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Europe Is Going To Regulate Gene-Edited Organisms As If They Were Alien Plants From Space
That's too bad, because gene editing, for better or worse, is probably going to be one of the techniques that bring us what we need to feed our battered planet.
That's too bad, because gene editing, for better or worse, is probably going to be one of the techniques that bring us what we need to feed our battered planet.
August 21st, 2018
by Patrick Clinton
The world (stop me if you’ve heard this one before) is not perfect. And the legal system is less perfect than the world: Laws are created by people who don’t necessarily understand what they’re trying to legislate and certainly don’t know the zigs and zags the world will start taking before the ink is even dry on them. They do their best, I suppose, but the results are often somewhere between shaky and disastrous.
And then these imperfect laws sit around, getting more and more out of touch with reality. (My children will be happy to inform you that a similar process affects certain family members of theirs.) Eventually, someone will decide to use them to accomplish something that the original legislators hadn’t anticipated or, perhaps, hadn’t intended. And then, well, if you care about truth or justice or even plain common sense, you hold on to your hat and hope for the best.
I was holding onto my hat last week, waiting for the European Court to decide how gene-edited crops should be treated under EU law. Now that the decision has come down, I’m torn. On the one hand, if the EU wants to subject gene-edited crops to intense regulatory review, which is the main result of the court’s ruling, well, it’s their continent. But I have to confess, I can’t stand the process that led to the decision. It was all about the law and not a bit about reality. And we all know how perfect the law is.
Laws are created by people who don’t necessarily understand what they’re trying to legislate.
Here’s the deal: In 2016, several groups in France sued the country to ban gene-edited crops. As near as I can tell (and the record is pretty confusing), they don’t actually care very much about whether the crops themselves are harmful or dangerous. They’re concerned with pesticides, and they seem to be arguing that GMO and gene-edited crops are dangerous because they encourage farmers to use pesticides, and pesticides are dangerous.
That’s already a little squishy—like trying to close the Maserati dealership because it encourages bank robberies, but the plaintiffs faced a bigger problem. French law specifically exempts crops genetically modified by mutagenesis—that is, by altering genes rather than adding genes from other organisms. And gene editing as it’s practiced today certainly seems to fit the definition.
The French kicked the case over to the European Court of Justice, which assigned advocate general Michal Bobek to give a formal opinion of what European law had to say about the matter. Bobek’s opinion, published in January, focused much of its attention on one legal point: Like French law, European law exempts some GMOs from intense regulatory oversight. At one point it says organisms produced via techniques with a long record of safety are exempt. At another point, it exempts organisms produced by mutagenesis as long as “they do not involve the use of GMOs as recipient or parental organisms.”
Okay, is that one exemption or two? When the law was first passed, the two categories were identical. Mutagenesis was something you did using ionizing radiation or mutagenic chemicals. Those were the only techniques, and they had a long track record of safety. But today there are other, newer techniques for changing a gene. They still don’t involve implanting foreign genes into a plant’s genome. They still clearly qualify to be called mutagenesis. But do they qualify for exemption from GMO regulations under European law?
Court of Justice of the European Union / G. Fessy
Photographed here is the building that houses the European Court of Justice, which recently weighed in on the gene-editing debate
Opinions varied, and Bobek summed them up: Greece and the U.K. argued that mutagenesis is mutagenesis, and the new techniques deserved exemption as much as the earlier ones. The Austrians thought the exemption applied only to techniques in use when the law was passed, with the French and Dutch taking a similar position and arguing that mutagenic techniques had to be proven safe before being granted the exemption. The Swedes argued that new techniques are safer than the old. (Remember, most chemical and radiological mutation was completely random. You zapped a plant and then waited to see what might emerge. Random mutation is still used, but the focus of new techniques is targeted mutation—changing a specific stretch of DNA whose function is already known.) They thought gene editing should get the exemption even if technically it didn’t qualify for it.
