Conventional Burger: Twice the Bacteria
Organic Lifestyle Comments Off on Conventional Burger: Twice the Bacteria
In Consumer Reports’ new tests of ground beef, 18 percent of the beef samples from conventionally-raised cows contained dangerous superbugs resistant to three or more classes of antibiotics used to treat illness in humans compared with just 9 percent of beef from samples that were sustainably produced.
Consumer Reports’ investigation comes as food poisonings are striking an estimated 48 million people in the U.S. each year with beef being a top cause of outbreaks. Compounding the issue, Americans often prefer their beef on the rare side. The grinding process used to produce ground beef can distribute bacteria throughout the meat and if it’s not cooked properly through to the center, the potential for getting sick increases.
The full article, “How Safe is Your Beef,” which includes the complete test findings, food labels to look for when shopping for beef, and more, is available at ConsumerReports.org/cro/beefsafety and in the October issue of Consumer Reports, on newsstands September 3rd.
***
IS THERE A RINGER ON THE ORGANIC STANDARDS BOARD?
The Cornucopia Institute has formally asked the USDA to review the appointment of an individual to the National Organic Standards Board (NOSB) who, the group contends, does not meet the legal qualifications for the position. The 15-member board of organic stakeholders was established by Congress to provide advice to the USDA on organic food and agriculture policy and determine what materials are allowed for use in organics.
Congress set aside four seats on the NOSB for farmers, explicitly defined in the enacting legislation as individuals “who own or operate an organic farming operation.” Cornucopia’s request for review to the USDA states that new NOSB member Ashley Swaffar, a full-time employee of an agribusiness involved in organic food production, neither owns nor operates an organic farm. The government and industry organic watchdog made this determination based on Swaffar’s application materials, submitted to the USDA and obtained via a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request.
“We are extremely disappointed by the USDA’s record of illegally appointing unqualified individuals to various stakeholder positions on the NOSB that fail to match the definitions earmarked by Congress when they established this important panel,” said Will Fantle, Cornucopia’s Research Director. “The USDA has been inappropriately stacking the board with agribusiness executives to amplify the voice of business interests at the expense of other constituencies in the organic sector,” Fantle added.
***
CERTIFIED ORGANIC FOOD MARKET HITS $91 BILLION
It is estimated the certified organic market is worth around US$91 billion globally.
A 2014 global marketplace report shows growth for organic beef and grain jumping by 20 per cent, dairy by 18 per cent, and around 13 per cent for vegetables and beverages in the past two years.
***
TWO NEW BOOKS OF GREAT INTEREST TO ORGANIC FOLKS LIKE US
As a race, human beings could do a lot better at treating our farm animals humanely. You can discover just how far we fall short by getting a copy of Project Animal Farm, a book by Sonia Faruqi (Pegasus Press, New York; 2015; 399 pp.; $27.95).
She’s a Dartmouth graduate who went to work on Wall Street in investment banking. She knew next to nothing about farming. Meat came from the market. Eggs from the market. Cheese and milk from the market. She’d never even been on a farm. Through a weird twist (which I will let you discover if you read the book), she set off on an around-the-world trip to see how farmers treat their animals.
The book is a fascinating read, if you have the stomach for it. She’s a good reporter and she doesn’t leave out the details. But the book is not a screed. There are farms, she found, where animals are treated humanely. As you might guess, these are farms with a purpose greater than just making money.
As Masanobu Fukuoka said in his book, The One-Straw Revolution, the chief aim of any farm should be to produce excellent human beings.
Speaking of Fukuoka-san, one of his followers who lived at his farm has written a fine book about his experiences with this Zen master farmer. It’s called, “One-Straw Revolutionary—The Philosophy and Work of Masanobu Fukuoka,” written by Larry Korn (Chelsea Green Publishing, White River VT, 224 pp., $10.95). The book starts with this quote from Sensei, as Fukuoka-san was called: “There is no big or small on the earth, no fast or slow in the blue sky.”
***
HERE”S A LIVELY LINK FOR YOU BACK-TO-THE-LANDERS
https://www.facebook.com/OrganicHomesteading
***
SEPTEMBER IS ORGANIC MYTH-BUSTING MONTH
In a major drive to educate and inform consumers of the benefits and the facts about organic food, the Organic Trade Association (OTA) and dozens of organic brands and industry leaders are uniting online Sept. 1-30 for “Organic Myth-Busting Month,” a 30-day #OrganicFestival on social media aimed at addressing long-held misconceptions surrounding organic.
Whether busting myths that organic isn’t affordable or correcting the misconception that science can’t prove the organic benefit, OTA along with dozens of strategic partners will take to social channels each day during “Organic Month” to tear down organic myths by replacing them with research-supported facts, engaging dialogue and opportunities to get questions answered. The organic truths will be presented as well-designed graphics, ideal for sharing across social channels.
“Why focus an entire month around myth-busting? Despite organic sales and accessibility at all-time highs, consumer confusion about organic benefits remains significant,” said Laura Batcha, OTA’s Executive Director and CEO. “Consumers need to know the facts about organic so they can make the smartest choices for themselves and their families. Together, by engaging with consumers, media and influencers with a consistent and clear voice, we can change some misconceptions and bring audiences ‘on the fence’ about organic into the fold.”
To bring focus to the information-packed festival, OTA each week in September will focus on a key area of misconception often spread about organic, deconstructing a related myth each day of that week:
Week #1 (Sept. 1-5): Organic Labeling, addressing the certification process, the integrity of the USDA label and the differences between organic vs. other unregulated claims such as “natural.”
