DDT is the chlorinated hydrocarbon insecticide that was developed during World War II and dominated post-war insect pest management for 20+ years. It was the most widely used insecticide in a family of chemistry that included aldrin, dieldrin, toxaphene, chlordane, hepatchor, and a handful of other active ingredients. It was widely regarded as a miracle […]
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The Attorney General (AG) of the State of Massachusetts has succeeded, for what is believed to be the first time, in getting a pesticide giant to change they way they communicate with the public about pesticide risks to the environment. As this press release describes how the state accused Bayer of misleading consumers about the […]
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“Stop Picking on Potatoes. They can feed the world” appears in the food section of the January 25, 2017 Washington Post. Written by the paper’s senior food writer, Tamar Haspel, it begins by noting that just about everyone, and all institutions offering advice on what Americans should eat, stress the same thing – eat more […]
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In an edgy January 5, 2017 piece, Sean Pratt and the Western Producer Magazine have upped the rhetorical ante circulating over the October 17, 2016 letter from five major farm groups and the U.S. Farmers and Ranchers Alliance (USFRA) to Dannon-USA CEO, Mariano Lozano. The letter criticizes Dannon-USA for its pledge to source non-GMO ingredients and […]
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The State of Arkansas is not known as a hot bed of aggressive action to limit pesticide use and risks. But last season illegal spraying of dicamba on Monsanto’s new genetically engineered Xtend soybeans in this and neighboring states led to lawsuits, EPA warrants being served and even the fatal shooting of an Arkansas farmer. This […]
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On 10/16/16 The Wall Street Journal posted an interesting interview with Jim Purdue, chariman of the mega poultry agribusiness Purdue Farms, Inc., discusses why Purdue eliminated routine use of antibiotics for growth promotion and disease prevention, and what happened as a result. Purdue discusses how consumers are looking at their food the way they look […]
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This great, long essay on soil health has unusually blunt discussion of the implications of declining soil health. Molly Jahn, a professor of Agronomy at my alma mater UW-Madison, seamlessly merges insights from a helicopter ride outside Des Moines during planting season, to the early crusade to expose and end slavery among sugar plantation workers […]
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Tamar Haspel is a talented food writer for the Washington Post. She often delves into food quality and health issues. In this “Unearthed” piece she uses dollars per calorie as the basic metric of the cost of “healthy” food, and compares basics like flour and vegetable oils to processed foods like Doritos and hot dogs. […]
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Undercurrent News, a fish-industry journal, recently reported that Cargill, in partnership with the German chemical company BASF, is developing GE canola that expresses much higher levels of two long-chain omega 3 fatty acids –EPA and DPA (but not DHA). Omega-3s are found naturally only in fish, some fungi, and microalgae. This new biotech would transcribe […]
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Cudos to the BBC and Nature magazine for highlighting the critical role of poor food choices in driving poor health and sustainability of our food systems. This BBC piece summarizes the chilling statements in a commentary in Nature, the #1 general science journal in the world. In the commentary, leading scientists make the point that […]
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