Judge Bans Monsanto's Genetically Modified Sugar Beets

One judge isn't so sweet on sugar beets — genetically modified (GM) sugar beets, that is. Last Friday, a Federal Court District Judge in San Francisco rescinded the U.S. Department of Agriculture's approval of GM sugar beets. Judge Jeffrey S. White claimed that the USDA failed to conduct a proper Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) before approving the sugar beet seeds, which are engineered to resist Roundup, an herbicide created by GM giant Monsanto.

White's ruling prohibits farmers from planting Monsanto's Roundup Ready sugar beets until an EIS shows that the GM crops won't negatively impact land, water, or wildlife. It's a pretty huge deal considering the fact that about 95 percent of America's sugar beet crop comes from GM seeds. Plus, sugar beets provide about half of the nation's sugar supply (the rest comes from cane sugar), representing an industry worth about $1.335 billion.

Monsanto and some farmers are bummed about the ruling, which shouldn't shock anyone considering how fat Big Ag's wallets have gotten as a result of GM seeds like Roundup Ready sugar beets. But for environmental groups like the Center for Food Safety, Organic Seed Alliance, High Mowing Organic Seeds, Earthjustice, and the Sierra Club, White's decision is a huge coup that may mark the beginning of a sea change in the government's stance on GM crops. "This is a major victory for farmers, consumers, and the rule of the law," Andrew Kimbrell, the Center for Food Safety's executive director of plaintiff and co-counsel, told the Civil Eats blog. "USDA has once again acted illegally and had its approval of a biotech crop rescinded. Hopefully the agency will learn that their mandate is to protect farmers, consumers, and the environment and not the bottom line of corporations such as Monsanto."

If the USDA had conducted that EIS like it was supposed to, the agency might have uncovered some scary truths about Roundup Ready sugar beet seeds. Let's look at the facts: Monsanto's Roundup Ready corn, soybean, and cotton seeds are already hugely popular throughout the U.S. agricultural landscape. Though many of these seeds were planted 20 years ago, we're starting to see some seriously troublesome environmental impacts. Weeds are evolving resistance to the herbicide Roundup, morphing into voracious "superweeds" that choke out corn, cotton, and soybean crops. These superweeds not only wreak havoc on crop fields, they prompt farmers to spray even more herbicides and pesticides on plants, poisoning the surrounding land, water, and wildlife.

Roundup Ready seeds also threaten pure crop varieties. GM seeds often spread into organic fields and cross-breed with natural crop varieties, threatening the livelihoods of organic farmers and the existence of native plant varieties. If scientists from the USDA or Monsanto really bothered to take a clear look at Roundup Ready seeds' environmental impacts, the picture they'd see would be pretty depressing.

Judge White's decision doesn't go so far as to say that farmers can never again plant GM sugar beets — it merely requires an EIS before this can happen, which will likely take a couple of years. Still, this decision shows that judges will no longer go along with whatever the USDA wants when it comes to GM crops. Once this message gets drilled into the agency a bit, maybe the USDA will finally stop siding with Big Ag giants like Monsanto and start standing up for consumers and the environment.

Photo credit: mindy.kotaska via Flickr