China Goes Organic After Scandal Of ‘Recycled’ Cooking Oil From Sewers

Bon appétit!


Organic food sales have taken off in China after a series of safety scares, including the disclosure that one in 10 meals is cooked using oil dredged from the sewer.

china-goes-organic-after-scandal-of-recycled-cooking-oil-from-sewers
Police inspect illegal cooking oil, better known as ‘drainage oil’, seized during a crackdown in Beijing Photo: AFP/GETTY

The Chinese now consume more than twice as much organic food as health-conscious Japan.

The market is worth an annual 10billion yuan (£1billion) having quadrupled in the past five years. For comparison, the British organic market is worth roughly £2billion. Interest has been promoted by a series of scares including toxic beans, contaminated milk and pork, pesticide-laced dumplings, chemically-tainted chicken, and the growing presence of what is known as “sewage oil”.

Night soil collectors typically visit the drains behind restaurants late at night to scoop up dregs of oil, which they filter and resell.

The government, which released the figures, has promised to take action against the practice. But since there are no laws against skimming oil from drains, police have had to release any suspects.

In April, a man was caught in broad daylight collecting oil at a sewer in Zhengzhou, Henan province, which he admitted intending to sell to street food vendors for 300 yuan a barrel.

“There is no way to prevent this oil from returning to the food chain,” said Zhen Zhiquan, 32, the manager of a company in Qingdao that turns sewage oil into biofuel.

“Companies like us buy around 10 to 20 per cent of the oil that is dredged from the sewers, but at least 80 per cent is recycled,” he said.

Xie Lili, 25, runs an organic store on the internet. In the aftermath of the oil scare, she said she had seen “a huge increase” in demand for organic salts, oils and spices.

“The volume is 10 to 15 times greater. People became quite scared and preferred to cook at home,” she added.

Read moreChina Goes Organic After Scandal Of ‘Recycled’ Cooking Oil From Sewers

Interview With Robyn O’Brien, Author Of ‘The Unhealthy Truth: One Mother’s Shocking Investigation into the Dangers of America’s Food Supply’

the-unhealthy-truth

Amazon.com: – The Unhealthy Truth: One Mother’s Shocking Investigation into the Dangers of America’s Food Supply– and What Every Family Can Do to Protect Itself

Amazon.de: – The Unhealthy Truth: One Mother’s Shocking Investigation into the Dangers of America’s Food Supply– and What Every Family Can Do to Protect Itself



Added: 19. July 2010

Alex Bogusky interviews Robyn O’Brien, author of The Unhealthy Truth

RED ALERT: Dr. Rima E. Laibow On The Food Safety Bill (S 510): This Bill Eliminates All Local Farming, Organic Farmers and Garden Farmers

“This bill is the triumph of agri-bills”

“It is the industrialization tool for the entire US food supply”

“It brings all of Codex standards and guidelines into implementation”

“This bill means that no farmer can safe seed”

“If it does pass, you and I, our children, our loved ones will suffer and we will die”


Added: 22. August 2010

Dr Rima Laibow MD tells how massive public PUSH BACK has held of the forced industrialization of food bill, S.510 in the US Senate, since last November.

Now the PUSH BACK must continue or we risk the bill being rushed through in September as a “noncontroversial” unanimous consent bill. Action Item at www.healthfreedomusa.org to educate decision makers.

More from Dr. Rima E. Laibow:

Dr. Rima E. Laibow MD reports from the Codex Committee on Nutrition Labeling

Dr. Rima E. Laibow on Codex Alimentarius and Food Nazification

Dr. Rima E. Laibow on the Contamination of the Food Supply & Deadly Antibiotics

Nutricide – Criminalizing Natural Health, Vitamins, and Herbs

And after you have watched Dr. Rima E. Laibow and read the article below you will know exactly why the Gates Foundation Bought 500,000 Monsanto Shares.

Follow the money!


The Food Safety Modernization Act (S 510) Makes it Illegal To Grow, Share, Trade And Sell Homegrown Food

us-constitution-dhs

S 510, the Food Safety Modernization Act,  may be the most dangerous bill in the history of the US.  It is to our food what the bailout was to our economy, only we can live without money.

