In a small victory for local beekeepers, Mexico’s Supreme Court has blocked Monsanto from planting genetically modified soybeans in areas of Yucatán and Campeche inhabited by indigenous communities.
Monsanto received federal authorization to plant seeds across 253,000 hectares of land spreading across several Mexican states. The new ban is limited to these Mayan communities in the two states.
This was welcome news after Mexico overturned a 2013 ban on GMO corn in August after two years of 93 appeals by the biotech industry.
Local Mayan farmers and beekeepers protested the GMO soybean planting, as did Greenpeace, the National Institute of Ecology, and several other institutions.
The court was swayed after environmentalists warned that honey production in the area was at risk.
Mexico is the world’s third-largest honey exporter and around 40 percent of the country’s honey is produced on the Yucatán peninsula.
Source: Argentina Independent
