Daily Food & Ag 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.
Consortium of farmers’ unions petition Indian government to approve GMO mustard
Farmers from 16 states in a signed petition to Prime Minster Narendra Modi have urged him to commercialise the Genetically Modified (GM) ...
Is EPA’s registration review of glyphosate being delayed for political reasons?
The Environmental Protection Agency appears to be punting a final decision on the safety of a controversial weedkiller into the ...
How to combat misinformation about GMOs
The good news is that farmers are finally recognizing the damage that misinformation is doing to our industry... The bad ...
Weed scientist—Herbicide use increasing most rapidly in non-GE crops not paired with glyphosate
[Editor's note: Dr. Andrew Kniss is a weed scientist at the University of Wyoming. He co-authors the Weed Control Freaks ...
Though few GMO crops in China, officials cultivating pro-biotech attitudes
For many in China, the term “genetically modified food” evokes nightmares: poisoned seeds, contaminated fields, apocryphal images of eight-legged chickens ...
Farmers angry after Dow’s new pest-resistant modified corn fails to control western bean cutworm
A type of corn marketed by Dow Chemical Co. and DuPont Co. is failing to live up to promises that ...
Pope claims GMOs could have ‘ruinous impact’ on environment
Pope Francis has warned against the use of genetically modified foods in a message to mark World Food Day. ...[T]he ...
Gene editing used to produce soybean oil with less trans fats
Due to high levels of polyunsaturated fatty acids, soybean oil has poor oxidative and frying stability, which limits its use ...
Environmental groups appeal Canadian court ruling upholding approval of GMO salmon
Environmental groups [headed] to court [Oct. 18] to challenge a Federal Court ruling which upheld the government's earlier approval of genetically modified ...
Dannon, other food companies leverage consumer preferences on GMOs to gain market share
[Editor's note: In April, Dannon announced that it would start to produce non-GMO yogurt and establish non-GMO feed supply chains ...
Consumer demands trump science when food companies make decisions on GMOs
Speaking on a panel at Fortune’s Most Powerful Women Summit on Tuesday, Sally Grimes, chief global growth office and president of Tyson ...
Alison Van Eenennaam v Jennifer Kuzma: How should hornless cows and gene editing be regulated?
Dairy cows, which come from the Holstein breed, naturally grow horns. On farms, the horns are often physically removed because ...
Farm groups call Dannon’s move towards GMO-free ingredients ‘marketing flimflam’
Several major U.S. farm organizations said they are “troubled” by The Dannon Co.’s shift to using fewer genetically-modified ingredients, a ...
Genetic breeding speeds improvement of African, Asian staple cowpea crop
UC leads six Feed the Future Innovation Labs ... The labs work to develop climate-resilient crops such as chickpea, cowpea and millet, ...
Video: Indian GMO cotton farmer has better yields, uses fewer pesticides, but excluded from public debate
Ganesh Nanobe lives in Nimbhaara, a small nondescript village deep in the heart of India, where he has grown insect ...
Farmer suicides rising in non-GMO France, mirroring India’s crisis
[Anti-GMO activists, led by Indian philosopher Vandana Shiva [read GLP profile here], have endlessly repeated the claim that the introduction ...
CRISPR may help create oranges resistant to devastating ‘citrus greening’
The researchers' tools were chemistry class standards — glass flasks, test tubes and pipettes — but the task performed may ...
Refrigerating tomatoes causes genetic changes that reduce flavor
The tomato hitching a ride home in your grocery bag today is not the tomato it used to be. ...[I]f ...
India should let farmers decide about GMO mustard
The GM mustard baiters have ... made a big song and dance about the bar gene, which makes the plant resistant ...
GMO grass could cut methane emissions from cows, improve milk yield
The grass is about to get greener thanks to DNA technology out of Denmark. Researchers say they've genetically modified a ...
Transgenics unnatural? Nature doing ‘horizontal gene transfers’ for eternity
There is [a] fatal flaw to the argument that GMOs are “unnatural” because distant species do not exchange genes in nature ...
Monsanto, Syngenta consolidation provides opportunity for smaller seed companies to flourish
Farmers might be worried about the multibillion-dollar deals transforming the agriculture industry, but independent seed companies see the consolidation as ...
NY State PTA proposal to ban GMOs in schools ‘contrary to science, common sense’
When it holds its annual meeting in November in Saratoga Springs, [New York State Parent Teacher Association] NYSPTA will vote ...
From caution to urgency: Climate change, poverty prompting Tanzanians to reconsider GMOs
...In the last 18 months, unusually high temperatures and a brutal El Niño have punished many parts of Africa with ...
Alison Van Eenennaam video: Animal geneticist on humane benefits of genetically dehorning cattle
Alison Van Eenennaam and colleagues at UC Davis, along with researchers at the biotech company Recombinetics, who aim to develop ...
France asks EU to regulate whether gene edited crops are GMOs
France has asked the European Court of Justice to rule on the legal classification of products generated by new plant breeding ...
Boulder, Colorado finalizing plans to institute GMO ban, support for organic farming
Officials in Boulder County have released a plan to remove all genetically-modified crops from county-owned farmland within the next five years. ...
