Wed, 16 Jul 2008 08:55:43 -0700 http://nwrage.org/ PostNuke Powered Site en-us http://nwrage.org/images/logo.gif http://nwrage.org/ frankie4260@hotmail.com http://nwrage.org/Article2283.html The cultivation of genetically modified maize has caused a drastic reduction in organic cultivation of this grain and is making their coexistence practically impossible. This is the main conclusion reached in one of the first field studies in Europe carried out by a researcher of the Institute of Environmental Science and Technology of the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, who has analysed the situation in Catalonia and Aragon, Europe’s main producers of transgenic foods. The study was carried out by researcher Rosa Binimelis of the UAB Institute of Environmental Science and Technology. Binimelis is working on the European project ALARM (Assessing Large Scale Risks for Biodiversity with Tested Methods) and analyses the application of the concept of coexistence between Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs) and conventional organic agriculture in the European Union. The results of the research have been published in the Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Ethics (April 2008). Wed, 16 Jul 2008 08:55:43 -0700 http://nwrage.org/Article2282.html Riceland Foods Inc. in Stuttgart subjected the state’s rice farmers to an ”ultrahazardous risk” when it experimented with genetically modified rice that contaminated the commercial supply, a class action lawsuit filed Wednesday alleges. Arkansas’ more than 4,000 rice farmers were adversely affected when the European Union began refusing Arkansas rice in 2006 after the genetically modified strain, Liberty Link, contaminated the state’s exports, according to the lawsuit filed in Lonoke County Circuit Court. Lonoke County residents and farmers Roger Webb, Harold West and JoAnn West are listed as class representatives in the lawsuit against the farmer-owned cooperative and world’s largest rice miller and marketer. Wed, 16 Jul 2008 08:53:05 -0700 http://nwrage.org/Article2281.html We're merely protecting an investment that exceeds $2 million a day -- Monsanto When you buy a loaf of bread, it's yours. You're done. It should be the same way with seeds. -- Gary Rinehart, wrongly sued convenience store owner Soybean farmer David Brumback calls himself a loyal customer of Monsanto Co. His product of choice: genetically engineered seeds resistant to pesticides and weed killers. So when the biotech giant named Brumback and more than 100 other local farmers in a subpoena seeking five years of sales records, his first reaction was befuddlement. Then anger. "With Monsanto, you're guilty until you're proven innocent," he said. Wed, 16 Jul 2008 08:49:51 -0700 http://nwrage.org/Article2280.html The European Patent Office in Munich is today granting an extensive patent (EP 1651777) on a method of breeding pigs despite international criticism and lack of clarity on the patent's legality. According to Greenpeace's analyses the genetic conditions described in it occur in all European pig breeds. The claims have been formulated in such a way that not only do they include the breeding method; the patent owner can in a dispute also make claims on pigs themselves and all their progeny. Greenpeace will lay an objection to the patent because it is in violation of the ban on patenting "mainly biological processes" for breeding. The European Patent Office is at present examining the extent to which patents on the breeding of normal plants and animals may in principle be granted at all. A decision on this is expected in 2009. "Corporations can use patents like this to go a long way towards monopolising animal breeding in Europe," says the patents expert Christoph Then on Greenpeace's behalf. "It is incredible that the European Patent Office is issuing a patent which is based on normal breeding and does not include any inventive steps whatsoever. This takeover of food production through patents must be halted." The US corporation Monsanto had originally applied for the patent in 2005. Making it known that it was collaborating closely with Monsanto, the US corporation Lengsham Choice Genetics bought the patent while the application was being examined. Wed, 16 Jul 2008 08:40:53 -0700 http://nwrage.org/Article2279.html Rising food prices are a hardship here at home, but they're truly disastrous for many beyond our borders. The staggering 83 percent rise in food prices reported by the World Bank over the past three years hits developing nations hardest. It's a complex situation with many causes, but the crisis is teaching us important and urgent lessons. First among these is what we've learned about biofuels. Once considered the "green" solution to foreign oil