Week #2 (Sept. 6-12): Organic Health, busting myths that organic isn’t better for you, sharing fresh research on organic’s health benefits
Week #3 (Sept. 13-19): Organic Value, revealing the costs behind organic, demonstrating organic is affordable for all – including budget-conscious consumers – and proving organic truly is worth itWeek #4 (Sept. 20-26): Organic Production, illustrating how organic can feed the world, outlining local and small vs. large-scale organic farming, highlighting environmental benefits
Week #5 (Sept. 27-30): Organic Beyond Food, celebrating the lesser-known silos of organic, sharing why organic fiber, home and personal care products are better for your skin and health, revealing the differences between organic and conventional textile production.
***
CORNUCOPIA INSTITUTE: BAN FRACKING WASTEWATER ON ORGANIC FARMS
The Cornucopia Institute has formally called on the USDA to tighten federal standards to prohibit the use of fracking wastewater from oil and gas drilling for irrigation in organic food production. In addition, the Wisconsin-based farm policy research group is also asking the USDA to ban wastewater from the nation’s municipal sewage treatment systems. Solid waste produced by the same facilities is currently prohibited.
***
THE GREEN REVOLUTION HAS FAILED
The Green Revolution, which started in the 1970s and was agribusiness’s attempt to replace indigenous people’s farming methods with high-tech chemical and biotech farming, has failed.
Despite an onslaught of farming technologies, GMOs and chemical fertilizers and pesticides intended to increase the production of food, almost one billion people are now hungry worldwide in addition to the slew of environmental and health problems stemming from the rise in industrial agriculture.
WhyHunger is at the forefront of a growing global movement of peasant farmers, grassroots organizers and NGOs advocating for a turn to agroecology — a sustainable agricultural method reliant on the traditional knowledge of those who cultivate the land — as a model for every community to reclaim ownership of their food supply from exploitative agribusiness.
This information is from Jon Gedney at Shore Fire Media in Brooklyn, NY. For more info, visit www.shorefire.com.
***
ANOTHER PEEK BEHIND THE BIOTECH CURTAIN
The promoters and purveyors of GMOs have spent hundreds of millions of dollars portraying anyone who questions the safety of their products as ignorant, alarmist and “anti-science.”
So they’re no doubt stewing over an article written last week—by a medical doctor and a scientist—outlining in detail why these experts are so concerned about the GMO foods and ingredients that now permeate our food system.
In an article published August 20, in the New England Journal of Medicine, Philip J. Landrigan, M.D., and Charles Benbrook, Ph.D., present rational and reasoned, science-based evidence supporting their recommendations that 1), the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) not allow the use of Dow’s Enlist Duo, a toxic combo of glyphosate and 2-4,D, until further study, and 2), that GMOs be labeled.
On the issue of 2,4-D, Dr. Landigran and Dr. Benbrook write: “In our view, the science and the risk assessment supporting the Enlist Duo decision are flawed. The science consisted solely of toxicologic studies commissioned by the herbicide manufacturers in the 1980s and 1990s and never published, not an uncommon practice in U.S. pesticide regulation. These studies predated current knowledge of low-dose, endocrine-mediated, and epigenetic effects and were not designed to detect them. The risk assessment gave little consideration to potential health effects in infants and children, thus contravening federal pesticide law. It failed to consider ecologic impact, such as effects on the monarch butterfly and other pollinators. It considered only pure glyphosate, despite studies showing that formulated glyphosate that contains surfactants and adjuvants is more toxic than the pure compound.”
And on labels?
“Labeling is essential for tracking emergence of novel food allergies and assessing effects of chemical herbicides applied to GM crops.”
To say nothing of the people’s right to know what’s in their food. Monsanto and friends’ current stance is, “You’re an American. You aren’t allowed to know what’s in your food. Don’t get uppity with us.”
###
How Stupid Does Coke Think We Are?
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Leading nutrition experts have expressed alarm over a U.S. pressure group led by scientists that downplays the risks of junk food and sugary drinks in favor of exercise in the fight against obesity-–and is funded by Coca-Cola, according to Joanna Walters writing in The Guardian.
The Global Energy Balance Network, a non-profit group promoting research into the causes of obesity, focuses its message on the need for people to increase their physical activity as the key to achieving a healthy weight.
In a video announcing the aims of the organization, Steven Blair, a spokesman for the Global Energy Balance Network (GEBN) and a professor at the Arnold School of Public Health at the University of South Carolina, says the world needs to be educated about getting the right amount of physical activity.
“Most of the focus in the popular media and in the scientific press is ‘Oh, they’re eating too much, eating too much, eating too much’ – blaming fast food, blaming sugary drinks and so on. And there’s really virtually no compelling evidence that that, in fact, is the cause,” Blair says in a promotional video issued by the group earlier this year.
The GEBN states on its website that it is supported financially by Coca-Cola, among others. The link to Coca-Cola was highlighted Monday in an article in the New York Times questioning the links between the nonprofit organization and the company.
The GEBN’s posts on social media sites such as Twitter and Facebook concentrate heavily on various aspects of the importance of exercise in the weight and health debate, with less attention on food. Its website claims the group wants to be the “voice of science” in research on obesity. But manyprominent scientists have expressed concern over GEBN’s focus and funding.
“You cannot exercise your way out of overeating, that’s kind of a misguided idea,” said Scott Grundy, director of the Center for Human Nutrition at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center.
Grundy was a member of the expert panel that devised the current clinical guidelines on obesity issued by the US government’s National Institutes of Health. Although they were published in 1998, Grundy said the findings and guidelines are just as accurate and relevant today.
A statement posted on the Coca-Cola website from Ed Hays, the company’s chief technical officer, included this statement: “At Coke, we believe that a balanced diet and regular exercise are two key ingredients for a healthy lifestyle and that is reflected in both our long-term and short-term business actions.”
Coca-Cola contributed $1.5m last year toward the creation of the Global Energy Balance Network and administers its website, according to the New York Times.
Barry Popkin, a professor of global nutrition at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, compared Coca-Cola funding scientists involved in obesity research to tobacco companies historically “enlisting” experts to become “merchants of doubt” about the harmful effects of cigarettes.
