Organic Consumers Statement on Recent Rulings Against Monsanto in Mexico

On behalf of the Organic Consumers Association (OCA) and its Mexico City-based affiliate, Asociación de Consumidores Orgánicos, OCA International Director Ronnie Cummins issued the following statement on the decision by Mexico’s agriculture sanitation authority (SENASICA) to revoke Monsanto’s permits to commercialize genetically modified soy in seven states, and a recent court ruling upholding a ban on the commercial growing GMO corn in Mexico:

“We are encouraged by these two decisions which reflect a growing trend in Mexico among government and court authorities of responding to the public’s demand to preserve Mexico’s hundreds of native corn varieties and rich biodiversity, and to reject Monsanto’s degenerative agricultural model that produces pesticide-contaminated food, pollutes waterways and soils and contributes to global warming.”

“The federal court’s decision to uphold a ban on GMO corn means that Monsanto’s appeal will now go to the Supreme Court. As we have in the past, Asociación de Consumidores Orgánicos will continue to work with the Colectividad del Maíz, a broad coalition of coalition of farmers, indigenous and human right groups, scientists, activists, lawyers, artists and civil society organizations, to resist corporate agribusiness’s attempts to overturn this ban, and to protect the integrity of Mexico’s most popular agricultural crop.”

Although Mexico does not allow the commercial growing of GMO corn, companies like Monsanto are allowed to grow GMO corn for scientific and testing purposes, in areas up to 2.5 acres, and non-commercial areas up to 24 acres, but only under legal supervision.

Monsanto’s permit to grow GMO soy was revoked in the states of Campeche, Chiapas, Tamaulipas, San Luis Potosí, Quintana Roo, Veracruz and Yucatán after GMO soy was discovered in areas where cultivation was not authorized.