Monsanto

   This morning I will be talking a little bit about Monsanto and the GMO industry. GMO is an abbreviation for genetically modified organism. The concept sounds so scientific and progressive. The concept screams hope, hope for a starving world. Imagine what can be done when you modify an animal or plant to withstand drought or grow faster or larger. Now imagine what happens when these products are rushed onto the market and bribed past the FDA and force fed to you unlabeled at your local grocery store. Monsanto dominates this industry and can be held responsible for the goods and the bad's that come from these foods. So far it seems more bad than good but i will not be directly attacking Monsanto today because they have lobbied to make that a crime.

   When you go to your local grocery store you can quickly find that most of these foods are processed, but what is not so well known is that 70% of processed foods include GMO's within them. These foods do not contain a label to inform you of this fact because Monsanto, with it's vast lobbying power has destroyed these attempts every time they have arisen since the 1970's. The international community had made some progress in this regard. The European Union, Japan, China, Korea, Australia, New Zealand and many other minor nations all require GMO labeling. Closer to home the average American eat over 200 pounds of meat per year. We must stop to consider what we are eating. We should have a right to know what is in our food.

   You might wonder why don't have this right. Maybe it has to with the fact that Monsanto spent at least 8,831,120 dollars in legal lobbying to the Federal government via their PAC's in one year alone. This goes contrary to democracy and when the indirect affect of this lobbying is that in 1972 the FDA conducted about 50,000 food safety inspections per year and are now down to about 9,164 as of 2006. In the last several years we have seen huge increases in food-borne  illness in humans and the time has come to call for labeling and identify the source of this threat to human health.

   When it comes down to the concept of GMO's I am not against them. I am however against Monsanto. I am against the lobbying of the FDA and I am definitely against poisoning the American people. When the day comes that Monsanto is held accountable for their crimes against humanity and the American people a new GMO
organization will take it's place. That is the time to be on the watch for abuse, and so long as we can hold that future organization accountable we can expect healthy and honest GMO  based food and safely feed the world. If you think that we cannot definitely prove Monsanto's guilt then sleep soundly with the realization that they have monopolized the food industry and lobby against third party investigation of their food and product's health affects.

                                                                                                 Kevin Locks

http://www.takepart.com/photos/food-inc-facts/impact-food-inc-lives
http://www.monsanto.com/newsviews/pages/saved-seed-farmer-lawsuits.aspx