WILMINGTON, Del., November 9, 2006 - In a briefing today with investment analysts, DuPont said its subsidiary Pioneer Hi-Bred International, Inc. is seeing strong product performance from its seed products from this year’s harvest in North America and continues to grow in Brazil despite a difficult agricultural economy in that country. “With the results in on almost 20,000 field tests, Pioneer corn is averaging 6 bushels per acre more than competitors’ products, a 50 percent increase in the Pioneer corn yield advantage over last year,” said William S. Niebur , vice president -- DuPont Crop Genetics Research & Development. “We are especially excited about the performance we are seeing from our newer corn products.”

LONDON (Nov. 10, 2006) – Monsanto (NYSE: MON) has a unique window of opportunity to build on its industry leading position and capitalize on emerging growth opportunities between now and the end of the decade, company executives told investors today.

The company’s remarks came as part of an investor meeting held in London, which featured presentations by Hugh Grant, chairman, president and chief executive officer; Robb Fraley, executive vice president and chief technology officer; and Terry Crews, executive vice president and chief financial officer.

LITTLE ROCK, Ark.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--The law firms of Cohen, Milstein, Hausfeld & Toll, PLLC and Emerson Poynter LLP announced today that they filed a motion for a preliminary injunction against Bayer CropScience in the Binkley v. Bayer CropScience class action case pending in federal court in Little Rock, Arkansas. The plaintiffs seek to prohibit Bayer from providing misleading communications on its website regarding a testing method that Bayer developed to detect the presence of its genetically modified Liberty Link rice. Plaintiffs are asking the court to order Bayer to provide corrective information to the public and to disclose that Bayer's testing method and certification procedure differ from rice standards in other countries - particularly important export markets in the European Union.

Nov. 8 – The latest spat over genetic engineering centers on Oregon, where activists and regulators are battling over the safety of so-called "pharmacrops" – controversial plants genetically modified to produce medicine through "biopharming." In response to a bill proposed last year that would have put a moratorium on biopharming crops in Oregon, a state committee has recommended inviting biopharming in the state, with a few caveats. The committee wants the state to have a say in permit approval for the technology, as well as increased public access to the application process.

WASHINGTON - When Research Triangle Park-based Bayer CropScience requested federal permission in August to market a variety of gene-altered rice, it assured itself a small, unwanted place in history: the first to seek approval for a genetically engineered food that was already, illegally, on the market. Now, as federal regulators consider that belated application, they are finding themselves under scrutiny, too -- from scientists and others who say the 20-year-old system of biotech crop oversight is failing.

he news comes amid a stream of similar announcements from other ingredients firms, as the industry is increasingly squeezed by higher raw material and energy costs. The latest increases from National starch, effective December 4 2006, will range from 7 to 10 percent on specialty products, depending on the product complexity and processing required. According to the firm, price increases for unmodified corn starch products will be "considerably larger", reflecting the higher base cost of corn in these products

WASHINGTON, Nov 6 (Reuters) - An AIDS virus genetically engineered to fight other AIDS viruses worked better than expected, suppressing the virus and renewing the immune systems of a few patients, researchers reported on Monday. The study involved just five people, and such an approach needs years more study, they cautioned -- but the surprising results offer new hope both for the field of gene therapy and for treating the fatal and incurable AIDS virus.

A new category of milk soon will join the old favorites on local store shelves, much to the chagrin of Monsanto Co. Dairies and producers in the St. Louis region are preparing to meet retailers' demand for milk made without the use of Posilac, a synthetic bovine growth hormone sold by Creve Coeur-based Monsanto to boost a cow's production.

Roughly 40 percent of U. S. rice exports have been negatively affected by what many experts consider to be their industry's worst crisis, a USA Rice Federation official said Friday. Speaking in Little Rock to the Arkansas Rice Research and Promotion Board, federation Vice President Bob Cummings discussed the damage caused to the $ 1. 3 billion U. S. rice export market after the U. S. Department of Agriculture's August revelation that traces of an unapproved, genetically engineered rice had been discovered in U. S. longgrain rice supplies.

In a move somewhere between brilliantly audacious and unbelievably outrageous, Monsanto’s Aug. 15 offer to buy Delta & Pine Land Co. will create a titan with a hammer lock on every corner of the cottonseed market—seed genetics, seed distribution and seed price. The $1.5 billion deal marries Delta, with an estimated 50 percent of the U.S. cottonseed market, to Monsanto, whose biotech traits are found over 80 percent of all American cotton acres.