Biotechnology companies face new foe: the Internet

["Grugnog" <grugnog@tao.ca>]

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Posted: Sunday, September 19, 1999 | 6:41 a.m.
Biotechnology companies face new foe: the Internet
By Bill Lambrecht
St. Louis Post-Dispatch Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON - Analysts at Deutsche Bank in Germany came up with
some grim conclusions this summer about the financial
prospects for genetically modified crops, saying companies
such as Monsanto were losing battle after battle.

A few years ago, the German report never would have traveled
outside the rarefied air of global investors. But that was
before the World Wide Web.

This month, a consultant in Idaho arranged for the bank
analysis to be posted on the Web, and in three days, thousands
of people had downloaded the 25-page report and further
disseminated it around the globe. Critics, farmers and people
still making up their minds about the new technology had a new
piece of information.

The Internet is enabling mobilization like never before and,
in the process, giving biotechnology companies fits. In recent
months, St. Louis-based Monsanto Co. and its rivals in the new
science of genetically engineering food have watched in dismay
as pockets of protest have mushroomed. Europe and Japan are
demanding the labeling of modified foods. A trade war is
brewing between the United States and Europe. American farmers
are wondering whether to continue sowing tens of millions of
acres with gene-altered seeds.

What is behind the recent developments? More people,
especially Europeans, are raising questions about
environmental safety, potential health effects and the power
of the companies to determine the nature of food.

But perhaps no single factor looms larger in biotechnology's
tumble than the role of the Internet. The Web has given
critics and skeptics the arena to post studies, opinions and
vitriol for the world to consume. E-mail and listserves --
electronic mailing lists -- enable activists to work with one
another and to exchange scraps of information instantly. All
the activity leaves the impression, real or imagined, of a
vibrant global movement.

The "life science" companies and biotechnology devotees use
the Internet, too, and in time they hope that it will play a
key role in convincing the world that biotechnology can yield
food that is not only safe, but better.

But as it stands, one powerful new technology may be
functioning to stem the growth of another powerful new
technology. The Idaho consultant who distributed the German
report, Charles Benbrook, contends that people who had
misgivings in the past about farm and food policies had no
means to link up and reinforce their beliefs. The Internet has
changed all that.

"Activists can transfer fresh and important information around
the world with speed and ease," Benbrook said. "And that's
something we've never experienced before." Changing policy
Until last year, the most public responses received by the
Department of Agriculture on a new rule was 7,000. Then
Agriculture Secretary Dan Glickman asked Americans to tell him
what they thought of a new organic foods policy that would let
food that was genetically engineered, irradiated or fertilized
with sludge carry the government's new "organic" label.

More than 250,000 people responded, mostly by e-mail, and the
vast majority said it was a terrible idea. Under the nearly
completed rules, genetically engineered food in the United
States won't be labeled as organic. The Internet is becoming
an important factor in politics and public policy debates on a
host of issues. Until recently, interest groups usually
consisted of associations with national memberships and slick
magazines. Now, with the Internet, people can mobilize and
pressure governments with the push of a button.

"It changes the presumptions of representative democracy,"
said Phil Noble, a political consultant and founder of
PoliticsOnline. "I think the Internet is going to do for
public policy what the telephone did for lobbying." People can
be mobilized, too, in ways that don't give a true picture of
public sentiment.

"In literally a matter of hours, I can create an interest
group of tens of thousands on whatever my issue is right now,
and mobilize them to send mail, e-mail or even rotten eggs,"
Noble said. Political scientist Michael Cornfield of George
Washington University said "cyberlobbying" soon will dominate
grass-roots organizing because of its speed and low cost. "It
won't level the playing field between those who don't buy
access and those who do, but it will make it easier for people
to be involved in grass-roots lobbying," he said. Anti-genetic
engineering forces seem to be finding it easy right now.

A PR headache With a staff of five in the United States and
Canada, the Rural Advancement Foundation International has
about 30,000 fewer employees than Monsanto. Yet RAFI's
"Terminator" campaign has created a monumental public
relations headache for Monsanto and triggered
anti-biotechnology sentiments around the world.

The Terminator is the RAFI-coined name for a genetic
technology that renders seeds sterile so they can't be saved
for the next crop. That way, farmers must buy more modified
seeds and pay the additional "technology fee." The
sterile-seed invention was patented last year by the U.S.
government and a Mississippi seed company that Monsanto is
acquiring.

Using the Internet, RAFI has persuaded some of the world's
leading agriculture researchers and even the
biotechnology-friendly Rockefeller Foundation to condemn the
Terminator on the grounds that it is unfair to low-income
farmers and might even be harmful if farmers planted them
unknowingly.

RAFI's Hope Shand said that the Internet has dramatically
increased her organization's power to reach people. In a
recent 16-month period, she said, RAFI had 1.3 million "hits"
on its Web site, from which visitors downloaded 455,000 pages.
"The Terminator campaign would never have been possible
without the spread of information on the Internet," she said.

Another Internet campaign torpedoed an effort by Monsanto in
Bangladesh. Last year, Monsanto agreed to give $150,000 to the
Grameen Bank, which is known internationally for giving loans
to poor farmers. But after the bank received a barrage of
e-mail critical of Monsanto, the arrangement was scrapped.
Distorting reality?

Dozens of groups - from the Union of Concerned Scientists to
direct-action proponents such as Greenpeace - use the Internet
to work against biotechnology.

