AEF maintains close ties to prominent anti-GMO groups through its advisory board members.   Sarojeni Rengam is the executive director of Pesticide Action Network’s Asia branch, and Edie  Mukiibi serves as vice president of Slow Food International, an NGO that believes GMOs could turn “our food into a patented commodity controlled by a few multinationals.” AgroEcology fund takes a similar position, arguing that “banning genetically modified (GM) seeds …. illustrates a “commitment to food sovereignty.” AEF further believes “corporate GMO seeds” rob smallholder farmers of the right “to retain control over their seeds.”

In 2017, AEF and the Alliance for Food Safety Africa (AFSA), which has received $200,000 from AEF, collaborated unsuccessfully with the Center for Food Safety (CFS) to prevent the enforcement of biotech seed patents, because such “seed policies and plant variety protection laws …. have negative implications for smallholder farmers.” The collaboration is ongoing, however, and active in six African countries, including Tanzania, South-Africa, Zimbabwe, Zambia, Mozambique and Malawi. CFS has also received $50,000 from AEF.

Financial Data

_

Annual Budget: $1,200,000 (2018)

Major Recipients (total contributions 2012-present)

La Via Campesina $695,000

Grassroots International $300,000

Groundswell International $200,000

Alliance for Food Sovereignty Africa (AFSA) $320,000

International Indian Treaty Council (IITC) $210,000

Indigenous Partnership for Agrobiodiversity and Food Sovereignty $255,000

The United National Federation of Agricultural Unions of Colombia $100,000

Fahamu $195,000

Southeastern African American Farmers Organic Network $95,000

Sibol Ng Agham at Teknolohiya $95,000

Save PNG $75,000

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Despite evidence that GMO crops are tightly regulated, As You Sow claims that federal officials effectively let biotech companies set their own rules for products they develop. “GMOs have always been lightly regulated — the USDA and Environmental Protection Agency have often rubberstamped GMOs without adequate review of social or environmental effects,” As You Sow argued in March 2017. The group also says this lack of oversight poses a risk to our health “as the floodgates open” and next-generation gene-edited crops reach the market. “Unregulated biotech crops could have unintended health, economic, and environmental impacts, similar to the impacts that we have seen with pesticide-dependent GMOs.”

As You Sow lobbies for a ban on glyphosate, the popular weed killer often paired with herbicide-resistant GMO crops. AYS argued in a June 2017 report that “glyphosate poses a threat to human health and the food system” and the same year filed a shareholder petition against Pepsi urging the company to stop sourcing oats treated with glyphosate for its breakfast cereals. The group contended in the petition that the weed killer is linked “to chronic toxic effects – such as kidney damage and endocrine disruption – even at low levels.” However, no evidence exists to justify these assertions.

The group promotes activists who make scientifically questionable claims because they support AYS’s mission. In 2015, for instance, As You Sow president Danielle Fugere endorsed the work of anti-GMO blogger Vani Hari (the “food babe”), saying even “if she gets the science a little bit wrong, ultimately the bigger point is that [GMOs] shouldn’t be in our food.” Hari has drawn the ire of experts for her claims that GMOs cause liver damage, reproductive problems and are introduced into the food supply without any oversight from government regulators.

AYS is one of several high-profile anti-GMO advocacy groups that receives financial support from wealthy private foundations in the US. The Park Foundation, which donates to the Environmental Working Group (EWG), Center for Media and Democracy and EarthJustice, has given AYS nearly $300,000 since 2012. As You Sow has also directly supported anti-GMO advocacy groups, including EWG, Pesticide Action Network and Natural Resources Defense Council.

Financial Data

Annual Revenue: $3,378,610 (2016)

Total Assets $1,748,719 (2016)

Major Donors (total contributions 2012-present)

Roddenberry Foundation $956,781

Wallace Global Fund II $697,000

Educational Foundation of America $537,000

Wallace Global Fund $285,000

Park Foundation 285,000

California Community Foundation $225,000

Tides Foundation $180,048

Rockefeller Brothers Fund $120,000

Marisla Foundation $105,000

Merck Family Fund $120,000

Contribution totals only reflect publicly reported donors and may not include significant contributions from corporations, litigators and governments, domestic and foreign, through percent of sales agreements and allocations through various arrangements such as state lotteries and aid programs. Many claims by nonprofit organizations that they receive no contributions from governments or corporations are misleading or false.

