A MONTHLY NEWSLETTER OF FOOD SYSTEM ANALYSIS

No. 289, May 2012

ISSN 0827-4053

Minding our Ps and Qs

Our grandson, like many other children learning to write lower-case as well as capital letters, has had some trouble with b and d (and p and q). Which comes first, the straight line or the circle? We could ask the same question about the food system. Which comes first, the straight line of The Economy or the inclusive circle that describes the deep relationships between peoples and food? As we have pointed out in recent issues of the Rams Horn, The Economy is an ideological construct based in a linear model of inputs outputs exports. As such it is deeply foreign to the food system, which is holistic and circular. Wherever you enter the food system there are connections to other parts of it. If you look at seeds from one aspect you see the beginning of a crop; from another aspect theyre the product of selection through climate, geography, and human nurture (including culture). Or take Friday dinner. On one side its connected to the store where the fish and frozen peas were purchased and the back yard where the potatoes were grown, and further back to the income of the fisher and the state of the waters where the fish grew and the farm where the peas were grown and the plant where they were processed, along with the trucks that got them to the store. On the other side are connections to the nutritional needs of the family, the cultural tradition that calls for fish on Friday, and the composting or garbage disposal of the remains of the meal. The food system is about how people have gone about organizing their lives together to provide equitably and satisfactorily for their bodily needs for food, including hunting, gathering, fishing, and farming. The food system would also include storage (including root crops left in the ground) and minimum processing butchering, drying, salting and pickling as well as distribution to ensure that the elderly, infirm and very young are looked after. Considering agriculture and food as factors contributing to the GDP or balance of trade, however, is quite out of order, just like the capitalism that thinks in these terms. This issue explores some of the adverse reactions and costly consequences of this approach.

Farm life, piglets, and immune system health

Its really a matter of common sense that early exposure to a wide variety of organisms good, bad and indifferent is essential to the development of a healthy robust immune system (i.e. less asthma, fewer allergies). So we were hardly surprised to learn that a new study has shown that being raised on a farm directly affects the regulation of the immune system and reduces the immunological responses to protein in food. There is clear indication that expansion of a competent immune system in neonates depends on the composition of the intestinal microbiota and therefore exposure to environmental microbes. . . . In the study, some piglets were nursed by their sows on a farm while their siblings, from one day of age onward, were reared in an isolator unit under extremely hygienic conditions and fed formula milk, reflecting the environmental extremes under which human babies can be raised. The authors of the report say that their previous work suggests that intestinal bacteria play a pivotal role in the development of a competent immune system and these bacteria are obtained from the environment during early life. WP, 26/4/12
. . . continued next page

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From pigs to poultry:

A Minnesota vet whose clients are large turkey producers (In Minnesota, 250 turkey farmers raise more than 49 million birds annually an average of 200,000 each) observes that with increasing consumer demand for free-range turkeys, a whole new disease front has opened up. Free-range birds are exposed to soil bacteria, and that means exposure to new pathogens, thus requiring antibiotic use. What she is really saying is that being raised in a factory barn deprives the turkeys of exposure to what should be their natural environment, so they suffer from a weak immune system. Of course the industrys remedy is not to change the factory farm system, but to just accept that part of the cost of intensive meat production is the routine use of antibiotics. source: Star-Tribune

otics. Initially, the FDA is asking drug makers to voluntarily change their labels to require a prescription; federal officials said that drug makers had largely agreed to the change. NYT, 11/4/12 Where is the CFIA in all this? Heading for the back door, handing its responsibilities over to its private sector clients: self-regulation, in other words. The neoliberal Harper dictum is very simple not to say simple-minded: Eliminate regulations and let corporate capitalist business run rampant. Health Minister Leona Aglukkaq says, Our new approach will allow more timely approvals of safe, innovative products, while still protecting the health and safety of Canadians. Samuel Godefroy, director general of Health Canadas food directorate, says the recent budget-decreed changes in the Food and Drugs Act are not about lowering standards, but rather about streamlining the regulatory process so the department can respond more quickly to new scientific information. Clearly this is a joke, given the contempt the Harper regime has shown towards scientific information about climate change, his emasculation of Statistics Canada, cutting of independent research funding and so on. The disappearance of the CFIA is also forecast by the transfer of oversight and testing of seed crops from the CFIA to the private seed corporations, i.e., Monsanto, Syngenta, etc. These private authorized service providers are to be licensed and audited by the CFIA. Given Harpers practice of ignoring and/or making fun of auditors reports, we can hardly expect robust oversight of corporate interests. GM, 27/4/12 Given that the CFIAs mandate from day one has been to serve corporate interests in preference to the public good, the agency might as well be streamlined right out the door.

