Will We Let Industrial Farming Interests Set Us Up for Long-Run Mass Starvation?

As we reported in April ^[2], Michigan’s Department of Natural Resources (DNR) issued an Invasive Species Order, or ISO, that was supposed to “help stop the spread of feral swine and the disease risk they pose,” not to mention their “potential for extensive agricultural and ecosystem damage.”

Quite intentionally, we believe, the ISO’s unnecessarily broad definition includes heritage or “old world” breeds and open-range pigs raised on small family farms. These are included because they do not have the uniform color and appearance of factory-raised pigs.

The order allows DNR to seize and destroy non-conforming animals—some farmers’ principal livelihood and what remains of porcine genetic diversity—and will not compensate farmers whose pigs are destroyed ^[3]. Even pet pigs could be in danger.

Many observers believe that the Michigan Pork Producers Association is behind the order. The MPPA is a coalition of CAFOs or factory farming operations that would view the small pig farmers as undesirable competition. The ISO eliminates this competition and ensures that consumers have no choice but to purchase white pork from the confinement facilities, which are exempt from the ISO.

In addition, the order is also described by some farmers as “a brazen power grab” by the Michigan DNR to expand its jurisdiction beyond hunting and fishing to now include farming operations.

Since our earlier report, four lawsuits ^[4] have been filed by small farmers against the DNR to overturn the ISO on the grounds that it is vague and contradictory. Two of the plaintiffs are heritage breed farmers who actually received an order for them to “depopulate.”

To say that the order is vague and contradictory is an understatement. We doubt that whoever wrote it ever saw a pig. One of the defining characteristics of a feral swine in the ISO is tail structure: “Sus scrofa exhibit straight tails. They contain the muscular structure to curl their tails if needed, but the tails are typically held straight. Hybrids of Sus scrofa exhibit either curly or straight tail structure.” So in plain English, a pig with either a straight tail or curly tail is either a feral or a non-feral swine! If it is the wrong one, eliminate it!

The lawsuits were consolidated into a single hearing to determine whether the ISO—and DNR’s Declaratory Ruling interpreting the ISO^[5]—could be voided. A ruling is expected next month.

At the same time, there is a campaign to petition the governor of Michigan, Rick Snyder, to rescind the ISO. If the governor lets it stand, other states will take note, and we may get the same sort of order from other state agencies. The ISO is not only bad for Michigan local farmers. It would also leave us with only one kind of pig by destroying the genetic diversity of pig genes presently available.

If humanity goes down the road it seems to be on and discards its heritage seeds and animals so that powerful corporate interests, assisted by friends in government, can control our food supply, we shouldn’t be surprised if the eventual result is mass starvation.

If we stop this outrageous order in Michigan, we won’t just have stopped it there. We will have prevented its spread to other states.

Action Alert! If you’re a Michigan resident, please write to Gov. Snyder and ask him to rescind the ISO. Besides being terribly unfair to small farmers, heritage and “old world” breeds of pigs are important to provide genetic variety to an increasingly limited gene pool.

Global Food Supply System Could Collapse: 2013 Could Experience A Major Hunger Crisis

World grain reserves are so dangerously low that severe weather in the US or other food-exporting countries could trigger a major hunger crisis next year, said a report by John Vidal in The Observer [1] on October 13, 2012. John cited a UN warning. The food crisis is growing in the Middle East and Africa.

The report said:

Failing harvests in the US, Ukraine and other countries this year have eroded reserves to their lowest level since 1974. The US now holds in reserve a historically low 6.5% of the maize that it expects to consume in the next year.

"We've not been producing as much as we are consuming. That is why stocks are being run down. Supplies are now very tight across the world and reserves are at a very low level, leaving no room for unexpected events next year," said Abdolreza Abbassian, a senior economist with the FAO. With food consumption exceeding the amount grown for six of the past 11 years, countries have run down reserves from an average of 107 days of consumption 10 years ago to under 74 days recently.

Prices of main food crops such as wheat and maize are now close to those that sparked riots in 25 countries in 2008. FAO figures released this week suggest that 870 million people are malnourished and the food crisis is growing in the Middle East and Africa. Wheat production this year is expected to be 5.2% below 2011, with yields of most other crops, except rice, also falling.

