Comments on: Monsanto Does ‘Dust and Ditch’ Destroying Local Organic Farm

By: EarthTurns Vitamins

EarthTurns Vitamins — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 19:56:02 +0000

Very cool! Glad I found this post. I wanted to say hello and thanks for posting such good stuff. – Devin

By: Car stereo

Car stereo — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 21:52:34 +0000

As a Newbie, I am always searching online for articles that can help me. Thank you

By: amicus curiae

amicus curiae — Sun, 16 Aug 2009 12:37:12 +0000

Kelly Rivard is a Monsanto shill.Brad Mitchell the usual media pr guy must be on holiday?
Triple stack corn, no wait now they have an 8 stack!
the more they add gene snips the more chance of errors and mutations there are. they admit!! that the PVR plants loose their traits!!!! if seed is saved! ie roundup begins to affect them, and most are hybrids anyway.(dont breed true, revert to poor species)
The pilot should have his licence removed, and monsanto own the land contracted, arranged it and chose the chemicals. so how? are they NOT directly guilty?
See the world according to Monsanto,
go to the union of concerned scientists and see just how untrue the yield /lower pesticides/ etc etc, really are.
RR resistance now reqires 2,4D or Triazine to knock off volunteer GM and RR Weeds. less chemical use my butt! more roundup, then more toxic chem.Buy up all the seed companies and contaminate and patent the germ plasm, make it damned near impossible to source and NON GM seed, contaminate sue and drive small farmers off their land,Wonderful record of it.FACT ; USDA was partners with Delta Pine and Land, who developed Terminator Genes. guess who bought Delta?? yup! Monsanto!
so? do any of you have any questions now, about why? the USDA approves just about every GM product??
a 42 day shed trial on 2 sheds of chickens does NOT constitute a safety test, especially when one sheds data is not available. yet FDA and FSANZ both accepted that? as proof a 2x modified soy is ok for HUMAN consumption!

By: Em

Em — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 18:15:47 +0000

Anyone who cares to investigate objectively just a little bit can find out how Monsanto and corporations like it operate. They figured prominently in the show “The Corporation. Got money? Got lawyers? They have. They count on the public and competition not to.

By: Mark

Mark — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 04:05:31 +0000

It seems to me that a farmer should wait to see if there crop has been “decertified” before talking about lawsuits and legal battles over crop dusting neear his field. This article and the following posts read like the guy intentionaly assulted a farm field as if he wanted to drop a deadly bomb on a threatening enemy. And the comments about the pilot are rediculous. I’m sure that the guy worked EXTREMELY HARD to get his commercial pilots certificate, they do not just hand them out for a small fee. You have to prove your are able and qualified and I’ll be willing to bet that most people that have posted and even the person that wrote this article have not accomplished what this man has. It’s not an easy task.

By: Bob Fairlane

Bob Fairlane — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 10:07:56 +0000

How can Monsanto be “nazis” if they are apparently so focused on keeping black africans from starving themselves?

By: Bob Fairlane

Bob Fairlane — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 10:01:24 +0000

Mica Lehman of Monsanto. You could put some money in your apology handshake. Why do you need to screw with genetics of food and sell people dead seeds anyway. Are you really that destructive? This is why Monsanto is a hated name like Haliburton. People don’t fear power, they fear abuse.

By: Bob

Bob — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 09:54:35 +0000

That sure is hateful to ruin someone’s organic certification. That old saying holds true, “good fences make good neighbors.” But how high a fence must be to stop a light plane.

By: Byron

Byron — Sat, 25 Jul 2009 20:28:55 +0000

Here’s an article about one of the New Cuyama incidents.

“In May, in the agricultural community of New Cuyama in Santa Barbara County, a pesticide drift incident prompted the evacuation and closure of New Cuyama Elementary School. Five school employees and 17 students suffered nausea, sinus headaches, sore throats, burning eyes, vomiting and fainting after being exposed to off-gassing of the toxic pesticide metam sodium, which had been applied to an adjacent agricultural field several days earlier.”

http://articles.latimes.com/1999/sep/05/local/me-7101

They talk about a one mile buffer from sprinkler application of these toxic chemicals but what is he spraying from that airplane?

