
Telephone:   882-0152
Secretary:  Melinda Poole
Office Hours:  11:00am - 11:45 noon MW

____________________________________________________________

Classroom Etiquette

• Do NOT open your laptop unless you are actively taking notes!
      
• Arrive before class starts (11:00am)
   
• Leave when the class is over (12:15pm)

___________________________________________________________

Academic Honesty

Academic honesty is fundamental to the activities and principles of a university.  The University of Missouri has specific academic dishonesty administrative procedures (refer to the rules & regulations in the M-Book).

In cases of academic dishonesty, the instructor may award a failing grade for the assignment or a failing grade for the course, or may adjust the grade as deemed appropriate. The instructor also may require the student to repeat the assignment or to perform additional assignments. In addition to the instructor's disciplinary action, cases of academic dishonesty are required to be reported to the Office of the Provost.

What is "plagiarism?"   It is taking someone's words or ideas as if they were your own.   Plagiarism is the use of another writer's work without proper acknowledgment (footnotes, and also quotation marks if not paraphrased).   Plagiarism is the use of another person's work or idea and pretend that it is your own work or idea.

____________________________________________________________

Americans with Disabilities

If you have special needs as addressed by the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and need assistance, please notify the instructor immediately. Reasonable effort will be made to accommodate your special needs.