The figures come as one of the world's leading environmentalists issued a warning that the global food supply system could collapse at any point, leaving hundreds of millions more people hungry, sparking widespread riots and bringing down governments. In a shocking new assessment of the prospects of meeting food needs, Lester Brown, president of the Earth policy research centre in Washington, says that the climate is no longer reliable and the demands for food are growing so fast that a breakdown is inevitable, unless urgent action is taken.

"Food shortages undermined earlier civilizations. We are on the same path. Each country is now fending for itself. The world is living one year to the next," he writes in a new book.

According to Brown, we are seeing the start of a food supply breakdown with a dash by speculators to "grab" millions of square miles of cheap farmland, the doubling of international food prices in a decade, and the dramatic rundown of countries' food reserves.

This year, for the sixth time in 11 years, the world will consume more food than it produces, largely because of extreme weather in the US and other major food-exporting countries.

Oxfam last week said that the price of key staples, including wheat and rice, may double in the next 20 years, threatening disastrous consequences for poor people who spend a large proportion of their income on food.

In 2012, according to the FAO, food prices are already at close to record levels, having risen 1.4% in September following an increase of 6% in July.

"We are entering a new era of rising food prices and spreading hunger. Food supplies are tightening everywhere and land is becoming the most sought-after commodity as the world shifts from an age of food abundance to one of scarcity," says Brown. "The geopolitics of food is fast overshadowing the geopolitics of oil."

His warnings come as the UN and world governments reported that extreme heat and drought in the US and other major food-exporting countries had hit harvests badly and sent prices spiraling.

"The situation we are in is not temporary. These things will happen all the time. Climate is in a state of flux and there is no normal any more.

"We are beginning a new chapter. We will see food unrest in many more places.

"Armed aggression is no longer the principal threat to our future. The overriding threats to this century are climate change, population growth, spreading water shortages and rising food prices," Brown says.

Another report [2] on global wheat and corn stocks said:

World wheat stocks will drop by 13% next year and corn stocks will also be lower than expected until well into 2013, the US government predicted on October 11, 2012, prior to farm ministers from across the globe meeting to discuss high food prices.

It was the second time in two weeks that the US agriculture department (USDA) delivered low estimates of crop stocks to the markets. This time, the USDA said unrelenting demand would drag down US corn and soybean stocks to the lowest levels in years – 17 years for corn and eight for soybeans.

Agriculture ministers are due to meet next week in Rome amid renewed fears of a crisis in food supplies exacerbated by the worst US drought in more than 50 years, and drought in Australia, the world's leading wheat exporter.

On the US markets, corn futures soared 5% on the USDA's forecasts, hitting a three-week high. Wheat futures were up 2% near the close of the trading day in Chicago and soybeans were up 1.6%. While at high levels, corn is about 10% lower and soybeans 15% lower than the records set during the summer.

The USDA's estimates of the US corn and soybean crops were slightly larger than traders had expected, although the smallest in recent years. Corn and soybeans are raw ingredients in processed foods, fed to livestock and converted to motor fuel. Livestock feeders say they are being ruined by high corn prices and so the US government should relax a requirement to mix corn ethanol into gasoline.

With US corn production down for the third year in a row, usage will be tightened tremendously. Exports are forecast at 1.15bn bushels in 2012-13, the smallest in 37 years. Five years ago, the figure stood at 2.4bn bushels. Meanwhile, corn imports are forecasted to be 75m bushels, three times larger than average. The USDA also cut its estimate of the EU corn crop by 2.6%.

Drought will reduce Australia's wheat crop to 23m tonnes, down 12% from a month ago, the USDA said. Harsh weather, including summer droughts and early frosts, cut an additional 3% from Russia's wheat crop, it said.

The USDA added that while global wheat stocks would be down 13% next year, world soybean inventories would be up, boosted by huge crops in Brazil and Argentina, which would offset the crash is US.

Rebecca Smithers and Fiona Harvey reported [3] the UK food price scenario that shows hardship of common persons in a developed country:

According to a survey by charity IGD ShopperVista which showed that price is crucial in determining product choice, with 41% of shoppers naming it as the most important factor and 90% listing it within their top five influences.

Affordability is now the key factor in determining what food and drink we buy. Food prices have risen 12% in real terms over the last five years, taking us back to 1997 in terms of the cost of food relative to other goods. This week cash-strapped consumers – already stung by extra financial pressures such as rising petrol costs, inflation-busting rail fares and further hikes in their energy bills – were warned to expect further food price rises as a result of the drought in the US and the washed out UK summer that have affected the supply and quality of crops.