“Essentially, Coke is following the strategy used by the tobacco industry as they tried to create doubt among the general public and also politicians. It was very effective in the fights to regulate cigarettes and we have learned from this that it is essential to address these attempts and uncover what they are very rapidly,” he said. “We must change our diet. First and foremost this is sugary sweetened beverages.”
***
SCOTLAND TO BAN FARMING OF GMO CROPS
Scotland is to ban the growing of genetically modified crops, the country’s rural affairs secretary has announced, the BBC reports. Richard Lochhead said the Scottish government was not prepared to “gamble” with the future of the country’s ($20 billion) food and drink sector.
Lochhead said that Scotland was known around the world for its “beautiful natural environment” and banning the growing of genetically modified crops would protect and further enhance its green status. There is no evidence of significant demand for GM products by Scottish consumers and I am concerned that allowing GM crops to be grown in Scotland would damage our clean and green brand.”
The move has been broadly welcomed by environment groups. But Scott Walker, chief executive of farming union NFU Scotland, said he was disappointed that the Scottish government had decided that no GM crops should ever be grown in Scotland. “Other countries are embracing biotechnology where appropriate and we should be open to doing the same here in Scotland,” he said.
Huw Jones, professor of molecular genetics at agricultural science group Rothamsted Research, said the announcement was a “sad day for science and a sad day for Scotland.” He said that GM crops approved by the EU were “safe for humans, animals and the environment.”
***
NOT ONLY CAN’T YOU KNOW WHAT’S IN YOUR FOOD, YOU CAN’T KNOW ABOUT EFFORTS TO FIND OUT WHAT’S IN YOUR FOOD, OR ABOUT LAWSUITS TO STOP MONSANTO’S FALSE ADVERTISING ABOUT THE SAFETY OF ROUNDUP
What happens when one courageous attorney and a few citizens try to take down Monsanto? The mainstream media doesn’t cover it, claims Christina Sarich, writing for NaturalSociety.com.
Efforts to publicize a class action lawsuit against Monsanto for falsely advertising its best-selling herbicide Roundup, which was filed in Los Angeles County Court on April 20, 2015, have been rejected or ignored by almost every mainstream media outlet.
It’s no different than Fox, NBC, CNN, or ABC refusing to cover the DARK act that would prevent states from passing laws requiring GMO foods to be labeled, she says.
“You would think that every paper, radio station, and blog would want to spread the news. But wait. . . just six corporations own ALL of the media in America, so there isn’t much luck there. That’s why you have to go to sites like Russia Insider or Al Jazeera to find real news, outside of certain alternative news channels in the US, and even those are white-washed from Facebook pages, and given secondary ratings on Google pages,” she says.
Matthew Phillips, the attorney suing Monsanto in California for false advertising on Roundup bottles, has asked the LA Times, New York Times, Huffington Post, CNN, and Reuters, one of the world’s largest news agencies, to report on the lawsuit (Case No: BC 578 942), yet most enforced a total media blackout.
“When I spoke with Phillips over the phone, he said that he has tried posting the suit in Wikipedia’s Monsanto litigation section, but it keeps disappearing. He says that he has also noticed posts on Facebook about this lawsuit get removed,” Sarich said.
If other attorneys were to follow his template-style lawsuit, then suddenly the plaintiff count could extend to all the citizens in the US who have purchased a bottle of Roundup from their local DIY store (Lowe’s, Home Depot, or Ace Hardware, for example) in the last four years, not suspecting it could demolish their gut health.
Another possibility, according to Phillips, is that Monsanto could try to bump the case up to federal court in order to try to side-step a likely adverse judgment. But in this case the class action suit would also be open to residents other than those of just California. This is surely an idea that Monsanto doesn’t want seeded in the American psyche.
Phillips is extremely confident he has the goods on Monsanto in this case, and barring a sold out judge:
“This is a slam-dunk lawsuit that exposes Monsanto for LYING about Roundup. Contrary to the label, Roundup does indeed target and kill enzymes found in humans — in our gut bacteria — and this explains America’s chronic indigestion!”
Many well-known scientists and professors emeritus have offered to be key witnesses in this suit when it goes to trial. The attorney says he refuses to settle the case and hopes that 49 additional attorneys in 49 states will use his case as an example. “When we allege that Roundup’s targeted enzyme is found in humans, it’s like alleging that the Golden Gate Bridge is found in California,” Phillips said.
Phillips also states that ‘false advertising’ and ‘misleading’ are synonyms in California law, so the fact that Monsanto has stated that the glyphosate in Roundup doesn’t target humans goes beyond just misleading. This misjudgment by Monsanto is a well-known secret among many anti-GM scientists. The enzyme that glyphosate targets is definitely found in humans.
Monsanto states, “Round Up targets an enzyme only found in plants and not in humans or animals.”
EPSP synthase, also known as (3-phosphoshikimate 1-carboxyvinyltransferase) is found in the microbiota that reside in our intestinal tracts, and therefore the enzyme is “found in humans and animals.” It is partly responsible for immunity activation and even helps our gut and our brain communicate with one another.
***
WHY SHOULD INDIAN FARMERS FACE HUNGER AND COMMIT SUICIDE?
Vandana Shiva, a world-renowned spokeswoman for ecological agriculture, wrote the following for EcoWatch on August 16, 2015:
There is no reason why India should face hunger and malnutrition and why our farmers should commit suicide. India is blessed with the most fertile soils in the world. Our climate is so generous we can, in places, grow four crops in a year—compared to the industrialized west where sometimes only one crop is possible per year. We have the richest biodiversity of the world, both because of our diverse climates and because of the brilliance of our farmers as breeders. Our farmers are among the most hardworking, productive people in the world. Yet India faces an emergency in our food and agricultural system. This emergency is man-made.
