Talk:Monsanto/Archive 6

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monsanto roundup

My husband died Dec. 13, 2017 from Non Hogkins Lymphoma. He used Monsanto Round up regularly, and I believe this product caused the lymphoma. I would like info on this product. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 107.12.244.241 (talk) 16:38, 23 March 2018 (UTC)

Ukraine

There are articles on the net which claim that monsanto bought vast tracts of land in Ukraine. The sale had something to do with an IMF loan which would not have been granted without that sale. Does Bayer now own these, too, and what were the intentions and activities with that land? 2001:8003:A928:800:D987:A121:5FC1:F91D (talk) 02:40, 10 June 2018 (UTC)

Bayer will retire Monsanto name on June 7th

https://www.cnbc.com/2018/06/04/with-deal-to-close-this-week-bayer-to-retire-monsanto-name.html Shushugah (talk) 19:10, 5 June 2018 (UTC)

Also Rupert Neate (4 June 2018). "Monsanto to ditch its infamous name after sale to Bayer". The Guardian. Retrieved 11 August 2018. Pol098 (talk) 20:14, 11 August 2018 (UTC)

Unable to understand recent edits

How is it possible to add the following on Sept. 11:

There is limited evidence human cancer risk might increase as a result of occupational exposure to large amounts of glyphosate, such as agricultural work, but no good evidence of such a risk from home use, such as in domestic gardening. The consensus among national pesticide regulatory agencies and scientific organizations is that labeled uses of glyphosate have demonstrated no evidence of human carcinogenicity. Organizations such as the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Food and Agriculture Organization, European Commission, Canadian Pest Management Regulatory Agency, and the German Federal Institute for Risk Assessment have concluded that there is no evidence that glyphosate poses a carcinogenic or genotoxic risk to humans. The EPA has classified glyphosate as Group E, meaning "evidence of non-carcinogenicity in humans". Only one international scientific organization, the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), affiliated with the WHO, has made claims of carcinogenicity in research reviews. The IARC has been criticized for its assessment methodology by failing to consider the broad literature and only assessing hazard rather than risk. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Monsanto&diff=next&oldid=859121765

And two days later remove the following saying Undid revision 859329986 by Petrarchan47 (talk) Undo edit warring. You need to gain consensus for these edits, not reintroduce them.)

$39 million was awarded for past and future damages, and $250 million in punitive damages. Judge Suzanne Ramos Bolanos Monsanto said Monsanto "acted with malice, oppression or fraud and should be punished for its conduct".

I am no longer closely following this article but this certainly stood out as strange. Perhaps I'm missing something? If not this seems like pretty blatant bias to me. I've worked on plenty of other corporate articles and it's unheard of to have an editor refuse a short addition such as the one that Petra added. Gandydancer (talk) 17:47, 13 September 2018 (UTC)

References

I'm not sure what you mean by how it was possible. I just hit the edit button and transferred consensus text about carcinogenicity of glyphosate and related formulations. That's needed for WP:DUE pretty much any time that claims about cancer and glyphosate come up. That's all MEDRS supported, so I guess it's not clear what your concern is.

As for petrarchan's edit, that's already being discussed a few sections up. Being a corporate article doesn't really change how we deal with scientific topics, especially when we get into WP:FRINGE territory. Kingofaces43 (talk) 19:38, 13 September 2018 (UTC)

What absolute rubbish. So now we have WP telling us that a court settlement is fringe and as such we cannot add the court's opinion to our article? Shame, shame on WP editors that go along with this rather bizarre reading of WP's position. Gandydancer (talk) 20:10, 13 September 2018 (UTC)

It has nothing to do with MEDRS since no claims about medicine are being made. It is however relevant when a corporation (yes I know it was bought by Bayer) loses 5% of its equity in a lawsuit and may face similar lawsuits in future. If you want to add something saying that there is a consensus in the scientific community that the judgment was wrongly decided, then go ahead and do so. TFD (talk) 20:17, 13 September 2018 (UTC)

Due weight at Roundup Cancer coverage.

My edit was reverted for "undue weight". From WP:DUE: "Keep in mind that, in determining proper weight, we consider a viewpoint's prevalence in reliable sources, not its prevalence among Wikipedia editors or the general public."