  ________________________________________________________________________________________________

Email Professor Matthews at SMatthews@missouri.edu         

________________________________________________________________________________________________________

1. Pilgrim's Pride (the U.S.'s #1 chicken grower/processor):  Closing 7 chicken processing sites as feed costs rise (March 12, 2008)
   • What about all its "grower contracts?"  Will it just give them written notice and cancel the hundreds of grower contracts?
   • More than 40 contract chicken growers and farms in Sevier County filed suit contending Pilgrim’s Pride Corp. lied to them before requiring expensive equipment upgrades without promise of future flocks, according to Wednesday’s (February 14, 2008) Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.  The suit, filed Friday by Clark Mason of Clark Mason Attorneys in Little Rock, contends the chicken company misuses its power as the nation’s largest chicken producer to bully growers into investing thousands of dollars in poultry houses that are abusive to the birds, environmentally wasteful to operate and economically unworkable for the growers.
   • Forty-one East Texas families allege Pilgrim's Pride violated labor standards
     • Despite contractual obligations, the plaintiffs contend their relationship with Pilgrim is the employer-employee form. To apply under the Fair Labor Standards Act, plaintiffs are arguing they have been employees rather than independent contractors of Pilgrims as shown through defendants "supervision, management, direction, and control" of activities on the plaintiffs' farms. Demonstrating the employee argument, plaintiffs describe how Pilgrim sent supervisors called "service technicians" to micromanage how the broilers are feed, broiler house temperature and light amount, and other activities regarding the plaintiffs raising of boilers.   
     • Plaintiffs state they have suffered serious economic loss by unfairly receiving inferior chicks, not enough or poor feed quality, and possible delay in Pilgrim's catching the boilers resulting in less quantity due to mature chicken death.  
     • Plaintiffs state Pilgrim is not fairly paying under contract details but requires the plaintiffs to make unnecessary, unproductive and expensive modifications to equipment.  
     • Pilgrim is accused of showing favoritism with those retrofitted farms by providing superior broiler chicks and a higher Grower Ranking Report that is used to determine payments.
     • The families insist they are prevented from switching to Tyson Foods, which hires from the same geographic area of Northeast Texas.
2. The chicken broiler industry is dominated by Tyson Foods, Inc. in the early 2000s producing over 25 million head of chicken. In 2003, Pilgrim's Pride Corp. bought the chicken processing assets of ConAgra Inc., becoming the second largest poultry processor in the United States. Other industry leaders included Gold Kist and Perdue Farms.  
   • Tyson Foods' chief competitor is Pilgrim's Pride Corp., a diversified food company that became number two in the U.S. poultry business in 2003 when it acquired the chicken processing arm of ConAgra, Inc. The company as a whole earned $2.6 billion in fiscal 2003 for all of its divisions and employed a total of 24,800 people. Based in Pittsburg, Texas, Pilgrim's Pride markets its products in Asia and Europe, as well as in the United States. It is headed by chairman Lonnie Pilgrim.
3. U.S. Chicken Broiler Industry Profile (Answers.com)
4. U.S. Prisons:  More than 1 in 100 American adults are behind bars. One in nine black men, ages 20 to 34, are serving time, as are 1 in 36 adult Hispanic men.  The 50 states last year spent about $49 billion in tax dollars on corrections, up from nearly $11 billion in 1987.  However, the national recidivism rate remains virtually unchanged, with about half of released inmates returning to jail or prison within three years.  
   • For all the money spent on corrections today, there hasn’t been a clear and convincing return for public safety.  Many Americans have come to believe, wrongly, that keeping an outsized chunk of the population locked up is essential for sustaining a historic crime drop since the 1990’s.  In fact, the relationship between imprisonment and crime control is murky. Some portion of the decline is attributable to tough sentencing and release policies. But crime is also affected by things like economic trends and employment and drug-abuse rates.
5. Threats Against Judges On The Rise ("Rule of Law" challenge)
6. How Contracting Has Grown in U.S. Agriculture, 1991-2003 (pdf)
7. Researchers found that illness and medical bills contributed to at least 46.2%, and as many as 54.5% of all bankruptcy filings
   • Surprisingly, most of those bankrupted by medical problems had health insurance.  Often illness led to job loss, and with it the loss of health insurance.
   • "Covering the uninsured isn't enough. We must also upgrade and guarantee continuous coverage for those who have insurance."
8. As Bills Mount, Debts on Homes Rises for Elderly
9. American Seniors Rack Up Debt Like Never Before
10. Farm Bankruptcy in Nebraska
11. Are Farmers in the Midst of Another Debt Crisis (like the one in the 1980's)?  (case studies: why did these farmers take bankruptcy?)
12. Student Debt and Bankruptcy:  Forgiveness is reserved for those who can demonstrate that having to pay off their student loans will cause undue hardship. This is determined by the bankruptcy court. Student Loans are rarely forgiven
13. Filing Bankruptcy on Student Loans (short article)
