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.
EU Court of Justice upholds ban on neonicotinoid insecticides, dismissing cases by Bayer and Syngenta
A top European Union court upheld on Thursday (17 May) the ban on three insecticides blamed for killing off bee ...
Podcast: What it means to be a ‘sustainable’ farmer
Tim Hammerich sat down with journalist Marc Brazeau, founder and director the Food and Farm Discussion Lab for his Future of Agriculture Podcast. His question ...
New GMO corn variety significantly increases yields by boosting photosynthesis
The biotech firm Benson Hill Biosystems and the seed company Beck’s say their six-year-old partnership has yielded a trait that increases ...
Switzerland’s citizens to vote on complete ban of synthetic pesticides
Swiss citizens will get the chance to vote on a complete ban on the use of synthetic pesticides after campaigners ...
Blight-resistant GMO potatoes reduce pesticide use 80% in Ireland field trial
The environmental impact of potato production can be reduced by 95% by using a genetically modified (GM) blight-resistant potato in ...
Geneticist Pamela Ronald: Follow the facts—not your feelings—on GMOs
What does the drug insulin have in common with cheese, Hawaiian papaya and a vegan burger? All were developed using ...
Carnivorous waterwheel plant ten times faster than Venus flytrap
Scientists have characterised the movement of the Venus flytrap's aquatic cousin in detail for the first time. The carnivorous Aldrovanda vesiculosa, ...
Can organic farms produce similar yields to conventional agriculture?
In February [2018], scientists from Wageningen University & Research in the Netherlands and other institutes published an article [link (behind paywall)] ...
Viewpoint: What California’s coffee-cancer label teaches us about IARC and glyphosate
For coffee drinkers in California, health warnings on their morning fix will soon be commonplace. [In May], a legal battle involving Starbucks ...
How regulators ensure that pesticide residues on food don’t hurt us
Due to my relationship with the world of food, I constantly hear inaccurate comments about GMOs and agricultural pesticides. While ...
What the ‘Big Six’ agricultural biotech companies think about the GMO debate
Smack at the center of the debate over genetically modified organisms and their role in developing countries are large corporations. Bayer, BASF, Dow ...
UN food group: Sustainable bioeconomy can help tackle hunger, poverty and climate change
If done right, in particular with and for family farmers, bioeconomy can help efforts to tackle pressing global problems such ...
Indian government committee says more field trials needed before GMO mustard commercialization
A committee under Union Ministry of Environment and Forest (MoEF) has turned down commercial release of genetically modified mustard developed ...
Organic vs ‘biodynamic’ farming: What’s the difference?
These days biodynamic agriculture is often assumed to be a standard of excellence in agriculture or viticulture, although it widely ...
Disease-resistant GMO tomatoes, strawberries and citrus in the pipeline
As increasing numbers of genetically engineered crops become available for commercial markets, scientists are industriously working to develop the next ...
Viewpoint: Why does US still use neonicotinoid insecticides when they’re banned in Europe?
In late April, the European Union banned a blockbuster trio of neonicotinoid insecticides, marketed by chemical giants Syngenta and Bayer. The decision, motivated by mounting ...
Video: Blight-resistant GMO potato could help Ugandan farmers increase yields, reduce pesticide use
A GMO potato offers hope to Uganda farmers who are struggling with the devastating late blight disease. But politics have ...
Argentine scientists develop non-browning potatoes using CRISPR gene editing
Researchers of the INTA [Instituto Nacional de Tecnología Agropecuaria] Balcarce [in Argentina] edited the genome that causes enzymatic browning in ...
Funny or Die website: ‘All-Natural, Non-GMO 100% Gluten-Free Internet Video!’
If you've walked through the grocery store you've probably seen the marketing spin of food labels. “Non-GMO,” “gluten free,” “natural,” ...
Once-promising field of advanced biofuels is in ‘shambles’—can it be revived?
[Jay Keasling, a synthetic biologist at the University of California, Berkeley, and chief executive of the Joint BioEnergy Institute] did ...
Italian politician calls on EU to embrace new plant breeding techniques to cut farming’s environmental impact
The new plant breeding techniques (NPBTs) are a major opportunity to move toward sustainable agriculture and simultaneously ensure food quality ...
How GMO crops can benefit Nigerian farmers
The application of modern Biotechnology in an integrated multi-disciplinary approach can be a valuable ‘tool’ for addressing the several challenges ...
CRISPR chocolate? Gene editing boosts cacao trees’ disease resistance
Use of the powerful gene-editing tool CRISPR-Cas9 could help to breed cacao trees that exhibit desirable traits such as enhanced ...
CRISPR’s swiftest and most promising application might be food
When people mention CRISPR, they’re usually breathless over its potential to cure diseases like sickle cell anemia and muscular dystrophy ...
GMO bans leave Europe, Africa vulnerable to fall army worm invasion
A crop-destroying caterpillar that has devastated agriculture in Africa is poised to spread into southern Europe for the first time and ...
Viewpoint: Don’t let anti-GMO activist moms bully you into buying organic
I could certainly afford to pay up to 50 per cent more for organic food for my children to eat, ...
Video: Can CRISPR gene editing help solve world’s food and farming challenges?
A research team at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory is developing higher-yielding tomato plants with a gene-editing tool called Crispr-Cas9. Are ...