The mention of what the jury found, and the reason for the large fine, were reported in all coverage of this case:

Guardian https://www.theguardian.com/business/2018/aug/10/monsanto-trial-cancer-dewayne-johnson-ruling

NBC https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/jury-orders-monsanto-pay-290m-roundup-trial-n899811

CBS https://www.cbsnews.com/news/dewayne-johnson-monsanto-roundup-weed-killer-jury-award-today-2018-08-10/

Vox https://www.vox.com/2018/8/11/17678532/monsanto-roundup-causes-cancer-jury

NPR https://www.npr.org/2018/08/10/637722786/jury-awards-terminally-ill-man-289-million-in-lawsuit-against-monsanto

It should be on WP too. Therefore I will restore my edit. KoA43 was wrong in claiming my edit added undue weight. petrarchan47คุก 09:25, 13 September 2018 (UTC)

Please respect the intent of 1RR here. The idea that glyphosate or its formulations are carcinogenic is pretty much WP:FRINGE, so if we do mention those viewpoints, they are very subdued. Court cases aren't exactly WP:MEDRS here either. Consensus has repeatedly been that we cover the case to a degree in that it happened, but major weight issues occur when someone tries to expound the viewpoints of those bringing that case forward. Kingofaces43 (talk) 15:40, 13 September 2018 (UTC)

Where did consensus emerge that if a court case make findings that are novel, they should not be mentioned in the encyclopedia? Using MEDRS to support that idea is a gross misunderstanding of WP:MEDRS. My added coverage is nothing but the minimum that was reported by all sources, these sources are the ones we refer to when covering non medical issues. You appear to be wanting to sanitize the coverage here. That puts editors in an uncomfortable position. The findings in the case were definitely a first, which you refer to as "fringe", another gross misinterpretation of the guidelines. It was the first time internal documents from Monsanto had been revealed, and what was in those documents showed the jury that Monsanto "knew or should have known" that their product causes cancer. Further the documents showed the company was manipulating and ghostwriting science, and covering up studies that showed harm. So that has to be taken into consideration when speaking of related literature, possibly manipulated, that has been available thus far. That too should be mentioned for the reader. It isn't possible to give this landmark case proper encyclopedic coverage while sticking to what has been said with regard to cancer in the past.

From the Guardian link above: In the extraordinary verdict, which Monsanto said it intends to appeal, the jury ruled that the company was responsible for “negligent failure” and knew or should have known that its product was “dangerous”. “We were finally able to show the jury the secret, internal Monsanto documents proving that Monsanto has known for decades that ... Roundup could cause cancer,” Johnson’s lawyer Brent Wisner said in a statement.

Please show me where the community found otherwise. petrarchan47คุก 17:17, 13 September 2018 (UTC)

You're discussing some of it below. Generally, courts are not reliable for scientific findings, especially when that contradicts the scientific consensus. Generally when the court case has been discussed before, the consensus has been to include that it happened, but not overly detail things from the lawyers' standpoint, etc. like your change did since it's a fringe viewpoint. The case obviously got a lot of press, but it gets tricky reporting a lot on it because we follow due weight. Kingofaces43 (talk) 19:55, 13 September 2018 (UTC)

I quoted the judge, not a lawyer, and as you can see from Gandydancer's post below, no one agrees with your (mis)use of guidelines to keep this information out. petrarchan47คุก 06:08, 14 September 2018 (UTC)

Roundup =/= Glyphosate

In this edit, KoA43 mentions the safety of Glyphosate in the Roundup section, conflating the two, just as Bayer is doing.

From coverage of the recent Roundup cancer trial:

"[In its defense, Bayer/Monsanto] never mentions Roundup, instead using the word glyphosate. This is intentional, he noted.

"Glyphosate is "different than Roundup" since it includes a cocktail of other chemicals, which increases its weed killing potency. Wisner pointed out that the jury in California focused heavily on the "synergistic effect of the glyphosate and the other chemicals."

"And the simple fact is, Monsanto has never tested the carcinogenicity of the combined product," Wisner added. https://www.dw.com/en/did-monsanto-know-its-weed-killer-could-be-deadly-to-people/a-45116915

"And the last thing is—and this is really important—is that Mr. Partridge doesn’t say Roundup doesn’t cause cancer; he says glyphosate. And he does that intentionally, because he knows that glyphosate is different than Roundup. Now, glyphosate is part of Roundup, but Roundup is a combined product of glyphosate plus a bunch of other chemicals that make glyphosate significantly more potent. And one of the things that the jury is really focused on, this jury in our case, was that there’s a synergistic effect of the glyphosate and the other chemicals. And the simple fact is, Monsanto has never tested the carcinogenicity of the combined product. And this omission is glaring, and it’s intentional. In fact, we have internal documents that say, “We do not want to look at this issue because we’re afraid of what we’re going to see.” And the jury heard all this, and they rejected this idea that it’s a safe product, that it doesn’t cause cancer. And they said not only does it cause cancer, but that Monsanto acted with malice in doing so. I think that’s really important." https://www.democracynow.org/2018/8/14/historic_ruling_against_monsanto_finds_company

Please amend the edit so that it is scientifically accurate and encyclopedic. petrarchan47คุก 09:49, 13 September 2018 (UTC)

None of these are WP:MEDRS or WP:SCIRS and would seem to contradict what good sources actually do have to say about synergistic effects or risks of the formulations. What's currently there has been agreed upon text that accurately represents the sources in previous discussions, so that currently is the scientifically accurate version. Glyphosate-based_herbicides has more on that. Kingofaces43 (talk) 15:45, 13 September 2018 (UTC)

At Glyphosate-based_herbicides you have been warned that you need to use recent sources rather than sources that are 14 years old (here and here).