“If accepted [S 510] would preclude the public’s right to grow, own, trade, transport, share, feed and eat each and every food that nature makes.  It will become the most offensive authority against the cultivation, trade and consumption of food and agricultural products of one’s choice. It will be unconstitutional and contrary to natural law or, if you like, the will of God.”  ~ Dr. Shiv Chopra, Canada Health whistleblower

It is similar to what India faced with imposition of the salt tax during British rule, only S 510 extends control over all food in the US, violating the fundamental human right to food.

Monsanto says it has no interest in the bill and would not benefit from it, but Monsanto’s Michael Taylor who gave us rBGH and unregulated genetically modified (GM) organisms, appears to have designed it and is waiting as an appointed Food Czar to the FDA (a position unapproved by Congress) to administer the agency it would create – without judicial review – if it passes. S 510 would give Monsanto unlimited power over all US seed, food supplements, food and farming.

History

In the 1990s, Bill Clinton introduced HACCP (Hazardous Analysis Critical Control Points) purportedly to deal with contamination in the meat industry.  Clinton’s HACCP delighted the offending corporate (World Trade Organization “WTO”) meat packers since it allowed them to inspect themselves, eliminated thousands of local food processors (with no history of contamination), and centralized meat into their control.  Monsanto promoted HACCP.

In 2008, Hillary Clinton, urged a powerful centralized food safety agency as part of her campaign for president.  Her advisor was Mark Penn, CEO of Burson Marsteller*, a giant PR firm representing Monsanto.  Clinton lost, but Clinton friends such as Rosa DeLauro, whose husband’s firm lists Monsanto as a progressive client and globalization as an area of expertise, introduced early versions of S 510.

S 510 fails on moral, social, economic, political, constitutional, and human survival grounds.

1.  It puts all US food and all US farms under Homeland Security and the Department of Defense, in the event of contamination or an ill-defined emergency.  It resembles the Kissinger Plan.

2.  It would end US sovereignty over its own food supply by insisting on compliance with the WTO, thus threatening national security.  It would end the Uruguay Round Agreement Act of 1994, which put US sovereignty and US law under perfect protection.  Instead, S 510 says:

COMPLIANCE WITH INTERNATIONAL AGREEMENTS.

Nothing in this Act (or an amendment made by this Act) shall be construed in a manner inconsistent with the agreement establishing the World Trade Organization or any other treaty or international agreement to which the United States is a party.

3.  It would allow the government, under Maritime Law, to define the introduction of any food into commerce (even direct sales between individuals) as smuggling into “the United States.” Since under that law, the US is a corporate entity and not a location, “entry of food into the US” covers food produced anywhere within the land mass of this country and “entering into” it by virtue of being produced.

4.  It imposes Codex Alimentarius on the US, a global system of control over food. It allows the United Nations (UN), World Health Organization (WHO), UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), and the WTO to take control of every food on earth and remove access to natural food supplements.  Its bizarre history and its expected impact in limiting access to adequate nutrition (while mandating GM food, GM animals, pesticides, hormones, irradiation of food, etc.) threatens all safe and organic food and health itself, since the world knows now it needs vitamins to survive, not just to treat illnesses.

5.  It would remove the right to clean, store and thus own seed in the US, putting control of seeds in the hands of Monsanto and other multinationals, threatening US security. See Seeds – How to criminalize them, for more details.

6.  It includes NAIS, an animal traceability program that threatens all small farmers and ranchers raising animals. The UN is participating through the WHO, FAO, WTO, and World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE) in allowing mass slaughter of even heritage breeds of animals and without proof of disease.  Biodiversity in farm animals is being wiped out to substitute genetically engineered animals on which corporations hold patents.  Animal diseases can be falsely declared.  S 510 includes the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), despite its corrupt involvement in the H1N1 scandal, which is now said to have been concocted by the corporations.

7.  It extends a failed and destructive HACCP to all food, thus threatening to do to all local food production and farming what HACCP did to meat production – put it in corporate hands and worsen food safety.

8.  It deconstructs what is left of the American economy. It takes agriculture and food, which are the cornerstone of all economies, out of the hands of the citizenry, and puts them under the total control of multinational corporations influencing the UN, WHO, FAO and WTO, with HHS, and CDC, acting as agents, with Homeland Security as the enforcer.  The chance to rebuild the economy based on farming, ranching, gardens, food production, natural health, and all the jobs, tools and connected occupations would be eliminated.

