Syngenta has been hit with another GMO corn lawsuit, this time by a group of Louisiana farmers who claim that Syngenta Corp.’s actions caused the price of U.S. corn to decrease and thus negatively impacted their corn farms.

Background on Syngenta Claims

Syngenta Corp. began selling their Viptera corn seed, a genetically modified organism or GMO, to United States farmers in 2011. Viptera is also referred to as MIR162, which is the genetically modified strain of the corn that makes the crop resistant to to black cutworms and corn earworms.

Prior to releasing the corn for sale within the states, Syngenta submitted their GMO corn proposal to China, the largest importer of U.S. Corn crops, for approval. However, the GMO crop was rejected. Despite this rejection, Syngenta allegedly sold the MIR162 corn strain to U.S. farmers, claiming approval by the Chinese government was imminent.

This decision by Syngenta to sell the corn without approval by one of the largest importers of the crop came back to haunt them later; in 2013, Chinese regulators rejected and turned away tons of U.S. Corn shipments that may have been contaminated with the Viptera GMO corn.

Plaintiff farmers in numerous Syngenta lawsuits claim that this has affected the whole U.S. corn market and caused corn producers to suffer economically.

Syngenta Litgation

Plaintiffs Stacy M. Darlton, Peggy Kemp, Mike Ross and William C. Stutts (also referred to as the Plaintiff Farmers) have filed this Syngenta class action lawsuit on behalf of themselves and a class of similarly situated individuals who endured economic and non-economic losses because of Syngenta’s actions.

According to their Syngenta corn lawsuit:

“MIR162 corn was only planted on about 3% of U.S. acres for the last two seasons; however, defendants did not take steps to ensure that other U.S. corn would not be contaminated with MIR162 . . . [because of] Syngenta’s decision to continue marketing MIR162 to a small minority of U.S. corn farmers-the vast majority of U.S. corn has been effectively blocked from what was previously the third-largest export market for U.S. corn, causing U.S. farmers significant damages and corn prices have dropped from the loss of China’s export markets. Syngenta’s decision to bring Viptera to the market crippled the 2013/14 corn export market to China and caused damages to Plaintiffs.”

The plaintiff farmers of this Syngenta corn class action lawsuit bring several allegations against the company, including claims of violation of the Lanham Act, public nuisance, trespass to chattels, negligence, strict products liability, ultrahazardous or abnormally dangerous activity, failure to warn, and fraudulent misrepresentation.

Darlton, Kemp, Ross, and Stutts, all farmers located in Louisiana, are seeking relief from the court in the form of compensatory damages worth more than $75,000, court costs, per-judgement interest, entry of judgments against Syngenta, and other forms of relief so deemed fit by the court.

The Syngenta Corn Class Action Lawsuit is Darlton, et al., v. Syngenta AG, et al.,Case No. 3:2015cv02205, in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Louisiana.