A New World Order for crop seeds

[excerpt:]
"...the large agriculture chemical companies have purchased most of the small seed companies that you and I send off to for our garden seeds. The reason is our courts have ruled that it is legal to patent all seeds.

I thought it was bad enough when companies that had genetically modified their seed could get patents; but now whoever gets to the patent office first, owns the rights to any seed. One large chemical company now has patents on more than 11,000 different seeds.

You and I won't even be allowed to save seeds without paying a fee to the company who owns the patent. It sounds crazy, but they receive this fee not because they invented something but because they were the first into the patent office.

Now, why did you and I not think of this? I believe it is because we think owning a patent on something that we did not invent would be morally and ethically wrong. And, owning a patent on seeds that have been developed by farmers and gardeners for thousands of years is unthinkable..."

The full article is available on the Times-Gazette website.