Organics in the News

The U.S. Department of Agriculture and the Environmental Protection Agency are asking farmers to use coal ash to grow their crops, despite a paucity of research on possible risks, according to documents released today by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER). USDA endorses use of coal combustion wastes by farmers "for crop production" while acknowledging uncertainty on the extent to which "toxic elements" are absorbed into produce entering the market.

This month, USDA enters the final year of a three-year partnership with the Environmental Protection Agency as part of a larger effort by the American Coal Ash Association, the Electric Power Research Institute and others to "promote appropriate increased use of" coal ash in agriculture. The implementing Memorandum of Understanding obliges USDA to generate "documentation of the effectiveness, safety and environmental benefits, including bioavailability of trace elements such as mercury, arsenic and selenium...to satisfy the concerns of producers, generators, regulators and the public."

A report from GRAIN discusses how agriculture can put back much of the excess carbon dioxide in the atmosphere into the soil.

Soils contain enormous amounts of carbon, mostly in the form of organic matter. The report shows that industrial agriculture, and thus the global food system, has spewed large amounts of this carbon into the atmosphere. Policies focused on restoring soil fertility - restoring the organic matter in the soil which has been lost - would make a huge contribution to resolving the rapidly escalating climate crisis.

In 50 years, soils could capture about 450 billion tons of carbon dioxide - more than two thirds of the current excess in the atmosphere.

We need a revolution in our food delivery system because the global $3.2 trillion processed-food industry is undermining our health and significantly contributing to our carbon footprint.

Let’s take a quick look at how produce in Massachusetts makes it to our grocery store shelves. Quite likely it was picked in California’s Central Valley, the mother of all breadbaskets. The produce journeyed across the country from the field to the wholesaler to a retailer and finally to your dinner table. Total travel time, about 12 to 14 days.

The Environmental Protection Agency plans to conduct a new study about the potential health risks of atrazine, a widely used weedkiller that recent research suggests may be more dangerous to humans than previously thought.

Atrazine — a herbicide often used on corn fields, golf courses and even lawns — has become one of the most common contaminants in American drinking water.

For years, the E.P.A. has decided against acting on calls to ban the chemical from environmental activists and some scientists who argued that runoff was polluting ecosystems and harming animals.

More recently, new studies have suggested that atrazine in drinking water is associated with birth defects, low birth weights and reproductive problems among humans, even at concentrations that meet current federal standards.

The E.P.A. is expected to announce on Wednesday that it will conduct a new evaluation of the pesticide to assess any possible links between atrazine and cancer, as well as other health problems, such as premature births. The E.P.A. may determine that new restrictions are necessary.

hogMust we be dosed daily with antobiotics? According to the meat industry, the debate over legislation pending in the House that would ban the use of sub-therapeutic doses of antibiotics comes down to a simple “fact”: hog-farming on any scale without sub-therapeutic use of antibiotics is impossible. The National Pork Producers Council says so. The American Veterinary Medical Association says so. Heck, even GOP Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa says so.

For the record, these folks also say that livestock producers don’t really use 70% of all antibiotics distributed in the US as the Union of Concerned Scientists estimates. And you know what, we have no idea if they’re right. What many people don’t realize is that antibiotic use by American livestock producers is one of the best kept secrets on the planet. The UCS had to deduce that number based on US sales of antibiotics combined with data from a country that does publish figures on antibiotics use in livestock: Canada. That’s right. No one in the US, not the government, not industry—no one—has any responsibility to tell Americans how much antibiotics is actually in their meat. We’re just to supposed to Take Industry’s Word For It that everything’s peachy.

Frank Morton said he was told he should sue the USDA if he didn't like Roundup Ready sugar beet seed being produced in Oregon's Willamette Valley.

"I was literally told three times that if you don't like that, you'll have to sue USDA," Morton said.

In January 2008, the Philomath-area organic vegetable seed grower contacted the Center for Food Safety and helped instigate the suit that has put in question the future of transgenic sugar beet production.

U.S. District Judge Jeffrey S. White, a Bush-administration appointee, last week ruled the USDA violated the National Environmental Policy Act when it failed to prepare an environmental impact statement before deregulating the genetically engineered beets in 2005.

White has scheduled an Oct. 30 meeting to discuss remedies. The Center for Food Safety and Earthjustice are expected to ask for an injunction banning new plantings until USDA can complete the environmental assessment.

The African Centre for Biosafety (ACB) has today released a report exposing the patents and players involved in appropriating key African food crops to produce genetically modified (GM) climate crops. According to the report, biotechnology is being used to identify "climate genes" in African crop plants, which are able to withstand the stresses that are likely to become prevalent as the world's climate changes. By patenting genes that can withstand stresses like drought, heat and salinity corporations are positioning themselves to turn a fat profit.

Monsanto, working through strategic partnerships, is at the forefront of patenting key African food crops such as sorghum, maize, peanut, cotton, wheat, manioc, sugar cane and banana for their 'climate' properties including stress tolerance, biomass accumulation and drought tolerance.

Paul and Katherine Priester had to look past a heap of tires and a deserted trailer park to envision their berry farm.

"I first had to get rid of 600 tires and 15 mobile homes," Paul Priester said of the 14.8 acres in the Town of Two Creeks in Manitowoc County that the couple bought in November 2007 for $36,000.

"This place looked like a post-apocalyptic horror film with garbage strewn everywhere, broken windows, doors banging open. It was very creepy."

The abandoned missile site was a trailer park and tire dump before the Priesters decided to transform it into an organic pick-your-own berry farm a mile west of Lake Michigan.

They still live in their Washington Heights neighborhood of Milwaukee during the school year.

The Boulder Valley School District has contracted with a cooperative of farms headquartered in Wisconsin to supply organic milk to the district's 28,000 students.

Organic Valley Family of Farms, the nation's largest cooperative of organic farmers based in La Farge, Wis., is supplying milk from its Rocky Mountain Pastures for the School Food Project, a public-private partnership with a goal of improving the health, nutrition and taste of school lunches. Organic Valley began providing its milk to students on Aug. 18 via lunch line dispensers.

The cooperative employs a regional milk production model, which means Organic Valley Rocky Mountain Pastures milk comes from certified organic cows pastured in Colorado, Utah and Idaho. The nearest organic dairy farm in Colorado participating in the program is the Makita Family Farm in Calhan, Colo.

The milk is being bottled and delivered by Sinton Dairy Foods Co. LLC based in Colorado Springs.

"School lunch programs across the nation need to make fundamental changes to improve the health and well-being of our children. Unfortunately, public schools are one of the last places where organic milk is usually found," said Chef Ann Cooper, the "Renegade Lunch Lady" and interim nutrition director for the school district. "Not only is organic milk produced without antibiotics, synthetic pesticides and hormones, making it healthier for growing children, but Organic Valley milk is healthier for our local community because it's produced by local family farmers."

The officials claimed that organic farming comes as on the top priorities specifically with relation to food security, diversification / alternatives in agriculture production, income generation for small and medium scale farmers and improves access to regional and international markets mainly through exports from developing countries.

In Pakistan main objective of the study was to prepare feasibility report for promotion of organic farming across the country. For this, 50 villages would be selected out of 1012 villages described under the project “Special Programme for Food Security and Productivity Enhancement of Small Farmers in 1012 Villages in Pakistan (Crop Maximization Project-Phase II)” funded by Ministry of Food and Agriculture.