Organic farmer David Zuckerman, a former Vermont legislator, has joined a class-action lawsuit against genetically modified seed giant Monsanto and will appear in a Manhattan courtroom tomorrow for the first hearing in the case.
With his wife, Rachel Nevitt, and their daughter, Addie (pictured), Zuckerman runs Full Moon Farm in Hinesburg, a 115-acre 151-acre certified organic, community-supported-agriculture farm that raises vegetables, pigs and poultry. Zuckerman served seven terms as a Progressive representing Burlington in the state House of Representatives, including four years as chair of the Agriculture Committee, before retiring in 2010.
Monsanto is infamous for suing farmers whose crops were cross-pollinated with the company’s patented genetically engineered seeds — and now the farmers are fighting back.
The Organic Seed Growers and Trade Association (OSGATA), representing 83 farmers and farm organizations with membership upward of 250,000, is asking a federal judge to protect farmers from patent lawsuits should their crops become cross-pollinated with Monsanto’s transgenic seed. (Click here to read the complaint.)
As a legislator, Zuckerman sponsored the Farmer Protection Act to protect Vermont farmers from just such lawsuits. “The Farmer Protection Act said that if genetic material did trespass onto another farm, and that farm loses money, the owner of the patent would be liable, not the farmer,” Zuckerman tells Seven Days. “It would have placed responsibility for cross-pollination with seed manufacturers like Monsanto.”
The legislation passed the House and Senate but was vetoed by Gov. Jim Douglas in 2006.
Zuckerman is the sole Vermont farmer plaintiff in the case, though the Northeast Organic Farming Association of Vermont (NOFA-VT) is also a plaintiff. Zuckerman planned to arrive in New York today in advance of tomorrow’s hearing on a motion to dimiss filed by Monsanto.
Zuckerman says that the issue of cross-pollination is a “real risk” for him and other Vermont farmers.
“I’ve got a conventional dairy farm that grows corn within pollination distance of my fields,” he says. “I work to plant my corn further away than that distance, but it doesn’t mean it couldn’t happen. So I’m one of the people suing because of that potential.”
Zuckerman points out that organic certification relates to farming practices, rather than the “end product,” meaning he could still sell his produce as “organic” even if it was cross-pollinated with genetically engineered pollen.
“Technically, it would be organic,” he says, “but from a consumer perspective and a marketing perspective, people wouldn’t buy my corn.”
Zuckerman says he isn’t aware of a case of cross-pollination in Vermont and that the lawsuit is a preventative measure.
“It’s on behalf of myself but part of a bigger-picture agricultural scenario,” he says. “It’s about our right to be protected from being sued for having it when we didn’t do anything to get it.”
Images courtesy of Full Moon Farm
This article appears in Jan 25 – Feb 1, 2012.
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“Zuckerman says he isn’t aware of a case of cross-pollination in Vermont and that the lawsuit is a preventative measure.”
I haven’t been hurt yet (i.e., cross-pollinated), and I may never be hurt. And even if there IS cross-pollination, my corn would STILL be considered organic . . .
. . . but I’m suing anyway.
Sounds like this lawsuit deserves to be thrown out.
“Technically, it would be organic,” he says, “but from a consumer perspective and a marketing perspective, people wouldn’t buy my corn.”, the actual quote from David Zuckerman.
Sounds like you are neither a farmer nor a person possessing even a modest sense of business or public ethics Sutton_Hoo.
How does Framer Zuckerman know that people wouldn’t buy his corn, even though it’s still organic? Is he going to advertise his organic corn as “possibly cross-pollinated with Monsanto corn, but I don’t know?”
That’s simply idiotic.
Sounds like you don’t know what you’re talking about, Randomarrow.
@Sutton_Hoo:disqus
Farmer Zuckerman knows that he could not honestly sell his corn as organic if he knew it was contaminated by GMO (genetically modified organism) corn. It sounds like he is an honest organic farmer who would not deceive his customers for short term personal gain. I do not know of any organic farmer who would, they always seem to lean in the other direction, holding themselves to more stringent standards than expected of them in order to maintain not only their own reputation but also the reputation of organics as a whole.
“That’s simply idiotic.”
Such behavior does not seem to me to be “idiotic” Sutton_Hoo but highly ethical. I’m beginning to believe that I cannot adequately explain “ethical behavior” to you sir so let me put it more crassly. If Farmer Zuckerman, knew or suspected that corn he sold as organic was or was possibly contaminated by Monsanto’s genetically modified corn he would be dishonest and guilty of deceiving his customers. Such behavior would not only destroy his reputation as an organic farmer it would also cast a dark cloud across the reputation of all organic farmers. I personally believe that Farmer Zuckerman is a highly honest man and would not tread the path you suggest.
