The Company, Crops, and Chemicals Curated to Poison America

Though now controlling 33% of the global seed market, Monsanto did not start out as an agricultural giant, but as a chemical company producing plastics and synthetic fibers. Eventually, it became the top supplier of Agent Orange for use by the US government during the Vietnam War.

Today, it has merged with the pharmaceutical company Bayer and holds a reputation for their ruthless pursuit of small town farmers over its seed patents. 

But behind Monsanto’s key agricultural (and chemical) products lies a historical use of carcinogens, aggressive lawsuit patterns, and falsified data outputs that have somehow been erased from its history. 

A History with Liability

Monsanto was founded as a chemical company in 1901, specializing in the production of plastics and synthetic fibres. 

Monsanto was the dominant producer of Agent Orange for the US government, who used the chemical pesticide in Vietnam. It’s been proven to be highly carcinogenic due to its dioxin levels, a compound that results in damage to the liver, immune system, and reproductive functions of the body. It also results in several forms of cancer.  

Pre-war notes from Monsanto scientists prove that the company knew dioxin levels in Agent Orange were dangerously high before selling it to the government, and post war it falsified study data in order to prove that dioxin wasn’t carcinogenic to avoid lawsuits. 

Additionally, as part of the plastics industry, Monsanto produced polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) far into the 1990s, which are now proven to be carcinogenic.

That’s where the deception starts. In the 1990s, Monsanto chemical company faced lawsuits over the discharge of PCBs into local water supplies. The biggest lawsuit came from Anniston, Alabama, where Monsanto settled $600 million dollars of claims brought by residents.

Man protesting Monsanto’s use of PCBs in Anniston, Alabama. | Source: Southern Spaces 

Immediately afterwards, Monsanto took a gamble and shifted into an agrochemical company – with a focus on their most successful product, trademarked as Roundup. To finally distance themselves from the chemical business and detach themselves from lawsuits, Monsanto sold chemical aspects of their company to Solutia, Bayer, and the Great Lakes Chemical Corporation. 

Later liability costs ended up bankrupting Solutia, but in the end, Monsanto paid hundreds of millions under what they owed: to both Agent Orange and PCB exposure victims. 

Roundup & Relaunch

After Anniston payments were made, Monsanto invested everything into their agricultural branch, which had been mildly successful with the introduction of the herbicide Roundup, launched in 1976. 

They also began using genetic modification (GM) to increase their product diversity. The introduction of GM was marketed as what would successfully feed a ‘hungry world’— which is true, as the usage of successful GM greatly increases crop yields.

Some of the first GM products developed were Monsanto’s ‘Roundup Ready’ seeds, which were resistant to the effects of Roundup (specifically, its main ingredient Glyphosate). Quickly, Roundup Ready seeds became popular and Monsanto began buying up other seed companies in order to secure a monopoly over corn and soybean seeds.

Source: Mother Jones 

Soon after production took off, Monsanto patented Roundup (and Roundup Ready). Monsanto patents on Roundup Ready GM seeds allowed them to prosecute farmers who used their seeds without properly paying for them. This lawsuit  grew to be a high priority for Monsanto, who devoted10 million dollars a year to the investigation, harassment, and suit of small American farmers with traces of Monsanto seed in their ground.

However, genetic seed drifting (due to wind, proximity to other forms, etc) occurs: and innocent, often non-GMO farmers, are punished for having small traces of Monsanto seed in their soil and crops. 

The investigation tactics of the company have ruined the business, life, and reputation of many non-GMO farmers, who, when earmarked by Monsanto as containing traces of the patented GM seed, are forced to abandon their crops and are threatened with excessive legal charges until bankruptcy. Those same investigations have earned the company a reputation for the ruthless pursuit of small town farmers. Usually, those farmers have never been connected with Monsanto, and they’ve never used the seeds. 

In Iowa, and other locations along the US corn belt, Monsanto is a threatening name that comes with huge consequences most small farmers aren’t able to face.

The Toxic Merge

In 2018, German pharmaceutical Bayer merged with American Monsanto in a $63 million dollar deal.

Werner Baumann, CEO of Bayer AG and Hugh Grant, CEO of Monsanto. | Source: Farm Progress 

By that point, Monsanto’s most famous product, Roundup, the main active ingredient being glyphosate, had faced thousands of lawsuits: all alleging that glyphosate exposure from Roundup caused non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma (NHL), a type of blood cancer.

Bayer is the world’s leading pharmaceutical company, which produces a variety of medications treating NHL – the very same cancer Monsanto’s leading product causes.

And glyphosate? The main ingredient in Roundup products? It’s classified as ‘probably carcinogenic’ by the World Health Organization. 

Monsanto’s Roundup has been linked to causing cancer. And Bayer profits from treating it.
This creates a cycle: where the Bayer company (combined with Monsanto) controls both the cure and cause of a cancer crisis that kills over 250 thousand people every year.

(De)regulation & The Future

Monsanto, and other agrochemical companies, are regulated and tested by a variety of federal organizations who mainly fall under the purview of the US Department of Agriculture (more commonly the USDA). 

One of those organizations is the Pesticide Data Program, or PDP, which is responsible for national tests and reports on the levels of pesticide use in various agricultural commodities. The data collected is commonly available to the public, and it tracks the usage of many different pesticides in diverse commodities – everything from frozen winter squash to tomatillo peppers to pears in baby food. 

The program has grown dramatically since its introduction in the early 1990’s. From 1991, the programs started, to 2020, those reported results have grown by exactly 18596.6%. 

PDP has helped to set the tolerance levels for what ‘healthy’ pesticide usage in crops looks like. It has promoted safer crop protection methods which forces farmers to stay accountable for using sustainable production methods.

But most importantly, PDP’s program has pushed farmers to stop using certain pesticides and herbicides that can severely damage the human body. 

For instance, azinphos methyl was in the top 5 pesticides detected in crops in 1994. In 2012, it was banned from crop usage.

In addition to being a severe pollutant of water, and an unstable fire hazard, azinphos methyl is extremely toxic to humans. Less than a teaspoon of the substance would be lethal for a 150lb person – and it is toxic by skin absorption, ingestion, and inhalation. 

This year, the USDA’s budget, which encapsulates programs like PDP but also E. Coli meat testing, Avian bird flu poultry monitoring, and food disclosure standards, has been cut by 23%—per the Trump Administration’s $7 billion dollar cut to the USDA budget, headed by Secretary of the USDA, Brooke Rollins. 

Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins | Source: POLITICO 

Individually, PDP has been cut by nearly $800,000 from 2024 to 2026. 

But the majority cuts affect a wide variety of people: local farmers in need of disaster assistance, the forest service branch for fighting wildfires, and infants/children fed by USDA supplemental nutrition programs. 

And with that, the very hunger that Monsanto’s GM seeds promised to resolve will only continue to thrive.