Earlier this week, I asked plant pathologist and molecular biologist Doug Gurian-Sherman to explain some of the science behind genetically engineered crops and their potential — or lack thereof — to feed a more populous, climate-changing world. Today, President Barack Obama is unveiling a $15 billion plan for food security in Africa. It’s a plan that appears to contain a number of good elements, but it also promotes genetic engineering as a significant tool to help poor farmers produce more food and lift themselves out of poverty. [If you haven't already, take a minute to read and possibly sign the petition being circulated by CREDO Action — the activist arm of Working Assets — titled "Tell your senators Monsanto can't feed the world.] In the last
With food shortages provoking riots in recent years, and the world’s population increasing exponentially, Congress will soon be debating the next big U.S. aid package for developing countries. America currently spends about $2.5 billion on food aid, most of it to buy surplus U.S.-grown commodity grains to donate — a policy that may fill bellies but is wildly inefficient and by
The last page of every issue of Edible San Francisco contains this anonymous quotation: “Despite its artistic pretensions and its many accomplishments, humankind owes its existence to a six-inch layer of topsoil and the fact that it rains.” One could even go so far and say that most life — plants, birds, reptiles, insects, and mammals — also owes its existence to this thin layer of topsoil. Unfortunately, humanity has been taking topsoil for granted, and paying the price in many ways, from
Another round for the revolving door: Rumor has it that Mike Taylor, currently a professor at George Washington University but better known for his work as Monsanto’s Vice President for Public Policy, will start on Monday at the FDA in a position coordinating food safety. Congress is considering a major food safety bill — more info here — and the scuttlebutt is that Taylor might coordinate the implementation of that bill once it’s passed. It’s not clear whether Taylor will be employed
There is a reason the word eat is in sweat. Coming off of a weekend of non-stop planting, weeding, irrigating, harvesting, and storing, I finally reached one of those exhausting peaks where I asked myself, “Why do I do this?” And then I looked up at my equally sweaty and exasperated husband and voiced what his eyes questioned back, “Why do we do this?” “This” meaning
In 1945, during the fourth year of America’s direct involvement in World War II, President Harry Truman issued a proclamation about food. He called for those on the home front to plant larger victory gardens, to preserve more food, and to minimize food waste. This proclamation came after years of propaganda about growing a Victory Garden, the operation of community canning centers across the country, rationing of premium foods, and other wartime policies, and so I’m guessing that it was taken
School’s out for the summer, but there’s a food fight going on in the cafeteria. In Washington, Congress is turning up the heat on the policies that determine what 30 million children will eat once the lunch bell rings. Want hormones out of kid’s milk? Pesticides off the tomatoes? Local lettuce in the salad bar? Candy bars and snack cakes to be considered junk
By Renee Ciulla Although many days I would prefer to just pick up a shovel and start farming, I am forging ahead with a Master of Science degree in Agroecology. I am currently studying for a year in Germany, and the more I learn about organic farming and local-food initiatives, the more I see how they can ameliorate some of the problems associated with our global food system. I hope that by learning more about the factors related to ethical and environmental food production, I can ultimately inspire others to feel proud about the food they swallow. I would
By Twilight Greenaway I walked out of the screening of “The End of the Line” feeling deeply uneasy. Most of my discomfort had been carefully orchestrated by the film’s director, Rupert Murray, who filled the 80 minutes with straight-talking scientists and image upon image of wild fish being violently removed from the ocean. Fishermen stabbed endangered bluefin tuna (left) in roiling pools of bloodied water. Giant trawl nets scraped across the ocean’s
Though I’ve been gardening for many years, every season I come up against all the things I don’t know and want to learn. Usually I grab a book or talk to a friendly farmer at the local farmers market to see how someone else does what I want to do. But recently, I discovered a list of workshops available at the George Jones Memorial Farm in Oberlin, OH — only an hour away — and decided to head there for an introduction to permaculture. I’ve wanted to learn about permaculture for a while but haven’t been able to find the time (or
If the whole “edible landscape” notion has failed to appeal to you, the Heartland Harvest Garden at Powell Gardens in Missouri just might make you reconsider. Officially open as of June 14, Heartland Harvest Garden is a feast for the eyes as well as the appetite. Comprising 12 acres of edible landscape, which garden officials claim make it the biggest such garden in the country, the Heartland Harvest Garden has numerous spaces both educational and beautiful: home-style kitchen gardens, fruit and vegetable parterres
Catch-share no catch-all solution to ocean’s troubles: Law professor Rebecca Bratspies has an excellent, if acronym-heavy essay about how privatizing the seas through the use of “catch-shares,” also known as individualized transferrable
U.S. bigeyes too big for sustainable plate: Although scientists are urging an immediate reduction in bigeye tuna catches to protect the species, and most nations are planning on reducing their bigeye catches by 10% per year, the U.S.-flagged fleet (which
Soy vey!: Soy products market pioneer Silk doesn’t look so smooth in a new report by the Cornucopia Institute. Not only does it get a zero-bean rating in the scorecard,
We can feed the world: Is a food crisis imminent? In his latest “Policy Pennings” column, Daryll E. Ray, director of the University of Tennessee’s Agricultural Policy Analysis Center, says no, for two reasons. First, the world has plenty
Thirsty for more information: The Government Accountability Office recently looked at oversight of the bottled water by the FDA and states in comparison to EPA’s regulation of tap water. FDA’s standards are generally similar, but GAO noted
No good deed goes unpunished: Planting a California buckeye (Aesculus californica; Wikipedia image at right) in your yard will benefit
Not so comic relief: Connecting the dots from NAFTA to swine flu. (Mother Jones) See something for the Digest? Send the link to digest@ethicurean.com.
A recipe for complete and utter world disaster: Rich countries and international corporations, including automakers, are buying up farmland in developing countries at a rate that ought to set off humanitarian alarm bells worldwide. New reports from the
“Don’t make a fucking shelf-stable organic English muffin!”: We’ve been holding off on Digesting the Washington Post’s much-talked-about
Time for a new Meatrix?: Lest we forget that the Department of Agriculture’s role is to help out the food industry by any means possible, a team of scientists led by USDA Agricultural Research Service biologist
Before hipsters discovered butchery class: Houston Press reporter Robb Walsh has a long but fascinating feature on his recent adventures in butchery, which “all started with a meat mystery — call it the case of the disappearing skirt.” Walsh
Seeds of change at White House still germinating: Thoughtful piece asking food movement heavyweights (Ferd Hofner of the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition and yes, the ubiquitous Mr. P) whether the Obama Administration has been more talk than
We can’t get enough of Will Allen: The Sunday New York Times Magazine had a must-read profile of Milwaukee urban farmer and grant magnet Will Allen, one of the most inspiring leaders of the sustainable food movement. Allen, writes “Bottlemania”
How to reach across the GMO corn rows: A brief segment on NPR reported from Kansas City has the food-politics blogosphere and Twitter kingdom bristling. (La Vida Locavore calls
Eat food. Not too much. Mostly…whatever you like: Nice, if rambling, article about how writers like Mark Bittman, Michael Pollan, and new entrant Robyn O’Brien (whose very interesting book, “The
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