Center for Global Food Issues Calls for Transparency for Environmental Groups Behind Atrazine Campaign

Released on: June 21, 2010, 8:20 am
Author:
Alex Avery / Center for Global Food Issues
Industry:
Agriculture
Center for Global Food Issues unveils its new blog entry, The
Big Money Behind the Environmental Scare Movement –the attack on
atrazine replays the alar scare, which calls for transparency into
environmental activists’ work to demonize and ban the herbicide
atrazine.
Written by Alex Avery, director of research and education for the Center for Global
Food Issues at the Hudson Institute, the new blog entry questions why “activists
(should) get a free ride when it comes to full disclosure,” and outlines the
significant dollars behind the assault on modern agricultural technologies,
particularly the safe and effective herbicide atrazine.
In his blog entry, Avery digs deeper into the public financial records of the
National Resources Defense Council (NRDC), one of the organizations behind the
1980’s “alar scare” and the current campaign against atrazine. Avery cites records
that show that by 2004, the tax-exempt organization had received nearly $6.5 million
in discretionary grants from the EPA since 1993, noting the EPA conceded all the
discretionary grants awarded to the NRDC were awarded without competition.
Additionally, Avery contends tax returns show NRDC received $350,000 in government
money in 2007; similarly, the allied Land Stewardship Project also receives about 14
percent of its money from government grants.
Furthermore, Avery states in the entry that “according to its most recently
available tax return, from 2007, the NRDC received revenues of more than $100
million and has net assets of more than $187 million. According to the Green
Tracking Library, former NRDC president and founder John H. Adams had a combined
2006 income of $757,464. Just because the NRDC is officially non-profit does not
mean it cannot make money from its attacks. In going after alar, the NRDC caused
apple farmers to lose more than $100 million.”
Also notable, Avery highlights quote by PR strategist David Fenton in the aftermath
of alar campaign: “We designed [the alar campaign] so that revenue would flow back
to the National Resources Defense Council from the public, and we sold this book
about pesticides through a 900 number and the (Phil) Donahue show. And to date
there has been $700,000 in net revenue from it.”
Avery remarks, “I suggest that reporters, if they really want to fulfill their
watchdog function, maybe ask some of these activists where their funding comes from.
This is particularly important, as the activist campaign against atrazine is based
largely on discrediting the ‘industry-based’ science on which regulatory approval
has been at least partially based. If the default assumption is that money is the
root of all evil, then transparency should be the price of being taken seriously by
journalists and policymakers.”
Avery’s full blog entry is available here.
About Alex Avery:
Alex Avery is director of research and education with the Center for Global Food
Issues at the Hudson Institute. Since joining the Center in 1994, Alex has
represented the Center at the 1996 United Nations World Food Summit in Rome. The
Center for Global Food Issues looks at agricultural policy from a global
perspective, with reference to both economic and environmental impacts. More
information on the web:
http://www.cgfi.org/
http://www.cgfi.org/about/alex/
Contact Details: Alex Avery
Director of Research and Education
Hudson Institute's Center for Global Food Issues
(540) 337–6354
aavery@hughes.net

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