Monsanto Plant Patent Case Winds On

srw writes "A follow-up to a slashdot story from two years ago: The Supreme Court of Canada is willing to hear the case of Percy Schmeiser -- a Saskatchewan farmer accused of violating Monsanto's IP by growing their patented canola. This article contains more background."

Go Europe!

[PaulQuinn]

Thank god the EU has some humanity and dignity left. I praise their stance on GM foods which is basically denying them completely, even wilfully paying fines brought by the WTO to not allow GM food trade.

Why would any nation allow, let alone a single farmer choose to use patented seeds under these restrictions? I'll answer my own question - GREED.

I hope Monsanto looses this one in a big, utterly devastating, way.

intentional or accidental?

[sssmashy]

Monsanto said canola plants grown from its genetically altered seed had grown along a ditch on the Schmeiser farm in violation of the company's patent. Schmeiser contends the GM seed blew off a truck or came from someone else's field but Monsanto argued that's impossible. Schmeiser said he never bought Monsanto seed.

(...) At issue are the patent rights to Roundup Ready canola, a genetically modified strain resistant to a herbicide that would normally kill the plants used to produce cooking oil.

Beyond the obvious issue of whether genetically altered plants should be patentable, there is also a simpler, common sense issue at stake: who was responsible for the contamination?

If the seed blew in accidentally, contaminating the farmer's own breed of canola, there is no reason the farmer should be held responsible. Otherwise, what would stop an unscrupulous patent-holder from "accidentally" spreading their patented product all over the area, and then demanding compensation from the unsuspecting farmers?

There's one simple way to test whether the seeding was intentional: did the farmer use herbicides on his crops? If the answer is yes, he clearly knew that Monsanto's herbicide-resistant plants were growing in his field. If the answer is no, he got no economic benefit from growing Monsanto's plants and should be left alone.

Re:Obviously a frame-up

[cheesybagel]

Actually, considering the world produces enough food for everyone already (it is just poorly distributed), the right thing to do is for Monsanto to sod off with their Frankenfood which requires heavy use of their own brand very poisonous pestitide RoundUp.

Re:Obviously a frame-up

[PaulQuinn]

Honestly, I don't know what the correct decision here would be

OMG!!! You don't know what the correct decision is?????
Let's see, choose between:

Noone being allowed to grow a garden
VS
The profits of a company

Holy shit - you must be an American. Only a born and raised money bleeding capitalist would think that is a hard decision. Geez.

Re:Obviously a frame-up

[Tyler Eaves]

Not all capitalists are American.

Not all Americans are capitalists.

Re:Obviously a frame-up

[Chester K]

This would effectively destroy IP rights of all seed companies.

Those are the risks you take when you try to patent life.

technology good, patents bad .

[Thinkit3]

You're fighting two camps here, the luddite camp that wants to fight genetically engineered foods, and the IP people, who want to fight logic.

Monsanto and their ilk are a plague

[WIAKywbfatw]

I'm sorry, but I'm sick to death of biotech companies experimenting on us with GM foods, etc for no better reason than profit.

They'll willingly gamble with all of our lives, betting the pot that their crops are safe to us and the environment yet they'll be the first to walk away and just shrug their shoulders if something goes wrong.

I recently watched a programme about how Novartis was screwing Korean leukemia sufferers over the cost of their Glivec/Gleevec drug treatment. The very patients that were part of the company's clinical trials are now being fleeced by the company, blackmailed into paying tens of thousands of US dollars a year for a drug that they themselves helped bring to the market! This for a drug that costs pennies to mass produce.

In fact, the whole Glivec issue is such a big deal in Korea (ask any Korean that you know) that although it's a life-saving drug, the name Glivec is now synonymous with death - that's how much Novartis's greed has pissed off an entire nation.

(For more, check out this Google search: novartis glivec korea [google.com].

These assholes seriously piss me off. Profits are one thing, but profits before people isn't just immoral and unethical, it's disgusting.

Re:Obviously a frame-up

[caseih]

Your point about a few companies controlling the world's food supply is very valid and should be of a great concern to all of us. There is a disturbing trend among of the companies that genetically alter seed to desire to produce grains (canola is an oilseed not a grain, but it still applies) that are sterile and do not reproduce. This could be seen as a good thing, since genetically modified plants then cannot "escape" into nature. However, as growing the GMO grains becomes more and more prevailant and traditional strains no longer grown (either because they don't produce as well, or are too tall or whatever), then that makes farmers have to pay for their seed every year, rather than hold back a portion and replant like they used to. Even more effected by this are third world countries who will be completely at the mercy of these companies. They are really worried the trends and "progression" being made by companies like Monsanto.

