"Big 6" Biotech Corporations

The "Big 6" biotechnology corporations are BASF, Bayer, Dupont, Dow Chemical Company, Syngenta, and Monsanto. They are so called because they dominate the agricultural input market -- that is, they own the world’s seed, pesticide and biotechnology industries.

According to the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), corporate concentration of the agricultural input market "has far-reaching implications for global food security, as the privatization and patenting of agricultural innovation (gene traits, transformation technologies and seed germplasm) has been supplanting traditional agricultural understandings of seed, farmers' rights, and breeders' rights."

For more information, see the Pesticide Action Network of North America (PANNA) resource here.