Monsanto's Mexican Maize Mischeif
Monsanto has employed the services of a firm called Bivings Group which used a phony e-mail campaign to persuade the prestigious science journal Nature to retract the Chapela and Quist paper finding that GM maize had escaped into Mexico - the first time in the publication´s 133 year history that it had ever retracted a paper [1] [2] see also Monsanto's World Wide Web of Deceit. The architect of the deception is thought by some to have been Monsanto´s Jay Byrne who was also active in attempts to shut down web sites critical of Monsanto [3] see also Biotech's Hall of Mirrors. Also see CARMA International and this Spinwatch article on the Congress of Racial Equality for more on Monsanto's PR tactics.
Chapela and Quist have since been vindicated as it turns out that GM maize has indeed invaded Mexico. Says Science 3/1/2002 "Surprisingly, even Quist and Chapela's most strident critics agree with one of their central points: Illicit transgenic maize may well be growing in Mexico.... At a 23 January meeting in Mexico City, CINVESTAV official Elleli Huerta presented preliminary PCR findings indicating that transgenic promoters, mostly CaMV 35S, were present in about 12% of the plants. In some areas, up to 35.8% of the grain contained foreign sequences, INE scientific adviser Sol Ortiz Garcia told Science last week." "This is the world's worst case of contamination by genetically modified material because it happened in the place of origin of a major crop. It is confirmed. There is no doubt about it." Jorge Soberón Secretary of Mexico's National Biodiversity Commission told the London Daily Telegraph, April 19, 2002 [4]. Also [5].
Unfortunately for Chapela, despite overwhelming support from Berkeley staff and students alike, Chancellor Robert Berdahl decided to deny him tenure. Supporters then petitioned the new Chancellor, Robert Birgeneau, to reverse the decision. However "the Budget Committee knows the chancellor wants to get his hands on that corporate loot [Berkeley receives tens of millions of dollars from biotech] Chapela is exactly the kind of person we need around here. He has wisdom, and above all he has courage and integrity" said Joe Nielands, emeritus professor of biochemistry [6].