All of this has led to a sharp increase in wheat prices in the UK – from £150 a tonne to more than £205 a tonne. This will almost inevitably mean higher bread prices. It is also bad news for meat prices, as farmers struggle to pay for feed for their livestock.

The combination of a severe drought early in the year, followed by the wettest early summer on record, has produced some of the worst possible conditions for Britain's farmers, decimating yields and leaving crops prone to disease. Wheat was the crop worst hit by the heavy rainfall, with a 14% fall in yields, according to the National Farmers' Union.

Other crops have also suffered severe damage.

The British Growers Association (BGA), representing vegetable farmers, said the pea harvest was down about 45% - a reduction that will mean huge imports to make up the shortfall of one of the UK's most popular vegetables.

The much-anticipated Christmas dinner is likely to be dearer too. Poultry producers have seen their overheads increase dramatically, owing to the poor grain harvest, which has pushed up the price of chicken and turkey feed. Early projections show there will be one-fifth fewer Brussels sprouts this year thanks to the weather. Parsnips have had a poor season and the effects of discolouration on potatoes are still to be fully felt.

Retailers are also helping by agreeing to relax some of their high standards on the size and shape of vegetables and fruit. Mis-shapen or small fruit has traditionally been rejected by supermarkets, for aesthetic reasons, but the poor weather has meant an increase in the proportion of slightly odd-looking produce. Throwing that away at a time of high prices would be deeply unpopular, so the shops have promised to take more of them.

All this has put national food policy under the spotlight. The Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) reported last week in a barely noticed 50-page statistical document - the Food Statistics Pocketbook 2012 - that UK food prices have increased by 32% between 2007 and 2012. As a result, lower income families have cut their consumption of fruit and vegetables by nearly one-third to just over half of the five-a-day portions recommended for a healthy diet. No surprise, then, that internet companies selling food past its "best before" date (but still safe to eat) at knock-down prices – known in the industry as "the grey market" – are enjoying a boom.

The consumer group Which? has been interviewing consumers in video "booths" across the UK for its Future of Food project – due to report next month - which is an in-depth investigation into shopping and spending patterns. Early findings show that the average cost of shopping bill is £76.83 per week, an increase of £5.66 compared to a year ago. Most people (86%) said the reason for an increase in their weekly shopping bill was due to an increase in food prices, with only 2% saying it was because they had more money to spend. And 92% said they'd noticed an increase in the price of food in the past year.

In addition, more people (91% compared to 81% a year ago) are shopping around to get the best price; more (91% compared to 74% a year ago) are buying cheaper groceries and more (77% compared to 59% a year ago) are shopping at discount supermarkets.

Mary Creagh MP, Labour's shadow environment secretary, described the current situation as "a national scandal". She said: "Even though we are the seventh richest nation in the world, we face an epidemic of hidden hunger, particularly in children … Being able to feed yourself properly is fundamental to people yet government figures show that people on lower incomes are buying and consuming less than five years ago as fruit, milk, cheese and egg prices are up by 30%."

Food statistics digested from Food Statistics Pocketbook 2012, published by Defra October:

• Food prices rose by 32% in the UK between 2007 and 2012 compared to 13% in France and Germany.

• Fruit and vegetable consumption is falling. The lowest 10% of households by income reduced purchases of fruit and vegetables by 20% between 2007 and 2010.

• There are 63 million consumers in the UK, who last year (2011) spent a total of £179bn on food, drink and catering services, including £101bn on household expenditure on food and drink.

• Consumer expenditure on food, drink and catering has continued to rise despite the economic downturn: a rise of 3.5% in 2011 to £179 billion.

• Fruit prices are the second highest: by 34% since June 2007, rising steadily each year.

Source:

[1] “UN warns of looming worldwide food crisis in 2013”, http://www.guardian.co.uk/global-development/2012/oct/14/un-global-food-crisis-warning?newsfeed=true

[2] Reuters/ guardian.co.uk, “Global wheat and corn stocks to fall in 2013, says US government”, Oct. 12, 2012, http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2012/oct/12/wheat-corn-stocks-fall-2013-drought

[3] guardian.co.uk, “Food prices: 'Bread, coffee and fresh fruit have become a bit of a luxury'”, Oct. 12, 2012, http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2012/oct/12/food-prices-affordability-ethical?intcmp=239

http://www.countercurrents.org/cc141012.htm

Is Whole Foods Sincere About its Support for Labeling Genetically Modified Foods?

