Agriculture & Food
We eat to live. Humans use approximately 11% of Earth’s land for the cultivation of crops for food, but also for clothing, medicine and biofuels. Globally, major crops include sugarcane, pumpkin, maize (corn), wheat, rice, cassava, soybeans, hay, potatoes and cotton.
Below is the complete archive of related articles sorted by date.
Ayman Jallad: Mysterious Syrian-Lebanese businessman funds anti-GMO activist network in Europe
Ayman Jallad has two battles on his hands. The Syrian-Lebanese businessman is in the challenging business of selling imported Caterpillar ...
‘Opportunity or death knell’? Organic movement debates embracing CRISPR plant breeding
There have been public debates and whether certain novel plant breeding techniques (NPBTs) such as CRISPR, could be used within ...
‘Refuge planting’: How farmers could help slow developing insect resistance to GMO Bt crops
To date ... Bt crops have been remarkably successful. However, insect pests have shown the ability to evolve resistance to ...
President of Senegal bucks anti-biotechnology pressure: ‘I am for the use of GMOs’
President Macky Sall of Senegal has thrown his weight behind the adoption of agricultural biotechnology in the country. .... President ...
Our food system isn’t broken, it’s flourishing — and GMO crops are a big reason why
[Editor's note:Â Randy Krotz is CEO of the US Farmers & Ranchers Alliance.] Activists and others [say] the food system [is]Â broken, ...
GMO sugarcane: Dual-purpose bioenergy crop produces oil for biodiesel, more sugar for ethanol
A multi-institutional team led by the University of Illinois have proven sugarcane can be genetically engineered to produce oil in ...
Inexperienced hobbyist beekeepers ‘major driver’ of honey bee colony losses in Europe
Reports of honey bee population decline has spurred many national efforts to understand the extent of the problem and to ...
California v EPA: Legal challenge possible over Prop 65 labeling of herbicide glyphosate as carcinogenic
Monsanto officially lost its fight to avoid a Prop 65 warning label on its products containing glyphosate, a chemical used ...
Neonicotinoid insecticides in trace level parts per trillion detected in drinking water in Iowa
[A] team of chemists and engineers at the [U.S. Geological Survey] and University of Iowa reported that they found neonicotinoids ...
Video: Genetic engineering could help African farmers increase yields without expensive fertilizers
In this video by Robert Hazen of the [Cornell] Alliance for Science, scientists from the Engineering Nitrogen Symbiosis for Africa ...
Drought resistant, higher-yielding GM rice developed by Japanese researchers
Scientists at the RIKEN Center for Sustainable Resource Science have developed strains of rice that are resistant to drought in ...
Does National Institutes of Health fund ‘scientifically questionable’ European cancer groups?
The NIH and top official Linda Birnbaum face questions from a Congressional oversight committee about US funding of European cancer ...
Fertilizer-making GE microbes could boost crop yields, fight malnutrition in developing world
Industrial fertilizers help feed billions of people every year, but they remain beyond the reach of many of the world’s ...
Next generation insect-resistant GM cotton could be ‘game changer’ for Australian farmers
A new variety of genetically modified cotton is shaping up to be a game-changer for those looking to grow cotton ...
Chipotle fumbles science in attempt to justify its anti-GMO stance
[Editor's note: Stephan Neidenbach is a middle school teacher and blogger. He runs the popular We Loves GMO and Vaccines ...
CRISPR crops focused on sustainable farming could soften African resistance to genetic engineering
[Nteranya Sanginga is director general of the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture.] The role of genetic engineering in agriculture and ...
What are natural flavors and scents? Biotechnology blurs the definition
A company in the United Kingdom can transform chemicals found in oranges into the coveted flavor of grapefruit. By mixing ...
ChemChina takeover of Syngenta approved by US, EU regulators in China’s biggest foreign acquisition ever
U.S. and European regulators have cleared a Chinese conglomerate's proposed $43 billion acquisition of Swiss agribusiness giant Syngenta on condition ...
GMO disease-resistant bananas may be key to saving African staple
Banana is an important staple food crop feeding more than 100 million Africans, but is subject to severe productivity constraints ...
Was the EPA right not to ban the crop pesticide chlorpyrifos?
The EPA decision allowing farmers to continue using the popular pesticide chlorpyrifos has drawn both praise and scorn, each side ...
Key to developing flood-resistant crops: Genetically engineering plants’ stress response survival strategy
[The following is a Q&A with Dr. Emily Flashman, organic chemistry researcher at the University of Oxford, about a study she ...
Bee-apocalypse update: Honeybee deaths linked to gut microbe-altering antibiotic
[Editor's note: Kasie Raymann, Zach Shaffer, and Nancy Moran are researchers in the Department of Integrative Biology at the University ...
Bangladesh announces release of 3 more GMO pest-resistant eggplant varieties
Bangladesh Agricultural Research Institute (BARI) will release three more varieties of the country's first genetically modified (GM) crop--Bt Brinjal [eggplant], ...
Greenpeace’s ‘double standard’ on lab-created seedless watermelons and GMOs
[Editor's note:Â Myles Power is a chemist in Manchester, England. Read the GLP profile of Greenpeace here.] Last year [2016], I ...
What is synthetic biology?
[Synthetic biology is] a discipline that brings together the insights and methodologies of computer science; engineering; and, of course, biology ...
To ban GMO crops, European countries must prove ‘serious and evident risk’ to health, environment
An EU high court adviser on Thursday [March 30, 2017] gave member states a very limited go-ahead to ban the ...
Putting cancer risk in perspective: Random errors in DNA replication bigger factor than diet, lifestyle choices
[Editor's note:Â Jayson Lusk is a professor in the Department of Agricultural Economics at Oklahoma State University.] [E]ven if you eat ...
