The world according to Monsanto : pollution, corruption, and

74 the world according to monsantomental characteristics.” Two years later, the company was forced to pay$75,000 for suggesting in a new advertisement featuring a California horticulturistthat the herbicide could be sprayed in and around water. 12Oddly enough, these American legal decisions never troubled the EuropeanCommission, much less the French authorities, who tolerated unquestioninglythe advertising campaign Monsanto launched in the spring of2000. But the image of the lovable Rex about to gnaw on a bone soaked inRoundup stirred the wrath of the association Eau et Rivières de Bretagne,which in January 2001 sued the French subsidiary of the American giant forfalse advertising.“Scientific studies have shown that huge quantities of glyphosate havebeen found in rivers and streams in Brittany,” Gilles Huet, representative ofthe Breton association, told me in a telephone conversation in the spring of2006, referring to a report published in January 2001 by the ObservatoireRégional de Santé de Bretagne. 13 In fact, analyses conducted of streams inBrittany in 1998 showed that 95 percent of the samples had a level ofglyphosate above the legal threshold of 0.1 ppb, with peaks of 3.4 ppb in theSeiche, a tributary of the Vilaine. Huet pointed out that “in 2001 the EuropeanCommission, which reauthorized glyphosate, classified it as ‘toxic foraquatic organisms’ and ‘possibly causing long-term harmful effects on theenvironment.’ We are asking for a minimum of consistency: a ‘biodegradable’product that is ‘respectful of the environment’ cannot end up being ‘toxicand harmful’ in Brittany’s rivers.”On November 4, 2004, the criminal court in Lyon, where the headquartersof the French subsidiary of Monsanto was located, began proceedingsin which the company was charged with “false and misleading advertising.”Until 2003, taking advantage of delays in investigating the complaint by theBreton association, the agrochemical company had been able to continue itsadvertising campaign. And on the occasion of the Lyon trial, it even gaineda further two-year delay by simply not appearing. Company representativesclaimed never to have received notification by mail because, according tothe prosecution, they had no address in France, and so the prosecution decidedto put off the trial until June 2005. “Administrative error or maneuverby the company to avoid an ignominious judgment in terms of its brand image?”wondered the consumer association UFC–Que Choisir, which hadjoined the suit of Eau et Rivières de Bretagne in 2001. Gossip had it that the