At Glyphosate-based_herbicides you said "I've been actively looking for new sources"[1].

Did you do actually do that before making this edit? I've waited a few weeks for you to answer me there. Having a PhD in your specialty in insects and pesticides/pest management, I would think you would know the importance of doing a literature review, and that you would not add 14-year old studies, which is a violation WP:MEDRS. There are more current studies that contradict the older studies. petrarchan47คุก 17:29, 13 September 2018 (UTC)

Last I checked, the main sources being from 2015 to 2017 are far from 15 years old, so please refrain from casting aspersions about my edits here. Kingofaces43 (talk) 19:32, 13 September 2018 (UTC)

This is the edit I'm referring to, as detailed here. I don't see the need to repeat my concerns. Can I assume you will be updating the articles with Sera 2011 as soon as you have a free moment? petrarchan47คุก 17:35, 15 September 2018 (UTC)

How do editors plan to handle the ghostwriting problem?

In case editors here haven't been keeping up with the recent case in California, or aren't familiar with the problem of Monsanto's influence over published literature, I leave you with some reading. How do we intend to deal with this at the encyclopedia? petrarchan47คุก 21:05, 13 September 2018 (UTC)

Bloomberg, Aug 2017: Monsanto Was Its Own Ghostwriter for Some Safety Reviews - Academic papers vindicating its Roundup herbicide were written with the help of its employees

from Miller Firm LLC:

The emails contained in the document release clarify how agrotech giant Monsanto worked with a consulting firm called Intertek Group Plc to covertly co-write a 2016 review of Roundup’s® effects on human health in the scientific journal, Critical Reviews in Toxicology, which was falsely labeled as “independent.” Monsanto undertook this ghost writing endeavor in an attempt to discredit a 2015 finding by the World Health Organization’s (WHO) International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) that glyphosate, Roundup’s® key ingredient, is a probable human carcinogen.

From SFChronicle:

Monsanto’s response to that 2015 classification was more manipulated science. An “independent review” of glyphosate showed up in a peer-reviewed scientific journal decrying the IARC classification. The review not only was titled as being independent, but declared that no Monsanto employee had any involvement in the writing of it.Yet the company’s internal emails, turned over in discovery associated with the litigation, revealed that a Monsanto scientist in fact aggressively edited and reviewed the analysis prior to its publication.

That was but one of multiple examples detailed in the unsealed documents of similar efforts, referred to by Monsanto’s own employees as “ghostwriting.”

From the NYT: Monsanto Emails Raise Issue of Influencing Research on Roundup Weed Killer

Documents released Tuesday in a lawsuit against Monsanto raised new questions about the company’s efforts to influence the news media and scientific research and revealed internal debate over the safety of its highest-profile product, the weed killer Roundup...

The documents also show that a debate outside Monsanto about the relative safety of glyphosate and Roundup, which contains other chemicals, was also taking place within the company. In a 2002 email, a Monsanto executive said, “What I’ve been hearing from you is that this continues to be the case with these studies — Glyphosate is O.K. but the formulated product (and thus the surfactant) does the damage.” In a 2003 email, a different Monsanto executive tells others, “You cannot say that Roundup is not a carcinogen … we have not done the necessary testing on the formulation to make that statement.”

DemNow: How Monsanto Plants Stories, Suppresses Science & Silences Dissent to Sell a Cancer-Linked Chemical

...there are papers out there in published peer-reviewed journals that appear to be independent of Monsanto, that we know—from the evidence in the documents that we have, that we know Monsanto had a hand in writing, even though they look like they’re independent. And this is the term that’s come to be associated now with Monsanto, which is “ghostwriting.” We know that there are papers out there in the published literature that our regulators around the world have relied upon as being independent and authentic, and we know that Monsanto has ghostwritten them. Now, we don’t know how many more are out there.

CNN: Patients: Roundup gave us cancer as EPA official helped the company

A month before the IARC report came out in 2015, Monsanto executive William F. Heydens sent an internal email to company toxicologist Donna Farmer with the subject line "RE: IARC planning," according to court documents. In that email, he suggested ghostwriting parts of an "overall plausibility paper" to save money.