The advocate general, for his part, thought the case was clear. He argued that the legislation clearly meant to exempt all mutagenesis (with the one qualification we quoted above). “The EU legislature intentionally decided not to distinguish between the techniques to determine the scope of the mutagenesis exemption,” he wrote. “At the same time, it effectively narrowed down the exemption in order to take account of ongoing technological developments by adding the caveat deriving from the use of recombinant nucleic acid molecules. That caveat was considered to sufficiently take into account the emergence of new mutagenesis techniques.”
“What the Applicants are effectively asking for,” he continued, “is not an interpretation of the GMO Directive but a judicial redrafting of it, . . . seeking an insertion through a judicial medium of categories which are clearly not provided for in the legislation itself.”
Clear, right?
Wrong. The court usually takes the recommendations of the advocates general, but this time, it didn’t. In a decision issued on July 25, the court found for the plaintiffs and against gene editing. European courts don’t usually go in for American-style judicial originalism, but this time they did, ruling that the law as written intended to apply only to the technology that applied when it was written. Why the change? It’s pretty clear that the court thought of gene editing as a technique with unfathomable and unpredictable risks.
The advocate general, for his part, thought the case was clear.
Mutagenesis, it argued, “makes it possible to obtain the same effects as the introduction of a foreign gene into that organism.” (Perhaps, but in terms of safety, it’s still not the same as introducing a foreign gene into an organism. In general, gene editing will give you results you could obtain through conventional mutagenesis and selective breeding, if you could just get that infinity of monkeys to set aside their typing and help you pollinate.) Oh, yes, and modern techniques “make it possible to produce genetically modified varieties at a rate and in quantities quite unlike those resulting from the application of conventional method of random mutagenesis.”
Which, I think, translates to: “We’re happy to have you try to develop any fool thing you want to as long as you use a technique that makes it unlikely that you’ll succeed.”
This may be good law (though I doubt it). But it doesn’t look like good policy. Gene editing aims to accomplish the same goals as cross-breeding and mutagenesis, but more quickly and accurately. The end products, at least as the technology exists today, should be indistinguishable. If they’re not, that’s a problem. But that sounds like a question we could answer quickly with reasonable certainty. Instead, it sounds like Europe is going to regulate gene-edited organisms as if they were alien plants from space.
The baby, in short, is going out with the bathwater.
That might not matter at another time. But the world is not only imperfect, it’s getting hotter and colder and drier and wetter and a whole lot more populous. Our old plant breeds (none of them natural in any practical sense) will need to be updated. Gene editing, for better or worse, is probably going to be one of the techniques that bring us what we need to feed our battered planet.
Europe, meanwhile, is opting out. With regulatory constraints in place, researchers will likely flock away from gene editing—why develop plants that can’t be commercialized?—and other countries will set the agenda and perhaps in the long run force Europe to accept products it might have had a hand in shaping, but chose not to.
The baby, in short, is going out with the bathwater. We haven’t met the baby yet, we don’t know yet if we’d like him, we have no idea what he might grow into. But out he goes. Certainly governments need to pay attention to the safety of the food supply. Not every idea is a good one. But a decision like this—in effect rewriting a relatively sensible law for no clear reason—is a crummy way to go about it.
Patrick Clinton is a long-time journalist and educator. He edited the Chicago Reader during the politically exciting years that surrounded the election of the city’s first black mayor, Harold Washington; University Business during the early days of for-profit universities and online instruction; and Pharmaceutical Executive during a period that saw the Vioxx scandal and the ascendancy of biotech. He has written and worked as a staff editor for a variety of publications, including Chicago, Men’s Journal, and Outside(for which he ran down the answer to everyone’s most burning question about porcupines). For seven years, he taught magazine writing and editing at Northwestern University's Medill School of Journalism.
Who Cares? Why We Sued Ben & Jerry's
The company’s “Caring Dairy” program sounds like a dream-come-true for Vermont’s dairy farmers and dairy cows. But it’s more like a nightmare
2018
Organic Consumers Association
by Katherine Paul
Splashed across the Ben & Jerry’s website are cartoon-like pictures of happy cows romping in green pastures.
