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.
What turned the organic movement against GMOs?
The idea behind the organic movement has some virtues: using fewer chemicals that might be more dangerous, reducing logistics and ...
Syngenta now faces 360 lawsuits from US farmers
Farmers and farm businesses in 20 states have now filed more than 360 lawsuits against agricultural chemicals-maker Syngenta, and hundreds ...
False claim of ‘no consensus on GMO safety’ at heart of Vermont’s labeling bill
Several food industry trade groups, including the Grocery Manufacturers of America (GMA), filed suit in June 2014 to prevent Vermont’s ...
Genetically engineered ‘on-off switch’ could activate drought tolerance in plants
An innovative 'on-off' switch added to a plant protein may one day allow farmers to prep crops for drought by ...
Sequencing genome of brewer’s yeast could lead to new flavors, strengths and qualities
Imagine ales with a richness of flavour you never before imagined, lagers that can be brewed warm, or a Trappist-style ...
Genome tracking tech could make improve food safety and reduce food fraud
Each year foodborne illnesses caused by these microorganisms sicken 48 million Americans, hospitalize 128,000 and kill 3,000.... Food fraud is ...
Alison Van Eenennaam: Genetically engineered animals critical for food production
Genetically engineered food animals could provide a sustainable means to feed a fast-growing world population, yet regulatory hurdles keep such ...
Korean scientists develop GM sweet potatoes that grow in desert
A research team led by Dr. Kwak Sang-soo at the Korea Research Institute of Bioscience & Biotechnology is receiving a ...
Anti-GMO group Earthjustice offers to represent Hawaii County in suit despite conflict of interest
Attorneys representing groups suing Hawaii County over its restrictions on genetically modified crops want the county to defend itself without ...
Consumers should consider GMOs on case-by-case basis
Public awareness about bio-engineering is creating concern, confusion and fear, when such technology produces higher crop yields and helps the ...
Deposed EU scientific advisor Anne Glover says Greenpeace lied to oust her
The former chief scientific adviser to the European commission has accused environmental groups of “manufacturing” claims that they knew to ...
‘We now have tabloid science’: Activists use journals to push anti-GMO agenda
Recently a number of academics and activists sworn against biotech crops published an opinion that was accepted as fact. A ...
Will next generation of herbicide-resistant crops cause more problems?
The latest in a new generation of genetically engineered crops is poised to enter widespread use—and critics think they'll cause ...
India needs GMOs to be sustainable and resilient to climate change
The popular backlash to genetically modified crops ignores the fact that the ability to add value to agricultural produce is ...
Korea expands GMO labeling requirements
In the future, companies that use genetically modified organisms, or GMOs, as ingredients in their products will have to label ...
EU to consider new channels for scientific advice
There have been hesitant celebrations from scientists following the announcement that the European Commission has kick-started the process of establishing ...
Modern genetics (not necessarily GMOs) can help spur next Green Revolution
The green revolution transformed global agriculture. Through selective breeding, Norman Borlaug, an American biologist, created a dwarf variety of wheat ...
Greenpeace, activist groups call on tight regulation of new genetic engineering methods
In a joint open letter to the European Commission, eight farmers', environmental and food safety organisations demand that products derived ...
India stalls trials of genetically modified mustard
The pull of a technology that boosts mustard yield by between a fifth and a third should have been as ...
Money talks: Some farmers go non-GMO because of price premiums, not rejection of biotech
A small but growing number of Midwestern farmers in the United States are moving away from biotech seeds, drawn by the premium price non-GMO crops ...
Harvard’s George Church: ‘Gene leakage research will blunt anti-GMO activist scares’
Since the 1970s we've been ushering in the next era of breeding by physically lifting individual genes from one species ...
India introducing new GM crops
The pro-technology Modi government is desperate to introduce genetically modified (GM) crops. It is now holding closed-door meetings with the ...
“No consensus on GMO safety”? University of Florida’s Kevin Folta claims activist scientists spin facts
The world's esteemed scientific organizations have made bold statements regarding the scientific consensus on transgenic crops. The National Academies of ...
India surpasses China in GMO hectacres grown
Are genetically-modified crops on course to being the future of food despite the opposition? Evidence suggests they may well be, ...
DNA sequencing of 100 melon varieties could lead to improved taste, shelf life
Smart new combinations of state-of-the-art molecular techniques mean that breeding programmes can be accelerated dramatically: it may soon take only ...
New York Times’ writer addresses GMO labeling issue, leaves out the science
There are few industry debates as heated these days as the one about labeling foods that contain genetically modified ingredients ...
IBM, Mars collaborate to figure out what makes food safe
Is your food safe? Protecting the global food supply is a monumental public health challenge. In the U.S. alone, one ...