Firstly, the poor and vulnerable are dying for lack of food. According to the Deccan Herald, Lalita S. Rangari, 36, a Dalit widow and mother of two children of the Gondiya tribal belt, allegedly died due to starvation. Justice Bhushan Gavai and Justice Indu Jain of the Nagpur Bench of the Bombay High Court have served notice to the government of Maharashtra seeking its reply to the starvation death of the Dalit widow.
Even as India gets richer, we have emerged as the capital of hunger and malnutrition. According to the National Family Health Survey (NFHS), 42.5 percent of children under five years old were underweight. This is more than double the African average of 21 percent, which until recently was the face of hunger.
The second tragedy is that our food producers, the small farmers who have provided food to more than a billion Indians and hold the potential to provide healthy food for all, are themselves dying because of agriculture and trade policies which put corporate profits above the rights and well-being of our small farmers. More than 300,000 farmers have committed suicide in India since 1995, when the rules for the globalization of agriculture of the World Trade Organization (WTO) were implemented, transforming food into a commodity, agriculture into corporate business, and shifting control over seeds and food from farmers to a handful of giant multinational corporations.
The third tragedy is that even those who get food are being denied their right to healthy and nourishing food. The explosion of junk food, of pesticides and toxics in our food, have created a disease epidemic that is a human tragedy and an economic burden. There is an epidemic of diseases related to our lifestyle and food, such as diabetes, cancer, hypertension, infertility, and cardiovascular diseases.
The recent Maggi noodle scandal highlights the rapid invasion of junk food in the Indian diet. We are what we eat. When we eat food full of toxic chemicals, we pay the price with our health. India has emerged as the epicenter of diabetes.
In extensive studies reported in “Poisons in Our Food” by Navdanya, elevated levels of PCBs, DDE, and DDT have been found in the blood of women suffering from breast cancer. Studies show that 51 percent of all food commodities are contaminated by pesticides.
###
How Stupid Doies Coke Think We Are?
Organic Lifestyle Comments Off on How Stupid Doies Coke Think We Are?
Leading nutrition experts have expressed alarm over a U.S. pressure group that downplays the role of junk food and sugary drinks in the epidemic of obesity in America, claiming that exercise is the way to lose weight and fight obesity-–and is funded by Coca-Cola, according to Joanna Walters writing in The Guardian.
The Global Energy Balance Network, a non-profit group promoting research into the causes of obesity, focuses its message on the need for people to increase their physical activity as the key to achieving a healthy weight.
In a video announcing the aims of the organization, Steven Blair, a spokesman for the Global Energy Balance Network (GEBN) and a professor at the Arnold School of Public Health at the University of South Carolina, says the world needs to be educated about getting the right amount of physical activity.
“Most of the focus in the popular media and in the scientific press is ‘Oh, they’re eating too much, eating too much, eating too much’ – blaming fast food, blaming sugary drinks and so on. And there’s really virtually no compelling evidence that that, in fact, is the cause,” Blair says in a promotional video issued by the group earlier this year.
The GEBN states on its website that it is supported financially by Coca-Cola, among others. The link to Coca-Cola was highlighted Monday in an article in the New York Times questioning the links between the nonprofit organization and the company.
The GEBN’s posts on social media sites such as Twitter and Facebook concentrate heavily on various aspects of the importance of exercise in the weight and health debate, with less attention on food. Its website claims the group wants to be the “voice of science” in research on obesity. But manyprominent scientists have expressed concern over GEBN’s focus and funding.
“You cannot exercise your way out of overeating, that’s kind of a misguided idea,” said Scott Grundy, director of the Center for Human Nutrition at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center.
Grundy was a member of the expert panel that devised the current clinical guidelines on obesity issued by the US government’s National Institutes of Health. Although they were published in 1998, Grundy said the findings and guidelines are just as accurate and relevant today.
A statement posted on the Coca-Cola website from Ed Hays, the company’s chief technical officer, included this statement: “At Coke, we believe that a balanced diet and regular exercise are two key ingredients for a healthy lifestyle and that is reflected in both our long-term and short-term business actions.”
Coca-Cola contributed $1.5m last year toward the creation of the Global Energy Balance Network and administers its website, according to the New York Times.
Barry Popkin, a professor of global nutrition at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, compared Coca-Cola funding scientists involved in obesity research to tobacco companies historically “enlisting” experts to become “merchants of doubt” about the harmful effects of cigarettes.
“Essentially, Coke is following the strategy used by the tobacco industry as they tried to create doubt among the general public and also politicians. It was very effective in the fights to regulate cigarettes and we have learned from this that it is essential to address these attempts and uncover what they are very rapidly,” he said. “We must change our diet. First and foremost this is sugary sweetened beverages.”
***
SCOTLAND TO BAN FARMING OF GMO CROPS
Scotland is to ban the growing of genetically modified crops, the country’s rural affairs secretary has announced, the BBC reports. Richard Lochhead said the Scottish government was not prepared to “gamble” with the future of the country’s ($20 billion) food and drink sector.
Lochhead said that Scotland was known around the world for its “beautiful natural environment” and banning the growing of genetically modified crops would protect and further enhance its green status. There is no evidence of significant demand for GM products by Scottish consumers and I am concerned that allowing GM crops to be grown in Scotland would damage our clean and green brand.”
The move has been broadly welcomed by environment groups. But Scott Walker, chief executive of farming union NFU Scotland, said he was disappointed that the Scottish government had decided that no GM crops should ever be grown in Scotland. “Other countries are embracing biotechnology where appropriate and we should be open to doing the same here in Scotland,” he said.
Huw Jones, professor of molecular genetics at agricultural science group Rothamsted Research, said the announcement was a “sad day for science and a sad day for Scotland.” He said that GM crops approved by the EU were “safe for humans, animals and the environment.”