Just as Palladium, patents, and digital restrictions managenent do not bode well computer and software users, these types of genetic patents are no less negative. I personally have nothing against GMO food and technologies, but I think we should seriously consider the impacts of patenting and controlling such technologies.

I hope the courts rule in favor of the farmer. Until about 5-10 years ago in Canada, there were no IP rights for seed companies. Such rights are contrived and artificial, I believe.

Michael

Re:Obviously a frame-up

[berzerke]

...Either result could have disasterous implications...

Actually, only if the court decides in Monsanto's favor will it be a disaster. This isn't some inanimate matter patented, but life. And life will find a way to spread. Once released, if it doesn't die out, it will spread. Look at various insects (killer bees, fire ants, mosquitos).

What's the problem?

[Dthoma]

This is only a problem because the plant is patented. Virtually every other plant on earth is "public domain" so there's no problem about those when they grow on someone else's land. Why not just say that it's stupid and irresponsible to try to patent species of plants, not let anyone do it, and then leave the issue be? Companies will have the freedom to create these GM crops (thus placating the GM advocates) but have little incentive to do so since they will be available for free (thus placating the anti-GM campaigners).

Re:Monsanto = Scumbags

[DNS-and-BIND]

And just in case the above quotes are too oldy moldy for anyone's taste, here's one more, more recent:

"While Dan Rather attempts to rationalize the network's heartless decision to air this despicable 'terrorist propaganda video,' it is beyond our comprehension that any mother, wife, father or sister should have to relive this horrific tragedy and watch their loved one being repeatedly terrorized," the family said.
"Terrorists have made this video confident that the American media would broadcast it and thereby serve their exact purpose. By showing this video, CBS or any other broadcaster willing to show it proves that they fall without shame into the terrorists' plan."
-- Mariane Pearl, May 15, 2002

LOL, good joke

[dh003i]

LOL, that's one of the funniest things I've read on /...that is, if you're joking.

If not, then you obviously have a pretty sorry understanding of evolution and mutation. Plants are harvested en-mass. That means thousands or millions of them at once. The probability of such a mutatation as you describe occuring in one plant infinitesimally small. The probability of that same mutation occuring in enough plants in a harvest to have any significant effect is essentially zero. Also, for plants that are being maintained in huge numbers by humans, the forces of natural selection act quite interestingly. Namely, those plants which exhibit phenotypes that make us plant more of them will be selected for. (hence, the ensured survival of marijuanna plants as long as humans are around).

Re:Go Europe!

[zogger]

I've been following this case for a long time, because it also ties into various huge land grab schemes going on, along with creating global monopolies. Just to clarify on round up ready canola (rapeseed), the plants have been engineered to NOT die from the herbicide, roundup. That means the farmer can just spray big quantities of roundup all over everything, kill his "weeds" and it allegedly doesn't matter than.

Technically, it works, practically speaking, why someone ever thought spraying chemical poisons on FOOD is just amazing to me. We got this "war on terror" because "el bad queda someone" might have WMD, one of which is "nerve gas". Well, duh, a lot of the chemicals they use are so similar it don't matter, we got "terrorist attacks" daily, all over, the food supply got contaminated a long time ago.

I love farming, grew up working on farms, wish to retire to farming, but NO WAY do I use sprays. Just... ain't.. gonna.

The bad part about GM is--it's an unknown. We have NO idea what it will cause to human health down the road, they are throwing guesses at it being passed off as "research". sorry, there hasn't been several generations of human research, there simply hasn't been the time to really test it, and I volunteer the company employees, managers and stock holders as the "volunteer" testers, two generations, minimum.

this stuff, with zero doubt, will lead to monopolies, with AIR BORNE pollen, it will become impossible to save your own seed if anyone close by is growing that stuff. that's one of the major factors in this case, that it spreads and infects, and the proof is all over canada now, the stuff HAS spread all over and is pretty hard to get rid of. It was a BAD IDEA. We've already got it infected into most of the commercial corn crop as well, with "starlink" corn, that was a "whoops". I am CONVINCED that these companies will contiue to do accidental "whoopsies" until only their stuff can be grown. They'll just eat the toy fines they get (which to date have been there but joke sized)and keep saying they are sorry as they giggle their way to planet wide food control. It's not a joke.

Re:Obviously a frame-up

[Pall Agamemnides]

And life will find a way to spread. Once relased, if it doesn't die out, it will spread.

Well, that's not necessarily true. Species do become extinct. But on the other hand, these genetically-engineered crops are generally designed to survive very well, with resistence to drought, pesticides, etc. So eliminating these may prove more difficult than usual.