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Melinda Hemmelgarn, an “investigative” nutritionist and consultant to the organic industry, sits on Beyond Pesticide’s board of directors. Hemmelgarn is a member of the “A Team of Commentators, Strategists and Influencers” organic food companies rely on to promote their products in the public square. Emails released following a 2015 open records request revealed that Hemmelgarn was asked to amplify an industry-funded study suggesting that organic milk is nutritionally superior to milk produced by conventional dairies. Hemmelgarn didn’t disclose this consultancy relationship until December 2017, after she was pressed to do so.

Beyond Pesticides opposes the use of genetic engineering even when the technology doesn’t involve pesticides. In August 2018, the group urged the USDA to classify gene-edited crops, developed with plant breeding techniques like CRISPR/Cas9, as GMOs, claiming “that failing to classify [gene editing] as genetic engineering is a backdoor way of allowing GMOs without labeling them as such.”

Beyond Pesticides has also partnered with other anti-GMO advocacy groups to lobby for bans on crop biotechnology and related pesticides. BP supported Greenpeace’s effort to ban the synthetic weed killer glyphosate in Europe in 2018, and pushed for similar restrictions in the U.S. “While federal oversight and regulation lag behind, environmental groups …. are urging localities to restrict or ban the use of glyphosate and other unnecessary toxic pesticides,” Beyond Pesticides argued in an August 2018 blog post.

Similarly, in September 2018, GMO Free USA, Organic Consumers Association and Beyond Pesticides sued Pret A Manger restaurant chain for advertising some of its products as “natural” when they contained trace amounts of glyphosate. “Consumers expect Pret’s food to be free of synthetic pesticides, including glyphosate,” Diana Reeves, executive director of GMO Free USA, said of the lawsuit. “Glyphosate …. is linked to adverse health effects including cancer, infertility and non-alcoholic fatty liver and kidney diseases …. a company that willfully misrepresents its products needs to be held accountable.”

Financial Data

Annual Revenue: $1,173,313 (2017)

Total Assets: 1,467,521 (2017)

Major Donors (total contributions 2012-present)

Ceres Trust $1,230,000

Wallace Genetic Foundation $300,000

Cornell Douglas Foundation $230,000

Marisla Foundation $170,000

Elyse Meredith Roberts and Raymond John Roberts Charitable Foundation $160,000

Firedoll Foundation $45,000

Cedar Tree Foundation $60,000

Park Foundation $40,000

Bancroft Foundation $27,500

Contribution totals only reflect publicly reported donors and may not include significant contributions from corporations, litigators and governments, domestic and foreign, through percent of sales agreements and allocations through various arrangements such as state lotteries and aid programs. Many claims by nonprofit organizations that they receive no contributions from governments or corporations are misleading or false.

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Bloomberg has contributed over $40 million to the Sierra Club, an environmental group that views crop biotechnology as a weapon of “mass destruction” and says in its 2018 agriculture position statement that “genetically engineered crops have failed to provide promised increased productivity, resistance to drought and disease, and reduction in pesticide use.”

NRDC, which has received nearly $2 million from Bloomberg since 2012, has long been a critic of crop biotechnology. The group claims that the herbicide glyphosate (Roundup), often paired with GMO crops, is carcinogenic, though most experts disagree with this assertion. NRDC maintains that Bayer and other biotech companies use “tobacco-industry tactics” to silence researchers who challenge glyphosate’s safety. More broadly, NRDC argues that “GMO use in the United States has mostly contributed to chemical-dependent monocultures, resulting in skyrocketing herbicide use ….” Artist and environmental activist Maya Lin, a member of NRDC’s  board of trustees, also sits on Bloomberg’s board of directors. Bloomberg has also contributed $316,000 to the Ceres Trust, a private foundation that funds anti-GMO activism and believes the “use of genetically engineered crops has resulted in unprecedented corporate ownership of agricultural systems, with seeds increasingly controlled by multinational corporations.”