After months of pressure from the organic community, including thousands of its customers, the leadership of Whole Foods Market on September 11 endorsed Proposition 37 [3], the California Ballot Initiative to require mandatory labels on genetically engineered foods. But the endorsement came with “reservations” and inaccuracies. It also included the false claim that company policy precludes Whole Foods and its executives from providing much-needed financial support to Prop 37, a campaign that consumers – the very people who have made WFM and its executives wildly profitable – overwhelmingly support.

Is it possible that Whole Foods wants to ride the GMO labeling popularity wave while it quietly works behind the scenes to prevent Prop 37, or any other GMO labeling law, from passing? Could it be that a GMO labeling law – especially one like Prop 37 that prohibits the use of the word “natural” on any food containing GMOs – would cut too deeply into the company’s $9.8 billion in sales and almost $246 million in profits? [4]

Right up until the company announced its lukewarm endorsement, Vice President of Global Communications and Quality Standards Margaret Wittenberg and other WFM top brass repeatedly stated that they would not endorse Prop 37. CEO John Mackey has reportedly claimed that “the jury is still out” on whether genetically engineered crops and foods are unhealthy for people or the environment. (Mackey also has stated [5] that “no scientific consensus exists” to support global warming or climate change).

And while the company website states [6] that WFM is “committed to foods that are fresh, wholesome and safe to eat”, nowhere on its list of unacceptable ingredients [7] is there any mention of GMOs.

So why come out with a public endorsement of Prop 37? With national polls showing 90% support for GMO labeling, and voter support [8] for Prop 37 running 67% for and 24% against, it was just common-sense marketing strategy to get behind the initiative. But was it really an endorsement?

When it first came out, WFM’s official endorsement contained misleading information that read straight from the opposition’s playbook. It also contained one glaring error.  Initially, the company listed among its “reservations” about Prop 37 this incorrect statement: The use of 0.5% of the total weight as the upper limit for processed foods that contain one or more genetically engineered ingredients to be exempted from labeling is inconsistent with the long-established international labeling standard of 0.9%.

Not true. The OCA contacted the authors of the official press release and offered this correction, taken straight from the ballot initiative [9] itself: The 0.5% exemption is for one ingredient and a food can have up to ten such ingredients, meaning a 5.0% exemption (until 2019).

It took them several days, but WFM public relations team did finally issue a correction [3]. But the correction did little to strengthen the company’s endorsement, which continues to perpetuate the exact same myths that the NO on 37 campaign is now airing in its $35-million TV advertising blitz. The endorsement echoes biotech industry claims that Prop 37 is “too complicated.” That GMO food labeling is best left up to the pro-biotech federal government and the FDA (don’t hold your breath for this), rather than the states. That if passed, Prop 37 will result in greedy trial lawyers suing innocent grocery stores, farmers, and food processors for not labeling or mislabeling GMO foods.

None of this is true – as has been repeatedly outlined [10] by the YES on Prop 37 campaign.

Also not true? That WFM can’t financially support the most important battle ever waged in the U.S. for consumers’ right to know about GMOs and truthful labeling on so-called “natural” foods. According to its website, company policy precludes donating to political campaigns or ballot initiatives. And yet, in 2009 WFM spent $180,000 lobbying [11] against the Employee Free Choice Act, which would have granted farm workers (the same farm workers who pick the fruits and vegetables sold in WFM stores) and other food workers the right to form unions and enjoy collective bargaining rights with their employers.

Company policy also apparently doesn’t preclude WFM’s wealthy executives from donating to political campaigns. CEO John Mackey has donated $2500 so far this year to Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign, and has made many personal donations [12] to past political campaigns – yet not one penny to Prop 37.