Re:This is what you get when you support Capitalis

[istartedi]

You're mistaking capitalism for monarchy. Monarchies arise out of lawlessness when feudal lords accumulate enough power to form city-states, which then coalesce into nation-states, of which they are the monarchs. Now, in the US, we are laissez-faire enough so that we are almost lawless sometimes. Thus, it has been possible for corporate monarchies to arise, forming the market-states. Monsanto rules the agricultural market-state, RIAA the recording market-state, and so on. An ineffective government could allow the market-states to coalesce into a nation-state just as traditional monarchies did. Some argue that this has already happened--that our republic which arose in the wake of a monarchy has been completely co-opted by a loose association of monarchist market-states.

Capitalism, OTOH, is where the government establishes a framework in which a sufficient number of individual actors compete to provide goods and services, but without forming enough power to become market-states. Those who argue that capitalism needs to be replaced, when confronted with the question "replaced with what?" usually have one of two responses: 1. A blank stare, or anger followed by a re-affirmation that capitalism needs to be replaced, or 2. Socialism/Communism/Leftism/"the people". Invariably, "the people" is a euphemism for their people who are almost always Socialists/Communists/... etc.

The truth of the matter is that capitalism doesn't need to be replaced--it needs to be reinstated.

Re:The bottom line is this...

[El Christador]

Monsanto can't prove that they didn't contaminate his field

I don't understand why they'd have to. Percy Schmeiser has already testified in court that the glyphosate resistant canola seeds growing in his fields in 1998 were 1) planted there by an employee of his; 2) were taken from plants growing in his fields in 1997 which he had identified as being glyphosate resistant. The court took his account of the facts as being the canonical one. They ruled that even with the facts as he stated them, his company infringed the patent by planting glyphosate-resistant canola seed, that was known, or should have been known to be, glyphosate resistant.

So,they have nothing to prove, and wouldn't be allowed to try if they could. The fact-finding in the case is done; it can't be reopened at the appeal level. Percy Schmeiser won it. His version of the facts stands. And so far the courts have ruled in Monsanto's favour even with his account of the facts.


they are shaking in their large, multi-billion dollar boots because a farmer from Saskatchewan is about to bring part of them down.


I very much doubt it. They won the first two rounds and legally, their case sure looks pretty ironclad (IANAL, though). Legally, Percy has not a leg to stand on. He used a patented invention. He admits it. Says he knew what it was, too. Not a lot of wiggle room there. That's why he not only lost, but got assigned costs, which is the court's way of say "you really lost, and please stop wasting our time".

The following excerpt's from the first court ruling [fct-cf.gc.ca] might clarify my claim's about Mr. Schmeiser's account of the facts:

[38] As we have noted Mr. Schmeiser testified that in 1997 he
planted his canola crop with seed saved from 1996 which he believed came
mainly from field number 1. Roundup-resistant canola was first noticed in
his crop in 1997, when Mr. Schmeiser and his hired hand, Carlysle Moritz,
hand-sprayed Roundup around the power poles and in ditches along the road
bordering fields 1, 2, 3 and 4. These fields are adjacent to one another
and are located along the east side of the main paved grid road that leads
south to Bruno from these fields. This spraying was part of the regular
farming practices of the defendants, to kill weeds and volunteer plants
around power poles and in ditches. Several days after the spraying, Mr.
Schmeiser noticed that a large portion of the plants earlier sprayed by
hand had survived the spraying with the Roundup herbicide.

[39] In an attempt to determine why the plants had survived the
herbicide spraying, Mr. Schmeiser conducted a test in field 2. Using his
sprayer, he sprayed, with Roundup herbicide, a section of that field in a
strip along the road. He made two passes with his sprayer set to spray 40
feet, the first weaving between and around the power poles, and the second
beyond but adjacent to the first pass in the field, and parallel to the
power poles. This was said by him to be some three to four acres in all,
or "a good three acres". After some days, approximately 60% of the plants
earlier sprayed had persisted and continued to grow. Mr. Schmeiser
testified that these plants grew in clumps which were thickest near the
road and began to thin as one moved farther into the field.

[40] Despite this result Mr. Schmeiser continued to work field
2, and, at harvest, Carlysle Moritz, on instruction from Mr. Schmeiser,
swathed and combined field 2. He included swaths from the surviving canola
seed along the roadside in the first load of seed in the combine which he
emptied into an old Ford truck located in the field. That truck was
covered with a tarp and later it was towed to one of Mr. Schmeiser's
outbuildings at Bruno. In the spring of 1998 the seed from the old Ford
truck was taken by Mr. Schmeiser in another truck to the Humboldt Flour
Mill ("HFM") for treatment. After that, Mr. Schmeiser's testimony is that
the treated seed was mixed with some bin-run seed and fertilizer and then
used for planting his 1998 canola crop.

