Month: January 2019

Posted on

Companies and science: some take aways from the Monsanto trial

US multinational Monsanto has been involved in countless trials for its products and most recently its popular weed killer Roundup. The lateste trial, the Johnson cancer case, concerns a school groundkeeper and was the first to take the weed killer Roundup to trial. The trial got a lot of publicity, especially after Johnson famously won. Supposedly, this ‘win’ opens up for further trials on cancer and Roundup and is thus bad news for Monsanto. It is also bad news for German pharmaceutical company Bayer, that just recently acquired Monsanto. 

Aside from the fact that this widely used weed killer, Roundup, might cause cancer, the case is interesting because it reveals how Monsanto was actively working to shape the science around its product. During the trial, letters were released that revealed many examples of such questionable science-business practices. As one example, Monsanto appears to have been involved in ghost writing i.e. that the company writes text and then asks academics put their name, as authors, on it. As one of the revealed examples, Stanford researcher Mr Henry I. Miller wrote a piece on Forbes’s website in 2015, based on a Monsanto draft and failed to mention any involvement by Monsanto thereby violating Forbes policy for authors. The Forbes piece in question was written in response to the findings of the International Agency for Research on Cancer, a branch of the World Health Organization, that had just labeled glyphosate (ingredient in Roundup) a probable carcinogen. 

Another incident concerns the retraction of research that is unfavorable for the company. In 2013, while he was still editor of the journal ‘Food and Chemical Toxicology’, Mr. Hayes retracted a key study damaging to Monsanto that found that Roundup, and genetically modified corn, could cause cancer and early death in rats. Later, it surfaced that Mr Hayes had had a contractual relationship with Monsanto. This piece in the NYT covers most of the story. This article by science journalist Paul Thacker is also worth while.

What can we learn from this in terms of business and sustainability? Certain companies will inevitably have a strong interest in research, for example to show that their products are safe and effective. In my opinion, the fine line between science, corporate interests and corruption is a key business ethics issue for these companies that the management needs to handle. If not, when such business practices fail, it may show up as cases of unethical business practices, corruption or in the worst case, as for Monsanto, as legal cases. The EU regulation on non-financial reporting requires large companies to report on their anti-corruption and anti-bribery policies and practices. For companies with a large stake in science, how to avoid this kind of unethical incidents should be accounted for in this section.

Moreover, as a take away for us as researchers, we cannot be naive regarding the very strong incentives certain companies may have to meddle with science. While uncovering such cases may feed the publics distrust in science and media, e.g. the fake news debate, not uncovering biased or in worst cases incorrect research may risk the whole scientific system as such.

Regarding questionable retractions of research papers, to my mind full transparency is to not actually retract a paper but to let it remain with proper commentary for example as to why the research findings or methods are questionable. Paper retractions may otherwise, if we are not very careful, become a tool for censorship.

Posted on

Re-homing: how to give things you don’t want a new home

Re-homing means making sure that the things that leave your home gets a new home and don’t become waste. Post-Christmas is prime re-homing season as gift giving often means that people receive things they don’t need. Interestingly, while minimalism and decluttering has become trendy,  most people still buy gifts for others. It’s as if we feel inadequate if we don’t give to others. Right before Christmas, the Minimalist wardrobe blog even published a series on how to decline Christmas gifts, which caused some controversy.

This past year, I’ve tried and tested quite a few re-homing strategies and here are my thoughts and experiences.

Charity shops. There’s a lively debate around charity shops and whether things donated there do get a new home. What is clear is that we send an increasing amount of clothes to charity (30 ton of textiles per week in the case of Swedish Stadsmissionen). Is there a market for this enormous amount of clothes? The short answer is, no, there is not a market for these amounts of clothes locally so large amounts are instead exported to developing countries and sold there. There is a debate around whether this export of used clothing is good or bad. On the positive side, it is better for the environment that the people in developing countries use used clothing instead of new. However, some African countries argue that the large import of used clothing has harmed their national textile industry and thus tried to imposed tariffs on imported used clothes. As a result of pressure from and dispute with the US, it seems only Rwanda actually introduced the tariff. As I am not currently part of the charity shop market (I don’t shop at all) and it is uncertain if clothes to charity shops do harm or good, I avoid sending clothes there.

Giving to friends and family. This is where a large part of the clothes that enter my wardrobe comes from. However, be prepared that friends and family might give things back eventually. This is not necessarily a bad thing. Sometimes clothes are only right for you in a certain stage of life and then right for someone else. One of my favorites in this category is an old trench coat that my grandmother, mom and I have all worn. I cherish this coat.

Swap days. This is on my to-try-list. It’s as it sounds, you swap some of your clothing for someone else’s. In Sweden, Naturskyddsföreningen arranges a national clothes swap day every year. This year it’s April 6th, mark your calendars!

Reselling online (for example Blocket.se in Sweden, Finn.no in Norway). Usually there is a set price for the add, depending on the site, whereas you decide the price for what you sell although potential buyers might try to bargain. I’ve bought clothes this way (before my shopping ban), for example ski jackets etc. If you buy from someone local you can try clothes on before you buy. Also works well for furniture I find.

Selling on commission.  You get a part of the price and the commission store or site also takes a part. You set the price for the clothes together with the store/site. When selling on commission, you have to find the right outlet for your item. For example, selling clothes from French label Isabel Marant on French site Vestiairecollective.com worked really great but for example Italian brands did not work as well there. Selling a Filippa K dress in the Filippa K second hand store in Stockholm also worked great- it sold fast and I got a good price (and the store is super nice! Couldn’t all brands have their own second hand store?) So for commission, it’s worth considering the audience you will reach and if they are interested in what you’re selling. There are good venues for selling used books on commission too, for example Swedish Bokbörsen or the used books on Amazon. com, I use these a lot.

Auctioning. You set the starting price and the site usually takes a percentage of the final price. I’ve mainly used Swedish e-bay site tradera.se which worked great, for example for selling a pair of Converse Allstars, probably because it’s a rather standardized product where people know their size. Selling clothes has been more difficult, but it still got sold. Tradera is really excellent, however, for buying and selling homeware across the country and things that can easily be shipped. For more expensive things there are also the classical auction sites Bukowskis, Auktionsverket, Barnebys and Blomqvist in Norway etc. I’ve mostly bought furniture and glassware here.

The benefit of the online services is that it’s very easy to search for exactly the brand and size you’re interested in. There is also a bigger market with even international sellers and buyers. And you don’t have to search through a second hand store. The benefit of an actual store or buying from someone local is of course that you can try it on.

However, there are more items on my re-home-list than I have time to re-home. Reselling takes time and effort (finding out where’s the best market for this item- there are so many different reselling channels). So this is a great reminder to not acquire things I am uncertain of.  Eventually re-homing these things will just be work.

When re-homing, you also risk getting rid of something you might need or find useful in the future. There is usually also a loss of financial value when reselling clothes, rarely will you get more than you initially paid. Selling something and later buying it again new is not wise financially. On the other side, wearing something you don’t really like just for the sake of it when someone else might cherish it doesn’t really make sense either.

There is also a bit of a social movement push towards having a small wardrobe, being minimalist and the fact that some of us have less space than we would maybe need. As my non-minimalist sister says, maybe I don’t need less clothes but a bigger wardrobe so it doesn’t feel so crowded!

On the picture: the Filippa K second hand store in Stockholm, an excellent corporate initiative.