9.  It would allow the government to mandate antibiotics, hormones, slaughterhouse waste, pesticides and GMOs. This would industrialize every farm in the US, eliminate local organic farming, greatly increase global warming from increased use of oil-based products and long-distance delivery of foods, and make food even more unsafe.  The five items listed – the Five Pillars of Food Safety – are precisely the items in the food supply which are the primary source of its danger.

10. It uses food crimes as the entry into police state power and control. The bill postpones defining all the regulations to be imposed; postpones defining crimes to be punished, postpones defining penalties to be applied.  It removes fundamental constitutional protections from all citizens in the country, making them subject to a corporate tribunal with unlimited power and penalties, and without judicial review. It is (similar to C-6 in Canada) the end of Rule of Law in the US.

Read moreRED ALERT: Dr. Rima E. Laibow On The Food Safety Bill (S 510): This Bill Eliminates All Local Farming, Organic Farmers and Garden Farmers

California Files Legal Brief Opposing Monsanto in US Supreme Court

Conflict of Interest: Ex Monsanto Lawyer Clarence Thomas to Hear Major Monsanto Case:

In Monsanto v. Geertson Seed Farms, No. 09-475, the U.S. Supreme Court will hear arguments in a case which could have an enormous effect on the future of the American food industry. This is Monsanto’s third appeal of the case, and if they win a favorable ruling from the high court, a deregulated Monsanto may find itself in position to corner the markets of numerous U.S. crops, and to litigate conventional farmers into oblivion.

Here’s where it gets a bit dicier. Two Supreme Court justices have what appear to be direct conflicts of interest.

Stephen Breyer

Charles Breyer, the judge who ruled in the original decision of 2007 which is being appealed, is Stephen Breyer’s brother, who apparently views this as a conflict of interest and has recused himself.

Clarence Thomas

From the years 1976 – 1979, Thomas worked as an attorney for Monsanto. Thomas apparently does not see this as a conflict of interest and has not recused himself.

Fox, meet henhouse.


the-world-according-to-monsanto
(Watch this video here. More important information at the end of the article.)

California is weighing in on a landmark Supreme Court case with far-reaching implications for agriculture the world over. The Attorney Generals of California, Oregon and Massachusetts have filed amicus briefs along with a coalition of scientists, organic and conventional farmers, food exporters, former government officials and legal scholars in support of the Center for Food Safety, an anti-GMO advocacy group opposing Monsanto.

In Monsanto v. Geertson Seed Farms, the American biotech giant – currently under investigation for anti-trust law violations – is seeking to end an injunction on its patented “Roundup Ready” alfalfa imposed by a federal district court in 2007. Three years and two failed appeals later, Monsanto is taking their case to the the Supreme Court in what will be the first ever High Court ruling on a genetically engineered (GE) crop.

At issue in this case is a lower court’s ban on the planting of the GE alfalfa crop. The USDA approved its use in 2007 without submitting an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) to asses the ramifications transgenetic plants would have on farmers and surrounding environments. The court determined that by failing to comply with the environmental impact research requirements of the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), the USDA was derelict in its administrative duties.

Read moreCalifornia Files Legal Brief Opposing Monsanto in US Supreme Court

Dr. Russell Blaylock: Harmful Effects of Swine Flu Vaccine

Very important information!



About Dr. Russell Blaylock:

Dr. Blaylock is a board certified neurosurgeon, author and lecturer. He attended the LSU School of Medicine in New Orleans and completed his general surgical internship and neurosurgical residency at the Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston, South Carolina.

During his residency he ran the neurology program for one year and did a fellowship in neurosurgery after his residency. For the past 25 years he has practiced neurosurgery in addition to having a nutritional practice. He recently retired from both practices to devote full time to nutritional studies and research.

During his residency training he worked with the eminent neurosurgeon, Dr. Ludwig Kempe. Together they developed the transcallosal removal of intraventricular tumors, which is still used today.

Dr. Blaylock presented their cases utilizing this technique to the Congress of Neurological Surgeons. They also developed the ventriculolymphatic shunt in the treatment of hydrocephalus.

In addition, they conducted neuroanatomical studies together with the aim of developing improved approaches in vascular intracranial surgery. He has continued a close personal friendship with Dr. Kempe over the ensuing years, who at age 91 continues to study neuroanatomy, ornithology and is an editor of a major journal on medieval studies.

