Market Farming

[maroc AT islandnet.com (Maroc)]

I hope this is alright to Xpost this article to market farming, I thought
some of you may be interested in the message.

Don Maroc
Vancouver Island, Canada

P A N U P S
Pesticide Action Network Updates Service
===========================================

Seminis -- GE vegetable seeds

January 31, 1999

In the past five years, the California-based company Seminis Vegetable Seeds
has gained control of approximately 19% of the worldwide fruit and vegetable
seed market; Seminis now provides the seeds for some 40% of all vegetables
sold in the United States. Through the combined strategies of controlling
large amounts of germ plasm and entering cooperative agreements with biotech
developers such as Monsanto, Seminis Vegetable Seeds is positioning itself
to lead the way in future genetic engineering of fruit and vegetable seeds.

Seminis is a subsidiary of the Savia Corporation, formerly known as Empresas
La Moderna (ELM). Based in Monterrey, Mexico, Savia is part of the Pulsar
Group, headed by Mexican billionaire Alfonso Romo Garza. Pulsar's activities
range from health care to insurance to agribusiness. The company was created
through the merger of three large seed brands -- Asgrow, Petoseed and Royal
Sluis -- plus the acquisition of nine smaller ones. These smaller brands
include regional specialties such as Choong Ang, which supplies seeds in
South Korea, and Horticeres, which operates in Brazil.

Seminis has seed production facilities in Arizona, California, Idaho, Oregon
and Washington as well as in over 18 other countries; major processing
facilities in California, Idaho, Chile and the Netherlands; and research
centers in France, Italy, South Korea, the Netherlands and the U.S.

Seminis is developing a range of crops with traits such as herbicide, virus,
insect or fungus resistance, as well as foods with "improved"
characteristics intended to appeal to consumers. Plans are in the works to
introduce fungus-resistant lettuce, virus-resistant melon with longer shelf
life, peas with high sugar content, and disease-resistant tomatoes with
increased levels of the nutrients beta-carotene and lycopene.

A collaborative agreement established with Monsanto in 1997 lays the
groundwork for applying Monsanto's genetic engineering technologies,
including insect resistance (Bt toxin) and glyphosate resistance, to
vegetable and fruit seeds. Seminis is developing Roundup Ready lettuce
(engineered to tolerate Monsanto's Roundup herbicide, active ingredient
glyphosate); if approved for sale, the lettuce could enter supermarkets as
early as 2003. Work is also under way to develop Roundup Ready tomatoes.

Seminis is currently field testing many of its genetically engineered crops.
In California alone, Seminis is testing or has recently tested plots of
glyphosate-resistant lettuce, peas, cucumbers, and tomatoes plus a wide
variety of fungus-, insect-, and virus-resistant vegetables. Among its
activities in other states, Seminis has planted or is currently testing
insect-resistant tomatoes in Florida and glyphosate-tolerant lettuce in
Georgia and New Jersey.

One of Seminis' genetically engineered products, a virus-resistant squash,
is already being grown commercially. Developed by Asgrow, the first
transgenic squash was approved for commercial production in 1994. A second
variety, with resistance to three viruses, was approved in 1996 and a third
is now being field tested. Domestic squash has a number of wild relatives in
the United States. Thus a real threat exists of genetic pollution, in which
the trait for virus resistance could spread to wild relatives creating
"super weeds" with a competitive advantage. Asgrow's tests for ecological
safety have been criticized as entirely inadequate by ecologists and
organizations such as the Union of Concerned Scientists, but were accepted
by the U.S. Department of Agriculture as sufficient for approving commercial
cultivation of the crop.

Seminis' 1999 prospectus states that "the application of genetic
improvements to crop plants has provided greater value to growers which can
be captured by the seed industry through higher prices and greater demand."
An illustration is Seminis' long shelf life tomato seeds, which sell for
$5,200 per pound, contrasting with $1,400 per pound for traditional
varieties. Another way Seminis expects to profit from genetic engineering is
by producing a "reallocation of grower spending": farmers will spend less on
agricultural chemicals and therefore will be willing to pay more for seeds.

Source: "Expanding the Biotech Frontier -- Seminis Vegetable Seeds," Global
Pesticide Campaigner, December 1999.

===========================================
Pesticide Action Network North America (PANNA)
49 Powell St., Suite 500, San Francisco, CA 94102 USA
Phone: (415) 981-1771
Fax: (415) 981-1991
Email: panna AT panna.org
Web: http://www.panna.org
===========================================