***
NOT ONLY CAN’T YOU KNOW WHAT’S IN YOUR FOOD, YOU CAN’T KNOW ABOUT EFFORTS TO FIND OUT WHAT’S IN YOUR FOOD, OR ABOUT LAWSUITS TO STOP MONSANTO’S FALSE ADVERTISING ABOUT THE SAFETY OF ROUNDUP
What happens when one courageous attorney and a few citizens try to take down Monsanto? The mainstream media doesn’t cover it, claims Christina Sarich, writing for NaturalSociety.com.
Efforts to publicize a class action lawsuit against Monsanto for falsely advertising its best-selling herbicide Roundup, which was filed in Los Angeles County Court on April 20, 2015, have been rejected or ignored by almost every mainstream media outlet.
It’s no different than Fox, NBC, CNN, or ABC refusing to cover the DARK act that would prevent states from passing laws requiring GMO foods to be labeled, she says.
“You would think that every paper, radio station, and blog would want to spread the news. But wait. . . just six corporations own ALL of the media in America, so there isn’t much luck there. That’s why you have to go to sites like Russia Insider or Al Jazeera to find real news, outside of certain alternative news channels in the US, and even those are white-washed from Facebook pages, and given secondary ratings on Google pages,” she says.
Matthew Phillips, the attorney suing Monsanto in California for false advertising on Roundup bottles, has asked the LA Times, New York Times, Huffington Post, CNN, and Reuters, one of the world’s largest news agencies, to report on the lawsuit (Case No: BC 578 942), yet most enforced a total media blackout.
“When I spoke with Phillips over the phone, he said that he has tried posting the suit in Wikipedia’s Monsanto litigation section, but it keeps disappearing. He says that he has also noticed posts on Facebook about this lawsuit get removed,” Sarich said.
If other attorneys were to follow his template-style lawsuit, then suddenly the plaintiff count could extend to all the citizens in the US who have purchased a bottle of Roundup from their local DIY store (Lowe’s, Home Depot, or Ace Hardware, for example) in the last four years, not suspecting it could demolish their gut health.
Another possibility, according to Phillips, is that Monsanto could try to bump the case up to federal court in order to try to side-step a likely adverse judgment. But in this case the class action suit would also be open to residents other than those of just California. This is surely an idea that Monsanto doesn’t want seeded in the American psyche.
Phillips is extremely confident he has the goods on Monsanto in this case, and barring a sold out judge:
“This is a slam-dunk lawsuit that exposes Monsanto for LYING about Roundup. Contrary to the label, Roundup does indeed target and kill enzymes found in humans — in our gut bacteria — and this explains America’s chronic indigestion!”
Many well-known scientists and professors emeritus have offered to be key witnesses in this suit when it goes to trial. The attorney says he refuses to settle the case and hopes that 49 additional attorneys in 49 states will use his case as an example. “When we allege that Roundup’s targeted enzyme is found in humans, it’s like alleging that the Golden Gate Bridge is found in California,” Phillips said.
Phillips also states that ‘false advertising’ and ‘misleading’ are synonyms in California law, so the fact that Monsanto has stated that the glyphosate in Roundup doesn’t target humans goes beyond just misleading. This misjudgment by Monsanto is a well-known secret among many anti-GM scientists. The enzyme that glyphosate targets is definitely found in humans.
Monsanto states, “Round Up targets an enzyme only found in plants and not in humans or animals.”
EPSP synthase, also known as (3-phosphoshikimate 1-carboxyvinyltransferase) is found in the microbiota that reside in our intestinal tracts, and therefore the enzyme is “found in humans and animals.” It is partly responsible for immunity activation and even helps our gut and our brain communicate with one another.
***
WHY SHOULD INDIAN FARMERS FACE HUNGER AND COMMIT SUICIDE?
Vandana Shiva, a world-renowned spokeswoman for ecological agriculture, wrote the following for EcoWatch on August 16, 2015:
There is no reason why India should face hunger and malnutrition and why our farmers should commit suicide. India is blessed with the most fertile soils in the world. Our climate is so generous we can, in places, grow four crops in a year—compared to the industrialized west where sometimes only one crop is possible per year. We have the richest biodiversity of the world, both because of our diverse climates and because of the brilliance of our farmers as breeders. Our farmers are among the most hardworking, productive people in the world. Yet India faces an emergency in our food and agricultural system. This emergency is man-made.
Firstly, the poor and vulnerable are dying for lack of food. According to the Deccan Herald, Lalita S. Rangari, 36, a Dalit widow and mother of two children of the Gondiya tribal belt, allegedly died due to starvation. Justice Bhushan Gavai and Justice Indu Jain of the Nagpur Bench of the Bombay High Court have served notice to the government of Maharashtra seeking its reply to the starvation death of the Dalit widow.
Even as India gets richer, we have emerged as the capital of hunger and malnutrition. According to the National Family Health Survey (NFHS), 42.5 percent of children under five years old were underweight. This is more than double the African average of 21 percent, which until recently was the face of hunger.
The second tragedy is that our food producers, the small farmers who have provided food to more than a billion Indians and hold the potential to provide healthy food for all, are themselves dying because of agriculture and trade policies which put corporate profits above the rights and well-being of our small farmers. More than 300,000 farmers have committed suicide in India since 1995, when the rules for the globalization of agriculture of the World Trade Organization (WTO) were implemented, transforming food into a commodity, agriculture into corporate business, and shifting control over seeds and food from farmers to a handful of giant multinational corporations.
The third tragedy is that even those who get food are being denied their right to healthy and nourishing food. The explosion of junk food, of pesticides and toxics in our food, have created a disease epidemic that is a human tragedy and an economic burden. There is an epidemic of diseases related to our lifestyle and food, such as diabetes, cancer, hypertension, infertility, and cardiovascular diseases.