Clearly, the executives and big investors who control WFM don’t want to antagonize millions of their customers, so they’ve issued a token endorsement of Prop 37. But here’s the inconvenient truth. WFM sells billions of dollars of non-organic, so-called “natural” products every year that contain genetically engineered ingredients, including thousands of different processed foods, nutritional supplements, meat, and animal products. Once Prop 37 passes on November 6, WFM, just like every other supermarket chain, will face a major dilemma. Are they willing to demand that their suppliers get GMOs out of the 50,000 items sold in their stores, and give WFM legally binding affidavits to prove this? Is WFM willing to stop marketing non-organic GMO-tainted foods as “natural,” when many of them are not?

And the most critical question of all: Is WFM willing to antagonize – and possibly lose - their core customers, consumers who will not want to purchase foods carrying labels that say “produced through genetic engineering”?

Most of the workers, and certainly the overwhelming majority of the customers, at Whole Foods support organic foods and mandatory labeling of GMOs. It’s time for the executives and the top brass to stop the lies and obfuscation, to stop the greenwashing, and to atone for the fact that they’ve made hundreds of millions of dollars in profit over the years by selling non-organic, so-called “natural” foods and supplements that contain GMOs.

It’s also time for WFM to remove misleading information about Prop 37 from the company website. It’s time for this multi-billion corporation and its wealthy executives to put their money where their mouth is, and make a sizeable donation to the California ballot Initiative to label genetically engineered foods. This is the food fight of our lives, and Whole Foods Market is either with us or against us. Please join the 25,000 organic consumers who have already signed this petition [13] asking WFM to throw real support behind Prop 37.

Jason Mark -- Whoa, Is Organic Food No Healthier Than Non-Organic? Controversy Erupts Over Study

I had barely drank my first cup of coffee when I heard the news yesterday morning on NPR [3] – organic food, it turns out, may not be that much healthier for you than industrial food.

The NPR story was based on a new study published in the Annals of Internal Medicine [4] which concluded, based on a review of existing studies, that there is no “strong evidence that organic foods are significantly more nutritious than conventional foods.” The study, written by researchers at the Stanford School of Medicine, also found that eating organic foods “may reduce exposure to pesticide residues and antibiotic-resistant bacteria.”

The interwebs were soon full of headlines talking down the benefits of organic foods. “Stanford Scientists Cast Doubt on Advantages of Organic Meat and Produce,” the NY Times [5] announced, as reporter Kenneth Chang pointed out that pesticide residues on industrially grown fruits and vegetables are “almost always under the allowed safety limits.”CBS news [6], running the AP story on the Stanford study, informed readers: “Organic food hardly healthier, study suggests.”

Organic agriculture advocates were quick with their rebuttals. The Environmental Working Group [7] put out a press release playing up the researchers’ findings that organic produce has less pesticide residue. Charles Benbrook, a professor of agriculture at Washington State University and former chief scientist at The Organic Center [8], wrote a detailed critique you can find here [9]. Benbrook noted that the Stanford study didn’t include data from the USDA and US EPA about pesticide residue levels. He also pointed out that the researchers’ definition of “significantly more nutritious” was a little squishy.

Is this the last word on the nutritional benefits of organic foods? Hardly. As Benbrook said, in the coming years improved measurement methods will hopefully allow for better comparisons of food nutritional quality. (You can find an Earth Island Journal cover story on this very issue here [10].)

I’ll leave it to the PhDs and MDs to fight this out among themselves. As they do, I’ll keep buying (and growing [11]) organic foods. Why? Because even if organic foods are not demonstrably better for my health than industrial foods, I know that organics are better for the health of other people – the people who grow our nation’s food.

To his credit, NPR’s new ag reporter, Dan Charles, was careful to note that organic agriculture “can bring environmental benefit[s].” One of the most important environmental benefits organic agriculture delivers is a boost to public health and safety.

Let’s say you’re not worried about the relatively small amounts of pesticides that end up on the industrial foods at the supermarket. (Though you should read this [12] Tom Philpott dissection of the Stanford report when considering your risk of eating pesticide residue.) Well, you should still be concerned about the huge amounts of pesticides that end up in the air and water of farming communities – chemicals that can lead to birth defects, endocrine disruption, and neurological and respiratory problems.

