Anthony Gucciardi - Busted: Monsanto Abusing Illegal Workers in ‘Slave-Like’ Conditions

Monsanto’s disregard for human health is evidenced by their hazardous GMO crops and herbicides, but a shocking new report has revealed the company’s illegal ‘slave-like’ working conditions. Forcing slave workers to work the cornfields for 14 hours per day and buy their food (most likely GMO) at highly-inflated prices from the company store, Monsanto has beenrunning these slave rings for an unknown number of years.

What’s more is the company not only ‘hired’ all of the workers illegally, but prevented them from leaving the farm premises and withheld their salaries. The information came to light following a raid by Argentina’s tax agency known as AFIP, where it was revealed that the farmhands were being forced to work almost twice as long as legally permissible and given no compensation. Amazingly, AFIP says that it will hold Monsanto responsible for the slave-like conditions.

Unsurprisingly, Monsanto failed to respond to the story.

Read More:

http://naturalsociety.com/monsanto-abusing-illegal-workers-in-slave-like-conditions/

Genetically modified mosquitoes' survival rate concealed

A confidential internal document obtained by civil society groups shows genetically modified mosquitoes described by their manufacturer, UK company Oxitec, as “sterile” are in fact not sterile and their offspring have a 15 percent survival rate in the presence of the common antibiotic tetracycline.

In the study described in this document, the genetically modified mosquitoes were fed cat food containing chicken contaminated with low levels of tetracycline and many of the mosquitoes were able to reproduce, with their offspring surviving to adulthood (1).

A redacted version of the document, released to GeneWatch UK under freedom of information laws, shows that the company tried to hide the evidence that its technology will fail to prevent reproduction in the presence of low levels of tetracycline contamination (2).

Read More:

http://www.foe.org/news/news-releases/2012-01-genetically-modified-mosquitoes-survival-rate

Ari LeVaux - How Genetically Modified Foods Could Affect Our Health in Unexpected Ways

Chinese researchers have found small pieces of rice ribonucleic acid (RNA) in the blood and organs of humans who eat rice. The Nanjing University-based team showed that this genetic material will bind to receptors in human liver cells and influence the uptake of cholesterol from the blood.

The type of RNA in question is called microRNA (abbreviated to miRNA) due to its small size. MiRNAs have been studied extensively since their discovery ten years ago, and have been implicated as players in several human diseases including cancer, Alzheimer's, and diabetes. They usually function by turning down or shutting down certain genes. The Chinese research provides the first in vivo example of ingested plant miRNA surviving digestion and influencing human cell function in this way.

Should the research survive scientific scrutiny -- a serious hurdle -- it could prove a game changer in many fields. It would mean that we're eating not just vitamins, protein, and fuel, but gene regulators as well.

That knowledge could deepen our understanding of many fields, including cross-species communication, co-evolution, and predator-prey relationships. It could illuminate new mechanisms for some metabolic disorders and perhaps explain how some herbal and modern medicines function.

Read More:

http://www.alternet.org/story/153737/how_genetically_modified_foods_could_affect_our_health_in_unexpected_ways

Ari LeVaux - The Very Real Danger of Genetically Modified Foods

New research shows that when we eat we're consuming more than just vitamins and protein. Our bodies are absorbing information, or microRNA.

Chinese researchers have found small pieces of ribonucleic acid (RNA) in the blood and organs of humans who eat rice. The Nanjing University-based team showed that this genetic material will bind to proteins in human liver cells and influence the uptake of cholesterol from the blood.

The type of RNA in question is called microRNA, due to its small size. MicroRNAs have been studied extensively since their discovery ten years ago, and have been linked to human diseases including cancer, Alzheimer's, and diabetes. The Chinese research provides the first example of ingested plant microRNA surviving digestion and influencing human cell function.

Should the research survive scientific scrutiny, it could prove a game changer in many fields. It would mean that we're eating not just vitamins, protein, and fuel, but information as well.

Read More:

http://www.alternet.org/food/153737/how_genetically_modified_foods_could_affect_our_health_in_unexpected_ways?page=1

FoodFreedom.com - Three Approved GMOs Linked to Organ Damage

FoodFreedom.com   

http://foodfreedom.wordpress.com/2010/01/01/three-approved-gmos-linked-to-organ-damage/

By Rady Ananda

In what is being described as the first ever and most comprehensive study of the effects of genetically modified foods on mammalian health, researchers have linked organ damage with consumption of Monsanto’s GM maize.

Three varieties of Monsanto’s GM corn – Mon 863, insecticide-producing Mon 810, and Roundup® herbicide-absorbing NK 603 – were approved for consumption by US, European and several other national food safety authorities. The data used for this approval, ironically, is the same data that independent researchers studied to make the organ damage link.

The Committee of Independent Research and Information on Genetic Engineering (CRIIGEN) and Universities of Caen and Rouen obtained Monsanto’s confidential raw data of its 2002 feeding trials on rats after a European court made it public in 2005.

The data “clearly underlines adverse impacts on kidneys and liver, the dietary detoxifying organs, as well as different levels of damages to heart, adrenal glands, spleen and haematopoietic system,” reported Gilles-Eric Séralini, a molecular biologist at the University of Caen.

Click to read more ...

Marcela Valente - Poison from the Sky

http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=106159

Marcela Valente 

BUENOS AIRES, Dec 9 (IPS) - Argentina's soy boom has been a major source of foreign exchange. But the other side of the coin is the toxic effects among the rural population, from spraying agrochemicals.

Research by the National University of Río Cuarto in the northwestern province of Córdoba demonstrated that glyphosate, the herbicide used on transgenic soy crops, causes genetic damage in mice and amphibians, like frogs. 