Friends of the Earth and some of the biggest environmental
advocacy groups wage online global campaigns. An Internet
drive to force mandatory labeling of modified food is being
waged out of Washington state.

Crop saboteurs, such as genetiX snowball in Britain, hook up
with the Direct Action Media Network and organizations that
take a militant approach to advocacy.

Then there's Mutanto, a Web site that parodies Monsanto's.
Instead of Monsanto's slogan of "Food, Health and Hope,"
Mutanto offers "Fraud, Stealth and Hype." The critics of
genetic food are simply exploiting their Internet advantage,
said Michael Hanson of Consumers Union, which publishes
Consumer Reports. "The other side has just as much access, but
they're just not as good at it." The "other side" thinks that
the anti-biotechnology campaigners succeed on the Internet
through distortion: distorting the facts about safety and
creating the false impression that consumers, not just
activists, worry about modified food.

A relatively few activists have been able to create a sense of
movement that didn't exist before the Internet, biotechnology
companies say. As a result, news outlets and others believe
there's more out there than there really is, even though some
of the anti-biotechnology sites get very few visitors.

"It's a dual-edged sword," Monsanto's Jay Byrne said. "On one
hand, the Internet allows people with opinions or even
spurious facts to share that information broadly. But at the
same time, it allows the public access to scientific and
academic information that so far has been generally supportive
of the technology. The challenge lies in discerning between
the two."

Monsanto uses the Web aggressively and has won awards for it,
including one this month from an agribusiness magazine for its
French Web page. The company tailors individual sites around
the world to combat anti-genetic food sentiments.

In the United Kingdom, Monsanto's Web site went so far as to
offer a link to Greenpeace and post critical press accounts of
itself to stimulate debate. Monsanto uses its British site to
sponsor a public dialogue on the outbreak of European
incidents of crop destruction by protesters.

By the same token, detractors accuse Monsanto of exaggerating
in cyberspace biotechnology's potential to feed hungry people.
Despite the Internet's power and potential, both sides in the
biotechnology debate concede that it will come down eventually
to people sorting through issues themselves just like they've
always done. Benbrook, the Idaho consultant, said, "If the
public doesn't believe what is said, the fanciest Web sites
and the biggest public relations campaigns in the world won't
amount to much."

Some Web sites in the biotech wars

Critics

Union of Concerned Scientists.
<http://www.ucsusa.org/>www.ucsusa.org

Campaign to Label Genetically Engineered Foods.
<http://www.thecampaign.org/>www.thecampaign.org

Consumers Union.
<http://www.consumersunion.org/>www.consumersunion.org

Friends of the Earth. <http://www.foe.org/>www.foe.org

Rural Advancement Foundation Internationa.
<http://www.rafi.org/>www.rafi.org

Jeremy Rifkin; Foundation on Economic Trends.
<http://www.biotechcentury.org/>www.biotechcentury.org

Greenpeace. <http://www.greenpeace.org/>www.greenpeace.org

Organic Trade Association. <http://www.ota.com/>www.ota.com

Edmonds Institute.
<http://www.edmonds-institute.org/>www.edmonds-institute.org

Ecologist Magazine.
<http://www.gn.apc.org/ecologist>www.gn.apc.org/ecologist

genetiX snowball.
<http://www.gn.apc.org/pmhp/gs>www.gn.apc.org/pmhp/gs

"Mutanto."
<http://www.users.zetnet.co.uk/lean/nonsanto.htm>www.users.zet
net.co.uk/lean /nonsanto.htm

 Corporate

Archer Daniels Midland.
<http://www.admworld.com/>www.admworld.com

Monsanto Co. <http://www.monsanto.com/>www.monsanto.com

Monsanto Co. United Kingdom.
<http://www.monsanto.co.uk/>www.monsanto.co.uk

Novartis. <http://www.novartis.com/>www.novartis.com

Dupont. <http://www.dupont.com/>www.dupont.com

Agrevo. <http://www.agrevo.com/>www.agrevo.com

Biotechnology Industrial Organization.
<http://www.bio.com/>www.bio.com

Food Biotechnology Communications Network.
<http://www.foodbiotech.org/>www.foodbiotech.org

The Grocery Manufacturers Association.
<http://www.gmabrands.com/>www.gmabrands.com

National Food Processors Association.
<http://www.nfpa-food.org/>www.nfpa-food.org

Food Marketing Institute. <http://www.fmi.org/>www.fmi.org

 Academic, government

Danforth Plant Science Center.
<http://danforthcenter.org/index.html>http://danforthcenter.or
g/index.html

Missouri Botanical Gardens.
<http://www.mobot.org/>www.mobot.org

U.S. Government Food Safety Site.
<http://www.foodsafety.gov/>www.foodsafety.gov

Department of Agriculture Biotechnology Information Resource.
<http://www.nal.usda.gov/bic>www.nal.usda.gov/bic

UN Biosafety Information Network and Advisory Service.
<http://binas.unido.org/binas/binas.html>http://binas.unido.or
g/binas/binas. html

Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations.
<http://www.fao.org/es/esn/biotech/TABCONTS.HTM>www.fao.org/es
/esn/biotech/ TABCONTS.HTM

 Miscellaneous

National Corn Growers Association.
<http://www.ncga.com/>www.ncga.com

Nature Magazine. <http://www.nature.com/>www.nature.com

Science Magazine.
<http://www.sciencemag.org/>www.sciencemag.org

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