14. Bankruptcy Judges Warn Young Consumers about Credit Card Debt
15. Bankruptcy Nuts n' Bolts (Wikipedia)
16. Population of Missouri:  5,842,713 (2006)
17. Population of the US:  299,398,484 (2006)
18. How is a "trade secret" related to a "patent?"
    • FAQ's about trade secrets
    • Some States have adopted the "Uniform Trade Secrets Act"
      • Missouri's Trade Secrets Act (1995):  Chapter 417.450 et seq.
19. What's the difference between a "non-disclosure" and a "non-compete" agreement
20. FAQ's about patents
21. FAQ's about copyrights
22. FAQ's about trademarks
23. Missouri's Trade Marks Act (1973):  Chapter 417
24. "Greening" Viagra:  Chemical Companies SAVING Money Going Green
    • Peter Dunn, who heads Pfizer’s green chemistry projects in Sandwich, England, said the company’s efforts have yielded “tens of millions in savings” in the production of two of its top-selling drugs: Viagra, the erection-enhancing drug, and Lyrica, a pain killer.
    • Much of the savings have come from reducing organic solvents like acetone. For Viagra, the company has reduced the amount of organic solvents from 1,300 liters per kilogram of drug produced in 1990 to 6.3 liters today, Mr. Dunn said. Some solvents, like acetone, were eliminated or replaced with renewable solvents like water.
25. Salmon Virus Indicts Chile's Fishing Methods
    • Norway, the world’s leading salmon producer, eventually decided to spread salmon farms farther apart, reducing stress on the fish, and responded to criticism of high antibiotic use with stronger regulations and the development of vaccines.
    • The O.E.C.D.'s 2005 Report said the Chilean salmon industry needed to limit the escapes of about one million salmon a year; control the use of fungicides like green malachite, a carcinogen that was prohibited in 2002; and better regulate the colorant used to make salmon more rosy, which has been associated with retina problems in humans. It also said Chile’s use of antibiotics was “excessive.”
      • Residual antibiotics have been detected in Chilean salmon that have been exported to the United States, Canada and Europe
      • One estimate is that 70 to 300 times more antibiotics are used by salmon producers in Chile to produce a ton of salmon than in Norway.  But no hard data exist to corroborate the estimates, he said, “because there is almost an underground market of antibiotics in Chile for salmon aquaculture.”
      • Researchers say that some antibiotics that are not allowed in American aquaculture, like flumequine and oxolinic acid, are legal in Chile and may increase antibiotic resistance for people.
      • Huge numbers of imported fish go uninspected. The F.D.A. inspected only 1.93 percent of all imported seafood in 2006, Food and Water Watch said, citing F.D.A. data.
        • The F.D.A. tested 40 samples of the 114,320 net tons of salmon imported from Chile in 2007. None of them tested positive for malachite green, oxolinic acid, flumequine, Ivermectin, fluoroquinolones or drug residues (according to the FDA).
26. Why does the FEDERAL government have exclusive right to insure plane passenger's have food, water, clean toilets, and water?  A federal appeals court Tuesday struck down a state law requiring airlines to give food, water, clean toilets and fresh air to passengers stuck in delayed planes, saying the measure was well-intentioned but stepped on federal authority.  The court said that while the goals of the law were "laudable" and the circumstances prompting its adoption "deplorable," only the federal government has the authority to pass such regulations.
27. Russian President Dmitry Medvedev singled out his commitment to embedding the rule of law in Russia.  Mr Medvedev emphasises instead the need to create a functioning legal system, with an independent judiciary and courts. If this could be achieved – and it is a mammoth task – it would have huge implications. It would strengthen Russia’s economic culture, eliminating bribery and corruption. It would also be the seed-bed from which democracy could thrive, giving opposition parties an opportunity to defend themselves against the Kremlin’s attack.
28. Wal-Mart says its milk now has no hormones (consumers prefer no GM's in their milk)
    • While the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has said milk from cows treated with rbST poses no risk to human health, Wal-Mart said it made the the change in response to customer demand.
    • Monsanto makes rbST (Posilac is the trademarked name):  "FDA approved Monsanto Company's recombinant bovine growth hormone (bovine somatotropin or rbST product) in November 1993 after a comprehensive review of the product's safety and efficacy, including human food safety."
      • Why did the FDA approve this drug to increase milk production when we already have too much milk?  "By Federal law, social and economic needs for a drug cannot enter into FDA's approval decision."
      • Why did FDA approve this drug for use in the U.S. when it is banned in Europe?  "The European Community placed a ban on the use of rbST on economic and political grounds. This had nothing to do with rbST safety."
    • University of California (UC) patented rBST in 2004, and licenses it to Monsanto
      • Monsanto sued the University of California:  "Under the terms of the agreement, Monsanto has exclusive commercial rights to manufacture BST. The University, meanwhile, retains non-commercial rights for research and educational purposes. The University agreed to drop the lawsuit, and in exchange, Monsanto agreed to pay the University $100 million in royalties upfront, with an ongoing royalty of 15 cents per dose of Posilac sold through the expiration of the patent in 2023. The University will be paid a minimum $5 million in those royalties regardless of how many doses Monsanto sells. That means the company will have to sell over 33.3 million doses just to cross that threshold."