When pesticides are sprayed onto farm fields, they don’t just stay in that one place. They seep into the water and waft through the air and accumulate on the shoes and clothes of farm workers. In recent years in California (the country’s top ag producer) an average of 37 pesticide drift incidents [13] a year have made people sick. Pesticides also find their way into the homes of farm workers. A study by researchers at the University of Washington found that the children of farm workers have higher exposure to pesticides [14] than other children in the same community. When researchers in Mexico looked into pesticide exposure of farm workers there, they found that 20 percent of field hands “showed acute poisoning. [15]”

The health impacts on those workers were serious and included “diverse alterations of the digestive, neurological, respiratory, circulatory, dermatological, renal, and reproductive system.” The researchers concluded: “there exist health hazards for those farm workers exposed to pesticides, at organic and cellular levels.”

There are shelves’ worth of studies [16] documenting the health dangers of pesticide exposure. A study published last year found that prenatal exposure to organophosphate pesticides [17] – which are often sprayed on crops and in urban areas to control insects – can lower children’s IQ. A follow-up investigation into prenatal pesticide exposure concluded that boys’ developing brains appear to be more vulnerable [18] than girls’ brains. A study by Colorado State University epidemiologist Lori Cragin found that women who drink water containing low levels of the herbicide atrazine are more likely to have low estrogen levels [19] and irregular menstrual cycles; about three-quarters of all US corn fields are treated with atrazine annually. British scientists who examined the health effects of fungicides sprayed on fruits and vegetable crops discovered that 30 out of 37 chemicals studied altered males’ hormone production [20].

Read more.. http://www.alternet.org/food/whoa-organic-food-no-healthier-non-organic-controversy-erupts-over-study

Frances Moore Lappé -- Stanford Scientists Shockingly Reckless on Health Risk And Organics

I first heard about a new Stanford "study" downplaying the value of organics when this blog headline cried out from my inbox: "Expensive organic food isn't healthier and no safer than produce grown with pesticides, finds biggest study of its kind."

What?

Does the actual study say this?

No, but authors of the study -- "Are Organic Foods Safer or Healthier Than Conventional Alternatives? A Systematic Review" -- surely are responsible for its misinterpretation and more. Their study actually reports that ¨Consumption of organic foods may reduce exposure to pesticide residues and antibiotic-resistant bacteria."

The authors' tentative wording -- "may reduce" -- belies their own data: The report's opening statement says the tested organic produce carried a 30 percent lower risk of exposure to pesticide residues. And, the report itself also says that "detectable pesticide residues were found in 7% of organic produce samples...and 38% of conventional produce samples." Isn't that's a greater than 80% exposure reduction?

In any case, the Stanford report's unorthodox measure "makes little practical or clinical sense," notes Charles Benbrook -- formerly Executive Director, Board on Agriculture of the National Academy of Sciences: What people "should be concerned about [is]... not just the number of [pesticide] residues they are exposed to" but the "health risk they face." Benbrook notes "a 94% reduction in health risk" from pesticides when eating organic foods.

Assessing pesticide-driven health risks weighs the toxicity of the particular pesticide. For example the widely-used pesticide atrazine, banned in Europe, is known to be "a risk factor in endocrine disruption in wildlife and reproductive cancers in laboratory rodents and humans."

"Very few studies" included by the Stanford researchers, notes Benbrook, "are designed or conducted in a way that could isolate the impact or contribution of a switch to organic food from the many other factors that influence a given individual's health." They "would be very expensive, and to date, none have been carried out in the U.S." [emphasis added].

In other words, simple prudence should have prevented these scientists from using "evidence" not designed to capture what they wanted to know.

Moreover, buried in the Stanford study is this all-critical fact: It includes no long-term studies of people consuming organic compared to chemically produced food: The studies included ranged from just two days to two years. Yet, it is well established that chemical exposure often takes decades to show up, for example, in cancer or neurological disorders.

Consider these studies not included: The New York Times notes three 2011 studies by scientists at Columbia University, the University of California, Berkeley, and Mount Sinai Hospital in Manhattan that studied pregnant women exposed to higher amounts of an organophosphate pesticide. Once their children reached elementary school they "had, on average, I.Q.'s several points lower than those of their peers."

Thus, it is reprehensible for the authors of this overview to even leave open to possible interpretation that their compilation of short-term studies can determine anything about the human-health impact of pesticides.

What also disturbs me is that neither in their journal article nor in media interviews do the Stanford authors suggest that concern about "safer and healthier" might extend beyond consumers to the people who grow our food. They have health concerns, too!

