Monsanto is already the world’s largest seed company and dominates the global market for genetically engineered crops. In 2013, Monsanto controlled 26% of the global commercial seed market, and Bayer controlled 3%. Monsanto controlled 8% of the agrochemical market, and Bayer controlled 18%.
“This extreme level of corporate control in seeds and pesticides risks the future of food and farming in Canada, and around the world,” said Lucy Sharratt of the Canadian Biotechnology Action Network.
Bayer and Monsanto are two out of six seed and agrochemical companies that already control 63% of the global commercial seed market and 75% of the pesticides market. (2) In addition to this merger, Dow and Dupont agreed to merge in 2015 and earlier this year, Chinese company ChemChina bought Syngenta. If regulators allow these three mergers, the resulting three companies would control almost 61% of commercial seed sales and more than 65% of global pesticide sales.
Over the past twenty years, seed prices have risen at a faster rate than most other farm inputs, and the price of genetically engineered (GE) seeds is higher than non-GE seeds.
“We need to examine the impacts of these mega-mergers and increasing corporate consolidation in all aspects of our food system,” said Sharratt. “Farmers need access to a diversity of seeds, at fair prices.”
The Canadian Biotechnology Action Network and the Quebec network Vigilance OGM are asking Canada’s Competition Bureau to investigate the potential impacts of this merger on Canadian farmers and farm businesses.
Corporate consolidation in the seed market over the past twenty years has been driven, in part, by the interest in genetic engineering and the potential profits offered by gene patents in particular.
Source: Meatbusiness