The recent Maggi noodle scandal highlights the rapid invasion of junk food in the Indian diet. We are what we eat. When we eat food full of toxic chemicals, we pay the price with our health. India has emerged as the epicenter of diabetes.
In extensive studies reported in “Poisons in Our Food” by Navdanya, elevated levels of PCBs, DDE, and DDT have been found in the blood of women suffering from breast cancer. Studies show that 51 percent of all food commodities are contaminated by pesticides.
###
The Regeneration of Regeneration
Organic Lifestyle Comments Off on The Regeneration of Regeneration
In 1982, Bob Rodale, son of Rodale Press founder J.I. Rodale (the man who brought the concept of organic gardening and farming to America), was then owner and chairman of that publishing company. In a memo to the staff, he laid out the idea that regeneration was the key not only to organics, but to many of life’s endeavors, including running a big company.
He organized retreats for top editorial people and business staff to explore the idea. He pushed regeneration—the ability of a system to reorganize and improve itself, especially after a setback—as a template for an overhaul of the way we do things. Unfortunately, Bob died in a traffic accident in Moscow in 1990, where he was starting an organic farming magazine for the Russian people.
Now, 33 years later, Ronnie Cummings of the Organic Consumers Association has found regeneration and wrote the following essay—all without mentioning Bob Rodale. I suspect this is not a snub. It’s just that Bob was so far ahead of his time that his trail has grown cold. Cummings says pretty much what Bob was talking about all those years ago. Here’s what he has to say:
“Regenerate—to give fresh life or vigor to; to reorganize; to recreate the moral nature; to cause to be born again.” (New Webster’s Dictionary, 1997)
A growing number of climate, food, environment, health and justice advocates are embracing and promoting a world-changing concept: regeneration.
What is regeneration? And why are so many public figures calling for regeneration or revolution, rather than sustainability or mitigation?
The inconvenient truth, of course, is that our degenerate “profit-at-any-cost” global economy is killing us. The living Earth—our soils, forests and oceans—and the “rhythms of nature” are unraveling. Greed and selfishness have displaced sharing and cooperation. Land grabs, Empire-building, resource wars, and out-of-control consumerism have become the norm.
Catastrophic times demand radical solutions. It’s time for change, big change.
Our heat-trapping, climate-disrupting, fossil fuel-intensive, industrial agriculture, and deforestation-induced CO2 monster in the sky, now approaching 400 parts per million (ppm), is the most serious threat humans have ever faced. Either we take down King Coal and Big Oil and switch to renewable energy, and simultaneously move, literally suck down, several hundred billion tons of excess carbon from the atmosphere and naturally sequester this CO2 in the soil and forests—through regenerative farming, grazing and land use practices—or we are doomed.
According to activist and author Vandana Shiva, “Regenerative agriculture provides answers to the soil crisis, the food crisis, the health crisis, the climate crisis and the crisis of democracy.”
But just what do we mean by Regenerative Agriculture?
The international community has set itself three important goals: to stop the loss of biodiversity, keep global warming to 2 degrees Celsius, and ensure everyone has the right to adequate food. Without fertile soil, none of these objectives will be achieved.
The loss of the world’s fertile soil and biodiversity, along with the loss of indigenous seeds and knowledge, pose a mortal threat to our future survival. According to soil scientists, at current rates of soil destruction, (i.e. decarbonization, erosion, desertification, chemical pollution), within 50 years we will not only suffer serious damage to public health due to a qualitatively degraded food supply characterized by diminished nutrition and loss of important trace minerals, but we will literally no longer have enough arable topsoil to feed ourselves. Without protecting and regenerating the soil on our four billion acres of cultivated farmland, 14 billion acres of pasture and rangeland, and 10 billion acres of forest land, it will be impossible to feed the world, keep global warming below 2 degrees Celsius, or halt the loss of biodiversity.
Healthy soil, healthy plants, healthy animals, healthy forests, healthy oceans, rivers and lakes, healthy people, a healthy climate . . . our physical and economic health, our very survival as a species, depends upon whether or not, and how quickly, we can carry out a global campaign of Regeneration.
According to a recent policy proposal by the French government, we need to increase plant photosynthesis and carbon sequestration in global soils by at least 0.4 percent each year if we are to head off runaway global warming.
Tom Newmark of the Carbon Underground explains the basic concept of Regeneration:
There is a technology that exists today that will suck excess CO2 out of the atmosphere. That technology is called photosynthesis. When I look outside my office window I see plants. Through photosynthesis, plants convert sunlight, CO2 and water to carbohydrates and oxygen. Plants are sucking tens of billions of tons of CO2 and creating plant sugars/carbohydrates. Some plant sugars we eat and some pass through the plant and get converted into humus, soil organic matter. This isn’t rocket science. This is a biological fact.
The soil itself is the largest available sink for CO2. There is more carbon currently sequestered in the living soils of the planet (2,700 billion tons), than there is in the entire atmosphere and biotic community combined (plants, and trees).The bad news is that by ripping up the soil through industrial agriculture abuse, we’ve put excess CO2 into the atmosphere.
The good news is that if we farm and ranch in harmony with carbon cycles, we can put carbon back in the soil—quickly. Scientists say that we can get back to 350 ppm in 10 years. All we have to do is increase soil organic matter in all grasslands on the planet by one percent. That is all we need to do to bring it back to 350 ppm. Nature can fix this problem that humans have created.
Along with educating ourselves and our community, we must utilize marketplace pressure to change our degenerate food and farming systems. We must boycott the fossil fuel-emitting, soil-destroying, climate-destructive products of industrial agriculture and the junk food industry. We must support those farmers and businesses whose products regenerate our health, our soils and our forests. Marketplace pressure, public education, and public policy change must go hand-in-hand.