    • Labeling milk as "Hormone Free"...could Monsanto sue you?
    • The loudest, most effective opponent of BST - indeed, of all agricultural biotechnology - is Jeremy Rifkin, president of the Foundation on Economic Trends in Washington. It was Rifkin who, in April 1986, organized a coalition of farm groups and environmentalists in Wisconsin and other states into the first formal crusade against BST and its manufacturers.
    • "Brazil, Russia, and the U.S. are the only industrialized nations that are using rbST,
29. U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (PTO)
    • Search for Patents
    • Search for Trademarks
      • Suggestion:  Try "Wheaties" (trademarked in 1924; on its third renewal)
      • Another suggestion:  Try "Revlon" (1530 records, going back to 1939...)
      • Try "WD-40" (189 entries)
30. U.S. Copyright Office (Library of Congress)
    • Search for Copyrights (online from 1978 to present)
      • Suggestion:  Try "I have a dream" (397 entries...jump to those at the end)
      • Suggestion:  Try "Rock and roll"  (2,243 entries)
31. Trade Secrets:  Wikipedia
    • A relatively recent development in the USA is the adoption of the UTSA, the Uniform Trade Secrets Act, which has been adopted by approximately 45 states as the basis for trade secret law. It is believed that a measure of uniformity among different states' laws will strengthen business' claims on their trade secrets.
    • Another significant development in U.S. law is the Economic Espionage Act of 1996 (18 U.S.C. § 1831–1839), which makes the theft or misappropriation of a trade secret a federal crime.
    • Basics of Trade Secrets (one-pager)
      • If you must disclose your invention or trade secret, particularly prior to having a patent application pending, you should absolutely use a Confidentiality Agreement. ( free sample agreements)
    • Remedies for infringement of a trade secret include damages, profits, reasonable royalties, and an injunction.  Attorneys fees are also available under the Uniform Trade Secret Act if the misappropriate is willful and malicious, or if a motion to terminate an injunction is made in bad faith.
32. Inventors' Workshop:  What Every Inventor Needs To Know (about protecting Intellectual Property Rights)
    1. Even without any attorney fees,  the absolute lowest you could pay for a single patent is $1,200.
    2. With respect to attorney fees, based on 2001 economic data, the national average is about $252.00 per hour.  If you are looking for an experienced patent attorney at a reputable firm, you should anticipate hourly rates to be somewhere between $300 to $450 per hour, with some senior patent attorneys charging well over $500 per hour.  Estimated patent attorney costs based upon the complexity of the invention:
       • Relatively Simple:  $4,000 - $6,500
       • Moderately Complex:  $9,000 - $12,000
       • Relatively Complex:  $16,000 - $25,000
       • Highly Complex:  $25,000 +
    3. You could probably find an attorney to write a patent for a business method or computer software for quite cheap (maybe $5,000), but a cheap computer related patent would not be nearly as strong as a patent application costing $25,000 or more.
       • Getting a stronger patent requires more claims and more attention to providing an adequate disclosure and describing as many alternatives, options and variations as possible. This requires greater attorney time and higher filing fees, which in turn requires more time spent working with the patent examiner to get the patent issued.
    4. Currently it costs $700.00 to get a patent issued. Which means that once the Patent Examiner tells you that you have allowable material you must pay $700 to the Patent Office. If you do not then no patent will issue.
    5. Maintenance fees are required to keep the exclusivity of the patent in tact for the full patent term. Maintenance fees are due 3.5, 7.5 and 11.5 years after issuance. Currently the cost of these maintenance fees for an individual inventor or small entity is $450.00, $1,150.00 and $1,900.00, respectively.
33. Patent Search FAQs
34. lg Nobel Prize Winners
35. Table:  By State, Adoption of GE Soybeans, 2000-2007
36. Table:  By State, Adoption of GE Corn, 2000-2007
37. Table:  By State, Adoption of GE Cotton, 2000-2007
38. FAQs about Biotechnology (USDA)
39. Overview of Agricultural Biotechnology in the U.S. (USDA)
40. Crop Biotech Figures & Tables  
41. The Global Value of the Biotech Crop Market
    • In 2007, the global market value of biotech crops, estimated by Cropnosis, was US$6.9 billion
      • Corn = US$3.2 billion for biotech maize (equivalent to 47% of global biotech crop market, up from 39% in 2006)
      • Soybeans = US$2.6 billion for biotech soybean (37%, down from 44% in 2006)
      • Cotton = US$0.9 billion for biotech cotton (13%)
      • Canola = US$0.2 billion for biotech canola (3%)
    • The global value of the biotech crop market is projected at approximately US$7.5 billion for 2008
42. News from other countries on their biotechnology laws & regulations:  Searchable by country, date, topic (Foreign Agricultural Service, USDA:  FAS Attache Reports)
43. The patents on Roundup Ready soybeans expired on July 10, 2007 (Source: U.S. GAO, Biotechnology, GAO/RCED/NSIAD-00-55, January, 2000, p. 13)
