Future of food: Peter Melchett has an excellent op-ed on what England’s bird-flu outbreak means for the future of farming — will it be high-tech, dependent on genetic engineering and biosecurity, or low-tech, meaning organic and local? Guardian (UK)
Overkill: A chillingly sad story about how so-called “disease containment” practices work in the United States, based […]

Wednesdays are always a busy day for the Digest, but this one might be a record. Hope you’re hungry, people, because there’s an 18-course meal’s worth of links today.
Get thee back into the lab, FDA!: Biotech reporter Denise Caruso has a kick-ass top-notch op-ed about why the FDA’s science regarding the safety of meat and […]

Breathing space: Hog producer Maple Leaf Foods is following Smithfield’s lead and phasing out farrowing crates for sows. Not because the science behind them isn’t sound, of course, but because consumers are spooked. (CattleNetwork) Other producers are sticking to their crates, according to the Fresno Bee, saying that veterinarians have determined that they cause no […]

My pesky job caused me to miss some huge breaking news today. The USDA has apparently decided that whatever the FDA might say about meat and dairy from cloned animals being just the same as that from two parents, it’s not close enough to be labeled “organic.”
Sam Fromartz, the author of “Organic, Inc.” who blogs […]

Ask the Weiss man: If you’re at all concerned about eating cloned meat and dairy under the organic label, read this excellent Washington Post online Q&A in which excellent biotech reporter Rick Weiss takes questions from readers. Make time to read it all, if you can, as Weiss not only clarifies the science, but […]

Meat monopoly busters: A new “packer ban” bill introduced by Senators Charles Grassley and Tom Harkin seeks to prohibit the large meatpackers from buying and raising their own livestock, which leads to price gouging and shutting out small farmers and ranchers. This is really big news, as it would basically force Tyson, Smithfield, etc to […]

No more “organic” imports: Britain’s Soil Association is considering withholding the organic label from food that has been imported by air because of the unsustainable “food miles” it has traveled. Guardian (UK)
This little piggy was raised on a farm: An article in the travel section, of all places, extols the gustatory — and ethical — […]

Good news! It’s not too late to help keep animal clones from entering our food supply.
A few weeks ago, I wrote to encourage readers to write and send an editorial to their local papers about their feelings on this recent “clones-are-just-fine-to-eat; don’t-you-worry-you-can-
trust-us” development. Now the Center for Food Safety is here to help you add […]

Bacteria love bagged lettuce: Scientists are now confirming the obvious — that processing, mixing, and bagging leafy greens promotes the spread of bacteria like E. coli, just like it has in the hamburger industry. Others claim the Vegetable Industrial Complex, with its triple baths of chlorinated water, is far more hygienic than homes or restaurants […]

Santa Cruz beats Marin: A new study found that California has about four times as many fast food restaurants and convenience stores as healthier alternatives. In Santa Cruz County, the ratio was fewer than two unhealthy options for every healthy one — the highest proportion of healthy food options like grocery stores, farmers markets […]

Cafeterias cozy up to farmers: A pretty good overview on how food-service giants — like Bon Appetit Management, with which we were familiar, and Sodexho and Aramark, which we weren’t — are embracing the “eat local” idea, sometimes to the bemusement of their customers (students, corporate employees). There are some rather cool substitutions for far-off […]

People and Planet: Somebody tell the Bill Gates Foundation to hold up on foisting a GMO- and fossil-fueled Green Revolution on Africa! A 10-year experimental project has shown that Ethiopian farms using organic compost are producing higher yields — sometimes double — compared with those using chemical fertilizers. (Reprinted from the South-North Development Monitor)
Business Week: […]

San Francisco Chronicle: We’ve been meaning to write about how the new humane-treatment-of-animals meat label from the Animal Welfare Institute stacks up against the others, but Chronicle food reporter Carol Ness has beaten us to it. Crushing discovery: The Certified Organic criteria permit debeaking of chickens and tail-docking of pigs.
Grist: Tom Philpott takes readers inside […]

The Times (UK): Britain is abuzz about this interview with David Miliband, the U.K.’s Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, who said that eating organic food is just a “lifestyle choice” as there is no conclusive evidence that organic food is better than conventional.
Marin Independent Journal: With real-estate values skyrocketing along with […]

New York Times: Finally, a cogent editorial about cloned meat that sums up the critical points — “Cloning isn’t just a matter for the F.D.A. to decide. It is up to us as a society to decide as well. We should be asking much broader questions than the F.D.A. is able to. Who will cloning […]