A recent article in the Guardian summarizes Regenerative Agriculture this way:
Regenerative agriculture comprises an array of techniques that rebuild soil and, in the process, sequester carbon. Typically, it uses cover crops and perennials so that bare soil is never exposed, and grazes animals in ways that mimic animals in nature. It also offers ecological benefits far beyond carbon storage: it stops soil erosion, remineralises soil, protects the purity of groundwater and reduces damaging pesticide and fertiliser runoff.
The benefits of raising and grazing beef cattle, sheep, goats, dairy cows, poultry and pigs “in ways that mimic nature” are many. These practices are more humane, they rebuild soil fertility and they sequester carbon in the soil.
But there’s another important benefit to these techniques, one that is driving consumers away from factory farm foods. These practices produce animal products that are qualitatively healthier than CAFO (Confined Animal Feeding Operations) products, because they are higher in Omega 3 and “good” fats, and lower in animal drug residues and harmful fats that clog arteries, destroy gut health and cause cancer.
Our agricultural soils have lost 25-75 percent of the soil carbon they once held in storage before the onslaught of industrial agricultural and destructive land use practices. The most important task of our generation is Regeneration: to put this dislodged, heat-trapping atmospheric carbon back into the soil and forests, where it belongs.
Unfortunately, the current climate change movement up until now has focused almost exclusively on reducing fossil fuel emissions. There has been little or no mention of the critical role soil and forests play as carbon sinks or repositories for excess CO2 in the atmosphere.
Reducing fossil fuel emissions to zero over the next few decades, as called for by climate activist leaders such as Naomi Klein and 350.org, will solve half the problem, but only half. By the time we reach zero emissions under this “50-percent solution” scenario, even the most optimistic projections are that we’ll get down to 450 ppm of CO2 in the atmosphere, a level that will detonate runaway global warming, and catastrophic climate change.
So widespread is this fixation on fossil fuel emissions that even the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the upcoming Paris Climate Summit have yet to recognize soil and soil regeneration practices as important carbon sinks. Yet there is a growing body of scientific evidence to support the idea that Regenerative Organic Agriculture, grazing, reforestation and land use practices, scaled up globally, could not only mitigate, but actually, over several decades, reverse global warming.
We need to embrace the regenerative “100-percent solution” if we want to get back down to the safe level of 350 ppm or lower, as soon as possible. And we need to pressure the IPCC and national governments to acknowledge the importance of carbon sequestration through regenerative land use practices.
A number of critics have told me and others that we should not talk about natural sequestration of CO2 in the soil, nor the enormous regenerative potential of organic food, farming and forestry, because this “positive talk” will distract people from the main task at hand, drastically reducing fossil fuel emissions and taking down King Coal and Big Oil. Of course we need to move rapidly away from fossil fuels, extractivism and over-consumption into conservation, sustainable living and renewable energy. We must all become climate activists and radical conservationists.
But we must also become advocates of Regenerative Organic Agriculture and forest/land use.
The large and growing anti-GMO, organic food and natural health movement must begin to think of itself as a movement that can fix not only the world’s health and hunger crisis, but the climate as well. Given that the degenerate GMO, factory farm and industrial food and farming system as a whole (production, chemical crop inputs, processing, transportation, waste, emissions, deforestation, biofuel/ethanol production) is the number one cause of greenhouse gas emissions, surpassing even the transportation, utilities, housing and industry sectors, climate activists need to start thinking of themselves as food, farming and natural health activists as well.
There will be no organic food, nor food whatsoever, on a burnt planet. Nor will there ever be a 90-percent reduction in greenhouse gas pollution without a transformation of our food and farming and land use practices, both in North America and globally.
We must begin to connect the dots between fossil fuels, global warming and related issues, including world hunger, poverty, unemployment, toxic food and farming, extractivism, land grabbing, biodiversity, ocean destruction, deforestation, resource wars, and deteriorating public health. As we regenerate the soil and forests, and make organic and grass-fed food and fiber the norm, rather than just the alternative, we will simultaneously develop our collective capacity to address all of the globe’s interrelated problems.
The extraordinary thing about de-industrializing food and farming, restoring grasslands and reversing deforestation—moving several hundred billion tons of carbon back from the atmosphere into our soils, plants and forests—is that this regeneration process will not only reverse global warming and re-stabilize the climate, but will also stimulate the creation of hundreds of millions of rural (and urban) jobs, while qualitatively increasing soil fertility, water retention, farm yields and food quality.
Regeneration holds the potential not only to restore forests and grasslands, recharge aquifers, restore and normalize rainfall, but also to address and eliminate rural malnutrition, poverty, unemployment and hunger.
So who will carry out this global Regeneration Revolution?
Of course we must continue, and in fact vastly increase, our pressure on governments and corporations to change public policies and marketplace practices. But in order to overturn “business-as-usual,” we must inspire and mobilize a vastly larger climate change coalition than the one we have now. Food, climate, and economic justice advocates must unite our forces so we can educate and mobilize a massive grassroots army of Earth Regenerators: three billion small farmers and rural villagers, ranchers, pastoralists, forest dwellers, urban agriculturalists, and indigenous communities—aided and abetted by several billion conscious consumers and urban activists.
The time is late. Circumstances are dire. But we still have time to regenerate the Earth and the body politic.
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AG-GAG LAW HELD UNCONSTITUTIONAL
Andrew Amelinckx, writing in Modern Farmer magazine, reports that Idaho’s so-called “ag-gag” law was one that opponents said criminalized investigative journalism and meant whistleblowers exposing unsafe or inhumane farming practices could end up in jail. No photos of animal cruelty allowed, in other words, or we’ll put you in the slammer.
The ldaho legislators who penned the law said it was about protecting privacy rights for an important industry in the state. This week, the federal court weighed in on the side of the law’s detractors in no uncertain terms. The court said the law is unconstitutitional, which of course it is, as it criminalizes the basic right of free speech.
