LITTLE ROCK — Thousands of long-grain rice farmers should start receiving payments in early January from a $750 million settlement with Bayer Crop-Science.
In a news release Thursday, Bayer, a subsidiary of the German-based conglomerate Bayer AG, said that at least 85 percent of farmers in Arkansas and other states who grew long-grain rice between 2006 and 2010 had made claims, and thus met the threshold of the July settlement.
About half of all U.S. long grain rice is grown in Arkansas.
“It is a great day for rice farmers in this country,” Scott Powell, an Alabama attorney representing hundreds of rice farmers, said in an interview. “[Farmers] are ecstatic. They’ve been through a difficult five years.”
Bayer had been sued by farmers across the U.S. after a genetically modified strain called Liberty Link, meant to withstand Bayer’s Liberty Link herbicide, inadvertently found it way into the U.S. long-grain rice supply. Though it was safe to eat, the European Union, Japan and other countries fora time banned the import of long-grain rice from the United States - leading to a significant drop in prices.
The infiltration of the Bayer Crop Science rice into the U.S. supply was discovered in Louisiana in 2006.
In April 2010, a Lonoke County Circuit Court jury ordered Bayer to pay about $48 million to farmers and agricultural operations for losses. The Arkansas Supreme Court upheld the damages in a decision last week.
The $750 million settlement is represented in three categories. Farmers would be able to recover up to $310 per acre to cover market losses between 2006 and 2010, depending on how many of those years each farmer planted rice. Powell said the time has passed for farmers to make a claim on that. It is not yet known how much money in total will be paid to farmers for market losses.
Those who planted the variety of rice that had not been approved by the U.S. Department of Agriculture also are eligible to receive an additional $100 per acre, and have 30 more days to file a claim. Farmers who had to clean up their fields and equipment after the contamination will get varying amounts. They have 60 days to file a claim.
“Although Bayer Crop-Science believes it acted responsibly in the handling of its biotech rice, the company considered it important to resolve the litigation so that it can move forward focused on its fundamental mission of providing innovative solutions to modern agriculture,” Bayer spokesman Greg Coffey said in a prepared statement.
Arlon Welch, a 44-year-old farmer in northeast Arkansas, told The Associated Press he’ll use the settlement money to pay off the debts he incurred after Bayer’s strain of modified rice seeds contaminated the supply.
“We’ve been dealing with this since 2006,” said Welch, who said he doesn’t know yet exactly how much money he’s getting. “We’re still hurting.”
But the settlement money isn’t enough to restore his confidence in rice; Welch planted soybeans and wheat this year.
“We’re a little bit nervous with the rice,” he said.
Business, Pages 30 on 12/16/2011