CALL TO ACTION
January 22, 2013 “The farm bill is a package of federal legislation enacted every five to seven years to set the general direction for America’s farm and food policy. Congress enacted the first farm bill in the wake of the Great Depression with the dual goals of supporting America’s farmers and ranchers and helping them to maintain their land.” H.R. 5973 (otherwise known as The Monsanto Protection Act) carries a small rider in section 733 that grants biotech companies free reign with little oversight. The legal team at the Center for Food Safety translates section 733 as a “dangerous assault on fundamental federal and judicial safeguards” and “would create a precedent-setting limitation on judicial review.” Food Democracy Now states that, if allowed to pass, The Monsanto Protection Act ”fundamentally undermines the concept of judicial review and would strip judges of their constitutional mandate to protect consumer rights and the environment, while opening up the floodgates for the planting of new untested genetically engineered crops, endangering farmers, consumers and the environment.”