In a private meeting held last week with the local association of soy producers, the US company announced a 26% increase in GM seed royalties which the company will aim to collect in 2009-2010.

The unilateral decision before the sowing season, which will start in fifteen days, caused the anger of Mato Grosso´s soy producers, who threatened with filing legal suits. Mato Grosso is the biggest soy producer of Brazil.

The producers estimate, according to Valor Económico, that with this increase Monsanto will profit 12 million dollars more, only in Mato Grosso. In addition, the company´s executives confirmed an increase in the technology tariff charged on GM corn, but they still haven´t announced how much.

A representative of the company interviewed by Valor Económico said that the producers who are not happy with the increase are free to choose between Roundup Ready GM seeds and conventional products. He also said that during the last years the company had been “very flexible” in terms of the demands of the businessmen of the soy sector.

The controversy around the increase of royalties acquired political dimensions. Senator Gilberto Göellner (member of the right wing party and one of the biggest producers of soy in Mato Grosso) publicly called to solve the difference with Monsanto through a “boycott” to GM products.

“If royalties take the profits from the producers, then we shouldn´t plant at all”, the Senator stated.

Photo: http://blogs.ft.com/gapperblog/