dependence, corn ethanol has morphed into a humanitarian and environmental disaster. Diverting one-quarter of America's massive corn harvest from food to fuel has nearly crippled the globalized food system. A bushel of corn fetches about three times the price it did two years ago, one big reason for quadrupling tortilla prices in Mexico. Wheat and soybean farmers, lured by higher profits, switched over to corn. As a result, supplies of those crops are limited and wheat prices have risen an astronomical 130 percent since 2007, exacerbated by poor Australian harvests. Fri, 04 Jul 2008 17:49:18 -0700 http://nwrage.org/Article2278.html Biofuels have forced global food prices up by 75% - far more than previously estimated - according to a confidential World Bank report obtained by the Guardian. The damning unpublished assessment is based on the most detailed analysis of the crisis so far, carried out by an internationally- respected economist at global financial body. The figure emphatically contradicts the US government's claims that plant-derived fuels contribute less than 3% to food-price rises. It will add to pressure on governments in Washington and across Europe, which have turned to plant-derived fuels to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases and reduce their dependence on imported oil. Senior development sources believe the report, completed in April, has not been published to avoid embarrassing President George Bush. "It would put the World Bank in a political hot-spot with the White House," said one yesterday. Fri, 04 Jul 2008 17:28:06 -0700 http://nwrage.org/Article2277.html Non-GM crops bred using traditional plant breeding methods still provide most of the food and animal feed in the world, covering more than 97% of agricultural land [1] compared with only 2.4% growing GM crops. The new analysis [2] was carried out by GM Freeze after media reports claimed 25% of global arable land was under GM crops – a figure obtained from the National Environmental Research Council’s website [3]. The GM Freeze analysis shows that in fact over 90% of global arable land [4] is used to cultivate non-GM crops. Even in the USA, where GM crops have been widely adopted, over 85% of agricultural land is growing non-GM crops and two thirds of arable land grew non-GM crops in 2007. Mon, 30 Jun 2008 14:35:18 -0700 http://nwrage.org/Article2276.html A new rice-growing system developed for the wetlands of West Africa could significantly increase the region’s yield capacity, bridging the gap between production and consumption and offering a long-term solution to the food crisis in Africa. West Africa has moved closer to attaining domestic self-sufficiency in rice, its fastest-growing and most costly food import. IITA, the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture, has developed a rice growing system, termed ’Sawah’ (Indonesian for ”wet rice-field”), which makes it possible to grow the crop in the region’s wetlands and with more than twice the yield of traditional dryland rice farms. IITA estimates that some 10 million rice farmers stand to benefit from the adoption of the system. As Africa imports about 40% of its rice and accounts for more than one-third of the rice traded globally, the ’Sawah’ system could save rice-consuming countries in the region some US$2 billion in annual import payments. But more importantly, it could help ease the food crisis in Africa where riots have erupted in recent months in several countries due to acute food shortage. Mon, 30 Jun 2008 14:33:32 -0700 http://nwrage.org/Article2275.html “All beers were organic 100 years ago,” says Christopher Mark O’Brien, Silver Spring, Md.-based author of Fermenting Revolution: How to Drink Beer and Save the World. Today, organic beers are a niche within a niche, constituting probably less than 1 percent of the craft beer segment (which itself produces less than 4 percent of the beer consumed in this country). But the sub-niche is growing rapidly: In 2006, sales totaled $25 million, up 32 percent over the previous year, according to the Organic Trade Association in Greenfield, Mass. To be advertised as organic, beer has to pass muster, just as other foods do. Ingredients must have been grown without the use of chemical pesticides, herbicides or fertilizers. No irradiation, no GMOs (genetically modified organisms). Certifying organizations may make surprise inspections to make sure brewers aren’t commingling organic and non-organic supplies. Mon, 30 Jun 2008 14:30:59 -0700 http://nwrage.org/Article2274.html While it seemed like a good idea to use agrofuels in the beginning- it has now become a menace to the quality of life for people globally and without reducing greenhouse gas emissions says the author. In the beginning it seemed like a