These costs are not just financial. Antibiotics are routinely added to livestock feed (beef and poultry) as a growth promotant. These are the same ones used to treat human illnesses, particularly bacterial infections, with the result that the drugs we depend upon to save human lives are becoming increasingly impotent, or indeed useless, as the bugs they are supposed to kill develop their own immunities. (This is parallel to the growing evidence that weeds are developing resistance to, or tolerance of, the herbicides that are supposed to kill them.) On top of which, there is increasing concern about the decimation of the trillions of bacteria in our guts by the antibiotics we are ingesting and injecting into our bodies. There is speculation that obesity is a possible consequence of the alteration of our internal bacterial colonies. It is not, however, mere speculation that the elimination of many forms of these bacteria has a significant effect on our immune system.

Really Big Beef

The drive for efficiency in animal farming does not stop with the sub-therapeutic use of antibiotics. The pharmaceutical giant Merck, for example, produces Zilmax (zilpaterol hydrochloride 4.8%) which it describes as a beef improvement technology to add value to the entire U.S. beef system by helping the industry more efficiently produce a safe, quality product. Zilmax is a feed supplement that enables an animals natural metabolism to more efficiently convert feed energy to lean, healthy, delicious beef. merck.com Despite these claims, it appears that as the cattle trucked to the packing plants have grown into bulky, lumbering giants, the quality of the beef has actually

The US Food and Drug Administration has been taking small steps to try to curb the use of antibiotics on farms for some time, but in the future farmers and ranchers in the USA will be required to get a prescription from a veterinarian before using antibiotics in cattle, pigs, chickens and other animals. Federal officials said that requiring prescriptions would lead to meaningful reductions in the agricultural use of antibi-

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plummeted. Meat from the most pharmaceutically enhanced cattle especially those given Zilmax can be so tough that some packing plants are refusing to buy cattle fed the drug. Some cattlemen and beef-industry executives have also begun to speak out, warning that continued use of the drug may make ranchers herds difficult to sell, and end up hurting the image of American beef. A beef-industry survey of restaurateurs and food executives in 2005 registered complaints of heavy carcasses, inappropriately-sized rib-eyes, and tough steaks that lacked the marbled fat that gives them flavour.

Both Zilmax and Optaflexx are controversial, though Zilmax is the more potent. It appears to make cattle gain more pounds than Optaflexx, and also does more damage to the meat. Dozens of nations, including China and the countries of the European Union, have banned their use because of concerns that residues in the meat could harm humans.
source: Chronicle of Higher Education, 15/4/12

Its Just a Tool, Honest

Have you noticed how often the term technology is applied in reference to some lifeform, or some deathgiving substance or process, such as genetic engineering? CropLife Canada goes so far as to refer to Tools like pesticides and plant biotechnology . . ., thus totally obscuring and neutering their purpose and character. CropLife describes itself as the trade association representing the manufacturers, developers and distributors of plant science innovations pest control products and plant biotechnology. . . and states: Our industry is committed to providing solutions to farmers and many other segments of society to help them overcome the pest challenges they face. . . These solutions are part of the old, familiar technology treadmill step by step, from poison to poison some we consume knowingly, some we take in unknowingly, some with suspicion, some with confidence since they are properly regulated. But sometimes the yuck factor takes over, as in the recent refusal of some retail food stores in the US to sell ground beef patties made with what is being called pink slime. It is made from beef tissue that would otherwise be scrapped or made into pet food. (ST, 27/3/12) Scrapped means rendered. Finely-textured beef represents about 3% of the US beef supply. It is composed of trimmings treated with ammonium hydroxide, or sometimes citric acid during its production to kill pathogens. Centrifuges separate out the fat, yielding 94-97% lean meat. Pink slime, according to the companies that use it (Cargill, Better Beef), has been a component of cheap beef patties for years without health problems, we are told, and without it, the companies will have to use more expensive cuts of beef. The scale of the pink slime industry? AFA Foods, one of the largest beef processors in the USA, has filed