By: Byron

Byron — Sat, 25 Jul 2009 19:56:00 +0000

We used to live in New Cuyama, California, a small community along Highway 166. Surrounding it there is a large carrot operation there both conventional and, supposedly, organic, across the street from each other, both run by an operation called Grimmway Farms. The operator was and probably still is a guy by the name of Dale Jackson. It seemed like the guy was constantly flying over in his crop duster, a little yellow plane spraying his fields. As winds were a regularity out there I had to question the integrity of his organic fields. I called the local ag commissioner who gave me his telephone number. So I called him to ask what he sprays since our small town was on the edge of his fields. I wanted to know what we were being exposed to. I was very polite as I was hoping to get some info. No dice. The guy was immediately abusive and threatening. In the course of our “conversation” he let out that he believed that I was calling from the school. There is an elementary school also next to his fields. I later researched and discovered the school had been closed twice in the past due to overspraying and contamination. The guy had no remorse whatsoever for these incidents and couldn’t care less who was exposed. Believing that I was calling from the school he threatened that he was going to call the school district and complain. We finally moved because I didn’t want my daughter, who was about to enter school attending there and because we were worried about the constant spraying around our town. I believe if an investigation was done they’d find that his so-called “organic” operations, the carrots from which I’ve found in natural food stores around the central coast are no more organic that his conventional ones. In my opinion the guy is a total fraud.

By: Becca

Becca — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 00:47:22 +0000

Here in Minnesota, When we posted our small farm as Organic, the sprayers backed up to the fences with our pregnant sows and let it blast in 17 mph winds directing it over the sows and the pasture they were in. Within 3 weeks 7 of the 9 aborted their fetuses and 1 absorbed hers with 1 sow having 3 normal looking piglets and 1 monster that was dead at birth. When we filed a complaint with the Department of Agriculture the following spring the applicators again backed up to the fence and let it blow with Atrazine and Metalachlor delivering an almost lethal dose to a man with Parkinsons Disease who could not leave the area who was with 3 young children at the time. The man with Parkinsons had an immediate falling off of medications and a rapid progression of his disease. The company was fined approxiametly 2500.00 which can be reimbursed by the department of Agriculture to the company. The applicators license should have been pulled and he should have been charged criminally instead he is a applicator in good standing with the state.This has been ongoing and the County Attorneys are responsible to press charges and they don’t.

By: Clint

Clint — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 01:07:39 +0000

Monsanto=the seed Nazis

By: Cynthia

Cynthia — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 18:33:54 +0000

A couple of things, Kelly. If we push aside any incriminations and simply look at what happened as “a mistake” it still stands out as an unnecessary action– and therefore reprehensible. It is sadder because of the long-term effects of this toxin being sprayed on this farm and its workers… will Monsanto address the long-term effects? Not likely.

I must also take issue with GMOs being responsible for improving the quality of life abroad. If you look at a load of “nutritional” products with unknown long-term effects b/c of their genetics, being dropped off in some African community, this is a very short-sighted and potentially disasterous situation. Take another read on what countries in Africa think of “terminator seeds”. Take a look at WHY various global countries have set aside indigenous, heritage seeds in secure vaults. Countries that haven’t done this are ones whose governments are pretty corrupt and not looking at sustainable agriculture in any serious, knowledgeable way.

I come from an agricultural background. My father was actually instrumental in introducing “seed patents” in our country in the early 60s and is very regretful– was regretful almost immediately when he was ‘briefed’ a little too late to stop the legislation. He is still sharp-minded in his 80s and a wealth of information for anyone who wants to ‘talk agriculture’ (or history or whatever lol). I am amazed at his understanding of a sustainable agricultural system… he has lots of regrets, too, for his part in ushering in the Big Farma chemical companies.

I can understand your concern for peoples of other nations who are in famine and desperate need… I just think that the short-sighted view (I’m being generous here)is NOT the vision that will sustain our global peoples and their food-growing lands.

By: Kelly Rivard

Kelly Rivard — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 16:04:22 +0000

I would like to point out that in the first paragraph of the above comment that I did NOT mean the organic farm is worthless: simply than a single small farm should not have been viewed as any type of threat. As stated in past comments, I myself work in nutrition and teach others about living naturally, organically, and/or raw. I fully understand the benefits of leading such a lifestyle, but also understand the necessity of mass production agriculture.

By: Kelly Rivard

Kelly Rivard — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 13:00:16 +0000

In reality, a small farm like the one involved is barely worth Monsanto to pay attention to. I hardly feel that the company deserves the wrath being directed to it for this incident. As stated before, the company is LOSING money when this sort of thing happens; a single, small, family-owned organic farm isn’t worth the thousands of dollars that a duster a field’s worth of chemicals would cost.

GMO’s have been developed to benefit the mass population. In other words, the research has been done to feed the world, not just America. Drought-resistant maize is being worked on to be introduced into Africa. If it weren’t for triple-stack corn (and I bet few of you know what that means), we’d have to use double- to quadruple-times the amount of harmful chemicals.

I am not saying that mass-production agriculture as is stands if perfect. In fact, half of my job is teaching people how to live more natural, beneficial, healthful lifestyles. But as it stands, GMO’s are responsible for improving quality of life in many places. Until organic farming can find a way to reach that level of sustainability, I stand by GMO’s.