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.
Philippine government anti-poverty agency claims Golden Rice ‘poses health risks’ and ‘threatens peasants’
The genetically-modified organism (GMO) known as “golden rice” will not significantly address hunger or Vitamin A deficiency (VAD) in the ...
Viewpoint: GMO crops can empower smallholder women farmers in Africa
Efforts to get products of modern agricultural technologies, such as GM crops, into the hands of farmers have so far ...
Sri Lankan chemistry professor: Lift the glyphosate ban, which was based on pseudoscience
As a Professor of Chemistry and University President who in a small way pioneered environmental science and food technology in the 1970s ...
Trump vs China: Trade war could hurt US GMO soybean farmers
Alan Kemper, a farmer from Lafayette, Indiana, and former president of both the American Soybean Association and National Corn Growers ...
Indiana fish farm will grow genetically engineered AquAdvantage salmon in 2018
A biotechnology company is upgrading a defunct fish farm where it plans to grow AquAdvantage Salmon — the first genetically engineered ...
Viewpoint: What happened to Russian ‘Factor GMO’ study—and why aren’t journalists covering it?
In late 2014, with fanfare and a multi-lingual press conference, a group centered in Russia hacked the food media with ...
Growing wheat in Africa? Variety developed with advanced breeding techniques can withstand 104 degrees
In the northern Senegalese village of Ndiayene Pendao, close to the border with Mauritania, Fatouma Sow is pulling weeds. Her team ...
Field study finds no negative impact on bees from neonicotinoid insecticide
In the last decade, the use of neonicotinoid insecticides increased significantly in the agricultural landscape and meanwhile considered a risk ...
Viewpoint: GMO crops are ‘natural step’ in long history of plant breeding innovations
Humanity has been benefiting from plant science innovations since the Egyptians first bred edible corn more than 2000 years ago ...
‘You have to have the courage to do it’: Kevin Folta on why scientists need to communicate with the public about GMOs
On Sunday, September 6, 2015, scientist Kevin Folta made the front page of the New York Times. ... [T]he Times article ...
Viewpoint: Chemical-free gardening is a myth
So-called “nature” is teeming with chemicals, in soil, in plants, in rain and not only in nettles. Chemical-free gardening is ...
Australian politician compares anti-GMO activists to ISIS
WA [West Australia] Upper House Liberal member and former grains farmer Jim Chown says anti-Genetically Modified (GM) crop activists are ...
How indoor farming and ‘metagenomics’ could change how we grow vegetables
Trevor Charles has three decades of experience in bacterial genetics, molecular biology and metagenomics and is CSO at Metagenom Bio Inc ...
Viewpoint: Organic campaigners in Uganda use ‘scare tactics’ to keep GMO crops from farmers
The organics are marketed as “sustainable agriculture”, “agro-ecology farming”, and “farming God’s way”. Organic products are branded natural, organic, safe, ...
Animal scientist: Genetic engineering can improve livestock health, growth and well-being
One method [Jon Oatley, director of the Center for Reproductive Biology at Washington State University] and his team of researchers ...
Genetically modified weeds could usher in new era of ‘genetic control’
The USDA’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture has announced a $500,000 grant to University of Illinois researchers in the ...
CRISPR food in grocery stores in 5 years? Gene editing research picks up speed
CRISPR, which works by finding and then replacing, editing or deleting a genetic sequence inside an organism, is currently being ...
Honeycrisp-enterprise cross: Cosmic crisp is biggest-ever launch of apple variety
Nearly 30 years ago, Dr Bruce Barritt was jeered when he branded the apple industry in Washington state a dinosaur ...
Viewpoint: Anti-GMO opposition to CRISPR gene editing driven by skepticism of corporations, capitalism
The Des Moines Register recently reported on research ... which unveiled Russian funding for and promotion of articles that question the ...
Bayer-Monsanto merger reflects larger trends in global agrochemical industry
The progress of the Bayer-Monsanto mega-takeover, which [recently] secured regulatory approval from European Union (EU) competition authorities, is only the ...
Kosher pork? Meat from cloned pigs and lab-grown meat are Kosher, prominent Israeli rabbi says
Prominent Israeli Rabbi Yuval Cherlow says meat from a cloned pig would be considered kosher under Jewish dietary laws. Cherlow, ...
It’s official: California will require cancer warning label on coffee products
A Los Angeles judge has determined that coffee companies must carry an ominous cancer warning label because of a chemical ...
First GMO crop in UK? Anti-biotech activists protest Rothamsted Research’s camelina field trials
Crops which have been genetically modified so they produce industrial products could be grown in Britain for the first time ...
Uganda’s GMO law expected to pass now that president’s ‘concerns’ have been addressed, officials say
Some Ugandan officials are optimistic that the nation’s biotechnology biosafety bill will soon pass, saying that President Museveni’s concerns have ...
Hatchery-raised vs wild-born coho salmon: Containment sites may alter epigenome, hurting survival in the wild
[Biologist Louis Bernatchez of Quebec’s Laval University] and his colleagues set out to search for evidence of a different kind of hatchery adaptation, ...
Viewpoint: Why are universities paying ‘anti-GMO liar’ Vandana Shiva tens of thousands of dollars to speak?
Vandana Shiva is coming to my hometown to lie. Not cool. For those unaware, Shiva is one of the world’s ...
With growing season nearing, concerns rise over more potential dicamba damage as Missouri lawsuit proceeds
Eyes on wide swaths of the nation's farmland are sure to look out for continued damage from dicamba – divisive ...