good idea to power our cars using plant based "biofuels", like switching from a diet of greasy hamburgers to pure sweet green tea. Most environmentalists agreed, and governments around the globe adopted policies mandating biofuels use and supporting the burgeoning new industry with subsidies. Multinational agribusiness giants, Archer Daniels Midland, Cargill, Bunge, Monsanto.... all rolled up their sleeves and prepared the coffers for major cash influx. So did the biotechnology industries, anticipating new opportunities to market genetically engineered crops for fuel, even where their food crops remained unpopular. Auto manufacturers breathed a sigh of relief: with an alternative fuel available, people would not bother to drive less. Big Oil with an eye on the future, ramped up investment and a major green-wash campaign. Mon, 30 Jun 2008 14:26:18 -0700 http://nwrage.org/Article2273.html Last month, GM canola crops were planted for the first time in NSW and Victoria after the two states announced they would let their bans on genetically engineered food crops expire. In response, local celebrity chefs including Neil Perry and Kylie Kwong have signed on to the GM Free Chefs’ Charter, launched in collaboration with Greenpeace in Sydney. The charter, unveiled at chef Jared Ingersoll’s Danks Street Depot restaurant in the inner-city Sydney suburb of Waterloo, calls for the NSW and Victorian governments to reverse their position on growing GM canola and demands thorough labelling of all food products that contain GM ingredients. Mon, 30 Jun 2008 14:20:11 -0700 http://nwrage.org/Article2272.html Fifteen Belgian colza fields, owned by Bayer CropScience, have been contaminated by genetically modified organisms (GMOs) banned in Europe, the country’s public health ministry announced Tuesday. The Bayer subsidiary, which specialises in improving crop yields, informed the Belgian authorities of the contamination, which happened last month during the planting of normal colza -- a crop similar to rapeseed and used in cattlefeed, cooking oil, machinery lubricant and, increasingly, as a biofuel. ”The conventional seed lot was contaminated by five percent GMO colza,” the statement said. A preliminary investigation carried out by the multinational put the problem down to ”human error.” Bayer ”has taken measures to prevent the spread of non-authorised GMOs” including the uprooting and destruction of the young crop, which had not yet flowered or produced grain. Mon, 30 Jun 2008 14:15:25 -0700 http://nwrage.org/Article2271.html The African Centre for Biosafety (ACB) condemns Bayer Cropsciences’ spate of no less than 8 permit applications for field trials involving 8 Genetically Modified (GM) cotton varieties. These GM cotton varieties are to be tested in South Africa’s Limpopo Province, where the majority of the population is poor and marginalised. The applications come on the first anniversary of Bayer’s US$310 million acquisition of Monsanto’s of Stoneville Pedigreed Seed Company - a leading US producer of cottonseeds. We condemn these applications, which will continue to consolidate our agricultural system into the capitalist economy and leave small-scale farmers out in the cold. We also assert that these crops pose inherent risks to human and environmental health. Mon, 30 Jun 2008 14:08:42 -0700 http://nwrage.org/Article2270.html Comment: So it look like it might be time to start boycotting Mars and all other chocolate producers or users who want to use genetically engineered chocolate. Now the GE chocolate will be years away but NW RAGE suggests to our readers that you email or call candy companies and chocolate makers to demand they not use GE chocolate as well as demanding they not use genetically engineered Roundup Ready Sugar Beet sugar which may be coming onto the market this year. For more info on the GE Sugar Beets please click here Thu, 26 Jun 2008 10:41:01 -0700 http://nwrage.org/Article2269.html The saying goes, it’s an ill wind that blows nobody any good - and the increasing hunger spreading around the globe as the world food crisis takes hold is sending the genetically modified food lobby smiling all the way to the seed bank. Food prices may be at a record high, food reserves at an unprecedented low, and millions of the world’s poorest may be struggling to scrape together a single meal a day - but the much-battered biotech industry is enjoying its biggest ever public relations bonanza. Yesterday, Environment Minister Phil Woolas said Britain needs to look at whether GM technology could help tackle the current crisis, signalling an end to more than a decade of government scepticism over GM plants. Suddenly, after years of being shunned by the British public, the industry and its cheerleaders are scrambling for the