Home Depot: Do the Right Thing and Dump Monsanto!

Monsanto seeks to pass itself off as an innovative agricultural company, when in reality they produced two of the most toxic substances ever known -- polychlorinated biphenyls, known as PCBs, and dioxin (Agent Orange). 

Monsanto may also be responsible for more than 50 Environmental Protection Agency Superfund sites, and they’re the masterminds behind some of the most dangerous products on the market today, such as:

• Genetically modified crops (Monsanto provides the seeds for 90 percent of the world's GM crops)
• Fertilizers, herbicides and pesticides 
• Aspartame
• Recombinant bovine somatotropin, or rBST, a genetically engineered growth hormone given to dairy cows to make them produce more milk 

Monsanto Has More Control Over Your Health Than You May Realize 

Monsanto is also deeply entrenched with the pharmaceutical industry. Pharmacia Corporation was created in April 2000 through the merger of Pharmacia & Upjohn with Monsanto Company and its G.D. Searle unit. After merging with Pharmacia & Upjohn, Monsanto handed over its flagship anti-arthritic drug Celebrex to Pharmacia in order to specialize in agriculture, especially the creation of genetically modified seeds. 

Monsanto is actually gaining control over the entire world’s food supply one seed at a time.  

Since the 1980s, Monsanto has become the world leader in genetically engineered seeds and has won 674 biotechnology patents, more than any other company.

But Monsanto is not only patenting their own GMO seeds. They have also succeeded in gaining patents for a huge number of crop seeds, patenting naturally occurring life forms for the first time -- without a vote of the people or Congress.

Farmers who buy Monsanto’s Roundup Ready seeds are required to sign an agreement promising not to save or sell the seeds, which has been the traditional practice since the beginning of agriculture. The result of this insane practice is that farmers across the world must now buy new seeds every year, and they must buy them from Monsanto.  

RoundUp – Not so Safe After All 

One of Monsanto’s longtime star performers is their herbicide RoundUp. It’s sold worldwide as the solution to pesky weeds. 

RoundUp long used the slogans, “It's Safer than Mowing"; "Biodegradable," and “Environmentally Friendly." But scientific research has proven Monsanto’s marketing tactics to be less than an accurate portrayal of their product.

For example, glyphosate, the active ingredient in RoundUp, is the most commonly-reported cause of pesticide illness among landscape maintenance workers in California. Additionally:

• The surfactant ingredient in Roundup is more acutely toxic than glyphosate itself, and the combination of the two is even more toxic.
• Glyphosate is suspected of causing genetic damage.
• Glyphosate is acutely toxic to fish and birds and can kill beneficial insects and soil organisms that maintain ecological balance.
• Laboratory studies have identified adverse effects of glyphosate-containing products in all standard categories of toxicological testing.

In one animal study, rats given 1,000 mg/kg of glyphosate resulted in a 50 percent mortality rate, and skeletal alterations were observed in over 57 percent of fetuses. In conclusion the researchers stated that,

“We may conclude that glyphosate-Roundup® is toxic to the dams [female rats] and induces developmental retardation of the fetal skeleton.”

Monsanto was finally forced to discontinue their use of the terms "biodegradable" and "environmentally friendly" in ads promoting glyphosate-based products, including Roundup.

RoundUp May Soon Become Ineffective

The massively widespread introduction of Monsanto’s genetically engineered crops, designed to be resistant to RoundUp, has led to the appearance of RoundUp resistant superweeds.

The soybean, cotton and corn crops, sold under the brand name Roundup Ready, are the world’s largest group of genetically altered crops. In fact, the altered soybeans now make up more than three-quarters of all soybeans grown in the United States. The Roundup Ready gene is also part of 65 percent of the cotton, and 10 percent of the corn grown in the United States.

While farmers like the modified crops because Roundup herbicide can be sprayed directly onto the fields, killing weeds without harming crops, the widespread popularity of the crops is now rendering the herbicide ineffective against some weeds.

Crop scientists say that the crops’ prevalence has greatly increased the use of Roundup herbicide. As a result, the rare weeds that survive the herbicide will ultimately flourish in the "survival of the fittest" environment.

Herbicide-resistant weeds have already popped up in Delaware, Maryland, California, Tennessee, Ohio and Indiana.

RoundUp Ready GMO Crops Lead to Higher Toxicity Levels in Your Foods

What many people fail to realize is that you ingest much more pesticides from genetically modified plants, simply because they contain so much more of them.  Like dioxins, pesticides -- including glyphosate -- are not broken down in your body, but rather accumulate over time.

Many types of pesticides are allergenic, neurotoxic, carcinogenic, mutagenic, cause hormonal alterations, and are harmful to male fertility. According to an article by biotech-info.net, these hormonal effects could be responsible for a 50 percent decline in sperm count over the last 50 years, stating that if the trend continues, the human race would have to resort to cloning by about 2060.

RoundUp Ready Genetically Engineered Sugar Coming to Shelves Near You

The Organic Consumers Association has also taken up the fight against Kellogg’s planned use of RoundUp Ready genetically engineered sugar in its breakfast cereals. On June 12, the organization sent a letter to Kellogg’s requested they not use GE sugar in its production or face a consumer boycott.

Kellogg responded, claiming that U.S. consumers don’t care if their food contains GE food or not…

Granted, I recommend you avoid sugary breakfast cereals entirely as they are one of the worst kinds of breakfast foods you could eat, but if you’d like to voice your opinion on Kellogg’s use of GE sugar, please see this link.