More Aventis?
April 2000

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Contents
Why Aventis?
Farm-scale trials, role in GM, strategy for GM crops, greenwash, dealing with regulators
What Aventis?
Aventis merger, UK operations, corporate structure and commercial activities, Aventis CropScience key products, financial details countries of operations
More Aventis?
GMO crimes, other eco-crimes, activism against Aventis, attitude to activists
Whose Aventis?
Who else and Aventis?GM partnerships, Other partnerships, other contractors, lobbying, PR, lawyers,
Where Aventis?
GM-related work, Aventis -owned sites, farm trial sites
Who Aventis?
Senior staff working on GM, PR slimers, directors

GMO crimes
In 1999 AgrEvo conducted a secret trial of GM forage maize near Wellington in Shropshire. The trial was for the National Seed List, authorised under Part C of EU directive 90/220, (which covers marketing authorisation), meaning AgrEvo could legally get away without notifying the public of the trial. When local vicar Reverend Paul Cawthorne approached the company and government officials to raise his concerns about the trial he was given the run-around. AgrEvo lied and denied that the site existed, and it was only after months of badgering that Mr Dick Stayward of the MAFF Plant Variety Rights Office, Cambridge, finally confirmed that there was a GM crop site in the area.[75]

Government / Aventis collusion on farm-scale trials was found illegal in late 1999, when the government decided to allow Aventis (then AgrEvo) to change the GM crop (from spring oilseed rape to winter oilseed rape) on some of its farm-scale trial sites without submitting a new application. A letter from the company to the regulators at the DETR stated: "I have discussed the option of submitting a completely new application… but a more efficient route would appear to be a small variation to add the new sowing dates to… the current consent". Friends of the Earth challenged the government in the High Court. Eventually the government backed down, but the crops remained in the ground. Furthermore, AgrEvo asked to increase the number of sites for each crop from 25 to 50 sites a year [76].

Although Aventis is pushing forward with the commercialisation of its unwanted crops, the company is unwilling to accept responsibility for any damage to health and the environment that may result from the inadequately tested mutant plants. In February 2000 NFU Mutual, the UK's leading farm insurer, announced that it does not offer cover for GM crop contamination risks and recommends that farmers taking part in GM trials ensure the company takes full responsibility for the crop and any liability claims. Reuters news agency asked Aventis whether or not they took such responsibility. Their response was: "Aventis do not believe that this technology will cause harm to people, other crops or the environment and therefore this does not give rise to a question of liability."[77]

AgrEvo and its subsidiary Plant Genetic Systems were both among six companies "named and shamed" by the government's Advisory Committee on Releases to the Environment (ACRE) in 1998, for failing to comply with conditions of its consents for GMO tests. AgrEvo failed to implement measures to limit escape of pollen on its herbicide-resistant wheat site, while PGS failed to notify conservation officials or the public about its trial of herbicide-resistant rape [78].

On planting oilseed rape for a farm-scale trial at Lushill Farm near Swindon, AgrEvo failed to meet the requirement to publicise the trial in the local newspaper. Instead, the company advertised it in the Gloucestershire Echo, which did not cover an area within 15 miles of the farm. When local campaigners brought the omission to light, AgrEvo was forced to re-advertise in the Swindon Evening Advertiser [79]

Rhone-Poulenc developed the herbicide bromoxynil (Buctril) for use on BXN cotton, genetically modified by Calgene Inc to be resistant to it. The two companies sell seed and chemical as a "package". This was the first commercialisation of a GM herbicide-resistant crop. According to Pesticide Action Network (PAN), bromoxynil causes developmental abnormalities in mammals, is highly toxic to fish, and is carcinogenic and can cause birth defects in humans. It is banned in Britain [80].

In April 1999, Brazil's National Biosecurity Technical Committee (CTNBio) ordered that AgrEvo's experimental herbicide-resistant transgenic rice be burned. The company had failed to take compulsory biosecurity measures [81].

