By Dr. Mercola
Biotech giants like Monsanto are finding more and more ways to buy friends, one of which is pouring money into institutions of higher learning. American Colleges and universities have been feeling the pinch of reduced public funding, which makes them more apt to sell out to the highest bidder in the private sector.
As the number 206 ranked Fortune 500 Company, Monsanto’s $15 billion1 in net revenues so far this year definitely places it into the “highest bidder” category.2
In 2012, University of Illinois’ College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences (ACES) accepted a $250,000 grant from Monsanto to create an endowed chair for its Agricultural Communications Program.3
This is just one in a long line of similar moneys given to this university and others, in exchange for assisting Big Ag with positive PR and helping them disseminate their “biotech-is-good-for-you” message.
According to Food and Water Watch, 25 percent of research funding at land grant universities now comes from corporations, compared to less than 15 percent from the USDA, giving big companies a stronger foothold than ever before in higher education.
In the US, as of 2010, 66 percent of higher education funding is now from private sources, compared to 35 percent in the UK.4 US colleges and universities also lag behind in terms of “international research collaboration,” ranking in the bottom 25 percent worldwide.5
How Land-Grant Colleges and Universities Came to Be
The University of Illinois, my alma mater, is one of the land grant colleges and universities created by the Morrill Act of 1962, which transformed American agriculture. The Morrill Act was signed into law by Abraham Lincoln and allowed Congress to designate 30,000 acres of public land for the establishment of institutions with the purpose of agricultural study.
Land-grant universities include MIT, Cornell, University of California, Texas A&M, and others—including University of Illinois, although some are calling it “University of Monsanto.”
For 150 years, these land-grant institutions supported cutting-edge research on food and farming. But real science is on the verge of extinction as corporate funding increasingly dictates what researchers and their institutions can and cannot say.
Corporations also wield power over educational institutions by giving college leaders positions on their corporate boards, and by hiring scientists as paid consultants. Corporate sponsorship of research has a tremendous impact on the end results.
According to one peer-reviewed study, corporate-funded nutrition research was four to eight times more likely to reach conclusions in line with the sponsors' interests.
If you are interested in an almanac listing major private gifts to higher education, the Chronicle of Higher Education has one dating back to 1967, sorted by gift size. It begins with a list of gifts of $100 million and above, and ends with those of a “meager $50 million.”6
Factors Leading to Privatization of Our Public Universities
In recent decades, three developments have undercut the public research system, with particularly devastating effects on food and farming science:7
- Systematic funding cuts to public educational institutions
- Heavy private investment in colleges and universities by companies like Monsanto, Cargill, and Dow
- Changes in US law that allow the “patenting of life” and privatization of funded research
In 1980, the Bayh-Dole Act made it possible for universities to retain ownership of inventions made under federally funded research. In return, universities are expected to file for patent protection and ensure commercialization upon licensing, and the royalties are shared between the inventors and the industry.8
An unfortunate side effect of this law is that the research agenda is now largely dictated by a handful of giant biotech corporations, like Monsanto. Essentially, any research that is funded narrows in scope to only those technologies that can be patented and profitably brought to market.
Alternatives are simply not considered—let alone studied or developed. The most glaring consequence is the genetic engineering of our food supply, which is why GMOs are now in 80 percent of your food.
Universities Make Big Bucks with “Technology Transfers” and Patents
Not only does private industry write fat checks to universities in the form of research grants, but they make it even more lucrative for these institutions when their research culminates in patentable products. You may be surprised by how much income biotech patents generate for universities. According to Earth Island Journal, universities received $1.8 billion in licensing revenue in 2011 alone.9 Jacob Rooksby, an expert in patent law and higher education, said, “Patenting can be hit or miss, but when you get a good one, it can be a home run.”
There is a mountain of money to be made in gene technology, making universities very interested in supporting the corporate agenda. Well, interested is probably a great understatement—take the University of California, for example. The UC system makes about $100 million annually from what are called “technology transfers”—basically, selling its researchers’ findings to the highest bidder.7
George Kimbrell, an attorney for the Center for Food Safety, states that these technology transfers restrict academic freedom, as well as making many large academic institutions proponents of the current patent law. Kimbrell said this is a case of “Money talks and bullshit walks.”7 Patent restrictions make it difficult, if not impossible, for independent researchers to assess the safety of GE crops, so critical scientific inquiries are aborted, and those that are undertaken are manipulated or controlled, resulting in the worst perversion of science.
