New poison on your plate - GM Salmon




Source: Food Freedom - Decentralize, Grow Your Own, Buy Local

 
If  you have never heard of Genetically Modified (GM) foods before, your ignorance is NOT bliss. I will tell you why in a moment.


But first, here’s the breaking news: FDA is on the verge of approving GM Salmon. That would make it the first animal species on this planet that has been given the God-Treament by Man!

Source: CNN

I decided to write this article after I saw the sorry excuse of a report CNN put out today to describe the issues around GM Salmon... a sorry excuse much like a lot of their reporting these days.

Anyhow, getting back to the point. AquaBounty Technologies has submitted an application to the United States Food and Drug Administration to obtain a license for producing and selling their GM Salmon. The genetic modification allows the salmon to grow 50% faster than non-GM salmon. This means GM-salmon is market ready in 18 months instead of the standard 30 month growth cycle for non-GM salmon.

How does FDA decide whether the product being proposed should be certified or not? According to Professor Anne Kapuscinski who is a fisheries biologist at Dartmouth College and spoke to NPR on Sep 7, 2010, FDA looks for 3 things in making its decision whether to grant a licence:

1.     What is the impact of the GM product on Humans?

2.     What is the impact of the GM product on the Environment?

3.     What is the impact of the genetic modification on the Animal (salmon) itself?

The above questions are worthwhile, but there are 3 major problems with the certification process:

1.   The data for answering the above questions is provided by the applicant itself (Aquabounty Technologies). FDA does not carry out its own tests. Among other reasons, a key factor is that FDA wouldn’t have the time, resources or money to carry out its own testing for every product certification application it receives. Unfortunately this always means leaving the fox to guard the henhouse!

2.   When it comes to environmental impact, the FDA does NOT set a criteria that would determine PASS or FAIL. It simply requires the environmental impact to be recorded. This would be like saying that its ok for electronic manufacturers to simply dump lead, mercury, arsenic and other toxic chemicals into the waste pipe as long as they let you know that these chemicals will make their way into your water and food supply and wreak havoc with your body. No, that is simply wrong! Its unacceptable that FDA doesn’t have clear and strict requirements that protect consumers but allow the money lobbies to get away with their crimes. Of course this has everything to do with money and politics that prevent good regulation in this case like so many other cases from being put on the books because ideologues cry “less government” but still want all the safety and protections they can get from the government.

3.   FDA is leaning towards not requiring GM-salmon to carry a label that states that it is genetically modified. Do you realize how awful that is? It means you will have no way of even knowing whether the salmon on your plate is GM or not unless ofcourse if the non-GMO salmon producers label their product as such. Still, who will believe the lables if there is no standard's body that provides the differentiating certificate (a seal of approval). Knowing how little time consumers have to do their own research and the almost blind trust they have in the FDA (or similar authorities), its not a stretch of the imagination to state that gullible consumers will be taken for a ride.

It may turn out that despite all the caveats mentioned above, there is really no danger to human, animal or environmental health after all. However its worth noting that GM-anything (GMO = Genetically Modified Organisms, to be precise) has a checkered past and the case against it has been growing ever stronger.

At the core are 3 problems which GMOs potentially pose:

1.   Allergenicity. In other words GMOs have the potential for generating allergic reactions and we have no way of knowing at this point which food allergies may be caused by which genetic modification. Further there is a real danger of the new allergies thus spawned having no cure.

2.   Gene Transfer. In other words the potential for alteration of the human gene sequence leading to unintended consequences. For instance it is being found that the puberty age in the United States has been dropping leading to girls developing breasts as early as the age of 7 and 10 year old boys standing 6 feet tall.

3.   Outcrossing. In other words the potential for genes from the GMOs to make their way into the wild and alter the gene sequences of naturally occuring organisms (plants… and now salmon?!). Unfortunately this is not just a possibility but now a documented reality.

If you are mad now, make your voice heard. Sign a petition, call your elected representative, leave a comment in this blog.

Source: Sign of the times

India, a developing country had the courage to reject Monsanto lead efforts to introduce BT Brinjal. If they can do it, you can do it.

 

Not convinced? Read the case against GMOs:

- The Chilling Reality of GM Foods

- 20 questions on genetically modified foods – from the World Health Organization

- Supreme Court Hears case against Monsato and GMOs 



Source: Philosophical Anthropology



  

Source: Reuters




Source: Sikh Philosophy Network



Source: Green Peace

$10,000 Sandwich and Blue Gold

Can you imagine paying $10,000 for a sandwich. That is 2,000 times more than a sandwich should cost!!

And yet that is what most Americans pay, when they buy Half a Billion Gallons of Bottled Water EVERY WEEK.


Ok, so you roll your eyes and ignore it... ie, YOUR addiction to plastic water bottles. You throw up your hands saying its not in your control. You think bottled water is safe!?

Read this, think again and thank me! And if you kick the habbit, I will thank you. And YOU WILL THANK YOURSELF  that you didnt turn into the MONSTER you see in the picture on the left.

- Plastic Water Bottles are a health hazard: Plastic bottles travel hundreds of miles in the heat to get to your store. And those sunny miles work their wonders on the plastic, leeching away harmful chemicals into the water you consume.