Financial Data

Annual Revenue: $177,097,351 (2016)

Total Assets: 7,850,216,969 (2016)

Major Recipients (total contributions 2012-present)

Sierra Club Foundation $41,000,000

Natural Resources Defense Council $1,763,900

Ceres Trust $316,000

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CFS argues “that genetically engineered foods can pose serious risks to farmers, human health, …. and the environment,” and campaigns for restrictions on crop biotechnology. In July 2018, for example, the group unsuccessfully sued the Trump Administration to force the release of documents related to the USDA’s GMO labeling rules. George Kimbrell, legal director at Center for Food Safety, claimed that the failed lawsuit was proof that “this Administration has reached new lows in trying to keep information from the American public.” Alongside environmental group Food & Water Watch, CFS sued the U.S. Department of Commerce in September 2018 to block “industrial aquaculture offshore in U.S. federal waters.” Aquaculture is a sustainable method of cultivating and farming fish.

CFS maintains close relationships with other anti-GMO advocacy groups and has recruited staff members from these organizations. CFS science policy analyst Bill Freese was employed by Friends of Earth for six years. Former Union of Concerned Scientists scholar Margaret Mellon is now a consultant to CFS, advising the organization on technical issues related to crop biotechnology. Randy Hayes, founder and former president of Rainforest Action Network, sits on CFS’ board of directors.

CFS also operates the Cornerstone Campaign  (CSC), a nonprofit established in 2002 to address “issues associated with the use of biotechnology in agriculture.” CFS is also the largest donor to CSC, contributing over $500,000 since 2012. CSC is housed within, wholly controlled and led by CFS, but they do not disclose that relationship on their tax returns.

CFS also funds other anti-GMO advocacy groups through CSC, including the Consumers Union. The well-known consumer protection group’s senior scientist Michael Hansen maintains that there is “ no consensus” on the safety of GMO crops. In a 2015 report co-authored with Center for Food Safety, Friends of the Earth and Pesticide Action Network, Consumers Union claimed that the “scientific consensus on GMOs frequently repeated in the media is ‘an artificial construct that has been falsely perpetuated ….’”

Financial Data

Annual Revenue: $4,641,510 (2016)

Total Assets $848,943 (2016)

Major Donors (total contributions 2012-present)

The Ceres Trust $1,838,289

Schmidt Family Foundation $725,000

William Zimmerman Foundation $650,000

Cornerstone Campaign $505,000

David B. Gold Foundation $450,000

Tomkat Charitable Trust $350,000

Marisla Foundation $175,000

Firedoll Foundation $80,000

Wallace Genetic Foundation $75,000

Contribution totals only reflect publicly reported donors and may not include significant contributions from corporations, litigators and governments, domestic and foreign, through percent of sales agreements and allocations through various arrangements such as state lotteries and aid programs. Many claims by nonprofit organizations that they receive no contributions from governments or corporations are misleading or false.

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In February 2018, for instance, the Center for Food Safety (CFS) sued the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for approving the herbicide dicamba, which is paired with GMO crops engineered to tolerate the chemical. When used incorrectly, the herbicide can drift and damage crops it’s not intended for. CFS claimed the EPA knew this would happen but “was pressured by Monsanto into approving the pesticide without any measures to prevent vapor drift.” In support of the lawsuit, Pesticide Action Network (PAN) called the situation an “exploding crisis.”

The Ceres Trust has maintained relationships with these and other prominent anti-GMO organizations for many years. Kathryn Gilje, Ceres’ executive director and sole employee since 2014, previously served as co-director of the Pesticide Action Network. While with PAN, Gilje argued in support of lawsuits against the “big 6” biotech companies (then Monsanto, Syngenta, Bayer, BASF, Dow and Dupont Pioneer), alleging that the “agrochemical industry …. operates with impunity while over 355,000 people die from pesticide poisoning every year.”

Kent Whealy, one of two Ceres trustees, is a lifelong advocate of organic agriculture. In 2012, Whealy contributed $1 million to support California’s GMO labeling proposal, Proposition 37, making him one of the largest contributors to the cause. Anti-GMO activist Gary Ruskin managed the Yes on 37 campaign, and went on to co-found U.S. Right to Know (USRTK) in 2014, an organization that claims to have “uncovered secret financial arrangements and close collaborations” between corporations and academics who study crop biotechnology. Along with the progressive activist groups Sum Of Us and MoveOn.org, Ceres was one of the three biggest donors in 2014 to Vermont’s anti-GMO legal defense fund, established to defend the state’s GMO labeling law against challenges in court.

