Tuesday, February 12

Boing Boing: A Directory of Wonderful Things
Percy Schmeiser is a farmer from Bruno, Saskatchewan, Canada whose canola fields were contaminated with Monsanto's Round-Up Ready Canola. Although Schmeiser never planted any Monsanto seed, Monsanto took him to court for using their intellectual property without permission -- and they won.
Roundup-Ready canola was found among Schmeiser's canola crops along a major haulage roadside. Monsanto's position is that it doesn't matter whether Schmeiser knew or not that his canola field was contaminated with the Roundup Ready gene, and that he must pay their Technology Fee. Since Monsanto won this suit it has lodged similar suits against farmers in North Dakota, South Dakota, Indiana, and Louisiana.
The case is on appeal. And apparently Schmeiser's fields continue to be contaminated. Schmeiser has been growing his own canola seed for 40 years, but he had to purchase brand new seed because his old stock was contaminated by Roundup-Ready canola volunteer plants.

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