TOP NEWS

Enjoy your pork product!: The feds have decided that even though pet food spiked with melamine has probably killed hundred of animals, and that pigs who ate the product should be quarantined and slaughtered, there’s no need to worry about the few that have entered the food chain already. The FDA and the USDA have jointly decided that “At this time, we have no evidence of harm to humans associated with the processed pork product, and therefore no recall of meat products processed from these animals is being issued.” Wonder if they just can’t track it? (USDA.gov)

Droplets Down Under: Good rain brings hope and planting opportunity for Australian farmers enmired in drought, but no certainty for crops. (The Australian)

Flipper flipflopping: The U.S. government has “arbitrarily and capriciously” sought to ease rules for foreign fishermen on so-called dolphin-safe tuna, ruled a U.S. federal appeals court in upholding current standards. (Reuters)

CCD in Taiwan: Over the past two months, farmers in three parts of Taiwan have reported most of their bees gone. (Reuters)

Blow to GMOs: A U.S. judge mulls whether to make the ban on planting Monsanto’s transgenic alfalfa permanent until the government conducts a study of the crop’s potential environmental impact. (Reuters)

Oh, the environy: Scottish farmers have to fly in organic animal feed from the Ukraine and Kazahkstan to keep up with the demand for local, organic meat. Scotsman.com News

Subtracting additives: A general story about the insecurity of our complicated food chain says that protein sources are so widely sprinkled across Americans’ diets that it would be impossible to do an effective recall if the human food supply got contaminated. Proteins like soy, wheat or corn are mostly used to make foods more nutritionally functional and appealing to consumers — a creamier soup, a sturdier meatless sausage, a more nutritious baby formula. Sacramento Bee

Dump Doha!: Developing world charities, unions and nonprofit groups from around the world sent Democratic members of Congress a letter urging them to end their backing of the “Doha Round” of World Trade Organization negotiations. The groups point to negative impacts of global trade in developing countries. (Washington Post via Reuters)

Vermont state proposes mobile trucks to do on-farm slaughtering (High Plains Journal)

Miracle-Gro sues organic plant-food co. (Associated Press)

Smithfield finds no melamine in feed, claims vertical integration model makes it safer (Cattle Network)

FEATURES

Seeds of destruction: A must-read Gristmill guest post details Monsanto’s quest to enforce its patent-protected monopoly over all genetically modified soybeans sold in Europe, which it’s using to squeeze farmers in Argentina, and the 13-year legal battle waged against it by the ETC Group, an international civil society organization, and environmental group Greenpeace (supported by 19 other civil society organizations worldwide). (Gristmill)

Pro-consolidation: An economist looks at consolidation in the meatpacking industry and says it hasn’t inhibited prices. (The Pig Site)

The wormwood turns: Intrepid absinthe drinkers have worked around the U.S. ban (because of its containing thujone, a potentially toxic compound) by ordering imported bottles off the Internet or smuggling them back from Eastern Europe. Now they have a third, less dodgy option: the first legal, genuine American absinthe in nearly a century. (New York Times)

Taking stalks: An excerpt from “Stalking the Wild Asparagus,” the 1962 forager’s bible whose simple descriptions and instructions teaching readers how to find, harvest, and cook wild foodstuffs make it more attractive and relevant than ever today. (Culinate)

Just say Naylor: George Naylor, the Iowa corn farmer profiled in “The Omnivore’s Dilemma,” says the farm program works against growers and the environment. (Des Moines Register)

Hog washing: Canadian farmers are advocating taking liquid hog manure and turning it into solid organic fertilizer — a relatively simple process — that eliminates the most harmful greenhouse gas it would otherwise produce as well as aids in water retention. (Vancouver Sun)

Sweet savings: A profile of a Vermont maple sugar maker who’s converted his operation to run on vegetable oil. While a dwindling number of small, traditional sugar makers still boil their sap over wood fires, the majority burn heating oil, a fossil fuel that contributes to global warming. (New York Times)

COMMENTARY, ETC.

Pucking the trends: Restauranteur Wolfgang Puck has an editorial in Newsweek about how “it’s up to chefs like me to help everyone stay healthy. …It’s about getting every one of us to eat the right foods. That means buying produce from responsible farmers who grow fruits and vegetables that aren’t covered with pesticides or genetically modified. It means getting meat from ranchers who not only shun the use of antibiotics and growth hormones, but also raise their animals humanely in a free-roaming environment.” (Newsweek via MSNBC)

Save us: The San Jose Mercury News and St. Petersberg Times editorial boards call for changes in the food safety system.

Go West, while you still can: Lovely little essay about how “the dry West is getting dryer by the year, even as the wet West grows steadily richer, and the rift between the two — in culture, politics, economy, theology — can seem as deep as the Grand Canyon itself.” (New York Times)

Edible media spat: East Bay Express food critic John Birdsall lamented shrinking local food coverage in some Bay Area dailies, and used a syndicated food-focused travel column by Colorado-based writer Laurel Miller as his example. In an interesting letter exchange, she responds and discusses her new focus on sustainable food issues around the world. (The East Bay Blog)