The world according to Monsanto : pollution, corruption, and

238 the world according to monsantothe organic farmers in Saskatchewan, requesting damages from Monsantoand Aventis for the loss of their canola crops. 41 On December 13, 2007, theSupreme Court of Canada finally rejected the claim on technical grounds,determining that the complaint, whose basis it did not challenge, could notbe treated in a class action but only through individual cases.In the interim, what Loiselle and his colleagues criticized had been confirmedby a scientific study conducted by René Van Acker, an agronomistfrom the University of Manitoba, at the request of the Canadian WheatBoard. 42 “We conducted tests in twenty-seven grain elevators of certifiednon-transgenic canola seeds and we found that 80 percent were contaminatedby the Roundup Ready gene,” Van Acker told me when I met him inOttawa in September 2004. “That means that now almost all Canadiancanola fields include Roundup Ready plants. As for organic canola, it has alreadydisappeared in Canada, where it’s hard to find three square miles withno GMOs.”“How were you able to use the experience with canola for wheat?”“The Canadian Wheat Board asked us to determine whether theRoundup Ready gene was likely to move from one wheat crop to another. Toanswer that question, we constructed a model of the flow of genes, which incanola operates from what we call ‘gene bridges.’ We compared all the elementsof the model, one by one, and we determined that the situation wouldbe similar for wheat and that a flow of genes was also possible.”“Couldn’t two separate channels be organized based on the segregation ofseeds?” I asked, adopting the argument frequently put forth by the promotersof biotechnology.“It’s impossible. Contamination in the field is inevitable and it makes anyattempt at segregation before planting ineffective.”This conviction is shared by the owners of grain elevators, confirmed by asurvey conducted in 2003 by the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policyin Minneapolis. 43 It showed that 82 percent of the owners contacted were“very concerned” by the possible marketing of RR wheat, because “it’s impossibleto have a segregation system with zero tolerance.” Two years earlier,an internal memorandum (obtained by Greenpeace) from Agriculture andAgri-Food Canada to the Minister of Agriculture, Lyle Vanclief, revealedthat the segregation argument didn’t convince government officials themselves:“If transgenic wheat is registered, it will be difficult and costly to