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.
Understanding transgenics: How genetic modification in conventional crop breeding and GMOs differ
“GMOs are a hot topic and very misunderstood by many,” [Bejo Seeds Senior Tomato Breeder Doug Heath] says. “It is ...
What’s the most sustainable cover crop? It’s not mixture but monoculture
Research thus far has consistently found that cover crop polycultures are not necessarily better than cover crop monocultures. This is now ...
Greenpeace’s ‘populist’ anti-GMO campaign is ‘post-truth’
[Editor's Note: This excerpt was translated into English by Google Translate and lightly edited for clarity.] This year the Foundation ...
Ghana’s new guidelines on GMOs could speed release of water-efficient rice, pest-resistant cowpea
Ghana’s National Biosafety Authority (NBA) ... issued guidelines for the release of genetically modified organisms (GMOs) [in December], a landmark step forward for ...
Commercial release of nontransgenic, high oleic acid safflower expected in 2018
The managing director of a company commercialising a safflower variety with unprecedented levels of oleic acid expects the first commercial plantings ...
EU panel concludes organic food may offer limited health, sustainability advantages
This report reviews existing scientific evidence regarding the impact of organic food on human health from an EU perspective, with ...
Bacteria carried by Varroa mites may be key to unlocking mystery of honey bee deaths
A University of Wisconsin-Stout biology professor and his students may have made an important discovery in the effort to determine ...
Farmers criticize use of non-GMO labels
I’ve committed myself to the same job that tens of thousands of other farmers have committed to as well. It ...
Crops raised for industrial meat production contribute to unsustainable agriculture practice
The way we eat in the industrialized world is unhealthy, unjust, and unsustainable. Far too much of the meat we ...
Could sustainable weeding provide alternative to pesticides in herbicide resistant plants?
Farmers are concerned about weeds becoming resistant to herbicides used on crops that have been genetically modified to withstand herbicides… ...
Incoming Trump Administration faces key food policy challenges
Here are some stories [to track] in the coming year: Mind-bending agribusiness deals. For more than a decade, the global ...
Scientists say Séralini’s latest GM corn study contained faulty experimental design
Editor's Note: This article discusses a study published in Scientific Reports entitled "An integrated multi-omics analysis of the NK603 Roundup-tolerant GM maize ...
Hunt’s slammed for ‘No GMOs in sight’ tomato marketing ploy
“No matter how far afield you look, you won’t find a single genetically modified tomato among our vines,” Hunt’s, the ...
Argentina’s soy farmers, seed sellers near agreement on GMO seed royalties
Argentine soy farmers and the companies that sell them genetically modified seeds could be close to a breakthrough in negotiations ...
GMO labeling law makes ‘Biggest Science Setbacks of 2016’ list
Scientific progress doesn’t always move in a straight line. In fact, as we’ve seen this year, sometimes things just turn ...
Séralini paper: Molecular analysis shows GMO corn differs from non-GMO–Is difference meaningful?
In the US, the Food and Drug Administration ... GMO crops are deregulated once nutritional and compositional “substantial equivalence” is demonstrated ...
Uganda promotes new drought tolerant, disease resistant maize varieties
Earlier this year, the Ministry of Agriculture , Animal Industry and Fisheries (Maaif) released four new maize varieties. It was ...
Neonicotinoid pesticides ban proposed in Chicago
Poisonous chemicals that can “decimate the population” of bees, butterflies and other pollinators would essentially be banned in Chicago under ...
What is the best strategy to market new GMO produce like pink pineapple?
Despite reservations many consumers and public health advocates have about genetically modified foods, researchers, farmers and ingredient suppliers continue to ...
DIY genetic engineering kit to brew glow-in-the-dark booze runs into trouble with FDA
Josiah Zayner has made glow in the dark boo with a do-it-yourself DNA kit that his startup, the Odin, has just started ...
98% of U.S. farmers say GMOs help reduce environmental footprint of farming
A survey of 282 U.S. farmers shows 98 percent of them think GMO seeds - typically bred to be resistant to things ...
Cuba could begin planting GMO soy, corn by Spring 2017
[Editor's note: This excerpt has been translated into English by Google Translate and lightly edited for clarity] "Following the successful ...
London brewery uses genetic analysis to custom make your favorite beer
...[O]ne London brewery has developed a customized beer service that caters to customers' personal genetic information. Meantime Brewery partnered with ...
Is developed nations’ anti-GMO activism ‘arrogance of affluence’?
While working on a research project in South Africa I met a distinguished-looking farmer, well dressed in a suit and ...
Genetically engineered yeast could make whiskey less expensive
Biotech company BioTork has engineered strains of yeast that demonstrate increased ethanol yields and decreased time needed for fermentation, according to a ...
Biologist, environmental lawyer, food columnist: GMOs shouldn’t be controversial
Two UCLA faculty members — molecular biologist Robert Goldberg and international law and policy scholar Edward Parson — defended the ...
Fertilizers helped food keep pace with population growth but with Faustian bargain?
Most people don’t think about fertilizer, but few innovations are as central to modern life. In the 20th century, manmade ...
