01.01.70

The USDA’s organic guidelines are supposed to ensure that the public is getting a 100 percent organic product. To be certified as organic, companies must not use pesticides, hormones, antibiotics, synthetic fertilizers, bioengineering, and radiation.

However, a sizable amount of organic food is imported from China. So far there is little evidence crops from China are tainted or fraudulently labeled. Any food that bears the USDA Organic label has to be accredited by an independent certifier. But tests are few and far between.

Mark Kastel, director of the Organic Integrity Project at Cornucopia Institute, an advocacy group promoting small family farms, says, “Two major organic dairy companies operate massive corporate farms. One farm has 8,000 cows in the Idaho desert. There, the animals consume such feed as corn, barley, hay, and soybeans, as well as some grass from pastureland.

Source: FinalCall.com News

by Nisreen Cain

Genetically Modified foods (GM foods) were first put on the market in 1996. Mostly as plant products such as soybean, corn, canola, rice, and cotton seed oil. GM foods' are foods derived from genetically modified organisms (GMOs) which have had specific changes introduced into their DNA by genetic engineering techniques. So how is this different than natural mutations, or selective breeding? and what does that mean to the foods we eat? Are these foods assessed differently than other foods by the FDA? and are there any potential risks to human health? are their implications for the rights of farmers to own their crops? what about the growing influence of the chemical industry on agriculture? how do we know what is genetically modified and how to make our choices of the food we eat? Ernest H. (Ernie) Flint is a native Mississippian from Attala county with a small farm background (dairy, veg, cotton, corn)....

Read more...

by Jessica

In my quest to better understand what I eat on a daily basis, I have been trying to learn more about our nation’s food sources. I have been noticing a lot of “non-GMO Project” or “No GMOs” on certain foods. I realize that I probably see these more often since I do the majority of my shopping at Whole Foods, but I was still unsure of what a GMO was.

So, what exactly is a GMO and what does it mean if it’s in your food? GMO stands for genetically modified organism. I don’t know about you, but that term sounds a little scary, especially when you are talking about food.

According to the Non-GMO project:

Agricultural products are segmented into two groups: (1) those that are high-risk of being GMO because they are currently in commercial production, and (2) those that have a monitored risk because suspected or known incidents of contamination have occurred and/or the crops have genetically modified relatives in commercial production with which cross-pollination (and consequently contamination) is possible.

Read more...