Many choose organic to decrease chemicals in food production because of the horrific consequences farm workers and farmers suffer from pesticide exposure. U.S. farming communities are shown to be afflicted with, for example, higher rates of: "leukemia, non-Hodgkin lymphoma, multiple myeloma, and soft tissue sarcoma" -- in addition to skin, lip, stomach, brain and prostate cancers," reports the National Cancer Institute. And, at a global level, "an estimated 3 million acute pesticide poisonings occur worldwide each year," reports the World Health Organization. Another health hazard of pesticides, not hinted at in the report, comes from water contamination by pesticides. They have made the water supply for 4.3 million Americans unsafe for drinking.

Finally, are organic foods more nutritious?

In their report, Crystal Smith-Spangler, MD, and co-authors say only that "published literature lacks strong evidence that organic foods are significantly more nutritious than conventional foods." Yet, the most comprehensive meta-analysis comparing organic and non-organic, led by scientist Kirsten
Brandt, a Scientist at the Human Nutrition Research Center at the UK's Newcastle University found organic fruits and vegetables, to have on "average 12% higher nutrient levels."

Bottom line for me? What we do know is that the rates of critical illnesses, many food-related --from allergies to Crohn's Disease -- are spiking and no one knows why. What we do know is that pesticide poisoning is real and lethal -- and not just for humans. In such a world is it not the height of irresponsibility to downplay the risks of exposure to known toxins?

Rachel Carson would be crying. Or, I hope, shouting until -- finally -- we all listen. "Simple precaution! Is that not commonsense?"

Read more.. http://www.commondreams.org/view/2012/09/06-12

David Korten - America’s Deficit Attention Disorder

The political debate in the United States and Europe has focused attention on public financial deficits and how best to resolve them. Tragically, the debate largely ignores the deficits that most endanger our future.

In the United States, as Republican deficit hawks tell the story, “America is broke. We must cut government spending on social programs we cannot afford. And we must lower taxes on Wall Street job creators so they can invest to get the economy growing, create new jobs, increase total tax revenues, and eliminate the deficit.”

Democrats respond, “Yes, we’re pretty broke, but the answer is to raise taxes on Wall Street looters to pay for government spending that primes the economic pump by putting people to work building critical infrastructure and performing essential public services. This puts money in people’s pockets to spend on private sector goods and services and is our best hope to grow the economy.”

Democrats have the better side of the argument, but both sides have it wrong on two key points.

• First, both focus on growing GDP, ignoring the reality that under the regime of Wall Street rule, the benefits of GDP growth over the past several decades have gone almost exclusively to the 1 percent—with dire consequences for democracy and the health of the social and natural capital on which true prosperity depends. 
• Second, both focus on financial deficits, which can be resolved with relative ease if we are truly serious about it; and ignore far more dangerous and difficult-to-resolve social and environmental deficits. I call it a case of deficit attention disorder.

To achieve the ideal of a world that secures health and prosperity for all people for generations to come, we must reframe the public debate about the choices we face as a nation and as a species. We must measure economic performance against the outcomes we really want, give life priority over money, and recognize that money is a means, not an end.

Read more...

http://www.yesmagazine.org/blogs/david-korten/americas-deficit-attention-disorder 

David Isenberg - The Globalisation of U.S. Special Operations Forces

It was recently reported that U.S. Special Operations Command (SOCOM) commander Adm. Bill McRaven and Deputy Director of Operations Brig. Gen. Sean Mulholland want to establish a worldwide network linking special operations forces (SOF) of allied and partner nations to combat terrorism.

If created, the network would comprise regional security coordination centres, organised and structured similarly to NATO SOF headquarters in Mons, Belgium. 

According to Mulholland, these centres would not be command-and- control nodes but rather centres for education, networking and coordination to gain regional solutions for regional problems. 

Mulholland estimated it would cost less than 30 million dollars a year to operate and maintain each regional node, although that is a figure that some observers consider laughably small. 

SOCOM plans to stand up the first one in Miami-based U.S. Southern Command later in 2013, with Mulholland tapped to command integrated SOF in Central and South America. 

This plan may seem ultra-ambitious but given the demand on and pace of U.S. SOF activities in recent years it hardly comes as a surprise. The forces will be conducting missions in 120 countries by year's end, up from about 75 currently. And while they account for only three percent of the military as a whole, they make up more than seven percent of the forces assigned to Iraq and Afghanistan. 