Of special note, Dr. Kempe climbed the Himalayan mountains at age 87, a testament of his robust health and enduring love of adventure.. It was during his residency that Dr. Blaylock did much of the primary work on intraventricular monitoring of craniocerebral trauma patients, which was reported in the scientific literature.

He also worked closely with Dr. Peter Jannetta during Dr. Jennettas early research on vascular compression of the cranial nerves as a cause of trigeminal neuralgia and hemifacial spasm. Dr. Blaylock was one of the first neurosurgeons to utilize high-intensity nutritional supplementation in craniocerebral trauma patients, which met with great success.

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More information on swine flu and vaccination:

Read moreDr. Russell Blaylock: Harmful Effects of Swine Flu Vaccine

I ate Hu Jintao’s dinner; China’s president, and the rest of the politburo eat only organic food

And corporations want to convince you that GM food is healthy. GM food is lethal stuff.

It is the same with the Royals in the UK. They only eat organic food. Their deer for example are naturally raised (no pellets as food, no antibiotics, no hormones, no hormones and artificial sweeteners that the deer gain weight faster) and then the chief personally selects the deer that will be served for the Royals. All the fruits and vegetables are organically grown – all paid for by the taxpayer.

The funny thing is that the British Royals since 1714 are coming from the House of Hannover and the House of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha. The Royals are ‘really’ Germans.

The royal family’s official name, or lack thereof, became a problem during World War I, when people began to mutter that Saxe-Coburg-Gotha sounded far too German. King George V and his family needed a new, English-sounding name. After considering everything from Plantagenet to Tudor-Stuart to simply England, the king and his advisors chose the name Windsor.

God save the ….. Looks like I’ve got carried away here.

*****

hu-jintaos-dinner

A stone’s throw from the Forbidden City and Tiananmen Square is Zhongnanhai, the walled compound where China’s top leaders live.

Each day the finest ingredients from all over China are delivered to the chefs in Zhongnanhai, by the Central State Organ for Special Food Supply.

Hu Jintao, China’s president, and the rest of the politburo get to eat specially-selected organic produce and wash it down with Red Robe tea, which only grows on a couple of bushes in Fujian.

Zhu Yong Lan, the head of the special food supply department, said no pesticides, fertilizers, antibiotics, growth hormones, pollution, artificial additives, preservatives, or genetic modification would ever make its way into the food eaten in Zhongnanhai, a rare feat in a country where the label “organic” is sometimes rather loosely applied.

No one else in China can eat this forbidden food. The only foreigners who taste it are guests at state banquets.

Read moreI ate Hu Jintao’s dinner; China’s president, and the rest of the politburo eat only organic food

A cancerous conspiracy to poison your faith in organic food

Organic vegetables and Fruit in a Box

Debate: Despite its obvious benefits organic food continues to be denigrated by the political and corporate establishment in Britain

Despite its obvious benefits for our health and for the environment, organic food continues to be denigrated by the political and corporate establishment in Britain.

The food industry, in alliance with pharmaceutical and big biotechnology companies, has waged a long, often cynical campaign to convince the public that mass-produced, chemically-assisted and intensively-farmed products are just as good as organic foods, despite mounting evidence to the contrary.

The latest assault in this propaganda exercise comes from the Food Standards Agency, the government’s so-called independent watchdog, which has just published a report claiming that there is no nutritional benefit to be gained from eating organic produce.

Those forces bent on promoting GM crops and industrialised production, would have been delighted by the widespread media coverage of the Agency’s report, portraying enthusiasm for organic foods as little more than a fad among neurotic consumers that would pass once the public is given the correct information.

But what is truly misguided is not the increasing popularity of organic goods, but the Food Standards Agency’s determination to halt this trend and instead promote genetic modification.

The new report from the FSA highlights this. For all the publicity it has attracted, the document does not contain any new material.

In fact, it is just an analysis of existing research carried out by other bodies. Moreover, the organisation that conducted this second-hand study, the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, is not renowned as a leading centre in this field.

Indeed, there is far more significant work currently being done on organic foods by several other bodies, some of it funded by the European Union, though the FSA has chosen to ignore it.

It is difficult to avoid the conclusion that the FSA has decided to give such loud backing to this report because it can bend the findings to suit its political, pro-GM, anti-organic agenda.

