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.
Understanding honeybee deaths: Close to 100% of Massachusetts’ hives infected by viruses
The honey bee population is on the decline, and bee experts want to know why, so the State Department of ...
One-fourth of cow genome descendant from snakes and lizards, study shows
There are genes known as retrotransposons that can copy themselves and paste the duplicates in other parts of our DNA, ...
Nigeria to commercialize GMO cowpeas and cotton by 2018
The National Agriculture Seed Council (NASC) has commenced sensitisation of Nigerian seed companies in preparation for the commercialisation of Genetically ...
Will EPA’s new restrictions on dicamba herbicide quell drift problems?
On the back of drift complaints, the filing of class-action lawsuits and, most recently, new EPA requirements for dicamba-tolerant crops, Monsanto continues to ...
John Deere acquires precision ag technology that could reduce pesticide use by 90 percent
Tractor giant John Deere just spent $305 million to acquire a startup that makes robots capable of identifying unwanted plants, ...
French grain farmers’ union opposes glyphosate ban, calling herbicide ‘essential’
With France set to vote against EU glyphosate re-registration this month, a group of French farmers have said they will ...
Rothamsted Research calls for more GMO trials or global food security will suffer
Genetic modification of plants will be essential to avert future food shortages, conclude a group of agricultural scientists who have ...
African scientists push governments to embrace GMOs to address fall armyworm crop losses
Over 17 million people in Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan and Uganda have reached emergency food insecurity ...
Insects can build resistance to Bt crops in as little as five years, study shows
While organic farmers have used Bt proteins in sprays successfully for more than half a century, some scientists feared that ...
GMO hornless cow awaits approval amid FDA policy changes
[In 2016], Recombinetics, the 35-person company [geneticist Scott Fahrenkrug] founded in 2008 with three other geneticists from the University of ...
Air freshener moss genetically engineered by failed plant glow-in-the-dark inventor
In 2013, Taxa launched a Kickstarter for genetically engineered plants would glow at night, cutting street lamp electricity costs tremendously ...
Utilization of GMO crops could double Bolivia’s corn yields
Bolivia has been harvesting genetically modified (GM) soybeans since 2008, and its production exceeds one million hectares per year since 2012 ...
Livestock feedlots more sustainable than organic cattle grazing, research shows
[Editor’s note: Dan Blaustein-Rejto is a food and agriculture analyst at the Breakthrough Institute.] A new report provides further evidence ...
Viewpoint: Do neonic traces found in world honey pose problems to bees or humans?
The last taste of honey you enjoyed likely came from bees exposed to neonicotinoids, the world’s most widely used class ...
Kenyan GMO task force to oversee commercial rollout of Bt insect-resistant cotton
[On October 11th, Kenya] unveiled a national task force to oversee the commercialization of genetically modified cotton in the next ...
Reinstatement of pesticide glyphosate use in Bermuda stirs protestors’ concerns
Lieutenant-Colonel David Burch, the Minister of Public Works [on the island of Bermuda] announced that his ministry would be granted ...
Video: Malaysian scientist’s TED talk on how to elevate public understanding of science and genetics
Fear-mongering ‘facts’—like tomatoes engineered with spider genes or cars exploding from full gas tanks on hot summer days— show how ...
Genetically enhancing the nutrients in corn using synthetic methionine
Methionine, found in meat, is one of the nine essential amino acids that humans get from food, according to the ...
Researchers map genome of famously strong-smelling durian fruit
[A team of five researchers from the National Cancer Centre Singapore (NCCS) ] used state-of-the-art sequencing platforms to map the ...
Cancer drugs could be grown in chicken eggs
Japanese researchers have genetically engineered hens whose eggs contain drugs that can fight serious diseases including cancer, in a bid ...
GMO debate intensifies as Ghana prepares for first crop release in 2018
The debate over whether biotechnology applications are safe in food production has intensified in Ghana as the country prepares for ...
Monsanto, other seed developers invest in gene editing in hopes of sidestepping GMO fears
Seed developers including Monsanto Co. and DowDuPont Inc. have invested in gene-editing technology, which enables scientists to make precise changes ...
Viewpoint: Many fears around ‘processed foods’ not based on science
[Most] of us don’t have a clear understanding of what “processed food” means. Many foods we like to think of ...
Nigeria’s biosafety director supports advantages of GMO crops despite criticisms
Despite the criticism that has trailed the used of Genetically Modified Organisms, GMOs, Nigeria’s bio-safety chief has defended the use ...
Viewpoint: EU’s glyphosate reauthorization should depend on science, not precaution
[Editor’s note: Pieter Cleppe is the head of the Brussels office of Open Europe, a non-partisan and independent policy think ...
Monsanto settles GM cotton royalties dispute with Indian seed firms
Three leading Indian cotton seed makers have settled an intellectual property dispute with Monsanto Co over its genetically modified (GM) ...
Pumpkins, cucumbers, and watermelons diverged from a single melon ancestor
About 100 million years ago, the genome of a single melon-like fruit copied itself. Over time, this one ancestor became ...