There’s a reason those cows are depicted by drawings, not actual photos—most of the real, live cows whose milk and cream are used in Ben & Jerry’s ice cream products are crammed into dark, filthy barns for most of their short lives.
Ben & Jerry’s goes to great lengths to create the perception that the Unilever-owned company “cares” deeply about the farmers who supply milk and cream for the brand, the cows raised on Vermont dairy farms, and the state of Vermont’s environment.
The company’s “Caring Dairy” program sounds like a dream-come-true for Vermont’s dairy farmers and dairy cows.
But it’s more like a nightmare, for the cows, Vermont’s environment and consumers who care about animal welfare.
As we state in the lawsuit we filed this week against Unilever, Ben & Jerry’s markets its products:
. . . as being made from milk produced by “happy cows” raised in “Caring Dairies,” leading consumers to believe that the products are produced using animal-raising practices that are more humane than those used on regular factory-style, mass production dairy operations.
In contrast to Unilever’s representations, the products include milk that comes from cows raised in regular factory-style, mass-production dairy operations, also known as “Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations” or “Large Farm Operations”—not in the special “Caring Dairies” emphasized in Unilever’s marketing.
As we reported last year, our testing revealed that many samples of popular Ben & Jerry’s ice cream flavors, in the U.S. and in Europe, contain traces of Monsanto’s Roundup weedkiller. We see that as a sign that the brand falls far short of its claims of social and environmental responsibility.
Unilever spends nearly $9 billion a year on advertising, second only to Proctor & Gamble. We think the company should spend less on misleading product claims, and invest more in helping Vermont dairy farmers transition to organic and regenerative practices that actually support those claims.
‘Caring Dairies’ program nothing more than a scam
Like any successful brand, Ben & Jerry’s knows that animal welfare tops the list of issues people care about. Hence, the creation of a program—“Caring Dairy”—intended to make consumers believe that Ben & Jerry’s “cares,” too.
But it’s all smoke and mirrors. Here’s why.
On its “Caring Dairy Standards” website page, the company lists a set of standards it says are required for all dairy farms that supply Ben & Jerry’s.
Thanks to the work of Regeneration Vermont, we know that Ben & Jerry’s sources all of its milk and cream through a cooperative based in St. Albans City, Vermont. Fewer than 25 percent of the approximately 360 farms that deliver milk and cream to the St. Albans co-op meet the “Caring Dairy” standards. But when farmers deliver their milk to the co-op, it’s all mixed together—the co-op doesn’t separate the milk delivered by a “Caring Dairy” program participant from the milk of other dairy farms. So even if some of the milk comes from a farm that actually meets those standards, Ben & Jerry’s can’t truthfully claim that all of their milk and cream come from dairies that meet the company’s “Caring Dairy” standards.
Advertising, even the false kind, pays
So you, the consumer, when you visit the Ben & Jerry’s website and see pretty pictures and a long list of standards the company says all of its farmers meet, are being duped.
All that talk of “Caring Dairies” is there to make consumers feel good about buying Ben & Jerry’s ice cream.
It’s pretty much all a lie. Especially when you consider that over the years, some members of the St. Albans co-op have been fined for violations of environmental laws, including one that illegally expanded its operation near the Missisquoi River Basin, which drains into the already heavily polluted Missisquoi Bay.
In fact, the dairy industry is Vermont’s biggest polluter, according to Regeneration Vermont, in part because the state’s conventional dairy farms feed GMO corn, heavily sprayed with pesticides such as atrazine, metolachlor, and glyphosate, to dairy cows.
So when Ben & Jerry’s says it’s “on a mission to make great ice cream that respects the farmer and their farmworks, the planet and the cow,” don’t believe it.
Ben & Jerry’s is on a mission to spin a false and misleading story about a company that has a lousy track record when it comes to sourcing ingredients from socially and environmentally responsible producers.
