A federal court has banned the commercial planting of genetically modified sugar beets until the U.S. Department of Agriculture adequately assesses its environmental consequences. The ruling in Center for Food Safety v.Vilsack, however, denied the plaintiff’s request for a permanent injunction.

The GM beets are modified by Monsanto to resist its Roundup herbicide, which environmentalists feel has led to both its increased use and the rise of herbicide-resistant weeds. Genetically modified beets make up 95 percent of the U.S. crop. Beets supply half of the country’s sugar, with the rest coming from sugar cane. The 2007-08 sugar beet crop brought in about $1.3 billion for growers, according to government data.

The ruling from federal court judge Jeffrey White was widely expected. In September 2009, when the case first came before the United States District Court for the Northern District of California, White found that the USDA had violated the National Environmental Policy Act by approving the modified sugar beets without first preparing an Environmental Impact Statement, a process that could take a couple of years.

Pressing for a ban, the Center for Food Safety filed to get an injunction on planting. However, White refused to grant a ban in March after agricultural economists, farmers, and sugar processors warned of dire economic consequences if he granted an immediate injunction. White warned growers, though, that he was inclined to order a ban, and that they should make every effort going forward to use conventional seed.

In the August 13 ruling, the court vacated the USDA deregulation of Monsanto’s biotech sugar beets and prohibited any future planting and sale pending the agency’s compliance with National Environmental Policy Act and all other relevant laws. USDA has estimated that an environmental impact statement may be ready by 2012.

The USDA asked the court for a nine-month delay in withdrawing approval to give it time to set up interim measures, but Judge White refused. He also contested defendant’s allegations that its failure to issue the impact report was not serious.

White said in his ruling that the USDA failed to “fully consider the potential consequences of deregulation” and that its errors are “not minor or insignificant.”