These effects are seen all the way up to the Supreme Court, which gets flooded with arguments from both industry and academia in support of the corporate agenda without much to counter it, and this places the small farmer “David” at a serious disadvantage when he must go up against a “Goliath” like Monsanto.
What Happens to Scientists Who Don’t Cooperate?
What happens if a researcher uncovers findings that run counter to industry’s rosy glow? The result is often loss of funding, censorship, and even loss of job, as revealed in Mother Jones:
“When an Ohio State University professor produced research that questioned the biological safety of biotech sunflowers, Dow AgroSciences and [DuPont's] Pioneer Hi-Bred blocked her research privileges to their seeds, barring her from conducting additional research. Similarly, when other Pioneer Hi-Bred-funded professors found a new [genetically engineered] corn variety to be deadly to beneficial beetles, the company barred the scientists from publishing their findings. Pioneer Hi-Bred subsequently hired new scientists who produced the necessary results to secure regulatory approval.”
Capitalism Disguised as Philanthropy
Control of higher education is not limited to biotech corporations. Even so-called “philanthropic” organizations exert enormous power and influence over the research that gets done and the messages disseminated to the public about scientific findings. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, founded in 1994, is the largest philanthropic foundation in the world, focusing on global development via high-tech agriculture and GMOs. It claims to be dedicated to “improving the quality of life for individuals around the world,”10 however, in looking at where it directs is dollars, it appears more interested in improving the quality of life for an elite few.
The Gates Foundation invests heavily in agrigiants like Monsanto and Cargill, while completely neglecting the interests and well being of small farmers of the world. The foundation also owns stock in Monsanto, Syngenta, and other tech-driven food industry bigwigs.11
To Gates, technology is the solution for everything. Its push for a big time introduction of GE soya to Africa, which would likely destroy many local farmers and their families, is just one example of the foundation’s pursuits. It plans to donate another $2 billion to Big Ag, mostly in the form of vaccines for livestock and 34 varieties of drought tolerance maize.10 As written in the Globe and Mail,12 some forms of philanthropy just aren’t good for the masses:
“Philanthrocapitalism, as it has been dubbed, has a dark side. Relying on genetically modified (GM) crops and chemicals to push up output per acre may help Monsanto (which was one of the stocks in the Gates Foundation’s investment portfolio), Syngenta and other tech-driven food biggies, but won’t necessarily support those who need the most help—poor smallholder farmers and underdeveloped countries. Making them part of Big Ag’s global supply chain might not help either.”
The Gates Effect
Pouring its vast power, wealth and influence into private industry is one thing, but It appears that Gates Foundation is now directing its influence into the higher education system, which is drawing fire by both liberals and conservatives alike.13 The Foundation has spent $472 million (so far) on higher education.14 According to the Chronicle:
“In higher education, many leaders and faculty members voice concerns about the Gates foundation's growing and disproportionate impact. Many private-college presidents, in particular, feel shut out of discussions about reform. Yet few of those critics speak out in public, and some higher-education leaders, researchers, and lobbyists were reluctant to talk on the record for this article. The reason? They didn't want to scotch their chances of winning Gates grants.”
Gates Foundation leaders deny that they are trying to shape public policy. However, in a 2008 speech at a Gates education forum, foundation representative Hilary Pennington told her audience that the foundation would use its “strong and persuasive voice" and "join you in advocating for policy changes and investments proven to get results.”
Leaders in academic institutions have voiced numerous complaints about secrecy and exclusivity, private meetings, and an “impenetrable” cluster of education reformers, saying that Gates operates as a de facto lobbying group with a direct pipeline to the Department of Education. The campaign rollout also included elements clearly designed to influence academic research, saying, “Gates holds such a powerful megaphone that it drowns out ‘real’ education researchers.”
How You Can Help Promote Change
The collusion between trans-national corporate powers, our educational system, regulatory agencies, and politicians now runs so deep that it will be a Herculean challenge to turn it all around. But I still believe it's possible.
Educating people about these realities is the first important step. You, being among those who are informed, can help share this knowledge with others. Remember that the definition of fascism is a government system that has complete power in regimenting all industry and forcibly suppressing opposition and criticism. What we have here is a hybrid—a sort of corporate fascism that forcefully suppresses anything that threatens their monopoly on profits—be it freethinking college students or a competing industry. Please be sure you share this information as together we are a powerful force and can make a huge difference in preserving the future of our food supply.