- Its Expensive, dammit!! If all you drink is bottled water, you are paying about $1,500 more per year for water! Kick this habbit and you could save enough money to watch movies on netflix for 13 years!!!

- The Bottled Water Companies are pulling wool over your eyes. Why? Because in most cases they fill those bottles with ordinary water any way (not mineral water which you want to believe it is) with some processing at times.

- Bottled water is NOT safer than municipal water. Want to know how your community water supply scores? Check out the Environmental Working Group's National Tap Water Database.

- Tapping Natural Water sources damages ecosystems: If mineral water is indeed used in your favorite brand, its not good either. Its "damaging ecosystems by sucking water from underground aquifers that are the source of water for nearby streams, wells, and farms. Lakes and wet lands are also damaged" (http://www.sierraclub.org/)

- WATER IS A HUMAN RIGHT that is under attack. But like all other human rights, capitalism is making a mockery of it. Corporatization means communities that live near water bodies do not benefit from it. This leads to social unrest. Coke set up a bottled water facility in India, which contaminated the water supply and depleted resources for the local people. The PBS documentary film Thirst, shows how rapid worldwide privatization of municipal water suppliesis affecting local economies.

- Bottled water means less attention to public systems. Public Systems need their leaks fixed and with a small investment they can be made more reliable than the water in your bottle. The more we run away from public water supply, the richer the bottled water suppliers become and the more we get addicted to their crap (because multinationals are stepping in to buy groundwater and other water sources). And its not just overseas. Maybe its gone too far in New Jersey  already.

- The process of making the plastics releases toxins such as nickel, ethylbenzene, ethylene oxide and benzene

- Plastic comes from oil (as if we arent already addicted to oil for our energy needs). The entire energy costs of processing the final product before it gets to you is equalent to filling One-Fouth of that same bottle with oil.

- Nearly 90 percent of water bottles are NOT recycled and wind up in landfills where it takes thousands of years for the plastic to decompose.

WHAT CAN YOU DO:
- Use this helpful guide to talk to your friends, children, parents, coworkers, neighbors.

- Learn how to promote tap water within your office, campus or public place with our guide: How Your Organization Can Promote Tap Water

- Take Back the Tap Pledge. If you don't like the taste of municipal water, use a carbon filter to fix it.

- Dine at restaurants that have pledged not to serve bottled water.

- Hosting an event? Make it bottled water free with the help of this guide: Free Your Event from Bottled Water.

- Watch and Host a movie screening of the Thirst. Or some of the other films on the subject - FLOW, Blue Gold, The Water Front or Tapped, powerful documentaries sure to get the message across. And make sure to make it a bottle-free event.

- Do you know when was the last time your office water cooler was cleaned?

- Do NOT reuse plastic water bottles. The more they are reused, the more chemicals they leech. Learn about the Plastic Numbering System before reusing any plastic.

- Just get a stainless steel bottle and fill it up. Spend your savings elsewhere


LEARN MORE

- Sierra Club's Fact Sheet on Bottled Water
- Sierra Club's Campagn against Bottled Water
- Watch: The Truth about Bottled Water

LEARN: 6 Reasons to Go Organic

1. Protect your health - You really don't want to ingest hormones, pesticides and other chemicals, do you? Worse, you dont want your children to be eating those toxic cancer causing chemicals. One study showed that 23.4 per cent of farms with caged hens tested positive for salmonella compared to 4.4 per cent in organic flocks and 6.5 per cent in free-range flocks. See the study at http://www.organicconsumers.org/articles/article_9990.cfm

2. Protect soil - In industrial farming, soil structure is not given much thought, leading to depletion of nutrients and erosion. If the soil is not handled in a sustainable way, it eventually stops giving back and you can't use it any more.

3. Protect water - Fertilizers and pesticides used in industrial farming inevitably make their way into ground water and other water bodies.

4. Reduce Energy - Organic farming uses much less of petroleum than industrial farming since it relies on manual cultivation methods.

5. Protect Farmers and Farm Workers - Farmers that do not own farms not only suffer from ailments brought on by inhalation/ingestion of chemicals found in fertilizers and pesticides, they are also at the financial mercy of corporations. With reduced land ownership, economic disparities between the haves and have-nots increases.

6. Organic Tastes Better - Try it, and know the difference!

DIY: 6 Natural Alternatives to Toxic Fabric Softeners

Use Baking Soda in your Laundry for softening clothes instead of using Fabric Softner Sheets:

http://www.care2.com/greenliving/6-natural-alternatives-to-toxic-fabric-softeners.html

Wondering why you need to make the switch? After all how bad could it be?

Here's a sampling:
- Various types of cancer (especially pancreatic)
- Respiratory problems
- Nerve Damage

For a complete list of the chemicals and what they do to you check out this compilation from EPA's Material Safety Data Sheets (MSDS).

On a related note, consider doing away with the dryer altogether and make a switch to drying clothes outdoor. Use the Sun, and the Earth will Thank You! Its a growing movement thats taking on the rules and regulations of communities and condo boards!