Percy Schmeiser
Activists At Mumbai Meeting Back Canadian Farmer Vs Monsanto
DOW JONES NEWSWIRES 20jan04
MUMBAI (AP)--Anti-biotech farmers and scientists rallied at the World Social Forum on Tuesday to mobilize support for a Canadian farmer who has been sued by agribusiness giant Monsanto Co. (MON) for illegally using its patented canola seed.
Percy Schmeiser was sued after Monsanto agents in 1997 found biotech canola growing in his fields in Canada's Saskatchewan plains. The company accused him of replanting seeds from those plants without paying a technology fee.
The case was coming up at Canada's highest court on Tuesday, where judges were to hear three hours of arguments and rule in several months.
"Win or lose, this case has significant implications," said Maude Bardow of Council of Canadians. "If we lose, it makes very, very clear that governments don't have the ability any more to make their own laws and protect their own farmers."
Some 50 anti-biotech activists from Argentina, the Philippines, Mexico, Japan, Canada and India met at the forum in Mumbai, formerly known as Bombay, to discuss strategies to counter the targeting of farmers by agribusiness corporations.
A decision against Monsanto would be a tremendous boost for the forces mobilizing against biotechnology.
Schmeiser has already become a rallying point for anti-biotech farmers. Worldwide donations have poured in to help him fight the case.
He says the Monsanto canola may have migrated to his 1,400 acres from neighbors' fields as airborne pollen, carried by animals or spilled from a cart. The 73-year-old farmer says the genetically modified seed has contaminated his organic crop and destroyed a lifetime of work.
But Monsanto, which has a lien on Schmeiser's farm after two lower-court victories, says there was simply too much biotech canola in his fields for the accidental exposure explanation to be credible.
It insists Schmeiser must pay every year for seed, just like 30,000 other canola farmers in Canada, where roughly half the 10 million acres of canola have been converted since 1996 to Monsanto's variety.
- Detailed account of Percy's story - Heartbreak in the Heartland: The True Cost of Genetically Engineered Crops
- Contribute to Percy Schmeiser's legal defense: http://www.percyschmeiser.com
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