Consumers who care about their health, the environment and animal welfare would do better to buy organic brands from companies that don't source glyphosate-sprayed ingredients and that do source from dairies that meet organic standards.
How The Internet Of Things Could Help Feed The World
The Internet of Things is heating up. Business spending is predicted to double over the next four years on the so-called IoT, and experts estimate that over half of new businesses will run on it by 2020.
Aug 19, 2018
Lorin Fries Contributori
Lorin Fries Contributori
Courtesy of Shutterstock
The Internet of Things is heating up. Business spending is predicted to double over the next four years on the so-called IoT, and experts estimate that over half of new businesses will run on it by 2020. There has been a flurry of attention to creating devices ranging from thermostats to wearables that “talk” to each other, analyze information and perform tasks.
Beyond modern-day conveniences, how might the IoT help us address more fundamental challenges, like feeding our growing global population? Companies like Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) are exploring this question. I interviewed Janice Zdankus, HPE’s vice president of quality, who highlighted the potential of the IoT for agriculture, the need to incentivize partnerships between agriculture and technology and opportunities for the next generation of STEM graduates to lead and innovate.
Lorin Fries: Could you describe your role in the technology and innovation space?
Janice Zdankus: Transformative technology is a big part of my role and our company. We believe that applying technology to agriculture can help to sustainably feed the growing world population, and we are fortunate to work on some leading-edge projects in this area. Agriculture provides an opportunity to advance disruptive technology.
Fries: Are there technologies under your purview that can positively influence food and ecological systems?
Zdankus: The Internet of Things is a particularly promising application for agriculture. At HPE, we use our Aruba wireless networking capabilities to collect, secure and send data, filter it with edge computing, and process it with high-performance computing systems. Those systems use algorithms, artificial intelligence, and machine learning to manipulate huge amounts of data and quickly produce recommendations for farmers.
We are testing this through a strategic research initiative with Purdue University, which is using HPE technology to monitor farm fields through sensors. A first use case is the ACRE farm wireless monitoring, which is gathering data each day about the traits and growth of different crops, with the potential to generate and process up to 113 terabytes a week. Another case is an advanced phenotyping facility, a state-of-the-art greenhouse with the capacity to generate 1.2 petabytes per week. These are examples where computing systems can benefit by filtering data at the edge, rather than at the core computer system, to avoid sending all that data back across the campus network.
We can eventually take lessons learned from this project to develop a model to advise farmers on when to plant and water, when to apply fertilizer or pesticides, and how to minimize application and manage runoff, thereby improving yields, reducing waste and lowering farmers’ costs. Such technologies could also be used by tractor vendors, brokers or purchasers of agricultural products to improve crop traceability and enhance the security of the supply chain.
Fries: What are the main challenges to scaling this approach?
Zdankus: A key challenge is how to reach the rural farmer despite low access to broadband, proper technology training and data analysis capabilities. Beyond farmers, existing market players may feel resistant to new approaches. We need to work together with large-scale players; we can’t underestimate the importance of this.
Fries: How could this innovation do harm, and what strategies could mitigate that risk?
Zdankus: With any technology, there’s the potential for someone to misuse it, but the benefits outweigh the risks. Being able to trace data means that it could be hacked, therefore the technologies bring up issues of data security and privacy. That’s why we focus on keeping data about crops and farmers secure. We minimize how much data is sent, and we decentralize where it sits.
Fries: What makes you most excited about these technologies?
Zdankus: We have a world challenge around hunger and population growth. The Internet of Things provides an opportunity to bridge disparate fields of expertise, including engineers, computer scientists, data scientists and others. There is such an opportunity for disruption in food systems that could have enormous positive impact – and that excites me.
Janice Zdankus, Vice President of Quality, Hewlett-Packard EnterprisesCOURTESY OF JANICE ZDANKUS
Fries: How do you see the industry evolving at the intersection of technology and agriculture?