    • U.S. Patent No. 5352605 (filed October 28, 1993)
44. In 1999,  80% of Argentina's soybean acreage and 51% of U.S. soybean acreage were planted with Roundup Ready soybeans.
45. Monsanto applied in Argentina in 1995 for a patent for Roundup Ready soybeans, but it was rejected.  Monsanto appealed the decision, and an Argentine court overturned the rejection.  Monsanto petitioned for reconsideration of the patent application.  (no information on what happened after that)
46. Bt corn is produced by modifying hybrid corn with a gene from Bacillus thuringiensis, a bacterium that occurs naturally in the soil.  The gene produces a protein that causes European corn borer larvae to die after they feed on the plant.  Monsanto, Mycogen, and Novartis hold patents for various types of Bt corn in the U.S. and Argentina.  But patent protection is not as crucial for Bt corn as for Roundup Ready soybeans because hybrid corn seeds when replanted produce offspring which do not have the same traits as the parent plant.  Farmers do not save and replant hybrid corn seeds, but soybean seeds can be saved and replanted (but for the patent infringement and/or purchase contract prohibition).
47. Monsanto's patents on Roundup Ready soybeans expired on July 10, 2007.
48. Monsanto's patents on the herbicide Roundup expired in 2000.
49. Can a Missouri farmers legally "brown-bag" seed?
50. What are the "main features" of the Cartagena Biosafety Protocol?
51. How does the Biosafety Protocol relate to the World Trade Organization (WTO)?
52. GMO and U.S. Public Perception
53. Brazil and Its Attitude towards GM Foods
54. PBS Interviews About GM Food:  Farmers, Scientists, GM Critics, Regulators, and the Food Industry
55. Currently all member nations of the European Union, Japan, China, Australia, New Zealand among other countries require the mandatory labeling of foods that contain genetically engineered ingredients. The result is that majority of food manufacturers in those countries completely avoid GM ingredients.  In the US and Canada, however, it is estimated that over 70 percent of the foods in grocery stores in the U.S. and Canada contain genetically engineered ingredients mostly in the form of corn and soy products.
56. Worlds Apart?  The Reception of Genetically Modified Foods in Europe and the U.S.
57. Thalidomide once prescribed as a sedative and for morning sickness (late 1950s and 1960s)
    • Around 10,000 babies were born with disabilities as a result of their mothers taking the thalidomide drug. Just under half of those survived - 456 of them in the UK.
    • I was born with very short arms, no right eye and 10 per cent vision in my left eye. My mother had taken one thalidomide tablet.
    • Dark Remedy: The Impact of Thalidomide and Its Revival as a Vital Medicine is a historical account of the development and clinical use of thalidomide, which constituted one of the most devastating tragedies of modern medicine.
    • Despite a lack of any scientific rationale, human trials of thalidomide as an anticonvulsant were undertaken in West Germany and Switzerland in 1955; although it did not prevent convulsions, Thalidomide was found to be a hypnotic. Thereafter it was widely marketed as a remarkably safe sedative, despite the failure to test for teratogenesis or its possible impact on pregnant women.
    • Dark Remedy describes how this tragedy forever altered the process of new drug evaluation and approval worldwide. German courts stressed the need to change the whole system of development, promotion and sale of drugs as well as public attitude towards drug safety.
    • In the US thalidomide had been distributed in clinical trials, including to pregnant women, without either informed consent or requirements for data collection; however, in 1962 as a direct result of this tragedy, John F. Kennedy approved the Kefauver-Harris drug amendments to the Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act to assure both physicians and consumers that any drug or therapeutic device on the market is safe and effective for its intended use. These regulations, which remain in effect today, require qualified investigators to inform the FDA in advance about clinical investigations and include provisions for informed consent. Moreover, they empowered the FDA to halt studies if issues of safety arise.
    • Approved by the FDA for treatment of erythema nodosum leprosum, thalidomide is now under evaluation for therapy of a broad range of diseases including cancer, infectious diseases and autoimmune diseases. Particularly impressive results have already been achieved in AIDS patients with aphthous ulcers and wasting, as well as in patients with refractory multiple myeloma.
    • In the 1960s it was discovered the drug had a radical effect on some of the painful symptoms of leprosy.
    • In the 1980s, scientists once again became interested in the drug's complex properties and researchers began to explore its use in the treatment of a number of diseases, including cancer. Trials began in the 1990s and are now ongoing
58. Thalidomide caused thousands of birth defects (England)
59. Ireland:  Can you buy GM-free foods there?
60. Kansas meat-packer (Creekstone Farms) wants to label its beef BSE-tested (free of Mad Cow disease)
61. Biotech products, like the products of any other business, need markets—markets where the values expressed by consumers clearly trump scientific arguments every time...the values debate is part of market reality.
62. U.S. vs. EU:  An Examination of the Trade Issues Surrounding Genetically Modified Food
63. Emerging Challenges for Biotech Specialty Crops
