ImagineTM

By John Hepburn

Monsanto's global website says "Imagine innovative agriculture that creates 'incredible' things today." Actually, I think most of us are more interested in 'credible' things when it comes to agriculture. Like food that people can trust is safe. And crops that meet the needs of the farmers that grow them.

Imagine a world with vast monocultures of patented, genetically engineered crops, producing foods with inbuilt pesticides. Imagine the world's staple food crops engineered with genes from bacteria and then released into our food chain without any real understanding of the health impacts. Imagine?

Imagine trying to introduce a new product into the market place when most people don't want it, and when it is effectively impossible to keep it separate from other similar products. Imagine being able to insist that the cost of keeping this product separate be passed onto the users of the other, existing products. It's kind of like insisting that your neighbour to pay for the new fence when you bring home a pit bull terrier for a pet. Imagine not only trying to pull off such an audacious scheme but actually succeeding!