In September 2016, German drugs and chemicals group Bayer and US company Monsanto, owner of the glyphosate-based herbicide Roundup and of the only GM plant currently authorised for cultivation in the EU (Mon 810 Maize), announced their intention to merge. The European Commission’s DG competition, whose validation is necessary to seal the deal, just released their preliminary review on the issue. This review identifies an impressive list of risks and problems associated with the potential merger, already opposed by hundreds of thousands of citizens.

It would, in their own words, “create the world's largest integrated pesticides and seeds company. It would combine two competitors with leading portfolios in non-selective herbicides, seeds and traits, and digital agriculture... Moreover, the transaction would take place in industries that are already globally concentrated, as illustrated by the recent mergers of Dow and Dupont and Syngenta and ChemChina”. Indeed, the last two “mega mergers” in the farming input sector have already aggravated significantly a very bad situation for the farmers.

The seed market in the EU is ridiculously concentrated. It is a common misconception that seeds are mainly produced by a multitude of thousands of SMEs in the EU, as these are in most cases owned totally or partially by the same few very big stakeholders. In 2014, only four companies were already controlling close to 95% of the vegetable seed market, two of these companies being Bayer and Monsanto. The Commission flags this down as a major problem, citing also the case of oilseed rape seeds.