You must enable cookies for this web site to function properly.

Protect Consumers, Not Biotech Profits!

We think of Monsanto and other companies as developers and promoters of GMOs. But thanks to passage of the Federal Technology Transfer Act of 1986, as well as President Reagan’s Executive Order #12591—“Facilitating Access to Science and Technology”—the USDA is also directly in the business of developing, patenting, and promoting biotechnology inventions. The difference is that USDA slips the patents, developed from government research and paid for by US taxpayers, into the hands of private companies such as Monsanto and Syngenta.

You read that right. According to the USDA’s own Agricultural Research Service (ARS), about sixty new patents are issued for USDA inventions each year. These patents are then transferred through licenses to the private sector—mostly to biotech companies. ARS has released more than 400 new crop germplasm lines since 2000, and the USDA spends about $220 million taxpayer dollars on biotechnology research each year. 

Write to your senators and representatives and urge them to tell the USDA to do its job by regulating the biotech industry—not guaranteeing their profits!

Recipients

  • Your Senators
  • Your Representative
  • Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack

Contact

*Required fields
 
 

Message

Stop the crony relationship between USDA and biotech

Dear [Decision Maker],

Sincerely,
[Your Name]
[Your Address]
[City, State ZIP]