Financial Data

Annual Revenue: $2,748,912 (2016)

Total Assets $19,259,511 (2016)

Major Recipients (total contributions 2012-present)

Center for Food Safety $1,838,289

Pesticide Action Network $1,495,000

Beyond Pesticides $1,230,000

Practical Farmers of Iowa $450,356

Midwest Organic and Sustainable Education Service $351,445

Xerces Society $300,000

Hawaii Seed $393,281

Physicians for Social Responsibility $275,000

Friends of the Earth $270,000

The Cornucopia Institute $120,000

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Since 2012, CCT has donated more than $24 million to the Tides Center, an organization that helps establish progressive political nonprofit groups. The Tides Center is an offshoot of the Tides Foundation, a substantial donor to anti-GMO activism. The Tides foundation has given at least $100,000 each to several prominent anti-crop biotechnology NGOs, including Greenpeace and the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC).

NRDC has played a prominent role in the campaign against the weed killer glyphosate, developed by Monsanto and often paired with GMO crops. In 2019, NRDC alleged that the herbicide causes cancer and the US Environmental Protection Agency colluded with Monsanto (now owned by Bayer) to conceal this fact from the public. Greenpeace, meanwhile, has been a staunch opponent of genetic engineering for more than 20 years, and continues to campaign against the use gene-editing techniques like CRISPR-Cas9, especially in Europe. “Releasing these new GMOs into the environment without proper safety measures is illegal and irresponsible,” Greenpeace claimed in July 2018, “particularly given that gene editing can lead to unintended side effects.”

According to its most recent (2017) tax documents, CCT continues to support Tides ($8,205,000), and donates directly to the Natural Resources Defense Council ($357,000) and  Greenpeace ($24,750). CCT also contributed $275,000 to the Angelic Organics Learning Center (AOLC) in 2017, a nonprofit that “builds sustainable local food and farm systems.” AOLC hosted prominent anti-GMO activist Vandana Shiva in April 2014, who has compared genetic engineering to rape and says “GMO” stands for “God move over.” The nonprofit also participated in the 2015 Farm Aid concert, whose organizers belive biotech seed companies wield “unbridled power” and “increasing political influence over the rules that govern our food system.”

Financial Data

Annual Revenue: $414,482,436 (2018)

Total Assets:$3,247,965,573 (2018)

Major Recipients (total contributions 2012-present)

Tides Center $24,032,000

Food and Water Watch 1,150,000

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Since 2012, Christensen Fund has contributed $455,500 to another private foundation called the New Venture Fund, which administers donations given to the AgroEcology Fund (AEF). AEF argues that “banning genetically modified (GM) seeds illustrates a “commitment to food sovereignty,” because “corporate GMO seeds” rob smallholder farmers of the right “to retain control over their seeds.” CF is one of four founding donors to AEF, alongside the New Field Foundation, the Swift Foundation and one other anonymous foundation. Since its founding in 2012, AEF has contributed “$4.03 million to …. 202 organizations in Africa, Asia, Europe, Latin America and the USA” to promote agroecology.

The nonprofit Slow Food has received $213,000 from CF in the last eight years, and fights “to prevent the disappearance of local food cultures and traditions.” The organization opposes agricultural biotechnology as part of its fight because GMO crops allow “a few multinational companies …. to control the entire GM food chain – from research to breeding to commercialization of seeds.” Slow Food adds that “[p]atenting genetic material has shifted the balance of economic power towards big business in their aggressive pursuit of profit.” The nonprofit maintains relationships with other prominent advocacy groups, too. Slow Food has collaborated with the environmental group Greenpeace, for example, in its efforts to stop GMOs from  “transforming our food into a patented commodity controlled by a few multinationals …..”  The Christensen Fund grantee has also partnered with Friends of the Earth, Consumer Reports and Food and Water Watch to attack beef producers for allegedly misusing antibiotics and failing to protect the environment, all while “greenwashing” the impact of their farming operations.

Financial Data

Annual Revenue: $12,455,957 (2017)

Total Assets: 307,789,677 (2017)

Major Recipients (total contributions 2012-present)

Kivulini Trust $580,600

New Venture Fund $455,500

Zan va Zamin $430,000

Natural Justice – Lawyers for Communities and the Environment $282,000

Culture and Art Society of Ethiopia $220,000

Earth Island Institute $220,000

Biodiversity International $300,000

Slow Food $213,000

Rudolf Steiner Foundation, dba RSF Social Finance $140,000

Indigenous Information Network $75,000

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The foundation, for example, helped finance a 2017 documentary called Seed the Untold Story. Featuring prominent anti-GMO activists including Jeffery Smith (Institute for Responsible Technology) and Andrew Kimbrell (Center for Food Safety), the film attempts to show that “our quaint family farmsteads have given way to mechanized agribusinesses sowing genetically identical crops on a monstrous scale.” This transition took place, the film’s website claims, “under the spell of industrial ‘progress’ and a lust for profit.” Arguments made in the film have been rejected by agricultural scientists and farmers. They say the idea that biotech companies have consolidated seed production and now control the world’s food supply is an oversimplification.

