Wheat Falls as Japan Suspends U.S. Imports on Biotech Crop Find

[Poll_Blind]

Source: Bloomberg Businessweek

Wheat in Chicago fell the most in two weeks after Japan suspended imports from the U.S., where the government discovered an unapproved, genetically modified strain growing in an Oregon field.

Japan, the biggest buyer of U.S. wheat behind Mexico, suspended imports of western-white wheat and feed wheat from the U.S., said Hiromi Iwahama, the director for grain trade and operation at the agriculture ministry. Scientists said the rogue wheat in Oregon was a strain tested from 1998 to 2005 by Monsanto Co. (MON), the world’s top seedmaker. Japan also canceled a purchase of 24,926 metric tons of white wheat.

The finding may hurt U.S. export prospects at a time when the U.S. Department of Agriculture is expecting record global production, boosted by a 48 percent increase in Russian output and a 40 percent gain from Ukraine. Exports from the U.S. probably will fall 9.8 percent to 25.2 million tons in the year that starts on June 1, according to the USDA.

--snip--

The USDA said yesterday it was investigating how the unapproved seeds were growing nine years after St. Louis-based Monsanto ended its wheat program.

Read more: http://www.businessweek.com/news/2013-05-29/wheat-drops-as-global-crop-outlook-counters-u-dot-s-dot-planting-delays

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At what point do you have to recognize that the Federal government is so beholden to corporate interests like Monsanto that they do so at the expense of the industry which Monsanto allegedly supports?

PB

[Kelvin Mace]

1. Corporations care money, only money

and maximizing money.

The concept that something may cost them money in the future does not matter, because current management sees that this will be someone else's problem, not theirs. By the time some future problem they created comes home to roost, the current management will be have either moved on to some other company, or kicking back with their multi-million dollar retirement package.

This is another way the legal fiction of corporations fails in practicality. Human beings who break the law, or who make other bad decisions, ultimately pay for it. Sure, you can eat bacon every day, 24x7x365, but when the heart disease shows up, you pay the piper.

Imagine how we would treat our bodies if we knew there would be no consequences for our actions, legally, mentally, or physically. We could run our bodies into the ground, then simply move into a new, healthier body.

[dixiegrrrrl]

3. Corporations care money, only money

which is why Japan, costing them money, is an effective way to get their attention.

[Kelvin Mace]

4. Sadly no

If it really starts to cost them money they pull the ripcord on their platinum parachute and it becomes someone else's problem. The next management team in may or may not deal with the problem, depending on what loopholes they can find and how much extortion/bribery power they can wield on Japan to make the problem go away. Also, they will use their stooges in the US Gov to extort/blackmail/bribe to make the problem go away.

In the short term, they will simply cut staff and benefits, then raise prices on farmers as a way to make up the difference.

[BrotherIvan]

6. Agreed

And not only that, Monsato will not be financially penalized for this shortfall, the taxpayers will have to make it up in subsidies.

*The corporation always wins.*

[Baitball Blogger]

2. We are shooting ourselves in the foot.

[Demeter]

5. Karma is a bitch

and Monsanto is gonna get some disciplining

[Zoeisright]

7. Once that engineered DNA gets into the wild

there is no stopping it. That's just one of the reasons so many oppose GMO foods.

[kelliekat44]

9. You just can't F*** with mother nature. She always wins in the end. nt

[Fearless]

8. Wake up America.