Re:Obviously a frame-up

[axxackall]

I wonder how they patent plants?

If the patent the property of seeds to resist pesticides then it creates a problem when other farmers use some amounts of pesticeds for years and eventually can get seeds more and more resistent to pesticeds. That could be another seeds, different then Monsanto's, just with the same property. And that eventually can come by itself - plants can mutate in time. Too bad, the patents should not cover properties. It's like patenting a physical law.

If they patent exact DNA then farmers must check every year their crops that they are not accidentally contaminated. Too bad for other farmers, such DNA exam is expensive and that can rulle many farmers out of business.

Instead, they should patent the technology of genetical modification, not plants. If the farmer use the same technology to modify seeds then - jail. If the way of modification was different, even with the same outoming seeds then - live free.

This case is a test of how far bad American patent system goes.

Monsanto should loose.

[theLOUDroom]

This is a pretty clear example of why you should NEVER be able to patent DNA.

At least one developing nation (South Africa, I think) has already outlawed GE crops, because of the IP concerns involved. What would happen to S.A. if these crops spread on their own and became the dominant species?

The developing nation would no longer be able to grow any food without paying royalties to Monsanto, which they couldn't afford. People would starve. Look at what happend with S.A. and AIDs drugs. I think that showed pretty clearly how little respect some companies have for life.

You should be able to patent a process for modifying DNA. You should never be able to patent the actual organism. If this means that you can get corporate funding for X, oh well. Apply for a grant.

Hell, what happens if someone else patents your DNA? Do you have to pay them royalties if you want to have kids? This is stupid.

BTW, someone else patenting your DNA isn't as unlikely as you might think. It's not like Monsanto developed the DNA for all their crops from scratch. What happens when you participate in some successful cancer/AIDS/whatever research, where they find you have just the right gene they need?

easy

[Uberbah]

you patent the engeneering process for whatever you're making. So Masanto (or whatever) could still create their modified seeds but couldn't sue some farmer into the ground for collecting seeds that blew onto his land.

Pure unadulterated bullshit

[lpq]

Monsanto should have to pay the farmer for damages because their genetically modified cra^hop has contaminated his land. Now he can't grow a normal crop that isn't tainted with their seed and who knows what effect their genetics could have even on other crops. Could their canola pollen cross pollinate with other species? I've seen flowers in my garden a dark rose single layer
petal rose and a light pink multi layer rose cross pollinate over a year through no effort of myself and the next year I had a black multi-petal rose.

I was utterly fascinated how easy it was for them to cross pollinate. Now if a company comes along and has artificially genetically altered crops that contaminate mine -- that have _tresspassed_ on my land, Monsanto should be paying full damages.

If Monsanto wants the crop destroyed, I could live with that, but I also say that they have to pay the farmer full price for what the farmer's land would have produced and give the farmer non-contaminated seeds to restart their crop. I could see Monsanto being liable for potentially years of lost profits if they want to force the farmer to destroy his crop.

I don't like the idea of forced destruction --- but if that's the decision, monsanto should pay full restitution until the farm is back to normal production. They can't have it both ways.

How is it that there is so much injustice in the world?

Re:On Monsanto:

[jmorris42]

> Control of Plant Gene Expression

You admit they didn't have anything with creating it, they just bought out the company that owned this tech.

> Polychlorinated Biphenyls (Aroclor, Pyroclor)

These were very useful compounds, and nobody knew of any risks. And the 'risks' were probably overstated since those sort of scares were all the rage back in the 70's. For that matter they seem to be pretty popular even after we have lived through enough that we should know better. (Lawsuits against McDonalds. Lawsuits against Nabisco. Etc.)

> rBGH Recombinant Bovine Growth Hormone

Ok, this one was a good idea, but if the proper testing had happened it would never have made it to market. One evil point for Monsanto.

> Agent Orange

Safe for use in the US and safe enough to use in a war zone are two completely different things. Balance the risks of using Agent Orange vs the risks of being shot by the VC hiding in the jungle and I thing I'd say "Spray em!" if I were a soldier in Vietnam.

Monsanto is neither good or evil. They are a corporation. Some of the people working there are evil, some good, most just praying they don't get rightsized. Which is why corporations as we have them are a bad idea, no accountability.

Re:Obviously a frame-up

[Fesh]

Yeah, but the virus part is the crucial distinction because it's what determines the element of choice and control. You use the GPL, the "contamination" is your informed choice. Some company virally infests your computer in a scheme to bleed you dry, you have no control over the situation (you could hardly have been expected to know that the virus was lurking in their software).