Can Monsanto Win Over its Critics?
Earlier this year I explored how Monsanto, the world’s most successful agricultural biotech company, became the poster child for the anti-GMO movement. (The best book-length history of how this came to be remains “Lords of the Harvest,” by NPR’s Dan Charles.) What fascinates me–and undoubtedly infuriates anyone who works at Monsanto–is how hard it is for the company to shake its villainous public image.
Even writing about Monsanto is a fraught endeavor, as Michael Specter has noted:
It is not possible to assert publicly that Monsanto is anything other than venal without being accused of being a sellout, a fraud, or worse.
(That’s why I figured I’d just roll with the charge, in good fun.)
This week’s cover story for Bloomberg Businessweek is the latest attempt to make sense of the strong emotions Monsanto triggers in many people, a phenomena parodied recently by the Onion:
I like to think of myself as a good person. I recycle for the most part. I’ve seriously looked into purchasing a hybrid car for my next vehicle. I buy organic produce whenever possible, both for my own health and to send a message. So, I guess what I’m asking is, does anyone know what Monsanto is? Because from the sound of it, I would definitely be against it.
The Bloomberg piece will definitely inform you what Monsanto is, but I doubt it will change the minds of those already inclined to distrust/hate/vilify the company.
And for those who are familiar with the demonization of Monsanto, the Bloomberg article will feel like a walk through familiar territory. But there is one teasing scene in a San Francisco triplex, where Michael Pollan is breaking bread with a high level Monsanto executive. I would have liked to have heard more about this. I will be especially interested if anything comes of it.
Nothing would please me more than to welcome Pollan over to the dark side.
I saw Pollan when he introduced a recent lecture by Pam Ronald at Berkeley, then shot questions at her afterward. He’s had many, many years to learn the actual facts about GM from people like Ronald who are at the forefront of academic biotech., Yet at this forum, as a reason for doubt, he brought up Seralini (in the form of unnamed “studies”, but the description was unmistakable).
Reading his NYT Magazine article from the late ’90s on the New Leaf potato, one gets the impression that his opposition to GM is rooted (so to speak) in a combination of a sense of “ick” (which you can never argue someone out of) and the fact that he would be embarrassed to serve his friends a dish prepared from GM raw materials. He does live in Berkeley, after all, and hobnob with the Alice Waters crowd.
I don’t think this is a man open to conversion, though I’d be delighted to be proved wrong so I can high-five him next time I’m in line behind him at the Monterey Market.
Short answer NO.
Monsanto are at an unholy nexus of opposition to global corporations and an unreasoning opposition to GMO.
I think there’s a sort of event horizon caused by a mass of bad publicity, poor thinking, ideology and FUD that means that nothing good can ever escape.
Monsanto are a prime example.
Pollan has two faces. Which one you see depends on the audience. In front of techies he’s willing to say that GMOs aren’t the spawn of satan (you can see this especially in the question section of his Long Now seminar). In front of his book customers and acolytes he is happy to imply that they are.
But it’s interesting you bring up the Seralini thing–because this is what he’s said about him in the past (~54min):
http://bit.ly/PollanSeralini
He didn’t note that he thought Seralini was “fringy” in the conversation with Pam, if I remember correctly.
Many people hate GMOs because they profit Monsanto, and they hate Monsanto not because of the fact that it produces GMOs but because of how they see it it using them. If Monsanto (or anyone else) wants to clean up the image of GMOs then the first step is to address the complaints about their business practices.
It wouldn’t mater what they did. In most circles it would be described as a ploy to mollify critics.
Pollan sells books. That’s his job. The best way to do that is to make everyone happy – a little for the techie geeks, a little for the hippies. A little not quite 100% accurate representation to keep everyone happy and buying books isn’t quite the same as lying, no?
It does not matter. Those that hate Monsanto’s because of their business practices either have the wrong “facts” about their business practices such as them suing farmers left or right (less then 10 a year in reality) or forcing farmers to use their produces (less then 30 percent market share in the seed business and you can use off brand round up) or are ignorant of the seed business and its history. Don’t know how many seem to think they are the only ones that can patent seeds despite the law being in effect and used for nearly 90 years. The worst is the save seed crowd which do not understand that corn has not been saved for the 70 years and soy/cotton/rape seed where moving that way before the introduction of GM varieties.
How about how they’ve stolen property from farmers because some of their GMO’s ended up on another property?
How about how they refuse to allow foods to be labeled as GMO’s. How about how they set up seeds that are terminal, one generation only, so farmers are forced to buy seeds from them again?
How about all of the problems with Roundup?
No, they are definately not worthy of respect.
At one lecture with PC Ronald he did state “OK, I give the papaya”. And he was quite civil, not even mentioning her 2 retracted famous rice studies. Problem with GMO’s are most are Pesticide resistant & he is a bit of an environmentalist along with encouraging people to eat whole healthy foods “real food”. Not the processed crap that include most GMO’s.
