Monsanto is spending millions to defeat Prop 37, which would require labeling of Roundup Ready, Genetically Modified (GMO) foods in California. This is huge because if labeling is required in CA, so goes the nation. The FDA does not require outside studies of GMO foods. Studies are done in the hen house by the fox, and all of them so far have been short term studies. Below is a link to information about longer term studies, the results of which are quite apparent.
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| Rats with tumors |
Get Out The Vote: Prop 37, California's GMO Labeling Initiative, Could Mean Change For The Entire Country
What are GMOs
"Roundup Ready Crops (RR Crops) are genetically engineered crops that have had their DNA altered to allow them to withstand the herbicide glyphosate (the active ingredient of Monsanto's herbicide Roundup). They are also known as "glyphosate tolerant crops." RR crops deregulated in the U.S. include: corn, soybeans, canola, cotton, sugarbeets, and alfalfa. When planting Glyphosate Tolerant crops, a farmer can spray the entire crop with glyphosate, killing only the weeds and leaving the crop alive. However, one concern with the heavy use of glyphosate on RR crops is that it will lead to the development of glyphosate resistant weeds (sometimes referred to as "superweeds").[1] One variety of RR Corn, NK603, was linked to tumors in rats by a 2012 study.["
More about glyphosate in an excellent article
http://naturalsociety.com/monsantos-infertility-linked-roundup-found-in-all-urine-samples-tested/The small print: There is a dissenting opinion by Steven Salzberg in Forbes magazine:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/stevensalzberg/2012/09/24/does-genetically-modified-corn-cause-cancer-a-flawed-study/ Salzberg tears this study up, while including the following statement about one of the researchers:
"Joel de Vendomois, is a homeopath, with a “Homeopathy and Acupuncture Diploma”, a double dose of quackery in a single degree."
Personally, I'm going to come down on the side of caution and vote for Prop 37. If nothing else, I want the right to decide for myself if I want Monsanto's Roundup in my food, or killing off the lovely, hard-working flora in my stomach. GR
p.s. I would love to hear from my readers in Europe on this subject.
From an article by Bill Bonvie,
ReplyDeleteBeyond any such threats to our physical well-being, however, lurks an even more surreptitious, some might even say sinister, socioeconomic peril, which I would characterize as “food fascism.”
If you think that’s a bit over the top, consider this: Every time Monsanto or one of its biotechnology buddies develops and markets a genetically engineered seed, it claims that seed as its exclusive “intellectual property.” That’s how the company is able to make contractual arrangements with farmers that require them to buy new seeds every year and prohibit them from saving any, a traditional agricultural practice. It’s also why Monsanto attorneys have been successful in the outrageous lawsuits they’ve brought against non-customer cultivators who had the misfortune of having the company’s patented GM seeds blow onto their fields and contaminate their crops.
With several of our major food sources, in effect, already being literally “owned” by one corporation, and more on the verge of being similarly taken over, it appears to be only a matter of time before that same corporate entity will be able to monopolize and control nearly our entire food supply – at least, if things keep going in the direction they are now.
In a recent interview with Bill Moyers on PBS, Indian activist, author and ecologist Vandana Shiva described the startling magnitude of this “corporate rule on a planetary scale.” Observing how Monsanto, in the process of “privatizing seed,” has “taken over most of the seed companies of the world,” Shiva, who also has a degree in physics, pointed out that “a seed is the first link in the food chain. And therefore when you control seed, you control food.” It’s all part of what she refers to as “a corporate hijack of our food and a corporate dictatorship over our food system.”
The full article: http://thesandpaper.villagesoup.com/opinion/story/food-fight-pay-attention-to-proposition-37/900858
Thank you for that article Ginny. As someone who has lived in Europe for the past two years I feel that the food they sell in the supermarkets here is safer. GMO's aren't allowed in the U.K. and even if you buy non-organic foods there isn't the feeling that they have been quite so messed with.
ReplyDeleteMonsanto is the same corporation who has been steadily killing off independent corn farmers over the past years. They have also gone into Mexico where there used to be a fantastic variety of different types of corn and undercut prices to sell GMO corn, kill off the native corn and then raise the prices back up.
We have the right to choose if we want to eat GMO food and that is only possible if Prop 37 is passed. I don't trust Monsanto to make the decision for us.
Caitlin Green