Friedrich Magge, an organic cabbage farmer in Gehdren-Niedersachen in Germany, has taken the Robert-Koch Institute (the agency responsible for giving permission for field trials) to court, along with 3 other farmers. His sales have dropped since an AgrEvo trial began 2km from his farm [82].
Other eco-crimes (AgrEvo, Hoechst, Rhone-Poulenc)
6.45am, 27 January 1996: An explosion at an AgrEvo pesticide plant in Griesheim in Germany contaminated at least 50 hectares of a residential district with hazardous levels of herbicide. AgrEvo took until 8.30am to warn residents of the leak. People were told not to eat locally grown produce and to stay indoors with the windows shut. Schools were also closed [83].

In 1997 Rhone-Poulenc supplied the Swedish state-owned railroad company Banverket with "Rhoca-Gil" to fix a leak in a tunnel under construction at the time. Unfortunately the company failed to tell Banverket that Rhoca-Gil was a highly toxic chemical, acting as a nerve toxin. The company even lied about the concentrations of the toxic ingredients in the product. Because of leaching into ground water, fish and cows started dying in the area. Today, three years after the "accident", the local water is still undrinkable. [84]

AgrEvo was fined £4400 for polluting the River Riddy with iron oxides from the Hauxton site in 1997 [85]. One resident said, "To us locals this seems a strange set of priorities. We also feel that AgrEvo was given a ridiculously easy ride by the EA [Environment Agency], which seems terrified of tangling with powerful chemical companies." [86]

Between 1976 and 1994, an American Hoechst subsidiary admitted that it had kept secret 200 studies showing adverse health impacts from its chemicals [87]. Hoechst's pharmaceutical subsidiary, Hoechst Marion Roussel, markets the contraceptive Norplant, which consists of silicone rods implanted in the upper arm which then release hormones into the bloodstream. Norplant has severe side effects, including irregular vaginal bleeding (one woman had to wear a nappy), hair loss, nausea, depression and mood swings. In March 1996, 45,000 women gathered at an open meeting about the contraceptive and to consider suing Hoechst for compensation under the Consumer Protection Act [88].

In November 1997, a huge explosion occurred at a Hoechst chemical factory in Madagascar, spreading pollution in residential and agricultural areas and contaminating the water supply. The company had insufficient water on site to deal with a fire, and did not cooperate with local health and environmental authorities in supplying a list of substances involved in the accident [89]. Hoechst was listed by Greenpeace in 1996 as a major producer of the phthalate DEHP, a hormone disrupting chemical used in PVC manufacture [90].

AgrEvo was also sued by cattle ranchers in Australia after their cattle were contaminated by the company's cotton pesticide endosulfan. Furthermore, a doctor who specialises in cancer treatment is claiming that the chemical is carcinogenic and can cause birth defects in humans. AgrEvo's response was to pass the blame onto users of the company's product: "When our products are used as directed there is no problem to the consumer, the environment or the user. Any substance, if used inappropriately, can produce some effects." [91]

Also according to PAN, Rhone-Poulenc has applied to have its name removed from transcripts of US shipping records for pesticide exports. Many pesticides are exported to developing countries, where they are not safely used, stored or transported [92]. According to Greenpeace, Rhone-Poulenc was one of the main companies involved in Eurochlor, which lobbied "to try to prevent legislation being introduced to phase out hazardous substances, and to encourage voluntary agreements" [93].

In the UK, Rhone-Poulenc companies were fined £50,000 for release of acid mist from a suplphuric acid plant in Derbyshire in 1996 and £12,000 for release of 10kg of ammonia from a Gloucester site in 1994 [94]. In 1995, the Dagenham site was served a prohibition notice after a leak of 12 tonnes of hydrochloric acid, and an enforcement notice after release of 1.2 tonnes of odious chemicals [95].

…and another thing
Hoechst and Rhone-Poulenc have both been fined for their part in a vitamins cartel which controlled the world market and fixed prices for nine years. Both companies pleaded guilty to criminal charges that they and five other companies held secret annual meetings to divide world markets. The companies fined a total of $242m, though the final figure is expected to be much higher as some of the original plaintiffs in the case are pursuing their own claims [96].
Activism against Aventis

"We could have had commercial crops of spring oilseed rape in the ground this year. Now these crops may be delayed beyond 2001. The destruction of some farm-scale crop trials means we have lost a substantial, and maybe crucial, amount of valuable data. We don't yet know how bad the situation is but delays are inevitable." - Aventis spokesman Des D'Souza, in 1999 [97].