“[The statute] seeks to limit and punish those who speak out on topics relating to the agricultural industry, striking at the heart of important First Amendment values,” wrote Chief Judge B. Lynn Winmill of the United States District Court for the District of Idaho in his landmark decision.
The judge, in his 29-page decision, said the “effect of the law was to suppress speech by undercover investigators and whistleblowers concerning topics of great public importance: the safety of the public food supply, the safety of agricultural workers, the treatment and health of farm animals, and the impact of business activities on the environment.”
The Idaho statute—similar to seven others in Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Montana, North Dakota, North Carolina and Utah—created a new crime, “interference with agricultural production,” that outlawed surreptitiously filming in agricultural facilities as well as misrepresenting your intentions when applying for a job at an agricultural operation, among other activities. These crimes were punishable by up to a year in jail and a $5,000 fine. Those convicted could also be forced to pay up to twice the amount of damages that the facility incurred as a result of the defendant’s actions.
“We think that’s inconsistent with the history of muckraking and journalism in the U.S. We think it’s inconsistent with the First Amendment,” the judge wrote.
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POPE FRANCIS ON SAVING THE NATURAL WORLD
“Where profits alone count, there can be no thinking about the rhythms of nature, its phases of decay and regeneration, or the complexity of ecosystems which may be gravely upset by human intervention…. It is not enough to balance, in the medium term, the protection of nature with financial gain, or the preservation of the environment with progress. Halfway measures simply delay the inevitable disaster.”
— Pope Francis, Papal Encyclical “Laudato Si,” June 18, 2015
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FAMILY OF MURDERED WOMAN ORDERED TO PAY GUN DEALERS
From Daily Kos:
The parents of Jessica Ghawi, a 24-year-old woman gunned down by James Holmes in the 2012 Aurora theater massacre, tried to sue the online ammunition retailer who sold James Holmes the ammunition used in the attack.
The case was dismissed before a trial could take place thanks to the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act, or PLCAA, a federal law passed by Congress and signed by George W. Bush in 2005.
The PLCAA provides very broad, blanket immunity from civil lawsuits for both gun manufacturers and gun dealers. Adding insult to extreme injury, a federal judge has issued an order that will likely bankrupt Jessica Ghawi’s parents.
The parents are faced with more than $200,000 in legal costs after a federal judge ordered them to pay attorney’s fees for four ammunition dealers the family attempted to sue. In the ruling, the judge wrote “those who ignore a fire should be responsible for cost of suppressing it before it becomes a conflagration.”
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GETTING RICH OFF THE WAR AGAINST ISIS
As long as we’re being political, let’s check in with Kate Brannen of The Daily Beast, who wrote the following:
For the Middle East, the growth of the self-proclaimed Islamic State has been a catastrophe. For one American firm, it’s been a gold mine.
The war against ISIS isn’t going so great, with the self-appointed terror group standing up to a year of U.S. airstrikes in Syria and Iraq.
But that hasn’t kept defense contractors from doing rather well amidst the fighting. Lockheed Martin has received orders for thousands of more Hellfire missiles. AM General is busy supplying Iraq with 160 American-built Humvee vehicles, while General Dynamics is selling the country millions of dollars’ worth of tank ammunition.
SOS International, a family-owned business whose corporate headquarters are in New York City, is one of the biggest players on the ground in Iraq, employing the most Americans in the country after the U.S. Embassy. On the company’s board of advisors: former Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz—considered to be one of the architects of the invasion of Iraq—and Paul Butler, a former special assistant to Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld.
The company, which goes by “SOSi,” says on its website that the contracts it’s been awarded for work in Iraq in 2015 have a total value of more than $400 million. They include a $40 million contract to provide everything from meals to perimeter security to emergency fire and medical services at Iraq’s Besmaya Compound, one of the sites where U.S. troops are training Iraqi soldiers. The Army awarded SOSi a separate $100 million contract in late June for similar services at Camp Taji. The Pentagon expects that contract to last through June 2018.
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AND NOW FOR SOME GOOD NEWS
Here are the latest dispatches from The Organic Center in Washington, D.C.
A recent study published in Sustainable Agriculture Research has found that organic farming methods can be used to reduce water pollution in U.S waterways. Researchers found that nitrate loss via water in the conventional cropping systems was twice as high as nitrate loss from the organic cropping system, and that the organic pasture system lost the least amount of nitrates.
A new study published in Organic Agriculture shows that some organic honey has natural antimicrobial activity that can combat the growth of Clostridium perfringens, a food pathogen bacterium known to cause food spoilage and illness in humans and animals. Overall, this study showed that organic honey has the potential to be used clinically to fight this foodborne bacterium.
A new paper published in the journal Sustainable Agriculture Research examines results from six of the oldest grain crop-based experiments comparing organic and conventional farming methods with the goal of communicating both the benefit of long-term comparison trials and environmental and economic findings for organic agriculture. All of the studies showed an increase in soil health, productivity, water quality, and economic benefits for farmers when they used organic systems.
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SPOKANE SUES MONSANTO FOR SAYING TOXIC CHEMICALS ARE SAFE
The city of Spokane, Washington, has filed a lawsuit against the international agrichemical giant Monsanto, alleging that the company sold chemicals for decades that it knew were a danger to human and environmental health. Marlene Feist, the city’s utilities spokeswoman, called the suit “long-term litigation,” and noted that the city will have to spend $300 million to keep PCBs and other pollutants from entering the Spokane River in coming years.
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LIKE TEA? CHECK OUT BUDDHA TEAS
Buddha Teas, a company based in Carlsbad, California, sells organic sencha green tea, a favorite in Japan, and organic white tea, the least processed of all teas. The ingredients are simple. Sencha green tea contains sencha green tea. Period. White tea contains white tea. Period. That’s the way we like it, and the teas are delicate and delicious.
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