Yes commonly referred to as the most evil corporation on the planet, recently morphed (not gone really) into Bayer & currently facing law suits about cancer-causing glyphosate found in Roundup. Then into the mix we have the Tull company that bought the patent for 1080 which is known for selling its product to NZ that has been using it to make the Class 1A ecotoxin now slathered all over its forests AND waterways with impunity, to control its pest population … more recently revealed, to expunge all non native species … for nigh on 50+ years and doesn’t appear to be working.
(There’s a further article to come from Carol Sawyer on the curious trail regarding the apparent closure of the Tull factory & subsequent sourcing of the raw product to make 1080 pellets by the two NZ factories).
By Carol Sawyer
THE LINK BETWEEN MONSANTO, TULL CHEMICAL COMPANY, AND 1080 POISON
Anniston, Alabama is only four miles from Oxford, home of the 1080 factory, Tull Chemical Co.
Monsanto transferred the patent for Compound 1080 to Tull Chemical Co in Oxford in 1955.
Tull Chemical Company’s current owner is Charles Wigley. Tull Allen, Wigley’s grandfather, started the Tull Chemical Company in 1956 after purchasing the process to make Compound 1080 from Monsanto.
Anniston was the home of Monsanto’s PCB factory. “People in Anniston didn’t want to accept it but in 1995 soil tests showed PCB levels higher than they had ever been recorded. Pediatricians at the local clinic reported babies with extremely rare birth defects that could not be explained. “We lead the state in birth defects”, reports Dr. Angela Martin. (Hulen, 2003)”.
The Tull Chemical Company in Oxford, Alabama is the only legal producer of Compound 1080 in the U.S.A. It is a small, family-owned business that has been making this toxin for decades. Most of the Compound 1080 is exported to New Zealand.
Read more on the Tull, Monsanto, 1080 link, and further down, an article on the destruction wrought by Monsanto on populations living and working amidst the known risks (by the manufacturers ie) of these deadly poisons. An echo of similar that went on with the Dow factory in NZ’s New Plymouth. And who could forget the Agent Orange carnage? Birth defects are one of the most heinous outcomes for exposure to their poisons, a factor highlighted regarding 1080 in NZ by the late Dr Peter Scanlon who told us there aren’t any studies proving the safety of 1080 in this respect. He said …“It is astounding that no−one has done any research on the effects of sub−lethal doses of 1080 episodic exposures on developing human and non−human brains, given the fact, that 1080 is a known brain or central nervous system toxin!”
You can listen to Dr Scanlon at this link HERE.
From the Washington Post:
Maker of Lethal Chemical Fights a Ban
Virtually unknown outside the neighborhood where it has been operating since the late 1950s, Tull Chemical Co. is the only known producer of Compound 1080, developed as a rat poison in German-occupied territories during World War II. Once banned in the United States, a teaspoonful could kill dozens.
Compound 1080 is used only sparingly in the United States but more widely in New Zealand to control outdoor predators and pests. Animal welfare groups and other environmentalists say it should again be outlawed because it kills too indiscriminately.
Rep. Peter A. DeFazio (D-Ore.) has asked the Department of Homeland Security to ban production of the odorless, tasteless poison for another reason: the belief by the FBI and others that Compound 1080 — the most toxic pesticide registered by the World Health Organization — could be used by terrorists to poison U.S. water supplies. There is no known antidote.
Trying to hold on to a business started by his grandfather, Tull Chemical owner Charles Wigley defends his product as safe when used properly. Other chemicals could be just as deadly in the hands of terrorists, he argues, and someone else could start making the poison.
Besides, unknown quantities of the poison could be stored around the United States from decades ago, before production was regulated.
“If they shut me down, it’s not like it’s going to just go away,” Wigley said.
Homeland Security spokeswoman Valerie Smith said the agency is reviewing Compound 1080, but it lacks the authority to ban production.
DeFazio previously asked the Environmental Protection Agency to shut down Tull Chemical because of safety problems at the company and the danger of its product, but officials refused. Neighbors of the factory were not surprised.
Lea Cheatwood has lived about 150 yards from Tull Chemical for decades, but she did not know what the company made until the early 1990s, when a neighbor obtained a copy of an EPA audit that cited numerous safety problems at the small plant, about 50 miles east of Birmingham.
Since then, Cheatwood has spent hours watching the plant and keeping logs that document truck traffic from the site, located in a city of about 15,000 people. Cheatwood said local, state and federal officials all have ignored complaints that the company transports deadly chemicals in unmarked trucks, has virtually no security and sits on the bank of a creek that regularly floods.