Aventis' rush to get its LibertyLink crops approved in Europe have led to an extensive testing programme in Britain - with crops being trialled both by Aventis and by Plant Genetics Systems, which Aventis owns.

1998: In spring 1998 activists decontaminated oilseed rape trials belonging to AgrEvo and PGS in Cupar, Fife, and Aberdeenshire respectively. That was just the beginning. In May AgrEvo's own East Winch site, at its corporate headquarters near King's Lynn, Norfolk was hit, with GM oilseed rape destroyed. PGS was next in June, when an oilseed rape trial near Cirencester was decontaminated. Oilseed rape was also removed over the summer from sites in Nottinghamshire, North Yorkshire, Dundee and Lincolnshire, and sugar beet from Exening Estate, Suffolk in July. [98]

1999: Activist decontaminations really took off in 1999. At least eight PGS sites were partially or totally destroyed during the year until August, in Cambridgeshire, Glouscestershire, Norfolk, Yorkshire, Nottinghamshire and near Edinburgh. All were oilseed rape. AgrEvo itself had sites targeted (excluding farm-scale trials) in Norfolk, Aberdeenshire, Yorkshire, Lincolnshire and Hertfordshire - a total of seven sites, including oilseed rape and sugar beet. At least two of these were National Seed List trials, hampering the company's efforts to commercialise GM.

Farm-scale trials: The biggest success for activists was the near-total destruction of AgrEvo's farm-scale trial of oilseed rape at Model Farm, Watlington, Oxfordshire, by a mass rally of around 600 people on 18 July 1999. This followed the week-long occupation of an empty farm adjacent to the test site, which was squatted, renamed 'The Alternative Model Farm' and planted with organic and permaculture plants. A farm-scale trial of GM maize at Lyng, Norfolk, was about a quarter destroyed by Greenpeace a week later on 26 July. Another farm-scale trial at Lushill Farm near Swindon was earlier ploughed up by the farmer on the instructions of his estate owners.

In total Aventis (including PGS) suffered at least 18 GM test sites damaged or destroyed in 1999. Activists focused particularly on National Seed List trials, and managed to decontaminate - partially or totally - nine NSL trials belonging to AgrEvo and PGS during the year.

Union Activism
Rhone-Poulenc's last ever shareholders meeting was delayed as unions, protesting against job cuts linked to the Aventis merger, blocked the entrance to the conference hall in Paris. Rhone-Poulenc Chairman Jean-Rene Fourtou told the shareholders that had managed to get into the hall that they would have to wait until the situation had been resolved. Several unions presented a statement to shareholders claiming that 11,000 job cuts were planned as part of the merger and that two plants in the Paris region were under threat. Unions said they wanted to meet Fourtou personally to award him a "diploma of shame". [99]

French unions are also battling with Aventis over plans to implement a 35 hour working week. Only one union is in favour of the plans and even this one doubts the intentions of the employers association (UIC). With scant regard for its workers, Aventis has broken off talks, preferring a fine to conforming to the law [100].
Attitude to activists
SLAPP injunctions: 'Strategic lawsuits against public participation'

In April 1999, AgrEvo successfully applied for an injunction against six Genetix Snowball activists, restraining them from trespassing on its land, uprooting plants at release sites, and procuring / encouraging / instructing / inciting / inducing or conspiring with others to do the same. This was an attempt to intimidate activists out of challenging the company - an approach which has been called SLAPP - a strategic lawsuit against public participation.

Worse, the activists were "sued on their own behalf and on behalf of all members of Genetix Snowball", meaning that if someone ELSE broke the injunction and was deemed to be a "member", then the named defendants would be prosecuted for it, and face up to two years in prison. AgrEvo defined "member" as anyone on any mailing list, including e-mail (and the court accepted this definition). The court ordered Genetix Snowball to give AgrEvo its mailing lists. One of the defendants was the group's press officer - making this a clear case of trying to silence the critics [101].

Aventis is now lobbying (along with other biotech companies) to have the location of test sites kept secret, though the UK government last year rejected the idea. Says Aventis' Des D'Souza: "The tests have been conducted with complete openness up to now, but we are discussing with the Government why the public needs to know the exact location of trial sites" [102]. He explains, "the only way to ensure their security would be a 24-hour guard. For most companies that's not practicable, especially if you have a number of sites", although he did hint that Aventis' security had been increased [103].

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