unfamiliar territory of the moral high ground. Thu, 26 Jun 2008 10:32:38 -0700 http://nwrage.org/Article2268.html The biotechnology industry has never been shy of making outlandish claims on behalf of its products. Back in the late 1990s we were sold genetically modified soya and oilseed rape on the promise that it would feed the world. On closer examination, it became clear that these first-generation GM crops were more about intensifying chemical agriculture and sealing corporate control of the food chain than feeding starving babies in Africa. Consumers, especially in Europe, rose in revolt, and the industry was forced into retreat. But big companies like Monsanto, Syngenta and BASF are not easily kept at bay for long. Now their PR-men have discovered a new line in emotional blackmail: that without GM crops we will be unable to produce enough food in an era of climate change. Transgenic crops will be able to grow in drought-stricken, saline areas, we are assured, helping to augment food supplies in an era of rapidly intensifying crisis. So is it time to follow in the steps of the UK environment minister Phil Woolas and reassess the potential of GM? As Woolas says: ”There is a growing question of whether GM crops can help the developing world out of the current food price crisis. It is a question that we as a nation need to ask ourselves.” So is he right? Thu, 26 Jun 2008 10:30:34 -0700 http://nwrage.org/Article2267.html As the global food crisis escalates, Big Biotech (Monsanto, Novartis, Syngenta, Dupont-Pioneer, Dow et al) are capitalizing on the desperation of the hungry at runaway prices and rapidly diminishing reserves as a wedge to foist genetically modified (GMO) seeds on a reluctant Third World. Latin America is a prime marketing target for Big Biotech’s little darlings, often tagged ”semillas asasinas” or ”killer seeds” for their devastating impacts on local food stocks. Now the killer GMOs are suspected of literally provoking murder most foul. Last October, Armando Villareal, a farm leader in the Mexican border state of Chihuahua, was gunned down after a farmers’ meeting in Nuevo Casas Grandes. Villareal had been denouncing the illegal planting of GMO corn in the Mennonite-dominated municipalities of Cuauhtemoc and Naniquipa. Thu, 26 Jun 2008 10:22:17 -0700 http://nwrage.org/Article2266.html Regulators are cracking down on companies that sell genetic tests directly to consumers, threatening to crimp the growth of one of the hottest sectors of the biotechnology industry. Mari Baker, the chief executive of Navigenics, says Navigenics is offering personal genetic information services to consumers. The California Department of Public Health sent “cease and desist” letters to 13 genetic testing companies two weeks ago, telling them they could not solicit business from state residents. The companies include the early leaders in the field — 23andMe, Navigenics and deCode Genetics — which are trying to carve out a new business of offering personal genetic information for use in health and lifestyle planning. Thu, 26 Jun 2008 10:17:38 -0700 http://nwrage.org/Article2265.html The replacement of traditional fuels with biofuels has dragged more than 30 million people worldwide into poverty, an aid agency report says. Oxfam says so-called green policies in developed countries are contributing to the world's soaring food prices, which hit the poor hardest. The group also says biofuels will do nothing to combat climate change. Its report urges the EU to scrap a target of making 10% of all transport run on renewable resources by 2020. Thu, 26 Jun 2008 10:15:10 -0700 http://nwrage.org/Article2264.html The environmental organizations ”Save the Danube and the Delta”, ”Eco Pontica” and Greenpeace appreciate that the illegally cultivated GM maize MON810 in the Danube Delta has been destroyed [1]. The case was signalled by Neculai Amihulesei, editor at ”Romania Libera” newspaper and he became the first successful gene detective in the frame of the freshly started Greenpeace campaign [2]. Mr Amihulesei will therefore get the first ”Gene Detective” t-shirt as a reward for the efficient detective work. ”We thank Mr Amihulesei for signalising this case. Cultivation of GM maize in a protected area - UNESCO World Nature Heritage such as the Danube Delta is a criminal act against biodiversity. It was a totally irresponsible and arrogant gesture of Monsanto, the company that produces MON810, and it was immediately taxed by the Government by destroying it. MON810 is created to kill a pest that doesn’t exist in the Delta, so the company’s gesture is therefore hard to understand. The Government must destroy all MON810 fields because it affects non-target species, soil health and even the aquatic life”, said Gabriel Paun, Greenpeace