In 2017, Clif Bar Family Foundation donated directly to Kimbrell’s Center for Food Safety (CFS), which “advocates for the containment and reduction of existing genetically engineered crops.” The foundation has also supported the Center for Biological Diversity, whose scientists say Monsanto is a “puppet master” that manufacturers evidence to hide the dangers of its chemical pesticides. As You Sow, which received foundation support from 2013-2015, pressures food companies to pull GMO crops out of their supply chains, because they boost pesticide use and “endanger human health or damage ecosystems.”

Besides giving grants to individual organizations, the Clif Bar Family Foundation runs a “special initiatives” program. The foundation launched the program in 2009, providing $1 million to establish Seed Matters. The organization promotes organic seed research because  “[t]he last several decades of industrial agriculture have developed seed that is suited to intensive chemical agriculture. While this approach has increased crop yields, Seed Matters acknowledges, it has led to unintended consequences including “air and water pollution, increased pesticide use, [and] increased exposure to toxins in farm workers ….”

The Seed Matters initiative is run by Matthew Dillon, an organic farming advocate and founding Director of the Organic Seed Alliance, the Clif Bar Family Foundation’s biggest grant recipient from 2012-2016. Dillon also helped the Clif Bar Foundation produce a 2016 animated short film called Mr. Seed. The four-minute short follows an animated organic seed who says, “we can feed the world without ruining it. But we do have dirty mouths, mother [expletive]!”

According to its tax filings, The Clif Bar Company funds the majority of the foundation’s work, contributing $3,750,000 in 2016 out of a total $4,027,174 in revenue.

Financial Data

Annual Revenue: $4,027,174 (2016)

Total Assets $191,188 (2016)

Major Recipients (total contributions 2012-present)

Organic Seed Alliance $155,000

Rural Advancement Foundation International $145,000

Seed Savers Exchange $84,928

Organic Center $50,000

Union of Concerned Scientists $40,000

Pesticide Action Network $30,000

Earth Island Institute $27,800

Organic Farming Research Foundation $25,000

Ecology Center $10,000

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The Center for Media and Democracy (CMD), a political activist group that has received over $500,000 from Cloud Mountain since 2012, works closely with organic-industry groups to challenge the scientific consensus around GMO crop safety, including the Organic Consumers Association (OCA). Jill Richardson, a policy advisor to OCA, is also a contributor to Source Watch, a wiki site published by CMD that tracks conservative activists who “manipulate public opinion on behalf of corporations ….”

OCA provided the initial funding to establish the anti-GMO group U.S. Right to Know (USRTK). USRTK works alongside law firms suing Bayer, alleging the chemical company’s herbicide Roundup causes cancer. USRTK archived internal company documents called the “Monsanto Papers” (Bayer owns Monsanto) which prove, USRTK claims, that Monsanto knew for years that Roundup is carcinogenic. Lisa Graves, CMD’s founder, also sits on USRTK’s board of directors.

Cloud Mountain has donated $50,000 to Food and Water Watch, an environmental group that lobbies the USDA to end field trials of GMO crops. Food and Water Watch says “the generous support from the Park Foundation, the 11th Hour Project, Tides Foundation …. and the Cloud Mountain Foundation” makes it possible to “fight back against the seemingly unlimited funds of the agribusiness industry.” In total, Cloud Mountain has given more than $4 million to Food and Water Watch, CMD and related anti-GMO groups.

Financial Data

Annual Revenue: $1,143,397 (2016)

Total Assets: 3,974,3161(2016)

Major Recipients (total contributions 2012-present)

Center for Media and Democracy $603,300

Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund $525,000

Center for Environmental Health and Justice $449,500

Science and Environmental Health Network $430,000

TruthOut $170,000

Clean Production Action $75,000

Sustainable Markets Foundation $135,000

Clean Water Fund $80,000

Food and Water Watch $50,000

Earth Island Institute $40,000

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