Plow to Plate Film Series Presents: The World According to Monsanto

You need only to look at a film like Michael Moore’s groundbreaking 1989 expose of General Motors, Roger and Me, to see that corporations seldom come off looking good on camera. And this is especially true in documentaries about the food industry. But The World According to Monsanto is particularly savaging in its unrelenting focus on unearthing the seediness, so to speak, of this global corporation.

Monsanto presents itself, through slick advertisements, as a company interested in making the world a better place by helping farmers grow more food and feed an expanding population. But the filmmakers make a convincing case the company’s true motive is profit and that it will go to any length to achieve it. Like skilled lawyers gradually stripping away the credibility of an expert witness, they establish their case by first examining the company’s past. Before Monsanto began passing itself off as a friendly agricultural company it was a chemical company, founded in 1901, that produced many dangerous or controversial products such as dioxins, PCBs, aspartame, and bovine growth hormone.

Then, the filmmaker goes over the Monsanto’s alleged sins, one by one. The company’s list of misdeeds is long: dumping dangerous chemicals in a creek and burying PCBs in the poor African American community of Anniston, Alabama in the 1960s and lying to the government and community about the hazards; falsifying scientific studies; destroying the careers and reputations of scientists who dared to question the safety of their products or methods; suing American farmers for patent infringement and destroying the lives of poor farmers in the developing world who cannot afford their seeds.

It’s a strong indictment and it is all meant to question the honesty and integrity of a company that envisions a transgenic world and believes that GMOs are safe.  Not long into The World According to Monsanto you pretty much hate the company and are extremely skeptical of its scientific claims, endorsed by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), that genetically modified organisms are “substantially equivalent” to non GMOs and that they are “Generally Recognized as Safe” or (GRAS). After all, Monsanto at first said that its cash cow herbicide, Roundup, was biodegradable and good for the environment, only to be forced to reverse itself when its own studies showed that after 28 days in the soil only 2% had broken down.

The title of this film, The World According to Monsanto, suggests the great power this monopoly has wielded in manipulating the FDA and implies that Monsanto, which has already bought up dozens of seed companies, has as its ultimate goal nothing short of dominating the entire food system. But despite its past political prowess, and its slick television commercials, Monsanto, at least in certain circles, is also a quite sinister company, and this film only validates that appraisal.  Marie-Monique Robin’s film will leave you doubting claims of food safety and benevolence. After 108 minutes Monsanto does not seem so powerful. The man behind the curtain has been revealed.

The World According to Monsanto will show Tuesday, March 12, second floor meeting room of the Coop, 7:00 p.m. Refreshments will be served.