Well I was talking about retail sector. Do lead me to a source on deregulation of agriculture that helps me understand that.
Well I am not going to do the donkey work, thats what google is for. But I will summarize
1) In 1980 the first lab created "lifeform" was patented.
Diamond v. Chakrabarty - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
2) Monsanto started as a company that created seed variants that were genetically modified. Mosanto seeds were resistant to a herbicide called Round-up. Basically round-up killed everything but the monsanto crop. Since there were no other plants sucking nutrients from the soil, yields went up. So far so good.
3) Trouble started when Monsanto patented these seeds. So as a farmer, I cannot save seeds for the next generation. Every year I have to buy new seeds from Monsanto. Monsanto keeps records and does audits on farmers who try to save seeds and then takes them to court and the farmer basically is fucked.
4) Trouble further \escalated when farmers who do not use Monsanto started getting pulled into lawsuits - This is how it worked
Assume you and I are farmers and we have farmland that shares a common border. Lets suppose you use Monsanto seeds and I use regular seeds. When the crop grows,, obviously there is going to be cross pollination. Hence my crops are going to get cross - pollinated with Monsanto genes. Now I save the seed for the next year. And Monsanto comes and audits my crops (for the record, they dont need permissions to come into MY property and audit MY crops). They will obviously find that my crops have Monsanto genes. And their record shows I did not buy their seeds. They will take me to court stating I saved seeds from a previous harvest or from another farmer who grew Monsanto crop in a previous harvest. So I go to court and say I did not and that it was because my seeds cross pollinated and I cannot do anything about it because I am not GOD and cannot control nature and tell the bees which pollen to use to pollinate my crops. You know what the court says. The fucking court says, it is my responsibility to ensure that my seeds are not cross pollinated with Monsanto genes and that I have to pay Monsanto for violating their fucking patents. Yes, believe it. Thousands of farmers have lost their land, their money and basically have had to settle out of court for large sums of money that they are not allowed to disclose. So basically what the US justice system and government have said to American farmers is - you buy seeds from Monsanto and farm or don't farm. Find another job.
Now there may be some who say so what. This is so what.
1) From over a 100 varieties of corn that was cultivated in continental USA a 100 years back, there is now one single variety that is cultivated. God forbid, there isn't a genetic mutation that wipes that species out. Fearing this there are people who have started their own seed repositories just in case.
2) Monsanto have already captured 95% of the market in Soy and Corn in the US. Their policies have resulted in massive consolidation of farmland and today 98% of all farmland is owned by corporations. Just 2% is owned by your average Joe farmer. Due to this and agricultural subsidies, the government basically decides the price of farm produce. To avail subsidies you have to meet a minimum threshold in terms of total output. If as a small farmer you dont meet the threshold and hence , cant make a net profit, you only option is to sell out. So agricultural consolidation was forced rather than opted for.
Now I dont ever see these things ever happening in India, but imagine if it does. Where are you going to find employment for 700 million displaced farmers?
But dont believe all I say. Do read up and arrive at your own conclusions. I am a little biased because I plan to retire in a year and start farming myself.
