A round-up of the most important news & commentary regarding SOLE- and anti-SOLE food issues, farming, policy, etc. that we think Ethicurean readers will want to know about.

DNA deliberations: Although transgenic corn, soy and cotton cover the nation, rules governing transgenic animals have yet to be developed. The FDA has not committed to a date for a set of rules, but seems to be narrowing its focus. The uncertainty is a problem for ‘breeders’ of transgenic animals, like the company with a […]

The issues surrounding food production in Australia are so overwhelmingly large and urgent that it’s hard to pause for a moment and think carefully, weighing the risks and rewards of actions that overlap between complex fields of study and competing interests. There are lists now of which Australian cities are likely to run out of […]

On July 5, the USDA’s Economic Research Service (ERS) released a new set of data on adoption rates of transgenic crops in the United States. The results are stunning: more than 85% of cotton and soybeans planted and almost 75% of corn grown in the U.S. have been engineered to include genes from other organisms, […]

A round-up of the most important news & commentary regarding SOLE- and anti-SOLE food issues, farming, policy, etc. that we think Ethicurean readers will want to know about.

The Digest trawls the Web for tasty news, features, op-eds and blog posts — from Farm Bill updates to backyard chickens, transgenic foods, E. coli recalls, and sustainable fish. No extra charge for the puns.

The Digest trawls the Web for tasty news, features, op-eds and blog posts — from Farm Bill updates to backyard chickens, transgenic foods, E. coli recalls, and sustainable fish. No extra charge for the puns.

The Digest trawls the Web for tasty news, features, op-eds and blog posts — from Farm Bill updates to backyard chickens, transgenic foods, E. coli recalls, and sustainable fish. No extra charge for the puns.

We’re surprised that Japan — a nation where rice is almost sacred and is generally opposed to GMOs–is letting researchers tinker with the rice gene.(http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2007/06/11/national/w140450D64.DTL”>San Francisco Chronicle)http://www.record-eagle.com/2007/jun/12garden.htm”>An Edible Schoolyard in Traverse City, Michigan (Record Eagle)Sniffing around CAFOs: A team of researchers from eight universities kicked off a multiyear emissions measurement project this week…. (http://www.farmnews-iowa.com/News/articles.asp?articleID=5386″>Farm News - Iowa)Which exit has the peaches?: New Jersey, long the target of jokes about chemical plants and toxic waste dumps, is expecting a superb crop of peaches this year from the state’s much ignored agricultural lands…. (http://americanagriculturist.com/index.aspx?ascxid=fpStory&fpsid=28705&fpstid=2″>American Agriculturalist)Fixated on nitrogen fixation: Nitrogen-fixing plants like soybeans, clover and alfalfa are often planted in rotation with other crops because they naturally extract nitrogen from the air and store it in the soil…. (Full article http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/full/104/24/10282″>here) ( http://pubs.acs.org/subscribe/journals/esthag-w/2007/june/science/rr_nitrate.html”>ES&T News)Ethanol ripples: The insatiable demand for corn by ethanol plants (driven by America’s insatiable demand for transportation fuels) is driving up the cost of milk, eggs, pork, beef, and other foods…. (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/06/14/AR2007061402008_pf.html”>Washington Post)Bye-bye birdies: Urban sprawl and industrial agriculture are causing steep declines in the populations of “backyard birds” like Evening Grosbeak, the Eastern Meadowlark, the Greater Scaup, and the Boreal Chickadee, according to a report from the National Audubon Society.

Hungry world: The U.N.’s Food and Agriculture Organization has released its June 2007 “Food and Food Outlook” forecast, showing that food expenditures worldwide will rise a record amount, mainly because of biofuels cutting into cheap feed costs. Developing countries will be affected most. To illustrate, the New York Times reports that soaring pork prices in China are as painful for Chinese as gas prices are for Americans.

NEWSFEATURES & COMMENTARYON THE BLOGS, ETC.An update on organic farming issues in the 2007 Food and Farm Bill in PDF format (Organic Farming Research Foundation)Americans clueless about nutrition (MSNBC via Reuters)Exports vs. clean air: The ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach are among the largest sources of air pollution in Southern California, causing uncounted ailments among residents (asthma, respiratory and cardiac problems)…. (Los Angeles Times)House Oversight Committee to investigate federal crop insurance program (Committee on Oversight and Government Reform)Challenges of always saying yes: The executive director of the Northwest Louisiana Food Bank explains some of the challenges faced by food banks that vow to accept any food donation, no matter how junky it is…. (http://www.shreveporttimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070527/OPINION0106/705250349/1058/OPINION03 “>Shreveport Times)Show us the number: In the famous http://www.ethicurean.com/2007/02/28/mackey-report/ “>Mackey-Pollan conversation, John Mackey complained that simply sticking a label that says “organic” on a package of meat wasn’t good enough…. But if no one is testing, how do we know it is BSE free?), pushing for permanent repeal of the Estate Tax ( a.k.a. the “Paris Hilton tax”, which applies to approximately the richest 2% of estates each year each valued at many millions of dollars, with extra exemptions for family farms. See this article for info on the myth of the estate tax and family farms), seeking to keep livestock manure out of the Superfund program (even when in quantities large enough to drown a small village).

The House of Representatives Agriculture Subcommittee on Livestock, Dairy and Poultry has successfully added language to its markup of the Farm Bill that would pre-empt state laws prohibiting or regulating the use of genetically modified food, food from clones, or other types of food if approved by USDA. So, bye-bye the is trying to add what is essentially another National Uniformity of Food Act to the Farm Bill.The Center for Food Safety has up-to-date comprehensive information, so please visit their site and send their message to the members of the Committee. The CFS has listed these Representatives’ phone and fax numbers on their site to aid with this process. Don’t forget to call the offices of Committee Members to voice your concerns as well!

The lead news story on the home page of my Yahoo! Australia account was an Australian Associated Press brief report that the Victorian government was expected to lift the ban on growing genetically modified crops when it expires at the end of February next year. “Pressure has come from farm groups and the federal government,” the story suggested. GM supporters claim a surge in agricultural productivity could happen, with farmers able to plant crops resistant to weeds, insects, and salinity, and that need less water.

NEWSFEATURES & COMMENTARYON THE BLOGS, ETC.Treehuggers meet rabblerousers: Labor and environmental groups are working together to influence the conservation portion of the Food and Farm Bill…. Many labor union members hunt and fish, pasttimes that will be a lot more difficult if the entire Midwest is covered with corn (which, environically, would be used to make ethanol to fuel some of the gas-guzzling vehicles made by union workers). (The Hill)Locavorism on the air: Barbara Kingsolver and Steven Hopp visit the KQED-FM studio to talk about their new book on a year of local eating…. (MILive (AP))You’ll probably have something good to add to this:Not being nice with our rice: The USDA’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service has approved a plan to use GM rice to produce human proteins, despite over 20,000 comments opposing the plan, compared with 29 in favor…. We’ve heard that before…We’ll probably also hear that rice yields in Geary County are too low, so the next crop needs to be in the heart of rice country to increase the yield and boost Ventria’s profit margins.

Digest: More bad news from China, EU revokes Monsanto soy patent, Smithfield gets bigger