64. State-level Legislative Tracker on Bills/Laws related to Agricultural Biotechnology
65. Fuel Economy Leaders:  2008 Model Year
    • Ford says its SUV sales are down 39%
66. A vast loophole in EU law exempts animal products from labelling requirements: foods like cooking oil, ketchup and cake mix have to be labelled if the ingredients include 0.9% GMOs or more, and animal feed packets must be similarly labelled. But food products derived from animals fed with GMOs - meat, milk, eggs - do not need to be labelled at all.
    • Over 90% of GM crops imported into the EU are soya and maize destined for animal feed. The diet of farm animals in Europe is typically composed of up to 30% GMOs. This amounts to 20 million tonnes of GMOs entering the EU food chain each year without consumers being told.
67. "The historic roles of universities, industry and government in shaping U.S. agricultural research and technology development appear to be significantly changing. However, little information exists to understand how the changes are influencing agricultural biotechnology, and the implications for consumers, farmers, industry, and the environment," said David Ervin, professor of Environmental Studies at Portland State University. "The firms and universities may be well informed about their individual relationships, but general society is largely flying blind through what may be a profound change in our agricultural research system and the future of agriculture."
68. PEW Biotechnology Reports
69. The proportion of Americans who say they "don't know" if gene-modified foods are safe has shrunk since 2001, while the "safe" and "unsafe" camps grew by about 5 percent each: 34 percent think they are safe, while 29 percent say they are not (2006 PEW poll).
70. The Food and Drug Administration requires labeling information for a new food variety (including GM foods) only if it differs in a significant way--in its composition, nutrition, or allergenicity, for example--from its conventional counterpart.
    • The food industry opposes mandatory labels because the products have been reviewed for safety by the government and they believe that a labeling regime would therefore act as an unwarranted warning, be costly and amount to a tax on consumers
    • A Canadian study estimated that mandatory labeling would cost that country’s consumers $700 million to $950 million annually
    • "Manufacturers, who currently receive no benefit or marketing advantage from bio-engineered ingredients, do not want to present their products in a way that is negative to consumers, and especially not in ways that would cause any significant number of consumers to avoid purchasing those products."  (General Mills senior VP)
71. GMOs and Biotechnology (link collection)
72. SuperWeeds:  What are superweeds? Do we have any in Missouri? How many? (glyphosate resistance)
    • Horseweed (mare's tail)
    • Pigweed
    • Waterhemp
    • Johnson grass?
    • Black nightshade?
    • Velvetleaf?
    • Yellow nutsedge?
    • Rye grass (Australia)
    • Goose grass (Malaysia) 
73. Resistance to GM Foods in Great Britain
74. Report Targets Costs of Factory Farming (Washington Post, April 30, 2008)
    • Factory farming takes a big, hidden toll on human health and the environment, is undermining rural America's economic stability and fails to provide the humane treatment of livestock increasingly demanded by American consumers, concludes an independent, 2 1/2 -year analysis that calls for major changes in the way corporate agriculture produces meat, milk and eggs.
    • The report released yesterday, sponsored by the Pew Charitable Trusts and Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, finds that the "economies of scale" used to justify factory farming practices are largely an illusion, perpetuated by a failure to account for associated costs.
    • Among those costs are human illnesses caused by drug-resistant bacteria associated with the rampant use of antibiotics on feedlots and the degradation of land, water and air quality caused by animal waste too intensely concentrated to be neutralized by natural processes.
    • In the end, however, even industry representatives on the panel agreed to such controversial recommendations as a ban on the nontherapeutic use of antibiotics in farm animals -- a huge hit against veterinary pharmaceutical companies -- a phaseout of all intensive confinement systems that prevent the free movement of farm animals, and more vigorous enforcement of antitrust laws in the increasingly consolidated agricultural arena.
    • "At the end of his second term, President Dwight Eisenhower warned the nation about the dangers of the military-industrial complex -- an unhealthy alliance between the defense industry, the Pentagon, and their friends on Capitol Hill," wrote Robert P. Martin, executive director of the Pew Commission on Industrial Farm Animal Production, which wrote the report. "Now the agro-industrial complex -- an alliance of agricultural commodity groups, scientists at academic institutions who are paid by the industry, and their friends on Capitol Hill -- is a concern in animal food production in the 21st century."
    • "At the end of his second term, President Dwight Eisenhower warned the nation about the dangers of the military-industrial complex -- an unhealthy alliance between the defense industry, the Pentagon, and their friends on Capitol Hill," wrote Robert P. Martin, executive director of the Pew Commission on Industrial Farm Animal Production, which wrote the report. "Now the agro-industrial complex -- an alliance of agricultural commodity groups, scientists at academic institutions who are paid by the industry, and their friends on Capitol Hill -- is a concern in animal food production in the 21st century."
