Bayer-Monsanto merger is ‘five-alarm threat’ to food and farms: Legal experts
White paper from two former Justice Department officials warns merger would violate antitrust laws and lessen competition
By Deirdre Fulton
INTELLIHUB.com
August 5, 2016
A new legal opinion penned by two former Justice Department officials bolsters warnings that the proposed merger between agroindustrial giants Bayer and Monsanto “is a five-alarm threat to our food supply and to farmers around the world.”
The white paper (pdf) by Maurice E. Stucke and Allen P. Grunes, both former employees of the Justice Department’s Antitrust Division, states that Bayer’s proposed takeover of Monsanto would:
Increase concentration in already concentrated industries for genetic traits, seed, and herbicides. For example, Bayer-Monsanto post-merger would account for approximately 70 percent of the U.S. acreage for cotton, with similar or higher shares in different regions of the U.S.
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