Cargill executive Glen Dolezal said that while the company supports some use of drugs to increase weight gain in cattle, Zilmax had taken the process too far. Cargill wont buy cattle that it knows have been fed zilpaterol, he said. Cargills view is that an overly aggressive focus on growth can have an impact on the consumer attributes of size, quality, and tenderness. So we need to find a balance. The message there is that we ask you to be careful. No such warnings have come from academics an omission that Allen Williams, a former associate professor of animal science at Mississippi State and Louisiana Tech Universities, says should be expected: At the universities, there are certain things you just cant say, because many functions are sponsored by the major agricultural business corporations. You dont talk against them. Merck is not alone in this business. Elanco, a subsidiary of Eli Lilly, began selling a drug called Optaflexx as a growth promoter in cattle in 2004. Both Zilmax and Optaflexx come from a class of chemicals developed to treat asthma in humans, which were later found to turn fat into muscle in livestock. One feed company was mixing Elancos drug with whey, milk, and barley and selling it to ranchers under the name Explosion, evoking the effect it was said to have on the beasts.

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for bankruptcy, blaming their situation on pink slime. AFA produces (or did) more than 500 million pounds (227 million kgs) of ground beef products every year. The company has (or had) 850 full time employees (wages not stated). WP, 12/4/12 US beef consumption has been in decline for several years . . . Americans will on average eat 55.4 pounds of beef in 2012, down 3.3% from last year. Consumers have also opted for cheaper cuts and reduced restaurant PINK SLIME visits. Artists note: When I searched the Internet for illustrations of pink slime, I kept getting pictures of Newt Gingrich!

translocated throughout the plant at nontoxic concentrations. To the horseweed, this controlled translocation process means the difference between taking many shots of whiskey on an empty stomach versus sipping wine with a meal. The biotechnology companies reaction to the weed resistance problem is to develop more herbicide-tolerant GM crops that will encourage more herbicide use to control weeds. The companies are creating a genetic modification treadmill similar to the pesticide treadmill experienced in the mid-20th century, when companies produced increasingly more toxic substances to manage pests resistant to pesticides. This continual insertion of more genes into crops is not a sustainable solution to herbicide resistance. The original justification for developing the herbicide-tolerant GM crops was that we would move away from older, more environmentally harmful herbicides. Now several companies are actively developing crops that can resist glyphosate, 2,4-D and Dicamba herbicides. 2,4-D and Dicamba are older and less environmentally friendly, and weeds will eventually evolve combined resistance to Dicamba and 2,4-D, as well as glyphosate. Also, increased use of 2, 4-D and Dicamba applied over the growing corn and soybean means much more of these herbicides will be applied at a time of year when many sensitive crops like tomato and grapes are most vulnerable to injury. Such injury results when these herbicides move from the targeted field during or following an application. The alternative approach, says Mortensen, is integrated weed management, including the planting of cover crops, rotating crops, and using mechanical weed control methods, as well as targeted, judicious use of herbicides. Cover crops such as winter rye, hairy vetch, crimson or red clover can be planted in early fall following annual cash crops, or seeded in early spring. These crops add a smothering effect and keep weed seeds from emerging. Unfortunately we have an agricultural industry that doesnt want to encourage cover cropping because it goes in the opposite direction of where they want to go with GM crops and herbicides.
sources: The Organic & Non-GMO Report, USA, 4/4/12, Pennsylvania State University, 9/2/12

Back on the Technology Treadmill

According to Dave Mortensen, professor of weed ecology at Penn State University and author of a paper published in BioScience, the over-reliance on glyphosate herbicide, coupled with vast acreage of glyphosatetolerant GM crops, including most recently Roundup Ready alfalfa and sugar beets, has created intense selection pressure for the evolution of glyphosate resistant weeds. The biotechnology companies are reacting to this weed resistance problem by introducing more genes into crops that will facilitate more herbicides to control weeds. This industry-led solution is causing a transgeneherbicide treadmill that will result in a doubling or tripling of herbicide use in corn, soybeans, and cotton. Twenty-one weed species are now resistant to glyphosate, and 75% of those have been documented since 2005, despite company-sponsored research stating that the resistance would not occur. Several species have developed amazing biochemical ways to resist the effects of the herbicide, said J. Franklin Egan, doctoral student in ecology, Penn State. If weed problems are addressed just with herbicides, evolution will win. One way the weeds develop resistance is to make an enzyme that is insensitive to the herbicide, but still maintains cellular function, Egan said. Weeds have also developed ways for the plant to move the herbicide away from targeted enzymes. For instance, glyphosateresistant strains of Conyza canadensis horseweed sequester glyphosate in leaf tissues that are exposed to an herbicide spray so that the glyphosate can be slowly