biodiversity campaigner. Wed, 18 Jun 2008 18:56:26 -0700 http://nwrage.org/Article2263.html The Socialist Left Party (SV) and agrarian Centre Party (SP) are in an uproar against the import of genetically modified corn. The Directorate for Nature Management has recommended that two types of modified corn be allowed for use as food, fodder and further processing, but not for cultivation. Lars Haltbrekken, leader of the environmental group Norges Naturvernforbund (Friends of the Earth Norway), supports the Directorate in their ban on growing modified crops, but rejects import as being hypocritical. ”We worry about the spread of modified plants in Norway, but by allowing their import we encourage their production abroad. This can lead to the spread of these organisms in those countries”, says Haltbrekken to the newspaper Nationen. Wed, 18 Jun 2008 18:54:56 -0700 http://nwrage.org/Article2262.html A farmer called Sidhalingappa Choori was killed on June 10 when police opened fire on hundreds of farmers waiting for fertilisers at the Agricultural Produce Marketing Cooperative Centre in Karnataka’s Haveri district. This was an entirely unnecessary tragedy. However, fertiliser protests are not just taking place in Karnataka. Similar incidents have also occurred in the Vidharbha and Marathwada regions of Maharashtra. First, the Green Revolution got the Indian farmers addicted to chemical fertiliser and now, globalisation is forcing them to depend on imports. Chemical agriculture has created the need for almost 4.8 million tonnes of synthetic diammonium phosphate or DAP in the country. About 1.9 million tonnes are produced domestically. The rest — nearly 2.9 million tonnes — has to be imported. In 2000-01, though the country did import a small quantity of DAP, it did not need to import any urea. Since then, import dependency has increased dramatically. With rising oil prices, prices of fertilisers are going up and so is the burden of subsidy. Imported fertiliser costs approximately Rs 55,000 to Rs 60,000 per tonne. At the same time it is sold at Rs 9,350 a tonne. Government subsidies make up for the gap of Rs 45,000 a tonne. However, even at such high prices, fertilisers do not reach the farmers on time. This is at the root of the farmers’ protests as also Sidhalingappa Choori’s tragic death. Choori’s death is one more aspect of what can be termed the "violence of the Green Revolution." Wed, 18 Jun 2008 18:51:44 -0700 http://nwrage.org/Article2261.html A group of around 35 masked intruders have destroyed genetically modified wheat being tested by researchers near Zurich. The group used wire cutters to get through the gate into the field at the federal agricultural research station in Affoltern where the tests are being carried out. In the course of their attack early on Friday morning they threatened three employees of the station with violence if they tried to stop them. According to the research station’s spokeswoman Denise Tschamper, members of the group then trampled the GM wheat plants or cut them down before escaping. Wed, 18 Jun 2008 18:47:43 -0700 http://nwrage.org/Article2260.html In the absence of a co-ordinated approach, the push for a Green Revolution in Africa will not benefit millions of farmers but will instead severely affect their resiliency even as it realises a boom for big-bucks biotech corporates, a new report says. ”Despite assertions to the contrary, there is a real danger that the Green Revolution will turn into a corporate biotech boom and the destruction of rural resiliency — and diversity — in Africa,” says Green Revolution 2.0 for Africa? This time the ’”silver bullet’ has a gun.” Prepared by the Canada-based Erosion Technology and Concentration Group — a respected research and conservation organisation — the report predicts that the mistakes made during the first Green Revolution will be repeated in the second one. Wed, 18 Jun 2008 18:42:24 -0700 http://nwrage.org/Article2259.html With Egypt’s recent approval of the cultivation and commercialisation of a pest-resistant corn variety that marked the first legal introduction of genetically modified crops into the Arab world, the Egyptian scientific community is having mixed reactions. But Nagib Nassar, Egyptian professor of genetics and plant breeding at University of Brazil, told Intellectual Property Watch, ”At the end of the day what was originally an Egyptian variety will become not only registered in Egypt but owned by Monsanto, and Egyptian scientists will end up only making the backcrossing as the ancient Egyptian was doing.” As a result, the Egyptian scientific community has had mixed reactions, some expressing concerns over health, environmental, socioeconomic, political and ownership-related issues. Wed, 18 Jun 2008 18:38:52 -0700