“They all just say it’s not in their jurisdiction,” Cheatwood said. “It’s an extremely dangerous product, and it worries me it’s made in my neighborhood.”
Wigley said he follows the law and laces his poison with black dye that would show up if the chemical, an organic compound, got into floodwaters in the neighborhood or — if used by terrorists — a public water reservoir.
“I haven’t been contacted by Homeland Security, but EPA visits a couple of times a year,” Wigley said. He accused Rep. DeFazio of trying to make a name for himself with environmentalists by seeking the ban on Compound 1080.
“He’s talking about shutting down a plant in Alabama. They’re against outsourcing jobs, but he’s talking about outsourcing mine,” Wigley said.
Tull Allen, Wigley’s grandfather, started Tull Chemical in 1956 after purchasing the process to make Compound 1080 from Monsanto Co., which had made the poison at a nearby plant that later became infamous for polluting Oxford and nearby Anniston with PCBs, or polychlorinated biphenyls.
Compound 1080 originally was developed as a rat poison in Nazi-controlled territory in the 1940s, and some research indicates that the Nazis considered using it to kill people in Holocaust death camps before deciding it was too dangerous for guards, said Brooks Fahy, executive director of the Oregon-based Predator Defense, which wants the poison outlawed.
The recipe made it to the United States, where the poison was used on rats and then at livestock ranches to kill coyotes and other predators.
Faced with complaints that the chemical was also killing eagles and other animals, the Nixon administration in 1972 banned the use of Compound 1080 for livestock protection. The Reagan administration reversed course in 1981, and the EPA said the poison could be registered for limited domestic use in poison-laced collars worn by sheep.
Government records show Tull Chemical closed for several years in the mid-1980s as the government considered whether to allow continued production of Compound 1080, but Wigley later reopened it. He reinforced the buildings and installed a chain-link fence topped by barbed wire after an EPA review noted inadequate security and other problems.
Wigley said he makes as much as five tons of the poison annually, with most of it being exported to New Zealand. He said his only U.S. customer is the Department of Agriculture, which said it uses less than four tablespoons of Compound 1080 annually in sheep collars. The collars kill coyotes by poisoning them when they bite an animal’s throat.
The poison collars are used in nine states, but the government said they only kill a couple dozen coyotes annually. It was once used in California, but voters there in 1998 approved a ballot resolution banning the use of Compound 1080 and another poison, sodium cyanide.
Environmentalists in New Zealand oppose the use of Compound 1080, which they claim kills slowly and painfully and can poison animals that feed on carcasses of its victims. Their protests are echoed in the United States by groups including Predator Defense, which got DeFazio involved in the issue.
Fahy has twice visited Oxford to gather information about Tull Chemical and Compound 1080.
“It’s so dangerous, there’s no legitimate use for it,” he said. “It is beyond belief that this place is operating and operating where it is.”
A locked gate blocks the entrance to Tull Chemical in Oxford, Ala., the only manufacturer of Compound 1080, a deadly poison opponents say poses terrorism and environmental risks.
SOURCE:
RELATED:
COMPELLING PHOTOS REVEAL THE LEGACY OF AMERICA’S MOST HATED CORPORATION
For nearly 40 years, while producing the now-banned industrial coolants known as PCBs at a local factory, Monsanto Co. routinely discharged toxic waste into a west Anniston creek and dumped millions of pounds of PCBs into oozing open-pit landfills. Thousands of pages of Monsanto documents – many emblazoned with warnings such as “CONFIDENTIAL: Read and Destroy” – show that for decades, the corporate giant concealed what it did and what it knew.
If you are new to NZ’s 1080 poisoning program here is a good article to start with …
WHY ARE PEOPLE SO CONCERNED ABOUT 1080?
A must watch also is Poisoning Paradise, the doco made by the GrafBoys (banned from screening on NZ TV, yet a 4x international award winner). Their website is tv-wild.com. Their doco is a very comprehensive overview with the independent science to illustrate the question marks that remain over the use of this poison. There are links also on our1080 resources page to most of the groups, pages, sites etc that will provide you with further information to make your own informed decision on this matter.
If you are pro poisoning of the environment, sorry but EnvirowatchRangitikei is not the place to espouse your opinions. Mainstream would be the place to air those. This is a venue for sharing the independent science you won’t of course find there.
Photos: Wikipedia (military spraying) & screen shot (1080 aerial drop) from GrafBoys’ video
Monsanto Chemical Works is named. The company’s first product is chemical saccharin, sold to Coca-Cola as an artificial sweetener.
Rangitikei Environmental Health Watch 
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