Monsanto is a monster corporation by any measure. It is among the largest of three corporations that are responsible for the development and distribution of 95 per cent of genetically modified organisms (GMOs).
Despite the biotech industry making wild claims that GMOs are the solution to feeding the hungry, a joint statement by delegates from 20 African nations to the FAO said:
"We strongly object to the image of the poor and hungry from our countries being used by giant multinational corporations to push a technology that is neither safe, environmentally friendly nor economically beneficial".
In 2002 Zambia, Zimbabwe and Mozambique went so far as to refuse free GM grain from USAID despite an impending famine in the region. The US policy to tie food aid to GMO dumping was widely criticised by NGO's.
So what is the real story behind GMOs? Why are companies so insistent on getting this technology out? Why are they so strong despite stiff opposition to their products?
Well, it's basic economics really, but economics for the companies behind it, not for the world. The largest biotech companies hit it big long before GMOs started creeping in.
Take Monsanto and Dow Chemicals, for example. They are large producers of pesticides, and were two of the main producers of the notorious Agent Orange, which caused such havoc to land, inhabitants and war veterans of Vietnam.
A class action lawsuit against the producers of Agent Orange was settled out of court in 1987 for $180 million. Until recently 50 per cent of Monsanto's profits came from its global sales of its patented herbicide Roundup.
Its sales of pesticides exceeded $3.5 billion in 2001. The downside for Monsanto is that its patent for Roundup ran out in the US and Canada four years ago, which means that anybody can produce and sell it today.
So what has Monsanto done in preparation for possible lean years in its Roundup sales? Has it turned instead to the development and promotion of organic pesticides, bearing in mind that their chemical herbicide, which annihilates your weeds, may also damage your crops? Alas no, for natural products are far more difficult to patent. Instead their laboratories (hence the designation "frankenfoods") have been busy coming up with GM crops like "Roundup Ready Soya Beans", "Roundup Ready Cotton", "Roundup Ready Corn", and "Roundup Ready Canola", otherwise known as oil seed rape or rapeseed oil.
The great selling point, as far as Monsanto is concerned, is that these crops have been modified to allow the farmer to use the Roundup herbicide without worrying about its effect on his crop.
However, Monsanto has built in added bonuses for itself. Farmers in America who purchase the GM seed are made to sign contracts a) relinquishing their rights to use their own seeds, b) committing themselves to buy seeds only from Monsanto, c) permitting Monsanto's police to enter their land at will for inspection and d) last but not least, to continue purchasing pesticides from Monsanto, thus reintroducing the company's patent rights through the back door.
All in all I must say "hats off" to the Monsanto legal team for "rounding up" such a great deal for their clients. But where does that leave the farming community, the environment and the rest of us consumers, and would such clauses stand up to European competition laws?
Hardly content with such a market ploy, the biotech industry has lobbied hard with governments to flood the world with GMOs. A prominent person in the Bio Industry Association donated £100,000 to Tony Blair's Labour Party.
The UK has funded 80 GM projects worldwide to the tune of £13.4 million and remains America's staunchest supporter of GMOs in Europe.
But there is more. The industry has now come up with terminator genes, crops that do not produce a seed. Can there be a greater crime against nature than the destruction of the very seeds of life? The industry's plan is clear.
It aims to control the world food supply through the control of the seed banks of the world. Monsanto has spent a staggering $12 billion buying up seed companies around the world, thus setting itself up as the second largest seed company.
The implications of GMOs are too horrendous to contemplate: a collapse in the biodiversity related to fodder and the human food supply; a holding to ransom of the world's producers, from small to large farms alike; contamination of non-GMO crops and the subsequent destruction of organic agriculture; the continued and increased use of herbicides and pesticides; the opening of yet another door to new health risks; and finally the creation of a new serfdom for those who work the land.
Monsanto has just fought and won a test case in Canada against Percy Schmeiser. Mr Schmeiser has been using his own seed stock of rapeseed oil for 40 years.
In 1998 his farm was contaminated with Monsanto's Roundup Ready Canola (rapeseed oil). You would think that the farmer would be paid damages for GM contamination.
You would also think that Monsanto would apologise and settle out of court to avoid the embarrassment, like it did with Agent Orange. Wrong!
The roles were reversed, and Monsanto won a lawsuit based on its allegation that the farmer had infringed its GMO patent. The Court told Schmeiser that in Canada patents have precedence over farmers' rights. He was ordered to pay the profits of his yield to Monsanto, and furthermore hand over his precious seed bank since he could not prove that it was totally free of any GM seeds.
The court did not enter into the merits of whether the farmer was actually responsible for the breach in patent rights, or whether responsibility lay with nature itself through wind. Apparently force majeur did not seem to carry much weight in the Canadian Court.
Last week the EU voted against the introduction of Monsanto's GM rapeseed oil into Europe. Malta's vote was also against. This was welcomed by environment NGOs in the media.
The next step is to ensure that it stays out, and that the Council of Ministers endorses the Commission's position. GMOs may well turn out to be one of the world's greatest challenges, vying with climate change and drought for pole position.
The EU is the only block powerful enough to stand up to American pressure to fill the world with GMOs. The rest of the world is looking to it with bated breath. If we fail, we fail not only our own European citizens, but also those in the developing world who are too weak to make a stand.
As for the little islands of Malta, Gozo and Comino, it would be devastating. Can we imagine the effects of wind-borne GMO pollen contaminating the entire islands?
Oilseed pollen, for example, can stay airborne for three hours, and a strong Majjistral (Northwesterly) would literally spread it across the islands. Can we imagine local farmers being sued by Monsanto?
Can we imagine the impacts of contamination on tourism when we know that the people of Europe have rejected GMOs en masse? Can we imagine the European market, which we have worked so hard to join, slamming its doors to Maltese produce because of GM contamination? We have enough problems to deal with; the GM monster is one we can well do without.