Marie-Monique Robin Deconstructs the World According to Monsanto (Interview)

Marie-Monique Robin is an award-winning French journalist and filmmaker. She received the 1995 Albert-Londres Prize, awarded to investigative journalists in France. She is the director and producer of over thirty documentaries and investigative reports filmed in

Latin America, Africa, Europe, and Asia. She is also the author of The World According to Monsanto: Pollution, Corruption, and the Control of Our Food Supply (The New Press) and creator of the film by the same name.

Creating such crucial and ambitious projects is never easy. "I traveled a lot, to the US, Canada, Mexico, Paraguay, India, Vietnam, Europe, and met a lot of scientists, experts, whistleblowers (from the FDA, EPA, Berkeley University), lawyers, farmers, or victims of Monsanto," she explains. "I consulted thousands of declassified documents from the EPA (dioxin), FDA (GMO's), judiciary affairs (PCB), scientific studies, reports from independent organizations, and then decided it was enough!"

Below is the rest of my conversation with Marie-Monique Robin.

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The World According to Monsanto

My Conversation With Marie-Monique Robin

Planet Green: Among other things, Monsanto is responsible for Agent Orange, Roundup Ready crops, PCBs, and GMOs, yet it has pretty much flown under the radar. Why do you suppose the vast majority of humans rail mostly at governments instead of the far more dangerous and powerful multinational corporations?

Marie-Monique Robin: The problem is that the corporations are acting behind the scene, manipulating information, studies, press, and the experts of the regulatory agencies. To speak quite frankly, I had never imagined before that a company could resort to the same procedures, to sell its harmful products, in complete impunity, during decades: concealing scientific data, lies, manipulating regulations, corruption, pressuring scientists and journalists, as well as threats. The problem is also that governments do not take any legal actions against the companies, which are repeatedly affecting the environment and the health of consumers. If Monsanto were a private person, it would be convicted as a great criminal, but the current law is protecting the criminal companies, which are never held accountable for the damages they cause.

PG: How does Monsanto impact many of our daily food choices?

MMR: Nowadays, Monsanto is the world leader in biotechnology and the first seed company. Ninety percent of the GMOs grown in the world belong to it. During the last decade, the firm bought dozens of seed companies all over the world, pushing its transgenic seeds, which are patented. A patented seed means that the farmers who grow it may not keep a part of his crops to re-sow it, the next year, as farmers used to do everywhere in the world. In the US and Canada, farmers who grow transgenic crops must sign a "technology agreement" the no-sowing requirement is clearly expressed. If they don't respect the agreement and violate the patent, they are harassed by the "gene police" and sued by Monsanto. Clearly transgenic crops are just a tool to control the seeds supply, which is the first link in the food chain, by forcing farmers to buy seeds each year.

PG: How influential is Monsanto in the decision-making process at the US Food and Drug Administration and other so-called protection agencies?

MMR: It was quite amazing to discover how Monsanto is using the "revolving door," in order to control the decisions or policies regarding its products. Just one example: To avoid tests on GMOs to assess their possible harm on the consumer health and on the environment, the FDA invented the concept of "substantial equivalence," which was based on no scientific data, as James Maryanski, the former chief of the Biotechnology Department, recognized in front of my camera. And who wrote the FDA's policy from May 1992? A former Monsanto attorney named Michael Taylor, who was hired by the FDA as deputy commissioner for policy, and then became Monsanto vice president! Interesting enough, Michael Taylor went back to the FDA, under the Obama administration.

PG: What does it say about all of us that this going on right under our noses?

MMR: Consumers and citizens played a role in this dramatic story. We all use the hazardous products, which characterize the "modern life." And the price we are paying is very high. In my next documentary and book, Toxic Lies, I explain how the chemical industry is "poisoning our plate." I investigated the link between chemical exposure (pesticides, food additives, plastics, etc.) and the epidemics of cancer, neurodegenerative diseases, obesity, reproduction disorders, diabetes, which can be observed in the so-called "developed countries," and especially in the US. And if you investigate how all the chemicals are assessed and regulated, you finally understand that consumers are not protected at all against these dangerous hazards.

PG: Can you suggest a good first step to challenge not only Monsanto but other players in this industrial culture?

MMR: The key is held by consumers and farmers. That means that all of us should promote organic farming by buying organic food, which is the best way of protect our health and environment. That will be for sure the end of Monsanto and similar companies.