SIPPING A GLASS OF WINE

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The Real Cost of Biotech

Global grain buyers are marking down the price of Australias genetically modified canola as the European market shuts the gate on GM crops. Monsanto has told GM canola farmers they will lose no more than $10 a tonne for product delivered to agricultural company Cargills crush facility at Newcastle by June 29. The Australian Wheat Board and Viterra are offering to buy up supplies of GM canola at guaranteed prices. Viterra is paying a $45 a tonne premium for standard canola in Western Australia 8% more than for the GM herbicide-resistant canola, which was introduced to Australia eight years ago. The nations biggest co-operative, CBH Group, is paying $40 to $45 a tonne less for GM canola, a 6% markdown. CBH Grains protein and oilseeds marketing manager Peter Elliott said Europe wanted to buy Australian canola, but would not accept GM product. Glycerol, a by-product of biofuel production from canola, is used in cosmetics, but all the major cosmetics companies have non-GMO policies. Australia is one of the few places with large non-GM canola production, so theres a big premium paid for non-GM into Europe. State laws permit GM canola to be grown in Western Australia, Victoria, New South Wales and Queensland, but not in South Australia, Tasmania, the Australian Capital Territory and the Northern Territory. 10% of W.A.s canola crop is now genetically modified, and promotion to increase this is intense. Bayer CropScience received approval in December from the federal governments Office of the Gene Technology Regulator for the commercial release of canola genetically modified to resist two types of herbicide. Meanwhile Canola Breeders WA, which promotes hybrid canola breeding, is offering to give away bags of Roundup Ready canola seeds for free in a buy three, get one free offer to farmers.
source: The Australian, 23/4/12

a result of its approval by the US Environmental Protection Agency and the US Congress has set a goal of blending 36 billion gallons of renewable fuels into biodiesel by 2022. One billion gallons of that is set aside for production from biomass, such as canola, according to the National Biodiesel Board. WP, 12/4/12 The USDA estimates the ethanol industry will consume 40% of the 2011 corn crop, and that could rise in 2012 with the approval of 15% ethanol blends for gasoline. Now farmers in western Canada are expected to seed a record 20 million acres with canola this spring to meet rising demand and take advantage of higher prices. Canola may be considered a good crop for biofuel production but we must remember that canola requires and can utilize large amounts of nitrogen-based fertilizers produced from natural gas. So what is the real equation of energy in and energy out? Its carbon footprint may be smaller than that of regular jet fuel, but the real issue is energy consumption itself. A big hope and hype for ethanol production in Canada was the promised construction of a $1.4 billion project in Manitoba to produce cellulosic ethanol from corn stalks and wheat straw by a partnership of Royal Dutch Shell and Ottawa-based Iogen Corp. Shell and Iogen have now announced that they are putting the project on ice in the absence of a strong government policy to put a price on carbon emissions that would drive up the price of ethanol. So its really the same old story: no massive public subsidy (by mandated use or direct subsidy for prodction), no ethanol just like that other stock scam, genetic engineering. Also cancelled was a $1.4 billion project to capture carbon dioxide from an Alberta coal fired power plant and sequester the gas underground. The reason given for the cancellation was a lack of adequate return on the investment was the absence of government regulations or levies to put a GM, 1/5/12 price on carbon dioxide.

A Stark Choice
Over 150 groups and more than 365,000 US citizens are urging the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) to reject a Dow Chemical application seeking approval of a controversial GE corn that is resistant to 2,4-D. In addition to the public comments, 154 farm, environmental, health, fisheries groups and companies have sent a letter to USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack expressing their overwhelming opposition to this crop. American agriculture stands at a crossroads. One

Energy sources and uses Canola

It may cost ten times more than standard jet fuel, but some airlines (Porter and Quantas) are trying out a blend of 50% biofuel from canola and 50% regular jet fuel. The biofuel is said to have a life cycle carbon footprint about 60% smaller than that of conventional jet fuel. Biodiesel produced from Canadian canola is also now being added to regular gasoline in the USA as

