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.
Study claims agroecology closes organic yield deficit with conventional farming
The more scientists actually study agroecology, the better it looks. The largest meta-analysis to date comparing yields of organic and ...
GMO labeling costly for those who don’t even care
Mandatory labeling of GM food in the United States will not only make all food more costly but also bamboozle ...
Proponents of organic diet craze reject GMOs, swear by health benefits
Over the past several years, the organic food craze has definitely grown. But some people feel that genetically modified foods ...
Kenyan research on GM maize must reach farmers
Dr Murenga Mwimali is the country co-ordinator of Water Efficient Maize for Africa. He was interviewed by AGATHA NGOTHO You ...
We can feed the world without chopping down more forests
Maybe this is obvious, but expanding our agricultural footprint to feed the growing population — cutting down forests, plowing prairies ...
Congress skeptical of benefits of mandatory GMO labeling law
The food industry is likely to find a receptive Congress come January in its fight against mandatory labeling of genetically ...
Can biotech help threatened bluefin tuna?
Of all the overfished fish in the seas, luscious, fatty bluefin tuna are among the most threatened. Marine scientist Goro ...
After education on GMOs, ‘idea became less scary’
A few weekends ago I made the four-hour drive from my hometown of Madison, Wisconsin to Northfield, Minnesota to visit ...
Avoiding GMOs based on precautionary principle is flawed logic
Some public commentaries proclaim that, on account of a philosophic notion called the Precautionary Principle, a moratorium or ban should be placed ...
Big Data shows value for farmers and industry
Who knew that the specific crossover of agriculture and big data was such a big deal? Everyone from Mother Jones ...
GMO yeast: One solution to omega-3 decline in salmon
When it comes to omega-3s, the message is clear: All salmon is a good choice. But that might soon change ...
Ontario farmers claim they are ‘bullied’ by proposed neonics ban
In November, the Ontario premier’s office and the ministry of the environment and climate change revealed its plan to restrict the ...
Mexico poised to approve 132 GMO crops and foods
The Federal Commission for the Protection against Sanitary Risks (Cofepris) in Mexico approved the sale and consumption of 132 genetically modified ...
How would Norman Borlaug, father of Green Revolution, tackle climate change?
Norman Borlaug was many things to many people. To his colleagues, he was a meticulous and rigorous agronomist, obsessed with ...
Fish-farmed genetically modified salmon could help alleviate overexploited wild fisheries
Seafood remains one of the last types of foods that we harvest from the wild at a commercial level, and ...
Oregon GMO labeling supporters file lawsuit over rejected votes
Supporters of a measure to label genetically modified food in Oregon filed a lawsuit today claiming 4,600 valid votes were ...
Dung factor: Why organic farming yields can never match conventional farming
In the last year or so the claim that organic farming methods can feed the world has come up several ...
Opponents to GE trees contend science violates environment and social mores
Organizations against genetically engineered (GE) trees are working across four continents to call for an end to the scientific manipulation ...
GMO opponent Vani Hari, Food Babe, lashes out at critics
We are close to winning. Over the last three years, the coalition we have built, the Food Babe Army, has had ...
EU GM crops in limbo for years likely to move forward with compromise in hand
Agreement to permit country-level bans of genetically modified plants should ease deadlocks in EU approval process. After years of political ...
Nobel Prize winner calls anti-GMO opinion ‘crime against humanity’
This is how you kick off a biotech convention: On Monday, the Nobel Prize in Medicine Richard J. Roberts accused ...
Silence from Bill Nye to Kevin Folta GMO debate challenge
Some of you might recall the open letter from Kevin Folta, a University of Florida plant scientist, inviting ["The Science Guy," Bill ...
Reflections on the Great Biotech Debate: Dissecting the arguments
Intelligence Squared, an organization that organizes public debates across the globe, holds them in traditional Oxford debating style which pits one team ...
Consumers open to GMO foods, nanotechnology if there are health benefits
Research from North Carolina State University and the University of Minnesota shows that the majority of consumers will accept the ...
Got synbio milk? Bioengineers create lactose-free lab-grown milk
Brace yourself for udderless dairy. What can science do better than a cow? That’s the question a trio of vegan bioengineers ...
EPA accomplice in environmentalists’ war on neonics?
The Environmental Protection Agency is arguably the worst regulatory agency in the history of the world. But perhaps I understate ...
Kauai authorizes $100,000 GMO pesticide health study
The state Department of Agriculture and Kauai County are paying a consultant $100,000 to examine the possible health and environmental ...