"If we went full-bore (with experts), we could be pushing $250K or maybe even more," Heydens wrote. He said a "less expensive/more palatable approach" might be to involve experts only for some of the less contentious parts of the report. Then, Monsanto would "ghost-write the Exposure Tox & Genetox sections."..."[W]e would be keeping the cost down by us doing the writing," the email said. Afterward, scientists outside Monsanto "would just edit & sign their names so to speak."..."Recall that is how we handled Williams Kroes & Munro, 2000," Heydens wrote, referring to a previous report on glyphosate.

NPR: Emails Reveal Monsanto's Tactics To Defend Glyphosate Against Cancer Fears

HuffPo: Monsanto Manufactured Scientific Studies And Then Used Those Studies To Influence EPA, Other Regulators

Question: Why is there not a Roundup article? Much of the information that is being called "undue" in this article would be more appropriate in a Roundup article. The product is notable aside from its being a glyphosate-based formula. Minor4th 21:07, 15 September 2018 (UTC)

FWIU the reason there is no Roundup article on the English version of Wikipedia is because user @Jytdog: got rid of it. There was no community discussion about it. S/he then made a redirect to Glyphosate. We've since had an RfC that ended with the community deciding it should not be merged with Glyphosate. I have asked @DGG: to help reinstate the article, since he was a part of the GMO ArbCom case. He has asked for help in locating the article logs, but has received none as far as I can tell. See here.

Here is an archived version of the Roundup page.

Here is the RfC that ended with:

I am going to discount concerns about POV editing / attack page / promo concerns because we have remedies to those issues. I will also discount those opposing on the basis of lack of unique material about RoundUp as it was presented without it being convincingly challenged as insufficient for a split. Therefore, consensus was that a split of the RoundUp material from glyphosate is appropriate.

I'm not clear where we stand at the moment as far as reinstating the page. (I hope Jytdog will forgive me if I've got some of these facts wrong. This is what I seem to recall but it's been years and I have a shoddy memory.) petrarchan47คุก 05:04, 16 September 2018 (UTC)

Petra, as I remember it there was a small talk page discussion re combining the two that did not necessarily come to any sort of conclusive decision or if it did it did not involve what one would expect to justify making the move without further discussion. Then a few months went by and Jytdog came along and on his own made the decision saying it had been decided. It has always concerned me because it has always concerned me that at about that time our Monsanto articles began to lack what I would consider unbiased coverage. But, it's been a long time and perhaps my memory is not correct on this. Gandydancer (talk) 13:28, 16 September 2018 (UTC)

I am currently in the process of personally rewriting the previously deleted page to focus on material involving this particular product. I understand that to be the consensus of the previous discussion. I am not of course doing it as an arb, but as someone interested and experienced in both commercial products and biological/biomedical topics. I shall put a note here when I have finished, which should be within about 12 hours. I'd appreciate it if peoplegave be the chanvce to do so, before commenting further. If anyone then wants to nominate it for deletion, they of course can. DGG ( talk ) 14:46, 16 September 2018 (UTC)

Thank you DGG. I was hoping someone with more expertise would take on this task. Minor4th 22:11, 17 September 2018 (UTC)

+1 ^{Atsme✍🏻📧} 22:37, 17 September 2018 (UTC)

'Old' vs 'New' Monsanto

This seems to me to be pure PR designed to distance the recent company from controversy and I haven't seen any other precedent for it on Wikipedia. The old and new sections should be merged.— Preceding unsigned comment added by Tiny beets (talk • contribs) 16:44, 18 September 2018 (UTC)

@Tiny beets: This distinction is supported by sources e.g. [2] Monsanto was now a totally different company from the old chemical company] [3] Monsanto jumped headfirst into the future five years ago, when it spun off its old-line chemicals business and rechristened itself a life sciences company that used biotechnology to develop genetically altered crops. SmartSE (talk) 16:47, 18 September 2018 (UTC)

@Smartse: Many companies shift courses throughout their existence. They don't become 'totally different' by selling a different range of products. The companies differ by the values of their shareholders, boards, CEO's etc. It seems remarkably convenient all the most controversial products of the same company are in the 'old' version. Where is the evidence the values and senior leadership of the company changed markedly? The NY Times article is a puff/advertorial piece about about the possibly carcinogenic 'Roundup'.Tiny beets

Hey, I thought I would split the difference by changing old to "Pre-Pharmacia" and new to "Post-Pharmacia." Legally the two Monsantos are different companies, and the most recent incarnation of Monsanto had a different mix of business than the prior incarnation, but I think two points are relevant here:

1. They chose to retain this name because they didn't really want to break from the identity of the previous business - otherwise I think they would have chosen a new name.
2. They took on the legal liabilities of the "Pre-Pharmacia" Monsanto that arose from the Solutia spin-off, which to me suggests continuity.

