Monsanto merges with Bayer

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  • June 8, 2018 at 5:25 pm #87200
    wv
    Participant

    Corporate consolidation continues.

    Bayer-Monsanto:http://www.dw.com/en/opinion-the-bayer-monsanto-merger/a-44110352
    Opinion: The Bayer-Monsanto merger

    Germany’s giant chemicals conglomerate, Bayer, has completed its takeover of US-based Monsanto….
    …
    …..German pharmaceutical and drugs company Bayer has completed its takeover of Monsanto, the US agrichemicals giant, for which Bayer paid €56 billion ($63 billion). It’s the biggest takeover ever undertaken by a German company of a non-German company.

    A hated brand disappears

    The Monsanto brand has become almost a synonym for corporate evil amongst greenies, with its GMO crop plants (genetically modified organisms) tailor-made to tolerate the company’s herbicide, glyphosate(sold under the trade name Roundup).
    Bonn: Bayer CEO Werner Baumann at the 2017 AGM (picture-alliance/AP Photo/M. Meissner)

    Bayer CEO Werner Baumann at the 2017 Annual General Meeting. The takeover of Monsanto has been Baumann’s personal priority and contribution to the Leverkusen-based company

    Bayer’s takeover of Monsanto predictably generated cries of alarm and outrage by the usual critics of all things capitalist in general and genetic engineering in particular. All these terrible things taken together, they warned, are responsible for the suffering of farmers in developing countries. A monopoly is forming in agrochemicals and GMO crop species that will leave the farmers of the world with no real choices about how to grow their crops if they want to be profitable…..

    June 9, 2018 at 10:25 am #87219
    nittany ram
    Moderator

    “A monopoly is forming in agrochemicals and GMO crop species that will leave the farmers of the world with no real choices about how to grow their crops if they want to be profitable…..”

    Well, I’m not going to defend the business practices of Monsanto or Bayer, but if farmers around the world were forced to use GM crops we would see better outcomes in terms of costs, sustainability, yield, land use efficiency, nutrition, environmental impact…

    June 9, 2018 at 11:34 am #87224
    wv
    Participant
    nittany ram wrote:

    “A monopoly is forming in agrochemicals and GMO crop species that will leave the farmers of the world with no real choices about how to grow their crops if they want to be profitable…..”

    Well, I’m not going to defend the business practices of Monsanto or Bayer, but if farmers around the world were forced to use GM crops we would see better outcomes in terms of costs, sustainability, yield, land use efficiency, nutrition, environmental impact…

    ——————

    Well i hear Monsanto genetically modified tower number 7. And thats why it wilted like Bulger in 2009.

    w
    v

    June 9, 2018 at 12:18 pm #87225
    Billy_T
    Participant

    Can’t find it yet online, but Maher really went after both companies last night on his show. It’s rare to see that. No holds barred.

    I knew how evil Monsanto was, but didn’t know Bayer is right up with them too. A merger of despicables.

    My ideal of great journalism is the no holds barred exposure of corporate/capitalist horrors, not just government. It needs to be both/and. Mostly we just get the low hanging fruit of government corruption, and that’s not in any way, shape or form deep enough. But we rarely hear about the capitalist side of things . . .

    Is that the influence of right-libertarianism and its influence on “conservatism” more generally?

    Rand Paul typifies this so often. He was asked by a reporter recently if it bothered him what Facebook is doing, giving customer info — and their friends’ info — to who knows what entities. He said he was much more concerned with government invasion of privacy. The corporate form of this doesn’t seem to faze him.

    Both/and. Not either/or.

    June 9, 2018 at 1:04 pm #87227
    nittany ram
    Moderator
    wv wrote:
    nittany ram wrote:

    “A monopoly is forming in agrochemicals and GMO crop species that will leave the farmers of the world with no real choices about how to grow their crops if they want to be profitable…..”

    Well, I’m not going to defend the business practices of Monsanto or Bayer, but if farmers around the world were forced to use GM crops we would see better outcomes in terms of costs, sustainability, yield, land use efficiency, nutrition, environmental impact…

    ——————

    Well i hear Monsanto genetically modified tower number 7. And thats why it wilted like Bulger in 2009.

    w
    v

    Strange system we’ve concocted for ourselves.

    The motivations of corporations can’t be trusted because their wants might not align with my needs, yet I am fully dependent on them for my needs.

    For example, pharmaceutical companies can’t be trusted, but my wife is only alive because of pharmaceutical companies. So we are beholden to them.

    So we create government agencies to watch over corporations, but then we allow the corporations to influence the people in the government who run those agencies.

    The extent that logic must be contorted in support of capitalism is truly amazing.

    • This reply was modified 6 years, 3 months ago by nittany ram.
    June 9, 2018 at 3:27 pm #87231
    wv
    Participant
    nittany ram wrote:
    wv wrote:
    nittany ram wrote:

    “A monopoly is forming in agrochemicals and GMO crop species that will leave the farmers of the world with no real choices about how to grow their crops if they want to be profitable…..”

    Well, I’m not going to defend the business practices of Monsanto or Bayer, but if farmers around the world were forced to use GM crops we would see better outcomes in terms of costs, sustainability, yield, land use efficiency, nutrition, environmental impact…

    ——————

    Well i hear Monsanto genetically modified tower number 7. And thats why it wilted like Bulger in 2009.

    w
    v

    Strange system we’ve concocted for ourselves.

    The motivations of corporations can’t be trusted because their wants might not align with my needs, yet I am fully dependent on them for my needs.

    For example, pharmaceutical companies can’t be trusted, but my wife is only alive because of pharmaceutical companies. So we are beholden to them.

    So we create government agencies to watch over corporations, but then we allow the corporations to influence the people in the government who run those agencies.

    The extent that logic must be contorted in support of capitalism is truly amazing.

    ==================

    Yeah one leftist writer calls that the great conundrum of Captitalism. In order to radically change or overthrow capitalism you need people to oppose it — but people need it to survive (they need to be wage-slaves in order to eat).

    Unless one is rich, about the only solution is to form small co-ops, and carve out spaces outside of corporate-capitalism — but thats not easy….blah blah blah.

    w
    v

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