AlkalizeForHealth
"The doctor of the future will give no medicine, but will interest his patients in the care of the human frame, in diet and in the cause and prevention of disease."
- Thomas Edison Cancer is a political problem more than it is a medical problem. For information on foods to avoid and foods that are safe, go to www.safe-
food.org "Monsanto should not have to vouchsafe the safety of biotech food," said Phil Angell, Monsanto's director of corporate communications. "Our interest is in selling as much of it as possible. Assuring its safety is the FDA's job."
- New York Times, October 25, 1998 "What the FDA is doing and what the public thinks it's doing are as different as night and day." - Dr. Herbert Ley, Former FDA Commissioner "The FDA serves as the pharmaceutical industry's watchdog, which can be called upon to attack and destroy a potential competitor under the guise of protecting the public." - Dr. James P. Carter | | The following information courtesy of Richard Wolfson, PhD, Consumer Right to Know Campaign for Mandatory labeling and long-term testing of genetically engineered food. |
Soya study casts doubt on GM decision making process
Gene insertion reduces yields
Agronomy Journal 93:408-412 (2001)
(the address of this page is
www.btinternet.com/~nlpwessex/Documents/elmoresoyastudy.htm )
May 2001
One of the most remarkable things about the large area of genetically modified crops now being grown (chiefly in North and South America) is the relative paucity of studies on their agronomic performance which have been published in peer-reviewed scientific journals.
The limited availability of such research brings into question the scientific basis of the decision making process which has so far determined the encouragement of the technology at both political and farm levels. This is particularly so when such limited basic research on agronomic performance may also only achieve peer-review publication years after, instead of before, the commercial introduction of the technology.
In this respect, therefore, it is especially significant that a rare peer-reviewed paper on the agronomic performance of genetically engineered Roundup Ready soya beans was published in Agronomy Journal, March-April 2001. The study's findings are illuminating as they specifically identify the novel gene, or the process of genetic engineering itself, as causing a reduction in crop yields when compared with otherwise isogenic non-genetically engineered sister lines.
The achievement of peer-review publication of this study does not appear to have been widely reported in the general or farming press, despite the following important conclusions in relation to GE glyphosate resistant (GR) soya bean varieties:
"Yields were suppressed with GR soybean cultivars............The work reported here demonstrates that a 5% yield suppression was related to the gene or its insertion process and another 5% suppression was due to cultivar genetic differential. Producers should consider the potential for 5-10% yield differentials between GR and non-GR cultivars as they evaluate the overall profitability of producing soybean. .........Based on our results from this study and those of Elmore et al., 2001, the yield suppression appears associated with the GR gene or its insertion process rather than glyphosate itself."
Elmore et al, Glyphosate-Resistant Soybean Cultivar Yields Compared with Sister Lines Agron J 2001 93: 408-412
The full paper can be read at:
http://screc.unl.edu/Research/Glyphosate/glyphosateyield.html
More information on the performance of Roundup Ready soya beans is available at:
http://www.btinternet.com/~nlpwessex/Documents/Benbrooksoyreport.htm
....
Date: 5/18/2001
GAIN Report #CA1075
Canada
Oilseeds and Products
Annual
2001
Japan Will Look to Canada Instead of U.S. for Soybeans:
The May 9 edition of Good Morning Ontario states that the U.S. ag attache in Japan reported imports of U.S. soybeans are forecast to decline in 2001/02, as soybean users continue to shift to non-GM soybeans from Canada and Brazil. "In order to meet Japan's increasing demand for non-GMO food soybeans, both Brazil and Canada have rapidly increased their soybean exports," says the attache. "For example, Brazil's share in volume increased from 12% in 1999 to 16% in 2000. Canada's share increased from 3%in 1999 to 5% in 2000. As a result, the U.S. market share dropped from 79% in 1999 to 64% in 2000." In addition, total meal imports are expected to decline for compound feed and an increase in meat imports.
IV. Identity Preservation
Canada Supplies Non-GMO and IP Soybeans: Various trade journals have looked at the issue of Canada supplying a growing market for non-GMO as well as identity-preserved (IP) soybeans. According to some in the soybean industry, Canada (specifically Ontario who is a major soybean producing province) has a competitive advantage in being able to supply non-GMO white helium soybeans. Japanese buyers who want non-GMO white soybeans turn to Canada who will later process the soybeans into white tofu. A staff person for the Ontario Soybean Growers (OSG) said that some companies involved in trading non-variety specific white soybeans believe that the introduction of a Roundup Ready white soybean would be harmful to the Ontario industry.
....
US presses EU for changes in crop rules
WASHINGTON, June 1 (Reuters) - The United States expressed concern on Friday about the European Union's plan to require new labeling and "traceability'' rules for genetically modified crops, EU officials said at their weekly briefing.
Acting on a recent letter from 19 U.S. industry groups, U.S. Undersecretary of State Alan Larson pressed EU Health Commissioner David Byrne on the issue in a telephone call Friday morning, the EU aides said.
"At the end, they have decided ... that the technical staff will meet again and discuss the draft regulations,'' which are scheduled to be approved on June 20 by the European Commission, the EU's executive body, an EU official said.
"The commissioner tried to explain the political situation is such'' that both EU member states and the European Commission feel they must do something to address consumer concerns about genetically-modified crops,'' the official said.
In a May 18 letter to U.S. Agriculture Secretary Ann Veneman, the American Farm Bureau Federation, the Grocery Manufacturers of American, and 17 other farm and commodity groups warned the EU's proposed regulations threatened "a $4 billion U.S. agricultural export market.''
...
http://www.organicts.com/newsnow/
Posted by ecott on Thursday May 31, @04:56PM
"Keep our agriculture free of genetic modification," demanded more than a hundred activists who recently joined hands to demand that genetically modified crop technology be rooted out from India.
.....
EUROPEAN DEMAND FOR NON-GMO SOYBEAN MEAL SOARS
May 30, 2001
AgJournal
Growing demand for meat products produced without livestock feed containing genetically modified organisms (GMOs) has pushed demand for soybean meal certified as GMO-free to between 20 and 25 percent of the European Union (EU) market. However, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Foreign Agricultural Service (FAS), U.S. soybean sales remain largely unaffected by this situation as European imports of soybeans and soybean meal from Brazil - which currently bans planting of Roundup Ready soybeans - continue to exceed demand for certified non-GMO soybean meal. Sources in the compound feed industry say the present demand for certified non-GMO soybean meal has grown from nearly zero in only 12 months, with the expectation of further increases in the coming year.
....
BEES AND GM CONTAMINATION
From: John Salt, President Moray Beekeepers.
j.j.salt@bees-trees.demon.co.uk
The British public have made it quite clear that they do not wish to eat food that is derived from any transgenic crop.
Should Scottish honey become contaminated with GM material the market for Scottish Honey will collapse. This is liable to cause the beekeeper to stop keeping bees. 80% of the fruit we eat is pollinated by the honeybee, together with virtually all the wild fruit and berries small animals and birds rely on.
....
http://just-food.com/news_detail.asp?art=34242&app=1
AUSTRALIA: GM audit finds trials not properly monitored
01 Jun 2001
Source: just-food.com editorial team
The University of Western Australia (UWA) has been placed under investigation after GM lupin plants were discovered over two years after trials of genetically modified plants were completed in Mingenew (1997) and Quairading (1998). The results, which are due during the early part of this month, are expected to conclude that the GM sites were not properly monitored.
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