I think it's more neutral to name the eras with regard to an event or action. In this vein think "Pre-spinoff" and "Post-spinoff" would also be acceptable categories. Or, with some rearrangement "Pre-solutia" and "Post-solutia" if the thought is to highlight divesting the chemical business. -Furicorn (talk) 08:58, 20 September 2018 (UTC)

Agree. Pre- and Post-Pharmacia is factual, accurate, fully descriptive, and sounds more...encyclopedic. "Old" and "new" are accurate but perhaps too informal. Having two sections is important to make plain Monsanto's core business re-direction. IMO, good incremental editing! --Tsavage (talk) 14:30, 20 September 2018 (UTC)

Thanks Furicorn - that's a good compromise. SmartSE (talk) 16:41, 20 September 2018 (UTC)

Link to USRTK

I added a link to "The Monsanto Papers: Roundup (Glyphosate) Cancer Case Key Documents & Analysis, by U.S. Right to Know", a site with information about Monsanto and its activities. Why was my edit reverted? Why does the user that did the reversion write that it may be spam?--Arsenal sin platea (talk) 20:48, 21 September 2018 (UTC)

Here is the diff of the revert edit: [4]. The edit was made by Zero Serenity, so I'm making this ping to notify them. With that out of the way, I wonder whether U.S. Right to Know satisfies WP:ELNO, whether the material there gets into the materials that were released by plaintiffs' lawyers, and if so, whether there are issues about selective release of only some of the material. I do not know the answers to any of that, and I have an open mind about it, but I think those are the likely issues. I'd like to hear from other editors. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:32, 21 September 2018 (UTC)

I hadn't thought about the ELNO context for USTRK before, but it's pretty fair to say it doesn't satisfy it. We generally wouldn't consider it a reliable source on its own, and it's not really acting as a secondary source here either. When it comes to the lawsuit stuff for actual content, we can let true secondary sources do that. Kingofaces43 (talk) 17:45, 24 September 2018 (UTC)

What point of WP:ELNO it doesn't satisfy?--Arsenal sin platea (talk) 12:36, 25 September 2018 (UTC)

Mostly #2. It doesn't have a reputation for fact-checking, is a known WP:FRINGE advocacy group, etc. If you want a rough parallel, it would be like having a link to a Heartland Institute webpage on an article about climate change. Kingofaces43 (talk) 14:28, 25 September 2018 (UTC)

First of all, thank you for taking your time to explain it to me and to discuss it! Even if USRTK is FRINGE, the documents in the site aren't, as far as I know they are documents released by a judge and presented by the parties. When adding this link, I thought it may serve as a source of primary sources for the readers interested in it, not as a secondary source. I still don't understand why you say it's not reliable as a collection of original documents from the trials (that obviously can't be brought directly to the article). (Only now I see that there's Monsanto legal cases, where to begin with I should have tried to add the link, and maybe this discussion should be maintained there, but the issues discussed don't change.) Again, thank you!--Arsenal sin platea (talk) 07:42, 26 September 2018 (UTC)

Removed item about Monsanto item ranked ethically worst corporation

In 2013, Swiss research firm Covalence released its annual ranking of the overall ethical performance of multinational corporations. The idea behind the Covalence research is that there is value—both for companies and consumers—in measuring corporations against an ethical standard. To complete its ethics index, Covalence compiled both quantitative and qualitative data, spanning seven years, for 581 companies. The data encompass 45 criteria that include labor standards, waste management and human rights records. And because it is a reputation index, the Covalence survey also incorporates media, industry and NGO documents into its evaluation. Monsanto was ranked last of 581 companies.

Removed above from "History" (diff). Seems out of place as history section currently doesn't cover controversies. Also, seems overly long in its description of the Covalence EthicalQuote. Also, no citation so should be checked. Interesting, though, could maybe fit as one sentence in "Controversies and litigation" section intro. --Tsavage (talk) 02:21, 28 September 2018 (UTC)

Good call, seems like a copyvio from here. Daß Wölf 20:04, 1 October 2018 (UTC)

Recent edit about Roundup and cancer

I would like to discuss this recent edit: [5]. The edit removed a paragraph from the Roundup and cancer section, which has the effect of removing a significant percentage of what had been in that section, but also put a small amount of that content into other paragraphs. For clarity, here is the paragraph that was removed:

