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Medford, OR - Family farmers and other supporters of Jackson County’s precedent-setting ban on genetically engineered (GE) crop cultivation are celebrating a federal court ruling upholding the legality of Jackson County’s ordinance. The ban passed last year with the backing of over 150 family farms threatened by contamination from GE crops, also known as GMOs, and bipartisan support from 66% of county voters. The win came despite almost $1 million in opposition spending by Monsanto, DuPont, Syngenta and other chemical corporations heavily invested in GE crops. The ruling released this afternoon by Federal District Court Magistrate Judge Mark Clarke was a resounding victory for Our Family Farms Coalition (OFFC) and Center for Food Safety (CFS), which intervened in the case to defend the ban along with two local family farmers. Lawyers with Center for Food Safety and the Earthrise Law Center based at Lewis and Clark Law School jointly represented the intervening parties.

Magistrate Judge Clarke rejected a legal challenge by two GE growers, backed by Monsanto and other GE interests, claiming that the Jackson County GE crop ban violated Oregon’s Right to Farm Act. The court, however, held that Jackson County’s ban was allowed under Oregon’s Right to Farm Act since it was intended to “protect against damage to commercial agriculture products, and therefore it falls into the exception to the Right to Farm Act.” The Court also relied on the fact that Oregon’s Legislature clearly intended to exempt the Jackson County ban when it adopted a general pre-emption bill aimed at GE crops during the 2013 special legislative session.