18/May/20

 

A majority of genetically engineered and gene edited plants now will escape any oversight on the part of the US Department of Agriculture under revised regulations issued by the agency. Despite a unified position from environmental groups, consumer organizations, biotech crop developers, and food industry stakeholders imploring USDA to eliminate a provision allowing crop developers to self-determine whether their products are regulated, the Trump administration refused to require developers to even notify the agency of products they believe are exempt under the new regulations. CSPI

 

 

The influential global nonprofit group International Life Sciences Institute (ILSI) says that its mission is to “improve the well-being of the general public,” but a new open access study published in Public Health Nutrition adds evidence that it is in fact a food industry front group. The study, based on documents obtained by US Right to Know via state public records requests, uncovered “a pattern of activity in which ILSI sought to exploit the credibility of scientists and academics to bolster industry positions and promote industry-devised content in its meetings, journal, and other activities". GMWatch

 

 

If you’re trying to get pregnant and raise healthy children, recent science suggests you should consider switching to an organic diet and voting out politicians who put the pesticide industry in charge of our nation’s health laws. The Journals of the American Medical Association have published studies implicating pesticide-treated foods in fertility problems and documenting large increases in human exposure to the world’s most widely used pesticide, along with a physician’s commentary encouraging people to eat organic. Huffington Post (2017 article but still important)

 

 

In 2014, the Bangladesh Agricultural Research Institute introduced four different GM aubergines (Bt brinjal) to resist the fruit and shoot borer pest. According to the sustainability group UBINIG, farmers have been reluctant to grow the GM varieties because they had negative experiences when trialling them. The International Food Policy Research Institute and the ministry of agriculture claim that 27,000 smallholder farmers are cultivating Bt brinjal across all districts of Bangladesh. But UBINIG was unable to find any GM brinjals in marketplaces – at least, there were no GM brinjals labelled GM in accord with the government's directive. This leaves the possibility that GM brinjals are being sold, but secretly and illegally. New Age

 

 

The Campaign to Stop GE Trees has had a letter published in the New York Times condemning the newspaper's biased pro-GMO reporting of plans to replace the American Chestnut tree with GM versions. The Campaign to Stop GE Trees