Deleted paragraph

There is limited evidence human cancer risk might increase as a result of occupational exposure to large amounts of glyphosate, such as agricultural work, but no good evidence of such a risk from home use, such as in domestic gardening. The consensus among national pesticide regulatory agencies and scientific organizations is that labeled uses of glyphosate have demonstrated no evidence of human carcinogenicity. Organizations such as the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Food and Agriculture Organization, European Commission, Canadian Pest Management Regulatory Agency, and the German Federal Institute for Risk Assessment have concluded that there is no evidence that glyphosate poses a carcinogenic or genotoxic risk to humans. The EPA has classified glyphosate as Group E, meaning "evidence of non-carcinogenicity in humans". Only one international scientific organization, the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), affiliated with the WHO, has made claims of carcinogenicity in research reviews. The IARC has been criticized for its assessment methodology by failing to consider the broad literature and only assessing hazard rather than risk. References

If I understand correctly, the rationale for the removal was that the paragraph was somewhat redundant with other parts of the section that discuss the IARC report, and that the paragraph interrupted the flow of the section. I can see some validity for those concerns, but I think that it might be better, instead, to integrate more of what the paragraph said into other parts of the section. I can also appreciate that some editors might have questions about due weight, given that this is the page about the company, rather than about the herbicide, although I don't see that rationale in the edit summary. However, I am concerned that too much material was removed, and I want to discuss that here. --Tryptofish (talk) 17:18, 6 October 2018 (UTC)

I missed that the content was removed when looking through my watchlist, so thanks for bringing this up. The short of it is that if we are going to mention anything about glyphosate and cancer, WP:FRINGE and WP:RS/AC more or less require some mention of the scientific consensus. Likewise, if we're going to mention the IARC, we need mention of how it's decision has been heavily criticized by scientists, etc. With that in mind, I'm open to integrating content more as I mentioned in the above RfC (not sure what we're doing with that at this point).

The issue I'm seeing with this new edit though is that it muddles the scientific consensus language basically saying even though there's a consensus, the IARC said differently. Normally we don't do that with consensus language (e.g., climate change) and bring up fringe viewpoints separately or avoid qualifiers that can unintentionally express doubt. The consensus language was already previous crafted to work as a whole paragraph, so I would looks towards restoring it for now, but I'm open to tweaks or ways to integrate it better through discussion after that. I'm on mobile right now, otherwise I'd work on it, so I'll take a closer look tomorrow. Kingofaces43 (talk) 18:27, 6 October 2018 (UTC)

I made a few more edits today, and in retrospect, the removed paragraph actually isn't that bad. It had been condensed down before the removal, and I took a few more lesser details out. I'm actually ok with how it looks for now at least. Looking over the article, the context is really only needed for in the United States as that's the only place the cancer stuff comes up. The consensus is international though, but since that's handled at other articles without a country focus, I don't really see any great spots for further integration outside of the US section. We may need to deal with other countries in the future though, so we can cross that bridge when we come to it. Kingofaces43 (talk) 16:57, 8 October 2018 (UTC)

Thanks, and I think that this resolves the issue that I raised. I made a few more tweaks, and added a topic sentence at the beginning to try to help with that US/international aspect. I, too, think that there might be a better approach that deals with the science in a different section, but I don't see an obvious place to do it, and I don't think its an urgent problem. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:25, 8 October 2018 (UTC)

I removed a redundant sentence as follows, to improve general readability:

The consensus among national pesticide regulatory agencies and scientific organizations is that labeled uses of glyphosate have demonstrated no evidence of human carcinogenicity.[211][212] Organizations such as the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Food and Agriculture Organization, European Commission, Canadian Pest Management Regulatory Agency, and the German Federal Institute for Risk Assessment[213] have concluded that there is no evidence that glyphosate poses a carcinogenic or genotoxic risk to humans.[211]

The second sentence restates the preceding sentence, and arbitrarily lists a small number of agencies that were already mentioned as a group. This is not an article about glyphosate, cancer, cancer risk of glyphosate, or Roundup, there is no need to develop glyphosate-cancer-Roundup information beyond an clear statement of the prevailing finding: properly used, glyphosate does not appear to cause cancer. The first sentence accomplishes that, the second adds nothing.

My edit is based on an editorial evaluation of the paragraph. The extra sentence serves only to reinforce a point already made—plainly speaking, that glyphosate is safe—which as a reader gives me pause: why the redundancy, the extra emphasis? It makes the content seem biased.

If there's a problem with how the IARC report fits, that should be worked on. My understanding is that, while issued by an apparently authoritative source, the report is a lone outlier and also open to misinterpretation (as to methodology and what it means). We include it prominently because it is also being used as a central argument in lawsuits. If there is RS for that, explaining the situation (succinctly, for this article) would probably add value.