Zdankus: Relatively few tech industry players are focused on agriculture applications. There’s great opportunity to link the vibrant startup ecosystem to the innovations needed for food systems. Venture capital for agriculture startups is increasing 29% year over year, but seed funding is decreasing. That’s a challenge.
Regarding bigger companies, most people haven’t internalized that to make an investment at scale on a problem like improving food systems, there needs to be a win-win for all. We’ve moved beyond the philanthropic play. There needs to be a market opportunity, along with policy-holders, NGOs and other agencies eager to solve the problems with you.
Fries: What is one wish you have regarding technology innovation in food systems?
Zdankus: I wish we could find the economic incentive to trigger greater partnership between technology and agriculture. There is unrecognized market potential, and we need to raise the visibility of the opportunity. In doing so, we’ll appeal to the next generation of technology innovators. I have yet to meet a millennial who doesn’t want to solve world hunger. I work in STEM mentorship and education, and I’ve seen many youth struggling to see how a huge investment in engineering or a related field can lead to social impact. Food systems provide that opportunity.
This interview is part of a series on how technology and innovation are transforming food and ecological systems – and how to get it right for people and planet. The conversation has been edited for clarity and length.
I am an expert on global food systems and environmental sustainability, recently serving as Head of Food Systems Collaboration with the World Economic Forum, and previously with Harvard University’s Corporate Social Responsibility Initiative, the U.S. Agency for Internationa... MORE
Lorin Fries Contributori
"Universal Paper Provides Fragile Roots Excellent Protection"
At this year's IPM in Essen, Ellepot introduced their new Universal paper. Ellepot are stocking up on their newly developed paper, after many customers report that the paper is doing well when it comes to root development and protection of fragile root tips.
The new product is characterized by a special “diamond” pattern so that the paper on one side has fine tiny small holes, and, on the other side, a fine netting ensuring that soil and dirt does not escape the paper.
“The Universal Paper has one of the best air flows of the papers we produce. We’ve made the pattern clearer, opening up the paper to allow them a significantly larger amount of air to pass through the pot. The result is that Ellepot Universal provides fragile roots an excellent protection and let roots grow perfectly through after transplanting minimizing transplant shock”, CEO Lars Steen Pedersen explains.
Perfect for plant out cultures
The new product is based on all-natural and environmental friendly wood fibres, sourced from responsibly harvested FSC certified forests. This means that the Universal paper is certified according to multiple industry standards such as RainForest Alliance, FSC and Veriflora. Combined with a relative short decomposing time of 6-9 months makes Ellepot Universal ideal for almost all types of crops and very useful for frequent plant out cultures.
Highlights and benefits of Ellepot Universal:
Special “diamond” pattern
Perfect root development and excellent protection
Roots grow perfectly through after transplanting
Short decomposing time of 6-9 months
Comes in brown color
You can experience the Universal Paper at Ellepot USA's booth 3018 & 3025 at the Cultivate Ohio this weekend.
For more information:
Ellepot
info@ellepot.dk
www.ellepot.com
Publication date: 7/13/2018
André Leu On Monsanto/Bayer Trial: Glyphosate Safety in Question
The recent verdict awarding Dewayne Johnson $289 million, because a jury determined that glyphosate, the active ingredient in Roundup, caused his non-Hodgkin lymphoma cancer, will open the floodgates for thousands of more people suing the manufacturer, Monsanto/Bayer.
August 13, 2018 in Eco-Farming, Eco-Living & Health, Fertilizers, glyphosate, Opinion, Uncategorized
By André Leu
The recent verdict awarding Dewayne Johnson $289 million, because a jury determined that glyphosate, the active ingredient in Roundup, caused his non-Hodgkin lymphoma cancer, will open the floodgates for thousands of more people suing the manufacturer, Monsanto/Bayer.