GM crops
What is truly misguided is not the increasing popularity of organic goods, but the Food Standards Agency’s determination to instead promote genetic modification

Ever since its creation in 2000, the Food Standards Agency has been biased against organic farming. The first chairman, Sir John Krebs (“Krebs” by the way is the German word for “Cancer”. – Infinite Unknown) , was supportive of the biotechnology lobby and only too keen to promote GM as the future of farming.

Read moreA cancerous conspiracy to poison your faith in organic food

California raw almonds must be treated, judge rules

WASHINGTON — A federal judge Monday upheld requirements that raw California almonds be treated to protect consumers from salmonella poisoning.

In a blow to organic almond producers and handlers, the Washington, D.C.-based judge rejected challenges to pasteurization requirements designed by the Almond Board of California. The Agriculture Department formally imposed the rules in March 2007, setting off sparks.

Read moreCalifornia raw almonds must be treated, judge rules

HR 875 The food police, criminalizing organic farming and the backyard gardener, and violation of the 10th amendment

This is about taking away ‘real’ food from your table, so that you are left with ‘food’ or better GM trash that is loaded with poisons. More change coming!


5. März 2009
Source: YouTube


Campaign For Liberty

HR 875 http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/F?c111:1:./temp/~c1112RD9bb:e11439:

This bill is sitting in committee and I am not sure when it is going to hit the floor. One thing I do know is that very few of the Representatives have read it. As usual they will vote on this based on what someone else is saying. Urge your members to read the legislation and ask for opposition to this devastating legislation. Devastating for everyday folks but great for factory farming ops like Monsanto, ADM, Sodexo and Tyson to name a few.

I have no doubt that this legislation was heavily influenced by lobbyists from huge food producers. This legislation is so broad based that technically someone with a little backyard garden could get fined and have their property seized. It will effect anyone who produces food even if they do not sell but only consume it. It will literally put all independent farmers and food producers out of business due to the huge amounts of money it will take to conform to factory farming methods. If people choose to farm without industry standards such as chemical pesticides and fertilizers they will be subject to a vareity of harassment from this completely new agency that has never before existed. That’s right, a whole new government agency is being created just to police food, for our own protection of course.

DO NOT TAKE MY WORD FOR IT, READ THIS LEGISLATION FOR YOURSELF. The more people who read this legislation the more insight we are going to get and be able to share. Post your observations and insights below. Urge your members to read this legislation and to oppose the passage of this legislation.

Pay special attention to

  • Section 3 which is the definitions portion of the bill-read in it’s entirety.
  • section 103, 206 and 207- read in it’s entirety.

Red flags I found and I am sure there are more………..

  • Legally binds state agriculture depts to enforcing federal guidelines effectively taking away the states power to do anything other than being food police for the federal dept.
  • Effectively criminalizes organic farming but doesn’t actually use the word organic.
  • Effects anyone growing food even if they are not selling it but consuming it.
  • Effects anyone producing meat of any kind including wild game.
  • Legislation is so broad based that every aspect of growing or producing food can be made illegal. There are no specifics which is bizarre considering how long the legislation is.
  • Section 103 is almost entirely about the administrative aspect of the legislation. It will allow the appointing of officials from the factory farming corporations and lobbyists and classify them as experts and allow them to determine and interpret the legislation. Who do you think they are going to side with?
  • Section 206 defines what will be considered a food production facility and what will be enforced up all food production facilities. The wording is so broad based that a backyard gardener could be fined and more.
  • Section 207 requires that the state’s agriculture dept act as the food police and enforce the federal requirements. This takes away the states power and is in violation of the 10th amendment.
  • There are many more but by the time I got this far in the legislation I was so alarmed that I wanted to bring someone’s attention to it. (to the one person who reads my blog)

Didn’t Stalin nationalize farming methods that enabled his administration to gain control over the food supply? Didn’t Stalin use the food to control the people?

Last word…… Legislate religion and enforce gag orders on ministers on what can and can’t be said in the pulpit, instituting regulations forcing people to rely solely on the government, control the money and the food. What is that called? It is on the tip of my tongue……….