    • But the system has brought unintended consequences. With thousands of animals kept in close quarters, diseases spread quickly. To prevent some of those outbreaks -- and to spur faster growth -- factory farms routinely treat animals with antibiotics, speeding the development of drug-resistant bacteria and in some cases rendering important medications less effective in people.
    • The Pew report also calls for tighter regulation of factory farm waste, finding that toxic gases and dust from animal waste are making CAFO workers and neighbors ill.
    • The report also calls for implementation of a long-delayed national tracking system that would allow trace-back of diseased animals within 48 hours after a human outbreak of food-borne disease. And it calls for an end to forced feeding of poultry to produce foie gras, a delicacy that Blackwell described unpalatably as "diseased liver."
75. Siphoning Off Corn To Fuel Our Cars/SUVs (Washington Post, April 30, 2008)
    • This year, about a quarter of U.S. corn will go to feeding ethanol plants instead of poultry or livestock.
    • People who use corn to feed cattle, hogs and chickens are being squeezed by high corn prices. On Monday, Tyson Foods reported its first loss in six quarters and said that its corn and soybean costs would increase by $600 million this year. Those who are able, such as egg producers, are passing those high corn costs along to consumers. The wholesale price of eggs in the first quarter soared 40 percent from a year earlier, according to the Agriculture Department. Meanwhile, retail prices of countless food items, from cereal to sodas to salad dressing, are being nudged upward by more expensive ingredients such as corn syrup and cornstarch.
    • Although ethanol was once promoted as a way to slow climate change, a study published in Science magazine Feb. 29 concluded that greenhouse-gas emissions from corn and even cellulosic ethanol "exceed or match those from fossil fuels and therefore produce no greenhouse benefits." By encouraging an expansion of acreage, the study added, the use of U.S. cropland for ethanol could make climate conditions dramatically worse. And the runoff from increased use of fertilizers on expanded acreage would compound damage to waterways all the way to the Gulf of Mexico.
    • No place demonstrates the competing demands on corn better than Iowa, one of the two biggest corn-exporting states. Iowa is home to 28 ethanol plants, which consume more than a quarter of its corn crop; two dozen others are under construction or in planning stages.
    • In 2007, U.S. acreage devoted to corn hit a record 93.6 million acres, up 20 percent from the year before. Farmers are expected to plant a little less than that this year.
76. Egypt's Bread Shortage:  The Egyptian government has provided heavily subsidized bread for decades as a way to guarantee social peace in a nation where the nasbaseeta, or simple folk, have little control over the larger forces that buffet their lives.  More than 40% of Egypt's 80 million people live on just $2 a day — what millions of Americans spend for a cup of coffee. Almost 20% get by on daily income of just $1.
77. Prodigene "pharma-crop" disaster:  What ProdiGene's corn plants were producing is being protected as confidential business information.
    •  FDA says only that it was a pharmaceutical material in clinical trials. USDA field-test permit records and company information indicate that ProdiGene's development programs include the protease inhibitor aprotinin, the simian immunodeficiency virus glycoprotein 120, the digestive enzyme trypsin, and other drugs and vaccines.
    • In October, regulators found a small amount of "volunteer" corn, sprouted from seed leftover from a 2001 field test, that should not have been growing in a Nebraska soybean field. Eventually, about 500,000 bushels of soybeans had to be quarantined and will be bought by ProdiGene and destroyed. 
    • USDA discovered a similar situation in an Iowa field in September and ordered ProdiGene to harvest and destroy 155 acres of corn surrounding the test site.
    • FDA says the very small amount of genetically modified material in such a large quantity of soybeans would have posed "virtually no health risk," but says these products will not enter the food supply.
    • ProdiGene Inc. will pay a $250,000 fine, plus an estimated $2.8 million to buy and destroy contaminated soybeans, to settle federal allegations that it tainted crops with an experimental corn plant engineered to produce medicine.
    • The $250,000 fine is the maximum permitted under federal law. The company neither admitted nor denied any wrongdoing.
    • "I think this is a pretty aggressive stand on the part of USDA," Agriculture Secretary Ann Veneman told reporters after speaking before a food policy group. "We're taking a very strong approach in terms of taking an enforcement action."
78. Pharma-Rice planted in Kansas in 2007:  The 2007 field plantings are intended to be used to produce rice seed for subsequent plantings and for extraction of the three proteins for commercial and research products. According to the EA (environmental assessment to the EPA), the company plans to market lactoferrin and lysozyme as medical foods (such as oral rehydration solutions) and nutritional supplements (for example, in food bars and performance beverages) and serum albumin for use in cell culture.
79.