U.S. House votes to extend "Monsanto rider" on GM crops

[proverbialwisdom]

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/09/20/usa-agriculture-gmo-idUSL2N0HG1C620130920

U.S. House votes to extend "Monsanto rider" on GM crops

Reuters, Sep 20, 2013

* Rider is contained in short-term spending bill
* Consumer groups decry "corporate earmark"
* Opponents ask Senate to strip out GM rider

The U.S. House of Representatives on Friday approved an extension of a law allowing farmers to keep growing a genetically modified crop while it is being challenged in court, a move critics said overrode actions to prevent contamination of non-GMO crops.

The extension, dubbed by critics the "Monsanto Protection Act" in reference to the agricultural biotechnology giant , would prolong the law scheduled to expire at the end of this month. The measure is contained in a 22-line rider to a stopgap bill to fund the government through Dec. 15.

Should the rider pass the Senate, it would keep the law alive for 11 weeks more. A coalition of small-farm, organic food, environmental, and consumer groups asked the Senate to strip out the language from the bill.

The rider allows the cultivation and sale of a genetically modified (GM) plant variety to go ahead even if a federal judge overturns Agriculture Department approval of the variety and directs USDA to conduct more studies on whether the plant is safe to release.

<>

Link from: http://gmwatch.org/index.php/news/archive/2013/15071-u-s-house-votes-to-extend-monsanto-rider-on-gm-crops

[proverbialwisdom]

1. ACTION ALERT.

http://fooddemocracynow.org

[img][/img]

Urgent Update: The Monsanto Protection Act is Back!

Tell Congress to Vote NO on the Monsanto Protection Act and stop any efforts to undermine state's rights to label GMOs? Don't let Monsanto corrupt our democracy and kill GMO labeling in Washington! This morning I received a disturbing call from a Congressional staffer in Washington DC alarmed at the fact that the U.S. House ...

Read more: http://action.fooddemocracynow.org/call/tell_Congress_to_stop_the_monsanto_protection_act_is_back_again/

UPDATE: On Friday, Sept 20th, the House passed a Continuing Resolution (H.J.RES.59) that contains the same Monsanto Protection Act that it passed last spring! We need your help to stop it in the Senate, which will vote next week! While the previous continuing resolution was scheduled to expire on September 30th, the new bill contains the exact same language that offers Monsanto and their GMO crops protection from judicial oversight and forces the USDA to allow the planting of untested GMO crops without proper scientific or regulatory review.

If allowed to pass again this dangerous provision could eventually become permanent, allowing Monsanto to succeed in stripping judges of their constitutional mandate to protect consumer rights and the environment, while opening up the floodgates for the planting of new untested GMO crops.

At the same time, Congressman Fred Upton (R-MI) and others are working to introduce a bill that would make it illegal for states to pass laws to label GMOs by preempting state's rights and forcing the issue to be decided at the federal level.
Your Congressperson needs to hear from you in the next 24 hours...

More: http://foodandwaterwatch.org/blogs/farm-bill-update-insulting-the-poor-while-complimenting-monsanto/

[sigmasix]

2. Upton is the scumbag behind the donut hole medicare legislation.

Upton has displayed his hatred for Americans through the legislation he has introduced. He is roundly hated by most michigan voters, but the NRA pays dearly every couple years to assure his re-election.

[proverbialwisdom]

3. Senate CR to Strip Monsanto Rider

http://www.organicconsumers.org/articles/article_28382.cfm

Senate CR to Strip Monsanto Rider

By David Rodgers
Politico, September 24, 2013

Straight to the Source: http://www.politico.com/story/2013/09/senate-continuing-resolution-monsanto-rider-97301.html

A controversial legislative rider added by Monsanto to the Agriculture Department budget last spring will no longer be effective after Sept. 30 under a draft stopgap government funding bill being drafted by Senate Democrats.

The provision touched off a storm last spring as critics accused Monsanto of "court-stripping" to protect its sales of the genetically modified seeds for which the St. Louis-based giant is a pioneer in commercializing.

The continuing resolution approved by the House last week would extend the rider without comment for the first months of the new fiscal year. But the Senate substitute, to be unveiled Wednesday, will explicitly go back and make clear that that Monsanto-backed provision will end this month.

"That provision will be gone," said Sen. Mark Pryor (D-Ark.), confirming the change to POLITICO. The Center for Food Safety, a Washington-based non-profit, welcomed the decision as "a major victory for the food movement" and "sea change in a political climate that all too often allows corporate earmarks to slide through must-pass legislation."

<>

Caught in the middle was Appropriations Committee Chairwoman Barbara Mikulski (D-Md.) who had inherited legislative agreements made under her predecessor, the late Sen. Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii). Mikulski promised then that she would do everything she could to terminate the provision with the new fiscal year. But the CR posed its own challenges since typically the leadership simply extends current spending and related provisions for the life of the resolution.