Daily Food & Agriculture Digest
Every day, the staff of the Genetic Literacy Project scours the Web for stories on a range of agricultural and food issues, including the GMO debate, conventional and organic farming, regulations, new breeding technologies and sustainability. We publish excerpts of those stories and encourage our readers to visit the original publications for the complete stories.
Gene editing poised to spark innovation in herbicide- and disease-resistant sugar cane
Sugarcane is one of the most productive plants on Earth, providing 80 percent of the sugar and 30 percent of ...
Come January, expect consumer confusion as US mandated bioengineered stamp competes with Non GMO Project label
Under the National Bioengineered Food Disclosure Standard act, it will become mandatory for food and beverage companies starting Jan. 1 ...
Viewpoint: ‘Greens’ around the world declare themselves ‘pro-science’. But on health and sustainability issues, from vaccines to energy to farming, they are anything but
The Greens present themselves as the party of science. In reality, the party traditionally stands for an anti-science course, despite ...
Does the public have an appetite for lab-cultivated meat?
Laboratory grown muscle cells from various animals are quickly becoming a commercial reality; they are already real food, at least ...
‘All positives’: 17 years after GM corn introduction, the Philippines shows sharp increase in output and household incomes — with the poor benefiting the most
Genetically modified yellow corn has increasingly been used in the Philippines since 2002. In just a period of 17 years, ...
Viewpoint: Anti-biotechnology activists harshly criticize Gates Foundation funding of African agricultural initiatives
Africans have long been told that our agriculture is backward and should be abandoned for a 21st-century version of the ...
Bird flu is a major threat to chicken farming and human health. A gene-editing solution developed by African scientists is in the works
Dr. [Alewo Idoko-Akoh], a research fellow at the University of Edinburgh, is working on a project that uses genome editing ...
Turning waste into energy: Could biotechnology tackle a major tradeoff problem of modern agriculture?
For decades now, bioenergy has been posited as a renewable and clean source of energy. Biomass, particularly from forestry, is ...
President Biden’s antitrust initiative could shake up the agriculture industry. Here’s how
President Joe Biden released a sweeping executive order on “Promoting Competition in the American Economy,” aimed at taking on massive ...
USDA proposes that gene modifications that mimic conventional breeding should not be regulated
The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) is soliciting feedback on a proposal to ...
‘Digital agriculture has the power to be truly disruptive’: How AI and robotics are helping Japan overcome land challenges and dramatically increase farm yields
Japan has one of the lowest food self-sufficiency rates out of all the major world economies. Caloric intake was 79% ...
Fact check: No, product codes do not identify genetically modified produce
"Want to know where your food and/or products come from?" asks a June 22, 2021 Instagram post. Identical posts, claiming ...
Viewpoint: ‘Europe has abandoned science-based assessments’ — Kenya and the rest of Africa face economic devastation, mass starvation if they adopt proposal to ban all products banned in the EU
It is hard to remember any decision that posed harm to Kenya as much as the recommendation before Parliament that ...
Animal GMO and gene-editing regulations are outdated, hindering innovation. Here’s what experts say needs to change
In order for gene editing in agricultural animals to “unleash enormous gains in productivity,” a remodeling of the federal landscape ...
Pork is central to China’s culture and cuisine. It’s also under dire threat from swine fever. Here’s how lab-grown meat could rescue this iconic food
Pork is big business in China, the only country in the world to have its own dedicated pork reserve. The ...
As UK veers from EU anti-biotech regulations and opens doors to gene editing, landmark study on broccoli and other brassicas highlights innovation
Field trials investigating healthy compounds in agronomically important brassica crops have underlined the "immense potential" of gene editing technology, say ...
Viewpoint: Outcomes over ideology — Why biotechnology innovations like pesticides and GM crops are essential tools in advancing regenerative agriculture
We hear a lot about regenerative agriculture these days, but everyone has their own definition of what this term means ...
Viewpoint: ‘Well intentioned’ Sri Lankan plan to embrace organic farming tainted by lack of science, damaging its economy, health, and food security
In Sri Lanka, world renowned for its tea production, an initiative to go all-organic — the textbook definition of a ...
With droughts escalating, and no current tools of use, scientists and farmers look to CRISPR gene editing
Scientists fear that we're entering a megadrought that could last decades. As agriculture consumes 80 percent of available water nationwide ...
Glow-in-the-dark potatoes? In quest to develop healthier spuds, Israeli scientists genetically engineer plants that signal when stressed
Plant stress can be caused by drought, extreme temperature and high levels of light. (Not that dissimilar to humans who ...
Video: Good intentions aren’t enough — Attempts to protect wild bees has gone awry and an influx of imported honeybees are doing more harm than good to native populations
Ron Miksha, a bee ecologist and former commercial beekeeper, is doing research at the University of Calgary about competition between ...
Nigeria moves forward with nitrogen-efficient GMO rice
Still basking in the euphoria of commercializing sub-Saharan Africa’s first genetically modified (GM) food crop — insect-resistant cowpea —Nigeria has ...
Viewpoint: Harvard fellow on why crop engineering is crucial to addressing food security and growing sustainability challenges
We routinely assume that “natural” is better than “unnatural” when it comes to food. But it is more complex than ...
Viewpoint: ‘Glyphosate is socially dead’ — While every major government regulator in the world finds the herbicide safe, politicians have caved to activists, and farmers are the victims
The specialist authorities from France, Sweden, Hungary and the Netherlands have come to a clear conclusion when it comes to ...
African scientists have created a CRISPR-edited banana that’s resistant to a disease ravaging farms across the continent
Banana xanthomonas wilt (BXW) is a bacterial disease that spreads easily and kills any banana plant it infects — farmers' ...
Frustrated by flavorless fruits and vegetables? Genetic engineering is poised to change that
You might be surprised that flavour ever went out of fashion. But finding truly tasty fruit and vegetable varieties can ...
Fear of climate change moving UK closer to breaking with EU and embracing gene-edited crops
GMOs account for the vast majority of U.S. soy, corn, canola, cotton, and sugar beet crops—but those same crops are ...