If it seems inconsistent to use the term consensus, then mention the IARC report, perhaps consensus is the wrong word to use. Consensus doesn't indicate unanimous agreement, so it is not incorrect, but it can be written other ways. Saying that "Only one", as opposed to just "One" organization finds otherwise can also be perceived as leading. Do we have sourcing to support that "all prominent agencies save for one agree"—that would be a simple and clear way to word it.--Tsavage (talk) 23:12, 11 October 2018 (UTC)

No, the source explicitly lists those as prominent organizations to mention with respect to the consensus. That's quite the opposite of arbitrary or redundant. The other reason that is included is because if the IARC is going to be mentioned (especially being affiliated with the WHO), we need to be sure to point out that this is significantly different than what the WHO overall says. It is extremely common to find people mistakenly saying the WHO says is glyphosate carcinogenic in this topic, so that care is needed. Please keep in mind that this applies to labeled uses of glyphosate (i.e., formulations), not just the active ingredient alone.

As for IARC being the "only" organization, the source yet again points this out. This is all what the source deems WP:DUE, so a lot of your comments fall into WP:OR territory. We also need that from a WP:GEVAL policy perspective. If we want to mention the IARC, we need to point out that it is out of line with the scientific consensus on this subject and has been heavily criticized. That more or less follows the topic of glyphosate and cancer no matter what article it shows up at. Kingofaces43 (talk) 01:34, 12 October 2018 (UTC)

None of that directly addresses my edit and reasoning, which is that the second sentence, which repeats that glyphosate seems safe, and unnecessarily namedrops an arbitrary four agencies ("such as"), is overkill, it makes the paragraph read like an argument for a particular position. There should be no argument at all for whether glyphosate causes cancer in a Monsanto company article. That there is is the result of poor writing.

The framing of that paragraph, "Monsanto has faced controversy in the United States over claims that its herbicide products might be carcinogens", is itself unsourced and vague. It goes downhill from there. If the controversy is in the shape of the lawsuits, that should be what leads. --Tsavage (talk) 23:19, 12 October 2018 (UTC)

I only have time right now to drop in here quickly, but I want to say that I agree strongly with Kingofaces43 about this. I think I'm a pretty good judge of writing style, and I really am not seeing a problem in that regard: the first sentence of the two is a summary, and the second sentence fills it out with the details. The sentence at the beginning of the paragraph is a topic sentence. And, well, science is science. We don't give false equivalence when a preponderance of sources point one way. I'm open to discussing alternative ways of writing the same information, but I strongly oppose simply removing it. --Tryptofish (talk) 14:41, 13 October 2018 (UTC)

Another recent edit

Oh well, I'm concerned about yet another recent edit that I feel needs some discussion: [6]. In my experience, leads typically start with the defining characteristics (not sure if that's the right phrase) of the page subject, and have notable controversies at the end. And I don't see this as what the edit summary calls "Glorification of GMO". To the contrary, the edit strikes me as somewhat POV and WP:RGW. Please understand that I do get it, that controversies about GMOs are indeed a significant part of what makes Monsanto notable, but I feel that putting the controversies first makes it sound like this is, first of all, a company known for wrongdoing, and only secondarily a company that has had highly notable influences on the world as we know it. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:58, 14 October 2018 (UTC)

I agree that controversy stuff usually goes later. There's also some aspect of "controversies" really being more WP:FRINGE stuff when this company comes up, so making controversies appear more prominent in broad strokes without giving specifics gets into tricky territory from policy perspectives. The previous version seemed fine with the above in mind, so I restored it. It also doesn't seem like there's anything unduly glorifying GMOs either. Kingofaces43 (talk) 03:29, 15 October 2018 (UTC)

Obviously, I agree with you about that. But please keep in mind that my bringing up a concern on the talk page, where you happen to agree with me, is not always tantamount to consensus. There would have been nothing wrong with leaving things as they were pending any further discussion. There's a reason I didn't revert it myself, which I could easily have done. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:37, 15 October 2018 (UTC)

I did have some concerns I mentioned above outside of agreeing with you in that presentation order can be become a WP:DUE issue in this subject. If not for that, I likely wouldn't have reverted it either even with the edit summary, etc.

That all being said, it looks like some of the controversies content needs some work (more background needed from crop patent articles, etc.). I'll see what I can do to flesh that out in the future, and that may end up affecting how we address some of the controversy subjects in the lead, etc. More of a long-term project though. Kingofaces43 (talk) 01:47, 17 October 2018 (UTC)

Requested move 15 June 2020

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: not moved (closed by non-admin page mover) Calidum 15:12, 22 June 2020 (UTC)