Of all the inaccuracies in your post I find the terminator myth the most hilarious. If the seeds were one generation only (which they are not) then why would Monsanto prohibit farmers from saving and replanting seeds? Doesn’t make much sense if they’re sterile, huh?
“Not the processed crap that include most GMO’s.”
???? You can’t sell a fresh GMO tomato?
Has any brand ever overcome a negative image with the progressive crowd? 🙂 I can’t think of one.
The managers of Monsanto (and other companies) are hired to maximize profit. And like all managers they will do that, regardless if things are good or bad for the people, the environment or the world.
There are no fresh GMO tomato’s.
Problem is pro gmoer’s believe in their fantasy’s. (Yes…..let’s promote more damage to the land via killings animals, bugs, soil, butterfly’s for profit!) JUNK Processed Foods for all…including animal feed.
98 % of GMO’s are pesticide resistant….only the papaya & a little squash are “real foods”.
Yep, a reputation that is not going to change for many more decades, if ever.
Only in some circles, those with a ideological predisposition to think the worst of any multinational or company involved with GMOs. So a double whammy for Monsanto.
Perhaps they might as well go for broke and start fracking.
Monsanto at this point is just a figurehead for BIG Chemical Companies. Syngenta, DOW etc. are catching up quickly.
Don’t know why some Scientists can’t figure out a way to “make progress” without destruction of the environment. GREED, I say & narrow mindedness. (Same with nuclear, now Scientists never figured out what to do with all this nuclear waste…..now because of drift…we have GMO pollution problem & they can’t figure out how to fix that one either)
As far as nuclear is concerned I think we lost our nerve and stopped working on new designs of reactor that would have minimised and reduced waste problems as well as addressing safety concerns.
Blame BIG green for that.
Why come to a science site to take a dump of your genetic illiteracy based hatred?
Nobody will buy your crap here.
If there WAS such a thing as “GMO pollution” it would only exist on farmer’s property. The moment it enters the biome at large it is subject to natural selection which protects us from all radical potentially harmful mutations and takes advantage of good mutations.
“Like all managers they will do that, regardless if things are good or bad for the people, the environment or the world.”
But wait – they make a product farmers want because it allows the farmers to make more profit because it allows them to spray fewer chemicals (a key goal of many environmental groups) and in your view that’s bad for people and the environment?
Last I knew, profit was a good thing because it generated taxes and taxes were used for the public good – for example, to fund agencies like the EPA and the FDA, which in turn regulate and protect the public from bad behavior by companies like Monsanto.
And last I knew spraying less chemicals while producing more food was a good thing because it reduces the impact of agriculture on the environment. But I know how much environmentalists hate it when companies give them what they ask for.
Right? Or no?
Who are you to tell me what and where to comment? Stop trolling me & flagged again, Jim
Again, read up & catch up http://toxics.usgs.gov/regional/emc/index.html
Not blaming anyone. But you would think they (whoevers job it was) would have figured out what to do with the nuclear waste BEFORE promoting and constructing all the reactors! (common sense folks)
Lock your comment history to avoid being followed, a practice encouraged by the disqus system.
Stop spreading ignorance and hate to be left alone.
Nope. Well, they did to an extent but underestimated the scale of opposition to reprocessing and burial.
If we’d kept developing reactor technology we’d have a generation of reactors that produce considerably less waste and could even feed off the waste of earlier generations of reactor.
But we didn’t and we’re saddled with largely 30 year old technology when we really need something up-to-date.
http://www.spinwatch.org/index.php/issues/science/item/164-smelling-a-corporate-rat
The study that you so enthusiastically attacked has now been triple peer reviewed and found to be at least as credible, if not more so, than the Monsanto studies supporting the unqualified safety of GMOs and the poisons that are sprayed on the crops, land and water in the fields.
. You ignore the second and third level impacts of the Roundup and agent orange spraying. Milkweed, essential to Monarch Butterflies, is being decimated in the US. Bees are dying not just from the syndrome but from the poisons in the GMO blossoms and the poisons sprayed across wide swaths of the USA in the name of more corn syrup for the Cargills of the world.
David, the article you linked to has some problems, at least two of the links don’t appear to reference the work they cite. More importantly, according to a statement by a chief editor at the opensource publisher who republished Seralini’s 2012 paper, the paper only passed one scientific peer review – the original one before the original paper was published. The second review resulted in retraction, and there was no scientific peer review by the republisher. The only review was to see that the paper had not been significantly changed.
no wrong ..it does NOT allow a farmer to spray less chemicals ..it allows then to spray MORE without killing the plant . This is then absorbed by the plant ,,and then ingested by YOU ..