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.
Monsanto and ag giants ‘own’ global seed business? No. 7200 seed companies in Europe alone.
The seed market in Europe contains nearly 7,200 seed companies, totaling more than 50,000 employees and accounts for 20 percent of the ...
GMO food labeling bill opens door to political interference in science
On Thursday, July 23, the “DARK” side took a hit. By a vote of 275 to 150, the House of ...
Atlantic latest liberal publication to oppose mandatory GMO labeling
On Thursday, July 23, the U.S. House of Representatives passed a bill that would ban states from requiring special labels ...
Humans began farming sooner that scientists thought
When did humans first begin farming? Scientists have long thought that our prehistoric ancestors didn't start raising crops until some 12,000 ...
Bacteria genetically engineered to make indigo could make dying jeans ‘greener’
Blue jeans get their signature color from indigo, a dye. Producing that indigo releases chemicals that can pollute water and ...
EU fights ‘STOP TTIP’ activists campaign maligning US crops with YouTube videos
In early 2013, President Barack Obama's call for a U.S.-EU trade deal generated such optimism in Europe that the graffiti ...
How low-quality research is used as activist propaganda
The paper published in Agricultural Sciences by Shiva Ayyadurai presents a hypothesis that transgenic soybeans are high in formaldehyde and ...
Mental health leading cause of farmer suicide in India, not indebtedness from buying GMO seeds
For over a decade, farmer suicides in India has been a serious public policy concern. More recently, this has led ...
80% of Americans demand mandatory labeling of ASOs–Artificially Selected Organisms
A new petition to Whitehouse.gov demands mandatory labeling for all “artificially selected organisms” (ASOs). The petition reads: ASO plants or ...
Food and ideology don’t mix: There’s not one way to feed world
There’s an unbreachable divide between advocates of modern conventional agriculture and, essentially, everyone else, from the mainstream (organic, local, anti-GMO) ...
How one farmer uses GMO corn to reduce pesticides, increase sustainability
In a wide, brown field, Bret Davis opens a pocketknife with a click, kneels down and scrapes through a furrow ...
Gene editing could end cruelty to dehorned dairy cows–unless GMO opponents derail it
Most of the roughly 9 million dairy cows in the United States have been dehorned—with an iron, clippers, or caustic ...
Bees not dying; Europe should lift neonics ban
Brussels banned a class of pesticides to avert a ‘beepocalypse’ that wasn’t happening. Now bugs threaten crops, and farmers may ...
GMOs contain formaldehyde? Kevin Folta challenge: ‘Let’s cooperate on lab analysis’ (crickets)
Dr. Shiva Ayyadurai recently published a systems biology paper in Agricultural Sciences. The report left much to be desired, and ...
Examining claims GMO cotton causing Indian suicide epidemic
One major accusation of evil on the part of GMOs and Monsanto is forcing Indian farmers into debt through expensive seed that cannot be ...
Monsanto refutes claims in Neil Young’s documentary
Monsanto, a company that manufactures genetically engineered seeds for agriculture that has sparked the ire of Neil Young, has issued ...
Rice with barley genes emits less greenhouse gas
A new type of genetically modified (GM) rice might significantly lessen the impact of agriculture on the climate. The plant, ...
Open letter to Consumer Reports: Organic alternatives to glyphosate not necessarily safer
Dear Consumer Reports, In the article Beat Those Weeds (Which was, somewhat ironically, published in the YOUR ADVOCATE section of ...
Biofortifying crops for better nutrition helps improve health of poorest
When I started my career as an economist 30 years ago, I had no idea that I would eventually work ...
New study challenges Moms Across America claim glyphosate present in mothers’ breastmilk
Washington State University scientists have found that glyphosate, the main ingredient in the herbicide Roundup, does not accumulate in mother's ...
House passes voluntary GMO labeling law as Senate girds for fight
The U.S. House of Representatives on Thursday, July 23, passed a hotly debated measure that would set up a system ...
East African countries face harsh biosafety restrictions in expanding gene editing research
For scientists across the globe in agricultural value chain to counteract the upcoming challenges likely to be faced by factors ...
GM canola becoming popular in Australia as farmers see yields increasing
Canola was once considered only useful as a break crop to clean-up weeds in paddocks, according to agronomist Greg Sefton, Cobram, ...
UK lifts EU ban on neonics to allow farmers to fight pests
Farmers will be able to use blacklisted pesticides linked to serious harm in bees after the UK government temporarily lifted ...
As bugs become resistant to Bt maize in South Africa, new practices needed to delay resistence
In the case of maize, the GM crops planted and consumed in South Africa are known as Bt-crops, so named ...
Chilean salmon industry aims to replace antibiotics with biotech bacteria
In an effort to reduce the use of antibiotics in the Chilean salmon farming industry, researchers in the South American ...
Nutrition professionals need to enter conversation on GMOs
I originally discussed the need for nutrition professionals to enter the genetic engineering (GE) conversation/GMO debates on the American Society ...