Two years ago, another research study by Andrés Carrasco, a professor at the Molecular Embryology Laboratory of the University of Buenos Aires School of Medicine and principal researcher at the National Council for Scientific and Technical Research (CONICET), also demonstrated damage in amphibians. 

Genetically modified (GM) soy seeds, approved amid controversy in the 1990s for use in Argentina, were developed by the U.S.-based multinational biotechnology corporation Monsanto to be resistant to glyphosate, the active principle in the "Roundup" herbicide sold by the company. 

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Food Freedom - Sebelius-backed biotech firm reorganizing under criminal probe

Food Freedom on May 3, 2011 

http://foodfreedom.wordpress.com/2011/05/03/sebelius-backed-biotech-firm-reorganizing-under-criminal-probe/

By Rady Ananda

The head of Health and Human Services not only denies that Americans have a right to bodily health and food of their choice, but Kathleen Sebelius is hell bent on spending taxpayer money to promote genetically modified food and drugs. One of her projects, Kansas Bioscience Authority, a publicly funded venture enterprise developed to promote biotechnology, is currently under criminal investigation. CEO Tom Thornton has resigned.

KBA also lobbied the Dept. of Homeland Security for the highly controversial bioweapons and cattle disease lab in the state, along with former Governor Sebelius, now President Obama’s Cabinet Secretary. Under her governorship and full support, the Kansas Economic Growth Act of 2004 passed, funding KBA’s mission with $581 million in tax revenue to develop a bioscience industry in Kansas.

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PF Louis - Genetically modified alfalfa and Roundup herbicides may create an agricultural disaster

by PF Louis

http://www.naturalnews.com/034264_GM_alfalfa_Roundup.html

(NaturalNews) Genetically modified organisms (GMOs) have been extended to alfalfa. This could be the beginning of a disastrous domino effect on our food crop and livestock systems. The GMO hazards have gone beyond the need for labeling our consumption needs. Genetically engineered alfalfa is a far more serious threat than imagined by most.

Alfalfa's importance

Alfalfa is considered the number one forage crop. Milk from cows that graze on alfalfa is considered premium. The best horses graze on alfalfa. And of course, alfalfa itself is used for human consumption with the increased popularity of alfalfa sprouts.

Its usefulness as animal feed goes beyond grazing. Alfalfa can also be used for animals as hay or silage, which is made by storing moist crops in a silo or under plastic. That process is known as ensiling or ensilage. The silage can also be dried and made into pellets for pet food.

Silage for livestock, usually produced from corn or soy, is what is used for non-grass fed or grazing cattle and other livestock. So it's not corn on the cob or soybeans that are used in concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs). Factory farms use silage because it's the most compact and convenient form of feed for industrial livestock.

Alfalfa has been found to be an excellent rotational crop to raise the nitrogen content of soil, which is very beneficial to other crops. Alfalfa also performs well as a conservation tillage system, where some crop is left on the surface after tilling to reduce erosion during high rain or flood periods.

Recent crop failures of GE corn and soy as well as farm animal abortion, still birth, and infertility that fed on the silage from those crops have created an ominous warning for GE alfalfa's future impact.

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Martha Rosenberg - What Drugs Was Your Thanksgiving Turkey On?

By Martha Rosenberg, AlterNet

Posted on November 20, 2011, Printed on November 21, 2011
http://www.alternet.org/story/153149/what_drugs_was_your_thanksgiving_turkey_on

 So far, 2011 has not been a great year for turkey producers. In May, an article in Clinical Infectious Diseases reported that half of U.S. meat from major grocery chains--turkey, beef, chicken and pork--harbors antibiotic resistant staph germs commonly called MRSA. Turkey had twice and even three times the MRSA of all other meats, in another study.

In June, Pfizer announced it was ending arsenic-containing chicken feed which no one realized they were eating anyway, but its arsenic-containing Histostat, fed to turkeys, continues. Poultry growers use inorganic arsenic, a recognized carcinogen, for "growth promotion, feed efficiency and improved pigmentation," says the FDA. Yum.

And in August, Cargill Value Added Meats, the nation's third-largest turkey processor, recalled 36 million pounds of ground turkey because of a salmonella outbreak, linked to one death and 107 illnesses in 31 states. Even as it closed its Springdale, Arkansas plant, steam cleaned its machinery and added "two additional anti-bacterial washes" to its processing operations, 185,000 more pounds were recalled the next month from the same plant.

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The Nepal Times - Going to seed

Hybrid and genetically-modified seeds may create more problems than they solve 

The Nepal Times 10 NOV 2011

http://www.nepalitimes.com/issue/2011/11/8/Nation/18676 

A US-government supported pilot project to introduce into Nepal hybrid maize seeds produced by the multinational, Monsanto, has set off alarm bells over its potential harm.

USAID's Nepal Economic, Agriculture, and Trade Activity (NEAT) has got the Department of Agriculture and Monsanto to set up test plots to promote the new seeds in Chitwan, Nawalparasi and Kavre districts. This pilot plan will train 20,000 farmers in hybrid maize production methods and help in marketing the seeds.

Last month, Monsanto India's Amitabh Jaipuria was in Kathmandu for a promotional launch in which he said the project would improve Nepal's food security and enhance income of Nepali farmers. USAID Mission Director in Nepal, David C Atteberry also said: "Most maize farmers are unaware of the health and financial benefits that high-yielding hybrid seeds can provide. Improved seeds and targeted capacity building on crop management will allow maize producers in Nepal to reap the full benefit of their labour."

Nepal only grows half its current annual requirement of 270,000 tons of maize for human and animal consumption, the rest is imported. USAID says the project will help make Nepal self-sufficient and save Rs 200 million in imports.

Click to read more ...