Read moreHR 875 The food police, criminalizing organic farming and the backyard gardener, and violation of the 10th amendment

France recalls contaminated soymeal delivered to some 127 organic farms

France discovers 300 tonnes of contaminated Chinese soymeal


Deliveries from China have been subjected to rigorous tests since the EU issued an alert last October recommending countries tighten controls on produce from China. (AFP)

RENNES – ALMOST 300 tonnes of soymeal from China, used to feed organic poultry in western France, were taken off the market on Friday after testing positive for a toxic chemical, an import company said.

The soymeal contained melanine – the chemical at the heart of a scandal in China over contaminated milk – 50 times over the recommended limit.

‘One of the three imported batches, was carrying 116mg/kg of melamine, while the average should be 2,5 grammes. All foodstuffs made from the same materials were taken off the market at the beginning of November,’ Mr Christophe Carousse from the French farm cooperative told AFP.

Other untested batches where delivered to some 127 organic farms in the Loire region in western France.

‘Tests on meat, pork and egg-laying chickens show there is no danger to public health. Unlike dioxin, melamine does not build up in the body. There is no way of catching it through the food chain,’ veterinary expert Frederic Andre told AFP. (Hmmh.)

Read moreFrance recalls contaminated soymeal delivered to some 127 organic farms

Codex Alimentarius: Population Control Under the Guise of Consumer Protection

This article is a must read.

Related video:
Nutricide – Criminalizing Natural Health, Vitamins, and Herbs
(Dr. Rima Laibow, M.D.)

__________________________________________________________________________

By: Dr. Gregory Damato, Ph.D.

(NaturalNews) Codeath (sorry, I meant Codex) Alimentarius, latin for Food Code, is a very misunderstood organization that most people (including nearly all U.S. congressmen) have never heard of, never mind understand the true reality of this extremely powerful trade organization. From the official Codex website (www.codexalimentarius.net) the altruistic purpose of this commission is in “protecting health of the consumers and ensuring fair trade practices in the food trade, and promoting coordination of all food standards work undertaken by international governmental and non-governmental organizations”. Codex is a joint venture regulated by the Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) and World Health Organization (WHO).

Read moreCodex Alimentarius: Population Control Under the Guise of Consumer Protection

U.S. Food and Water Supply Poisoned by Perchlorate

(NaturalNews) According to a report by the Organic Consumers Association, a toxic chemical that is a byproduct of rocket fuel is rapidly poisoning the food and water supply in the United States. Known as perchlorate, this chemical has been found in 93% of the nation’s milk and lettuce supply in a recent FDA study. It has also been found in the drinking water for at least 22 states at extremely alarming levels. Perhaps the scariest statistic is that perchlorate has been found in the breast milk of 97% of the mothers who were tested.

What are Americans supposed to eat?

Unfortunately, lettuce and milk weren’t the only foods that were found to be contaminated. Perchlorate was found in tomatoes, carrots, cucumbers, spinach, citrus, melons and more. Sadly, even organic vegetables were affected, because most crops are irrigated from polluted water sources. In a Wired.com article by Amit Asaravala, Bill Walker, the vice president of the Environmental Working Group’s West Coast operations, was quoted as saying, “The study confirms what we and some other people have been saying for a while — that perchlorate is not only a problem in areas with known water contamination but for anyone who eats food grown in the U.S.”

Read moreU.S. Food and Water Supply Poisoned by Perchlorate

Monsanto Defeated on rBGH Animal Drug After 14 Year Battle

(NaturalNews) I recently received great news from the Organic Consumers Association (OCA) that after a long fourteen year battle between OCA, public interest and family farmer groups against Monsanto’s Recombinant Bovine Growth Hormone (rBGH), Monsanto has announced on August 6th that they will sell off their controversial rBGH. This is very good news since rBGH has been fed to cattle since the early 1990’s and has been implicated in a wide array of health issues, some very serious ones for both the animals themselves and anyone who consumes anything from the animals who are fed rBGH.

rBGH is said to be responsible for a number of health issues ranging from premature puberty in children to colon, prostate and breast cancer to increased antibiotic residues and elevated levels of a potent cancer tumor promoter called IGF-1.

Highly recommended videos:

Life running out of control – Genetically Modified Organisms

The World According to Monsanto – A documentary that Americans won’t ever see.

rBGH is a genetically engineered variant of the natural growth hormone produced by cows. It is manufactured by Monsanto and sold to dairy farmers under the trade name Posilac. This hormone forces cows to increase milk production by about 10%, but it also increases the incidences of mastitis, lameness as well as reproductive issues.