---

Monsanto → Bayer Crop Science – Bayer Crop Science has only a small section on the Bayer page. Since Monsanto has been acquired by Bayer, there is still enough significance for Monsanto/Bayer Crop Science to receive ongoing coverage. The majority of the Bayer Crop Science history is found in Monsanto- I suggest moving this to Bayer Crop Science and them amending the article slightly to mention Monsanto being the former name. Superdadsuper (talk) 15:33, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose. I'm not seeing why someone would want to merge the two. Typically when a company merger occurs, the old company still keeps its own article, and relevant details are added to the acquiring company page (usually events after the merger). Most of the details on this page do not belong at Bayer and vice versa. If someone wants to flesh out Bayer#Bayer CropScience, this article generally isn't relevant to that since they were separate companies with their own history. To do that, you'd need to look up sources that deal with Bayer's agronomic history, not the Monsanto side. Kingofaces43 (talk) 16:41, 15 June 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose Bayer Crop Science has existed as a separate entity for decades before the Monsanto merger and IIRC, is much bigger in terms of revenue (if not in notoriety). Even if they become completely indstinguisable in the future, we would still want a standalone article about Monsanto to discuss the non-agricultural information. SmartSE (talk) 17:00, 15 June 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose - even if the entity has been subsumed under the new owner and the brand name discontinued, this article should remain to cover the defunct company under its WP:COMMONNAME. -- Netoholic @ 03:56, 16 June 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose per Opposers above. Jusdafax (talk) 23:15, 16 June 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose the proposed move seems like a campaign intended to hide the Monsanto name. Mikus (talk) 22:45, 21 June 2020 (UTC)

I don't think it's appropriate to cast WP:ASPERSIONS like that. There's no evidence in the proposal for anyone to even think of hinting at that. Someone could just as easily claim the opposite that such a move would be to demonize the acquiring company, but the discretionary sanctions in this subject are pretty clear. Kingofaces43 (talk) 14:00, 22 June 2020 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

[1]Controversy

Over the past years Monsanto has faced backlash over their weedkiller Roundup. Roundup weedkiller is used by homeowners and businesses for all their landscaping needs. As individuals used the Roundup weedkiller overtime they got exposed to harmful chemicals from it. Two years ago, in 2018 a company based in German called Bayer purchased Monsanto. Bayer knew they were getting the worlds top weedkiller but they did not have a clue about the backlash it would come with. Lawsuits started pouring in alleging that Roundup or Glyphosate caused cancer. Cases against Monsanto made headlines around the world and on social media. Monsanto has downplayed that Roundup was not harmful and that it did not cause any health issues to the public. However, Monsanto was taken to court on the allegation that their product were causing cancer. — Preceding unsigned comment added by DominatorST (talk • contribs) 04:16, 2 December 2020 (UTC)

Lobbying

In 2019, Monsanto lobbied the Thai government to repeal its ban on glyphosate: should this be mentioned in the Government relations section of this article? Jarble (talk) 22:03, 28 May 2021 (UTC)

• Not here. Maybe in glyphosate but even there that might be too much detail. Invasive Spices (talk) 22:50, 28 May 2021 (UTC)

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 25 August 2020 and 8 December 2020. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): DominatorST.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 04:26, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

$850,000,000 award against Monsanto

I don't have the full status, but international news organisations, including the BBC, are reporting (19th December 2023) that courts (Washington) have just awarded $850,000,000 against Monsanto for harm caused by some of its products in a school. Perhaps someone can find further information and update the article as this would seem to be of significant importance concerning both health and business impacts. 81.156.104.123 (talk) 04:38, 19 December 2023 (UTC)

Links:

https://www.reuters.com/legal/monsanto-hit-with-857m-verdict-over-pcbs-washington-state-school-2023-12-18/

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/18/business/monsanto-bayer-verdict-washington.html

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/dec/18/monsanto-verdict-857-million-seattle-school-pcb-chemical-leaks

https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20231219-us-jury-orders-monsanto-to-pay-857m-over-chemicals-in-school

https://www.usnews.com/news/top-news/articles/2023-12-18/monsanto-hit-with-857m-verdict-over-pcbs-in-washington-state-school

https://www.standard.net.au/story/8464724/monsanto-hit-with-13b-verdict-over-pcbs-in-us-school/

Confusing sentence

"Its seed patenting model was criticized as biopiracy and a threat to biodiversity as invasive species." What does this mean? Wikifan153 (talk) 18:20, 22 March 2024 (UTC)

Some of the sources are very old for one, but back then, there was a lot more WP:FRINGE conspiracy theories about GMOs "getting loose" (compared to legitimate conversations in scientific circles about realistic risk). Some of the patent comments also had to do with outright myths or misunderstandings of crop patents too. It's probably partly an artifact of that.

So looking at the sources, the first two are old newspaper sources that maybe shouldn't have been put in. Paull's article though at the end is technically published in a journal, though I'm not sure how WP:DUE it is at a glance, especially given the charged language they use. It's not really specific to Monsanto though and maybe more about overall biocontainment discussions at best that could be handled in a more appropriate article, so given all of that, it's probably best to just remove it from this article at least. KoA (talk) 22:01, 22 March 2024 (UTC)