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.
EPA panel begins evaluation of carcinogenicity of glyphosate
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is holding four days of meetings, beginning December 13, aimed at examining the evidence that ...
Is Boulder County’s GMO ban example of ‘fact-free,’ emotional regulation?
[Editor's note: Recently Boulder County, CO voted to phase out GMO crops on county-owned farmland. For more info, start here.] ...
GM baker’s yeast could one day provide caffeine addicts with their next fix
The proliferation of coffee shops and energy drinks bears testimony to the fact that caffeine is in high demand. The ...
Why the food science community should support GMO technology for the developing world
...it is helpful to view the GMO debate through the lenses of the “Rich World” and the “Poor World.” In ...
Nigerian Academy of Science speaks out in support of GMO adoption
When the Nigerian Academy of Science recently endorsed the country’s experimenting with Genetically Modified Organisms, generally known as GMOs, one ...
Freeloading farmers? Alleged cases of organic crop insurance abuses in Texas
“Pure and simple, they’ll harvest this field with a disc,” Carroll says. “No yield means big bucks. Rest assured, failure ...
Are millennials’ attitudes on GMOs anti-science?
If you have noticed the selection of organic, GMO-free crackers encroaching on the shelf space of the Pop Tarts and ...
Will Trump Administration reduce ‘unnecessary’ agricultural biotechnology regulations?
During the campaign, President-elect Trump questioned whether certain regulations were sensible, and in its transition to power the new administration ...
Indian farmer: Anti-GMO mustard activists don’t speak for me
For the last 20 years, I have farmed mustard in ... Rajasthan. Every year I procure hybrid seeds and use five ...
Boulder commissioners suppressed report showing GMO crops more sustainable than organic
The County Commissioners’ March 17 decision to ban GMOs from Boulder County open space was rigged. Commissioners Elise Jones and ...
Why farmers have been slow to adopt GMO alfalfa
Adoption of genetically engineered alfalfa among farmers has lagged behind other biotech crops, with the vast majority of U.S. acreage ...
Monsanto sued by peach farmer over alleged damage from illegal herbicide use
Missouri’s largest peach producer has filed a lawsuit against Monsanto Co., alleging that the biotech company bears responsibility for illegal ...
How Michael Pollan and the ‘foodie’ movement hurt small farmers
...[I]n some ways I am glad the "foodie" movement encouraged people to learn more about agriculture and how farmers provide the ...
New York Times unresponsive to scientists’ criticism of Danny Hakim’s error-filled article on GMO ‘failures’
The New York Times has conducted a decades-long vendetta against the ... techniques of genetic engineering applied to agriculture. Bias and inaccuracy ...
Breakthrough Institute: Outdated romantic notions of farming crippling innovation
Since the dawn of agriculture, humans have been converting forests, grasslands, and other ecosystems to farmland. The long-term conversion of ...
Nigeria will train ex-militants in modern agriculture including biotechnology
Coordinator of the Presidential Amnesty Programme, retired Brig-Gen. Paul Boroh, has said 1,000 former agitators will soon commence training in ...
GMO wars will seem ‘quaint’ when 3-D printed meat is introduced
We love organic food. We hate genetically modified food. That’s how the cool kids think these days. But the nerds ...
European Commission presses to allow countries to ban GMO foods EU science authority deems safe
The European Commission has made one more attempt to convince member states that they should accept its proposal to give ...
Norman Borlaug’s daughter Julie calls GMO opponents “anti-innovation”
The use of ... GMOs, is an important topic to many consumers. We recently talked with Julie Borlaug, granddaughter of Norman Borlaug ...
Does a burger from a hormone-treated cow pose a health problem? Maybe, if you eat the bun
[This article was written by Michelle Miller, aka Farm Babe, who raises lambs and beef cattle, and grows almost 2,000 ...
UN Biodiversity Conference: Anti-technology NGOs aim to block gene drive, CRISPR, synthetic biology
The UN Biodiversity Conference is taking place in Cancun through December 17. Activist groups and ... international NGOs can have a ...
New, more efficient method for using CRISPR to genetically edit flowering plants
A pair of plant biologists at the Institute of Transformative Bio-Molecules (ITbM) of Nagoya University, has reported in the journal Plant ...
Genetically-altered goats produce less allergenic milk
β-Lactoglobulin (BLG) is a dominant allergen present in the milk of goats and other ungulates, although it is not found ...
New Zealand won’t permit field trials of sustainable GMO ryegrass
AgResearch scientists have developed a genetically modified (GM) ryegrass that has a 40 per cent increase in production and a 30 ...
‘Precautionary’ delays in deploying GMO technology could cost $1 trillion
This article introduces a simple framework to assess the economics of delaying the introduction of GM technologies due to concerns ...
Gene editing could boost tomato yields by speeding fruit ripening
Using a simple and powerful genetic method to tweak genes native to two popular varieties of tomato plants, a team ...
Monsanto, climate experts collaborating to reduce farming’s carbon footprint
Various groups have joined with Monsanto Co. to form the Carbon-Neutral Collaborative, which was highlighted in a news release as ...
