2016-08-02

Well look who's dropping frankenwheat onto the market again.

Ding! Ding!

Monsanto!

http://www.ecowatch.com/monsantos-unapproved-gmo-wheat-growing-washington-1954609745.html


As the AP pointed out, unapproved GMO wheat was found at a university research center in Huntley, Montana in 2014 where it was legally tested by Monsanto in the early 2000s. In 2013, another unapproved strain of Monsanto's GMO wheat was found on an eastern Oregon farm even though there had been no tests in the area. To this day it is unclear how the wheat got there.

As EcoWatch noted back in 2013, because pollen naturally blows or migrates to neighboring fields, contamination of farmers' fields is both predictable and unavoidable. Additionally, many farmers incur considerable costs in testing their crops and seed supply for transgenic contamination or actually forgo planting of certain crops in order to maintain seed purity.
GMO wheat contamination is somewhat of a sore subject for Monsanto. In 2014, the agritech giant paid $2.4 million to settle a lawsuit filed by U.S. wheat farmers over the GMO wheat scare in Oregon. Last year, the company paid another $350,000 to farmers in seven states over the same issue.
Monsanto told the AP that the type of GMO wheat found in Washington state is similar to the one discovered in Oregon in 2013. 

The latest discovery of GMO wheat could also impact global trade, as many countries have strict regulations over GMOs and GMO imports.

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