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path leads to more intensive use of old and toxic pesticides, litigious disputes in farm country over driftrelated crop injury, less crop diversity, increasingly intractable weeds, and sharply rising farmer production costs, said Andrew Kimbrell, Executive Director of the Center for Food Safety. This is the path American agriculture will take with approval of Dows 2,4-D resistant corn, soybeans and the host of other new herbicide-resistant crops in the pipeline. Another path is possible, but embarking upon it will take enlightened leadership from USDA.

options to conduct field trials of genetically modified food crops such as tomato, cabbage and maize. The only viable options now are Gujarat and Andhra Pradesh.
Hindustan Times, India, 13/4/12

Marking the global anti-GMO Week, over 500 women from the Deccan Development Society organized a procession at Zaheerabad against the governments inaction on the spread of Bt cotton in Medak, 80km away. The women who predominantly cultivate native varieties of millets have demanded a total ban on Bt cotton in Medak District besides slapping serious criminal cases against Bt seed dealers.
Deccan Herald, India 14/4/12

Karnataka Farmer Goes Organic

Nagappa Nimbegundi, 51, is no run-of-the-mill farmer. Although dressed modestly in a bright white dhoti and shirt and green shawl, he has an innovative mind that helped him develop 23 varieties of cotton organically.
THE PATH OF BUSINESS AS USUAL

INDIA Breeding non-GE cotton

Concerned about the fading away of traditional Indian cotton seeds, a charitable trust has pledged Rs 50 lakh (about $940,000US) to support research to develop a new hybrid desi cotton seed. For the five-year project, field trials will be conducted in different parts of the country. The main aim is to propagate non-BT cotton hybrids and varieties having better performance. The seed will remain in public domain and be a gift to farmers. According to experts, since 2002 Bt cotton has spread to over 90% of land where cotton is cultivated in India and non-BT varieties and hybrids have vanished. Unfortunately, cotton seeds available are patented and owned by TNCs. They are earning huge royalties and governments have done little research on non-BT cotton hybrids, said one farmer activist.
The Times of India, India 14/4/12

Hailing from Haveri, he once swore by chemical fertilizers for farming and realised his mistake 10 years after growing Bt cotton. My land was losing its life. Initially, I got a yield of 19 to 20 quintals of cotton per acre. In five years, it was reduced to nine quintals. This further came down to four quintals and my land was dying. I began to feel depressed, said Nagappa, lamenting his years of Bt farming. Using chemical fertilizers, he used to grow millets, corn, tur dal and cotton on his five-and-a-half acre land. After noticing that his farmland yield was falling, Nagappa decided to switch from Bt to organic farming. I looked for organically developed seeds, but to my bad luck, everyone around me had switched to Bt crops and the shops also sold only Bt seeds. Hence, I decided to grow Bt seeds by using organic methods. This was a misadventure. The Bt seeds dont germinate when organic methods are used. Later, Nagappa began attending seminars and workshops along with some environmental groups. He finally joined hands with Sahaja Samrudha Organic Producer Company Limited. I got organically developed seeds and learned organic farming methods from them. Now, I not only grow all my crops organically, but have also developed 23 varieties of cotton, he said with a smile. His farm has close to 50 varieties of crops.
Daily News and Analysis, India, 30/3/12

Indias biotechnology industry is hitting a roadblock because many states are now saying no to GM crops. The big biotechnology companies now have few

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Luxury is Sustainability
Prompted by full page colour ad for Tory Burch bags (G&M, 30/4/12) we checked the Internet and found www. 2luxury2.com, announcing a partnership between upscale retailer Holt Renfrew, FEED Foundation and the Tory Burch Foundation. It features a limited edition tote bag Holts is selling for $50 each, with a portion of the proceeds from the sale of each bag going to the respective foundations. This, we discovered, is only one of a whole series of beautiful limited edition products to benefit the Tory Burch Foundation. Holt Renfrew+FEED+Tory Burch =a tote bag that can change the world. Really!

tions that can bolster a core drugs business that faces generic competition for blockbuster products like cholesterol drug Lipitor. By the end of last year, Pfizer had $35.2 billion in cash, cash equivalents and liquid investments, the fifth-highest cash load among U.S. companies, according to Moodys Investors Service. No reports of the transaction make any mention of the giant fines Pfizer is subject to for its illegal drug marketing practices. Pfizer has already paid $2.3 billion to U.S. Federal and State Medicaid programs as part of its settlement of a case involving illegal marketing of four drugs, most prominently Bextra.