Read More:

http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=107906

John Scales Avery - Adverse Effects Of Globalization

Today, economic globalization aims at increased trade throughout the world. At first sight, this might seem to be a benefit. However, laws preventing the exploitation of labor are not universal. The same unspeakable conditions experienced by workers in factories and mines during the early phases of the Industrial Revolution in Europe can be found today among factory workers in Indonesia or children weaving oriental carpets in Pakistan; and it is estimated that in India alone there are 80,000,000 child laborers.

In many developing countries today, industrialization involves slave-like working conditions. Meanwhile, in the industrialized countries, workers may lose their jobs because they cannot compete with underpaid labor in the Third World. Large multinational corporations are tending to move their operations to regions where salaries and living standards are very low. For free trade to be truly beneficial to all the peoples of the world, universal laws must be established to regulate business and industry globally, and to ensure that multinationals act in a way that is both socially and ecologically responsible.

Adam Smith's followers advocated complete freedom from governmental restraint, but the history of the Industrial Revolution demonstrates the need for regulatory social legislation. The historical perspective makes it clear that laws establishing minimum wage levels and laws prohibiting child labor are needed to avoid horrors such as those described by John Fielden in “The Curse of the Factory System”. Today, birth control is also necessary on a global scale, just as it once was needed in England, to raise workers above the starvation level. Finally, unions must be permitted everywhere in the world. If trade is globalized, the hard-won reforms achieved by Charles Knowlton, Annie Besant the Fabians and others must also be globalized.

Read More:

http://www.countercurrents.org/avery080512.htm

David Korten - A Plea for Rio+20: Don’t Commodify Nature

“Time is life.”"As alert citizen groups are pointing out," writes Korten, "the proposals being advanced would result in the ultimate commodification and financialization of nature for the short-term benefit of the same global profiteers who created the mortgage bubble that brought down much of the global economy in 2008."

With these three words, Karma Tshiteem, Secretary of the Bhutan Gross National Happiness Commission, ended his brief description of Bhutan’s distinctive approach to economic development. It caught my attention because of the striking contrast to our common Western phrase, “Time is money.”

The event I was attending was a small international gathering primarily of indigenous environmental leaders. I was privileged to be among the few nonindigenous writer-activists invited to join them.

Tshiteem was seated to my left. Winona LaDuke, program director of Honor the Earth and a celebrated Native American environmental author and activist, was on my right. Tom Goldtooth, global environmental leader and executive director of the Indigenous Environmental Network, sat directly across from me. Next to him was Pablo Solón, former Bolivian Ambassador to the United Nations. Pablo was a principal driver behind the 2010 World People’s Conference on Climate Change and the Rights of Mother Earth in Cochabamba, Bolivia.

Read More:

http://www.yesmagazine.org/blogs/david-korten/a-plea-for-rio-20-dont-commodify-nature

Chris Hedges - The Globalization of Hollow Politics

I went to Lille in northern France a few days before the first round of the French presidential election to attend a rally held by the socialist candidate François Holland. It was a depressing experience. Thunderous music pulsated through the ugly and poorly heated Zenith convention hall a few blocks from the city center. The rhetoric was as empty and cliché-driven as an American campaign event. Words like “destiny,” “progress” and “change” were thrown about by Holland, who looks like an accountant and made oratorical flourishes and frenetic arm gestures that seemed calculated to evoke the last socialist French president, François Mitterrand. There was the singing of “La Marseillaise” when it was over. There was a lot of red, white and blue, the colors of the French flag. There was the final shout of “Vive la France.” I could, with a few alterations, have been at a football rally in Amarillo, Texas. I had hoped for a little more gravitas. But as the French cultural critic Guy Debord astutely grasped, politics, even allegedly radical politics, has become a hollow spectacle. Quel dommage.

The emptying of content in political discourse in an age as precarious and volatile as ours will have very dangerous consequences. The longer the political elite—whether in Washington or Paris, whether socialist or right-wing, whether Democrat or Republican—ignore the breakdown of globalization, refuse to respond rationally to the climate crisis and continue to serve the iron tyranny of global finance, the more it will shred the possibility of political consensus, erode the effectiveness of our political institutions and empower right-wing extremists. The discontent sweeping the planet is born out of the paralysis of traditional political institutions.

Read More:

http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/the_globalization_of_hollow_politics_20120423/