“Sounds like you don’t know what you’re talking about, Randomarrow.”
Unfortunately for Vermont, Sutton_Hoo, I’m afraid that it does not sound like I know what I am talking about — to you.
I don’t know where in Vermont you live or how long you’ve lived there. I hate to admit it but I’m a Flatlander, moved up from Connecticut about 45 years ago but I’ve adapted. Keep the spring line tricklin, keep the plow truck pointed downhill and keep two years of wood in the stack. And I keep a pretty good ear open to what my neighbors are talking about. Seems like very few of them like BGH in their milk, butterfly killing Monsanto chemicals in their crops or antibiotic laced meat.
I guess by your standards we don’t know what we are talking about but perhaps its just me and my neighbors. Why don’t we just boil it down to the basics and invite other readers to reply.
1) Should Monsanto or other GMO seed vendors be able to sue any Vermont farmer, organic or traditional if GMO pollen drifts into their field and pollinates their Non-GMO crop.
2 ) Should organic farmers be able to sue Monsanto or other GMO seed vendors if GMO pollen drifts into their field and pollinates their Non-GMO crop.
” . . . if he knew it was contaminated by GMO corn.”
Uh, that’s the point: he may not KNOW whether his corn was or wasn’t cross-pollinated; there have been no known cases of cross-pollination in Vermont; and the chances of it happening are apparently small. So, no: he’s NOT going to stop selling his corn as organic just because of the vague POSSIBILITY that it might be cross-pollinated by some other farmer’s corn.
And your response shows that you don’t seem to get the larger point here: the current lawsuit against Monsanto is not because anyone has actually been cross-pollinated. It is because they fear they MIGHT someday be cross-pollinated. I repeat: such a lawsuit should be dismissed. I don’t disagree that they might have a valid lawsuit if cross-pollination ACTUALLY HAPPENS and the farmers can prove that they’ve actually been harmed because of it. But that is not what this suit is about.
If the farmers and NOFA want to make sure that they are compensated if they are cross-pollinated by Monsanto GMO corn and they are harmed because of it, that is a matter for LEGISLATION, not the courts. Legislation can deal with speculative harm; court’s can’t and shouldn’t. Or, they can wait and sue Monsanto if and when they can prove they’ve actually been harmed by cross-pollination.
Seems to me that Monsanto has divided the world into farmers who buy shit from them, and farmers who don’t. If the Zuckermans of the world are allowed to run around and spread their ideas Monsanto is going to step on them.
A.) how would Zuckerman or any other farmer know their crop had been contaminated without routine testing that would prohibitively expensive.
2.) How would the customers know
III.) How is anyone going to prove that the possible contaminating pollen came from Farm Joe’s farm and not Farm John’s?
I agree, this is a pretty worthless lawsuit. And, if I’m not mistaken I believe Monsanto’s GMO’s are engineered to be sterile and unable to reproduce. Ergo, no contamination. Possible mutation? Maybe, but then how do you know the extra DNA wasn’t a mutation and was GMO contamination?
It’s a publicity stunt.
1) Monsanto’s seeds are not sterile. That trait was denied by the federal Government years ago.
2) This is a national lawsuit with farmers and organizations from across the country. There are seed saving farms that have been cross-pollinated and they have had to throw away years of saved genetics because they have been contaminated. There are also farms that have had to forego planting on hige areas of their land because of the possibility that they would be cross pollinated (and then possibly sued).
3) We have a field that is very close to a conventional/GMO corn field. We have our rotation set up to try to stay away from that field with our sweet corn. But occasionally we will need to plant there. When we do, we will watch for when our corn is tassling and the neighbors. If they are tassling at the same time and if the wind blows the wrong way during that time we will get our corn tested and we will make the results public. We feel that is important information for our customers to know because our customers do not want GMO and we want them to trust our product and our marketing. Hopefully this all will not occur, but we will be vigilant.
4) One can track each companies DNA because they put a market gene into the plants so that they can track it themselves. Since it is the parent companies patent (not farmer Joe or John) it should be the parent companies responsibility, so which farm it came from is not the issue.
5) Vermont passed a law to make it the seed companies financial responsiblity (instead of the neighboring farm), but Gov. Douglas vetoed it under pressure from the seed companies that they would not sell their seed in VT. If the seed companies feel that there is no downstream consequences or risk, why would they not sell here if we had a law that said “if there is a problem, the seed companies are responsible”?