Monsantos GMOs unpopular

Monsanto said it does not plan to sell its genetically modified maize MON810 in France this year, nor after, even though the countrys highest court overturned a 3year ban in November. Monsanto considers that favorable conditions for the sale of the MON810 in France in 2012 and beyond are not in place, the company said in a statement. The French government said earlier this month it would uphold its ban on the insectresistant strain of maize, despite the courts decision to annul the ban after finding that it had not produced enough evidence that Monsantos MON810 posed a significant risk to health or the environment.
Reuters, 24/1/12

Nestl gets even bigger

Nestl has bought out the infant nutrition business of drug-maker Pfizer Inc. for $11.85 billion. Over the past two years, Pfizers infant nutrition business has grown 33%, to $2.1 billion, much of that in China. Nestl is the biggest company in the $39 billion infant nutrition business, ahead of Meade Johnson Nutrition and yogurt-maker Danone. Pfizer acquired the baby-milk formula and other products of Wyeth when it took over the company in 2009. G&M, 24/4/12 Nestl had a 17% share of the $27 billion worldwide market in 2010, followed by Mead Johnson Nutrition with 15% and Danone with 13%, according to the most recent data from Euromonitor International. But those companies held a commanding lead in China, where Nestl was ranked eighth with a 2.3% share in the baby formula market, according to Euromonitor. After taking over Pfizers unit, Nestl would be No. 3 in China with a 9.7% share, behind Mead Johnson with an 11.7% share and almost tied with Danone with a 9.8% share. The photo accompanying the article shows SMA Toddler Milk in cans with Nutritionally balanced for active toddlers and Nutritionally superior to cows milk on the label. For Pfizer, the deal provides what analysts estimated would be $8 billion to $9 billion in proceeds after taxes. The company is expected to use much of that to buy back shares, while applying the rest for acquisi-

BASFs decision to move its plant science headquarters from Limburgerhof, Germany, to Raleigh, North Carolina was an acknowledgement that GM plants are unpopular in the European Union. We are convinced that plant biotechnology is a key technology for the 21st century, said Stefan Marcinowski, a board member of BASF in charge of plant biotechnology. However, there is still a lack of acceptance for this technology in many parts of Europe from the majority of consumers, farmers and politicians.
EurActiv, Belgium 25/1/12

For the Record

The U.S. military used Agent Orange from 1961 to 1971 to save the lives of US and allied soldiers by defoliating dense vegetation in the Vietnamese jungles and therefore reducing the chances of ambush. . . . The U.S. government [issued]contracts to seven major chemical companies to obtain Agent Orange and other herbicides for use by U.S. and allied troops in Vietnam.

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Agent Orange was one of 15 herbicides used for military purposes during the Vietnam War and the most commonly applied. . . Monsanto manufactured Agent Orange from 1965 to 1969. monsanto.com

Hungary Destroys Tainted Crops

Crops are being destroyed on 8,500-9,000 hectares in Hungary because of maize tainted with genetically modified (GM) seeds, Rural Development Ministry state secretary Gyorgy Czervan said at a press conference. The GM-tainted maize is being torn up on about 4,500 hectares and crops on about 4,000 hectares are being destroyed to create a buffer zone around the tainted maize, Czervan said. About 225 producers are directly affected by the destruction of the crops. They will be paid restitution of HUF 360,000, which Czervan said was appropriate and fair. State secretary in charge of the Prime Ministers Office Mihly Varga told the representatives from Monsanto Hungria that Hungary is fully committed to a GM-free policy. He noted that the countrys new constitution even contains a paragraph on GM-free farming. Thousands of hectares of GM-tainted corn were destroyed in July. The corn was grown from Monsanto and Pioneer seed varieties.
Budapest Business Journal, 11/8/11

Monsantos performance reflects the growing importance of South America to the revenue base. . . Monsanto CEO Hugh Grant said that while the company had already established itself, particularly in Brazil, the region offers an opportunity to upgrade farmers to highertechnology, more expensive seeds that contain more of Monsantos biotechnology such as pest resistance. We are only on the front end of trait penetration in Latin America, said a spokesperson.
Financial Times, UK 4/4/12

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