Now Monsanto’s getting a taste of its own medicine.  The Center for Food Safety, the Sierra Club, and two organic seed groups have sued on grounds that the “Roundup Ready” sugar beet seeds just approved by the USDA and ready to enter the market will cross-pollinate and contaminate conventional sugar beets, chard and table beets. The same happened last year when Monsanto’s Roundup Ready alfalfa came under fire for similar reasons. The judge eventually banned it, citing USDA haste to commercialize the alfalfa seed “without a thorough examination of its effects.” 

The USDA’s deregulation of Roundup Ready sugar beets came in 2005, when it stated that the seeds “would not present a risk of plant pest introduction or dissemination.”  That’s patently false, and in fact those are the other grounds under which the plaintiffs have chosen to file, claiming that herbicide-resistant crops like Roundup Ready encourage the development of “superweeds” that adapt to resist chemicals. 

The most recent court ruling on the case skews favorably towards the plaintiffs. U.S. District Judge Jeffrey White ruled that Monsanto couldn’t intervene in the initial “merits” phase of the lawsuit, since they were not involved in the actual deregulation of the seed. This is a big deal, because, given the opportunity to intervene, Monsanto could and would have poured its ample energy and resources into steamrollering the case. As it is, they can file a brief this week that summarizes their arguments, and wait 'till the next phase of proceedings. 

We’ll all be paying attention.