Is Novartis a good fit with the mission of CNR?
| Novartis is a major producer of agricultural chemicals. These pollute our air, water, and food; they lead to insecticide resistance and pest outbreaks; and they increase the small farmer’s costs and decrease the profits |
| Novartis is the largest industrial agriculture company in the world, and the second largest biotech firm. The result of the 1996 merger of Ciba-Geigy and Sandoz, it is the product of rapid consolidation in agribusiness. Find out more about consolidation in the agricultural products industry. |
| Novartis is a leader in genetic engineering (GE) - food grown from their seeds produces pestidices in every cell so you can’t ever wash the pesticides off. Their health effects are unknown. Despite the fact that the large majority of Americans want these products labeled, the US government does not do so. Find out more about the uncertainty and controversy surrounding GE crops. |
| Novartis's corn uses genes from the bacteria that organic farmers use as a natural pesticide. This dramatic increase of the pesticide in the environment will cause the pests to evolve immunity to it. The only question is how long until this makes one of organic agriculture's best tools useless. Novartis says 30 years, some scientists say 5 years. |
| New evidence shows that these genetically engineered crops kill large numbers of beneficial, pest-eating insects. The story.... |
| The GE crops can cross-pollinate with organic crops, contaminating it with engineered genes. The story.... |
| GE companies are rapidly developing sterile seeds in order to increase farmers' dependence on their products. Read more. |
| Farmers who buy Novartis’s seeds are forbidden by law to save the seeds from one year’s crop and plant them the next year - and many of the plants produce sterile seeds anyway. This costs the farmer huge amounts in "seed royalties." |
| Clearly, Novartis produces a new product with unknown consequences. Effective regulation will require impartial research. The alliance would prevent Berkeley from providing that impartial research. |
| Furthermore, such an alliance is an implicit endorsement of Novartis's products and tactics. This is counter to the mission statement of CNR: a commitment to the environment, sustainablilty, and food safety. |
| Novartis recently began testing diazinon, an insecticide, on humans. The story.... |
| In 1976, Ciba-Geigy (predecessor to Novartis) conducted a test in which 5 boys under 18, including a 10 year old, stood in a cotton field without protection and were sprayed by a crop duster. The pesticide was later linked to cancer in animals and removed from the market. The story.... |
| Monsanto is another huge multi-national agrochemical company that produces genetically engineered crops. Monsanto and UC Davis are developing an alliance similar to the one here at Berkeley CNR. (That link includes some details about how Monsanto uses strong arm tactics to silence opposition.) Read how they bullied the Ecologist magazine when that publication tried to criticize the corporation. Can we trust Novartis to not bully CNR? |