Appeals Court Bars Planting of Genetically-Altered Alfalfa
A federal appeals court has ruled Monsanto Co. may not sell genetically altered alfalfa until a government environmental study determines whether the crop would contaminate farmers’ nearby fields.
The San Francisco-based 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a federal judge’s ban on further planting and sales in a 2-1 decision yesterday, the San Francisco Chronicle reports. The crop is designed to grow even when Monsanto’s Roundup herbicide is applied.
A switch in the makeup of the panel that heard the case “bore all the signs of a John Grisham plot line,” the Recorder reports in its story on the ruling. One panel member considered an environmentalist ally, Judge Betty Fletcher, couldn’t hear the case when she broke her leg. She was replaced by Judge N. Randy Smith, who grew up on an alfalfa farm and generally rules against environmentalists.
Smith was the panel’s dissenter. The two judges in the majority agreed with the Center for Food Safety, which argued the case for the plaintiffs seeking to halt sales of the altered seed.
The plaintiffs’ lawyer, George Kimbrell, said the ruling is a landmark decision that “for the first time, holds that biological contamination from genetically engineered crops to conventional and organic crops is irreparable harm.”
