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.
Insect-resistant Bt rice nutritionally equivalent to its non-GMO counterpart, study finds
Researchers from the Republic of Korea documented that Bt rice is compositionally equivalent to its non-Bt counterpart by using four ...
Nature editorial: Post-Brexit, the UK should embrace gene editing in food and agriculture while taking safety concerns seriously
[B]ecause of Brexit, [the UK] has an opportunity to diverge from EU [agricultural] regulations. In a consultation that [ended] on ...
EU pitches 23 ‘actions’ to achieve Farm 2 Fork targets, including promoting organic food in schools
The European Commission is counting on a suite of measures including new procurement schemes, promotional funds and research initiatives to ...
‘Gene editing is part of the solution’: With other sustainable farming tools, it will help us beat climate change
Despite changes in temperature, humidity and fertilizer application, [plants of the future] must be able to produce optimally. In addition, ...
French court upholds sugar beet grower exemption from neonicotinoids insecticide ban
Condemned as "bee killers," [neonicotinoid pesticides] have been officially banned in France since 2018. However, faced with the jaundice crisis ...
GM crops with bigger, deeper roots could help restore depleted topsoil
[A] good portion of topsoil—the black fertile dirt that looks exactly like what you buy at the home and hardware ...
UK poised to lift ban on gene-edited crop cultivation
Gene editing involves replacing genes that govern traits such as water dependency and nutrition with better-functioning ones from the same ...
Insect-resistant, GM, Bt corn could help Kenya keep cancer-causing mycotoxins out of its food supply
[The Kenyan] Agriculture and Food Authority (AFA) slapped a ban on maize imports from Uganda and Tanzania, saying tests on ...
Can CRISPR tame avian flu and prevent the next pandemic?
Now that the COVID-19 vaccine rollout is picking up steam, it’s tempting to hope that the world can soon move ...
GM, insect-resistant, Bt cowpea could generate more than $638 million for Nigeria over next six years
The newly released Bt cowpea facilitated by the Open Forum on Agricultural Biotechnology (OFAB) is expected to generate over $638 ...
Canada exempts gene-edited plants from regulatory review, speeding new crop development
Gene-edited plants differ from traditional GMOs because the method used to modify their genetic codes differs, and they often don’t ...
Viewpoint: Dirty Dozen? It’s time for Environmental Working Group to abandon pesticide scare tactics
Dramatic health benefits combined with low consumption figures underscore the need and importance of multiple efforts and resources to improve ...
EU ‘Green Deal’ could mandate 50% cut in pesticide use, include tax on ‘most dangerous’ chemicals
The [European] Commission proposed a 50 percent cut in the risk and use of pesticides by 2030 as part of ...
Viewpoint: Glyphosate weedkiller is dangerous and should be banned, or the $11 billion Roundup settlement is a legal ‘shakedown’
Plaintiffs allege that glyphosate—a widely used herbicide—is carcinogenic. Though it looks like Bayer will end up paying nearly $11 billion ...
Latin American researchers use gene editing to breed hardier crops
Latin American researchers are using gene editing to breed hardier varieties of staple crops and fruits, according to an Alliance ...
Facing tighter pesticide restrictions, Italian fruit growers hope biotechnology can help protect their orchards
Fruit growers are on the alert. “Once again we fruit growers find ourselves facing .... the consequences of other people’s ...
Video: Lab-grown meat is a global sensation. But can it really help battle climate change?
Last year, Singapore became the first country to allow the sale of lab-grown meat. BBC Minute takes a look at ...
China’s ‘five-year plan’ for farming productivity emphasizes importance of biotech crops
[China’s 13th] Five-Year Plan, which ended in 2020, was focused on eradicating extreme poverty in the country. With the new ...
GM, drought-tolerant, insect-resistant corn could save Nigeria $168 million in pesticide imports annually
Nigeria could save $168 million worth of chemical import annually from the production of the new maize variety. [TELA maize ...
‘Quest for deliciousness’: How hunger for tasty food drove human evolution
Human evolution and exploration of the world were shaped by a hunger for tasty food – “a quest for deliciousness” ...
Viewpoint: France’s anti-GMO Green Party committed to a dying breed of ‘radical’ environmentalism
[The French Green Party is] well on their way to becoming the last dinosaurs of a ridiculous and radical ecologism ...
Infographic: What are TALENs? Another important gene-editing tool to boost sustainable farming
See the original post here ...
Global food system responsible for 34% of greenhouse gas emissions, study finds
We have developed a new global food emissions database (EDGAR-FOOD) estimating greenhouse gas (GHG; CO2, CH4, N2O, fluorinated gases) emissions ...
EPA blocks state-level attempts to ease restrictions on drift-prone dicamba weedkiller
EPA said it intends to deny an attempt by North Carolina to extend the cutoff dates for dicamba to accommodate ...
Cattle industry sees real competition in growing alternative meat industry
The trend of moving away from the traditional burger intensified [recently], when it was announced that McDonalds and Yum! Brands ...
Is Europe’s Farm 2 Fork plan to expand organic farming really all that good for the environment?
[The European Union's "Farm to Fork" policy] seeks to reduce the use of pesticides and fertilizers by 50% by 2050 ...
Limited consumer demand could hinder Europe’s plans to reach 25% organic food production
EU plans to make over 25 percent of Europe’s farmland organic by 2030 will depend on changes in consumption patterns, ...