Read moreMonsanto Defeated on rBGH Animal Drug After 14 Year Battle

Organic Bees Surviving Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD)

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I know this won’t come as a surprise to many of our readers, nor to the many organic beekeepers that have been commenting on our posts, but there have been several reports of organic bee colonies surviving where the ‘industrial’ bee colonies are collapsing. Here is the latest to come to my attention:

Sharon Labchuk is a longtime environmental activist and part-time organic beekeeper from Prince Edward Island…. In a widely circulated email, she wrote:

I’m on an organic beekeeping list of about 1,000 people, mostly Americans, and no one in the organic beekeeping world, including commercial beekeepers, is reporting colony collapse on this list. The problem with the big commercial guys is that they put pesticides in their hives to fumigate for varroa mites, and they feed antibiotics to the bees. They also haul the hives by truck all over the place to make more money with pollination services, which stresses the colonies.

Her email recommends a visit to the Bush Bees Web site, where Michael Bush felt compelled to put a message to the beekeeping world right on the top page:

Most of us beekeepers are fighting with the Varroa mites. I’m happy to say my biggest problems are things like trying to get nucs through the winter and coming up with hives that won’t hurt my back from lifting or better ways to feed the bees.

This change from fighting the mites is mostly because I’ve gone to natural sized cells. In case you weren’t aware, and I wasn’t for a long time, the foundation in common usage results in much larger bees than what you would find in a natural hive. I’ve measured sections of natural worker brood comb that are 4.6mm in diameter. What most people use for worker brood is foundation that is 5.4mm in diameter. If you translate that into three dimensions instead of one, it produces a bee that is about half as large again as is natural. By letting the bees build natural sized cells, I have virtually eliminated my Varroa and Tracheal mite problems. One cause of this is shorter capping times by one day, and shorter post-capping times by one day. This means less Varroa get into the cells, and less Varroa reproduce in the cells.

Who should be surprised that the major media reports forget to tell us that the dying bees are actually hyper-bred varieties that we coax into a larger than normal body size? It sounds just like the beef industry. And, have we here a solution to the vanishing bee problem? Is it one that the CCD Working Group, or indeed, the scientific world at large, will support? Will media coverage affect government action in dealing with this issue?

These are important questions to ask. It is not an uncommonly held opinion that, although this new pattern of bee colony collapse seems to have struck from out of the blue (which suggests a triggering agent), it is likely that some biological limit in the bees has been crossed. There is no shortage of evidence that we have been fast approaching this limit for some time.

We’ve been pushing them too hard, Dr. Peter Kevan, an associate professor of environmental biology at the University of Guelph in Ontario, told the CBC. And we’re starving them out by feeding them artificially and moving them great distances. Given the stress commercial bees are under, Kevan suggests CCD might be caused by parasitic mites, or long cold winters, or long wet springs, or pesticides, or genetically modified crops. Maybe it’s all of the above… – InformationLiberation

That’s funny – that’s just what I said…

Let’s hear it for the natural/organic beekeepers out there! I hope this CCD incident will reinforce that natural systems respond far better to imitation and cooperation than reductionist arbitrary control. Work within the system, observe and learn. There’s a lot more to nature than meets the eye, or the microscope.

You Tube has removed the VIDEO

Further Reading:

May 15, 2007

Source: Celsias

My Forbidden Fruits (and Vegetables)

IF you’ve stood in line at a farmers’ market recently, you know that the local food movement is thriving, to the point that small farmers are having a tough time keeping up with the demand.But consumers who would like to be able to buy local fruits and vegetables not just at farmers’ markets, but also in the produce aisle of their supermarket, will be dismayed to learn that the federal government works deliberately and forcefully to prevent the local food movement from expanding. And the barriers that the United States Department of Agriculture has put in place will be extended when the farm bill that House and Senate negotiators are working on now goes into effect.

As a small organic vegetable producer in southern Minnesota, I know this because my efforts to expand production to meet regional demand have been severely hampered by the Agriculture Department’s commodity farm program. As I’ve looked into the politics behind those restrictions, I’ve come to understand that this is precisely the outcome that the program’s backers in California and Florida have in mind: they want to snuff out the local competition before it even gets started.

Read moreMy Forbidden Fruits (and Vegetables)