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’s wrong with Jeremy Seifert’s “GMO OMG”
I recently watched “OMG GMO,” Jeremy Seifert’s aggressively uninformed “documentary” about the corporate duplicity and governmental callousness that he says ...
Research shows success with targeted gene editing in dairy cattle
The first published research on the groundbreaking use of a modified gene-editing system to produce horn-free dairy cattle was released ...
Enough known to prove GM foods are safe, claims European Commission’s chief scientific adviser
Describing the rejection of GM foods as a “form of madness I don’t understand,” the European Commission’s chief scientific adviser, ...
Modified brinjal given go-ahead
The High Court on Monday cleared the way for the government to release the genetically modified (GM) crop – Bt ...
Genetically modified rice brings benefit to wild neighbors
Rice containing a transgenic modification that makes it resistant to a common herbicide can pass that genetic trait to weedy ...
Ghana begins testing for GM cotton production
The western African country of Ghana has begun testing four genetically modified (GM) crops, including cotton, for commercial production. The ...
Auckland Council at odds with government on stricter GM rules
Auckland Council and the Government are on a collision course over rules for genetically modified crops after councillors decided to ...
Study finds strong preference for biofortified cassava in Eastern Kenya
As the dissemination of nutrient-rich staple food crops intensifies, nutritionists are confident that millions of people will eventually get more ...
Misgivings about how a weed killer affects the soil
ALTON, Iowa — The puny, yellow corn stalks stand like weary sentries on one boundary of Dennis Von Arb’s field ...
‘Curbs on GM crop trials have paralysed seed industry’
With uncertainty dogging trials of genetically modified crops, the Indian seed industry is in a state of limbo, Chairman of ...
New corn rootworm traits will help farmers control underground pests
Corn farmers have experienced some cases of corn-rootworm resistance to new biotech traits, but the incidents have not been widespread ...
Progress in developing drought tolerant corn
Drought in corn and soybean growing areas of the Midwestern U.S. in the summer of 2012 and again this year ...
Labeling GM foods in Washington: “Science doesn’t support I-522”
Initiative 522 on Washington’s November general election ballot — to require labeling of genetically engineered (GE) foods — should be ...
Pakistan: Scientific truth about agri biotechnology
Introduction of new technologies has always been resisted in any field by the people who are the beneficiaries of the ...
How serendipity in an Israeli lab led to drought-resistant plants
Plant biologist Shimon Gepstein did not set out to find a revolutionary technology that has been successfully producing drought-resistant rice, ...
The Grocery Manufacturers Association has launched a GMO facts website
(Summary) In response to the growing polarization of the GMO debate, the Grocery Manufacturers Association (GMA) launched a new GMO ...
Europeans are less negative about GMOs than portrayed
Europeans may be slightly less anti-science than they are portrayed - at least when it comes to food. Though American ...
British Columbia: Union of B.C. Municipalities passes resolution to ask the province to ban GMOs
Municipal politicians rejected genetically engineered food by a narrow margin at the Union of B.C. Municipalities convention in Vancouver Thursday ...
Imagine a world without orange juice
Imagine a world without orange juice. Heck, I can’t even imagine a morning without this delicious drink. It’s been a ...
Poll: Are GM crops good for biodiversity?
Our special report, "All creatures great and small," argues that the best way to preserve biodiversity is to encourage growth. Perhaps even ...
Scientists use gene editing to dehorn dairy cattle
In groundbreaking research, University of Minnesota scientists have used a modified gene editing system to produce horn-free dairy cattle genetics ...
“The anti-GMO movement is anti-science/progress”
"One of the issues rolling around regarding the anti-gmo movement is whether they are anti-science," says Bernie Mooney in his ...
Africa: Drought-tolerant maize ‘could be available by 2017’
[NAIROBI] A drought-tolerant maize variety could be available to farmers in Sub-Saharan Africa by 2017, according to scientists working on ...
Golden Rice: A product of precise plant breeding for a noble purpose
"Throughout world history, humans have succeeded in improving plants and animals as food sources," explains Ben O. de Lumen, Ph.D., ...
International rice institute responds to Tufts’ Golden Rice screw up
Human nutrition studies help us understand how well the beta carotene in Golden Rice is converted to vitamin A or ...
Africa shouldn’t take GM crops lightly, but neither can it ignore their potential
In the unlikely event that I had forgotten just how controversial and polarizing genetically modified organisms (GMOs) are, the past few days ...
The bad science checklist of GMO opponents
One of my favorite science websites is at Science or Not, the author of which, Graham Coghill, claims that “this website will ...