André Leu
The World Health Organization’s International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) gave glyphosate the second-highest classification for cancer: 2A, a probable human carcinogen, in 2015. This means that cancer has been found in test animals, with limited evidence in humans. The evidence in humans was a strong association with non-Hodgkin lymphoma.
Despite this, the manufacturer continues to state that its studies and the reviews by regulators show that glyphosate does not cause cancer. The manufacturer and regulators, like the U.S. EPA, will not produce these safety studies, to be reviewed by independent scientists and other stakeholders, as they are considered commercial in confidence.
The first issue here is if they have the evidence that glyphosate does not cause cancer, why don’t they publicly release it, rather than hiding it?
The other major issue of concern is that the current best practice testing guidelines for pesticides miss the majority of cancers.
The testing guidelines for the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development(OECD) are regarded as best practice for testing animals for diseases caused by chemicals such as pesticides and are similar to most good practice testing guidelines.
Guideline 451 of the OECD is used for the experimental design of testing chemicals, such as pesticides, for cancers. It requires that: “Each dose group and concurrent control group should, therefore, contain at least 50 animals of each sex.” This is a group of 100 animals, with an equal amount of males and females. The guidelines also state: “At least three dose levels and a concurrent control should be used.”
This means that there must be one group of 100 animals, usually rats, that are the control and are not dosed with the chemical. There will be three other groups of 100 rats in each group given a dosage of the chemical from highest, middle, to lowest. The number of cancers in each of the dosed groups is compared with the number of cancers in the control group of rats. If the number of cancers is the same between the treated group and the control, then it is considered that the cancers were not caused by the chemical, but by some other means, as the control has not been exposed to the chemical. This is then used to say that a chemical or pesticide does not cause cancer.
There are serious flaws in this method. One of the dosed groups of animals with just one extra cancer than the control results in 1 animal in 100 with cancer. This is the lowest theoretical rate of detection, and it means that cancer would only be detected if the pesticide caused more than 1,000 people per 100,000 people to get cancer. It would miss lower rates of cancer, which are the actual rates of cancers.
The rates of diseases are categorized by the number of people with the disease per 100,000 people. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), in the United States, the rates of common cancers such as lung cancer are 57.5 people per 100,000; colon and rectum cancer 38 per 100,000; non-Hodgkin lymphoma 18.4 per 100,000; leukemias 13.2 per 100,000; pancreatic cancer 12.8 per 100,000; and liver and intrahepatic bile duct cancers 8.3 per 100,000.
For sex-dependent cancers such as breast, ovarian, endometrial, prostate and testicular cancers, the lowest theoretical level of detection is 1 animal in 50 because there are 50 animals of each sex. This means that these cancers would only be detected if they cause more than 2,000 cases of cancer per 100,000 people.
Consequently, despite no evidence of cancer being found in the dosed groups, the study would miss a chemical that could be causing the current epidemic of cancers of sexual tissues. According to the CDC, in 2015 the rate of breast cancer was 124.8 women per 100,000; prostate cancer was 99.1 men per 100,000; ovarian cancer was 11 per 100,000; cancer of the cervix 7.6 per 100,000; and testicular cancer 5.6 per 100,000.
There is no statistically valid way to determine that a dosed group of 100 animals, that shows no sign of cancer, can determine that the chemical in question cannot cause cancer at rates below 1,000 people per 100,000. All of the current cancers found in our communities will be missed.
The only way this could be done statistically would be to have greater amounts of test animals.
The fact is that studies using OECD or similar guidelines, that do not find cancer, cannot accurately say that a chemical does not cause cancer, as they would miss all known cancers.
The Glyphosate Debate
The WHO decision and the Dewayne Johnson verdict agreed that glyphosate is linked to non-Hodgkin lymphoma. The manufacturer states that it does cause this or any other cancer.
The published studies on glyphosate (and other pesticides), even if they used OECD or similar guidelines, use numbers of animals that are too small to detect any of the current cancers and therefore there is no basis to say that it does not cause cancer. It is statistically impossible to use a testing methodology that can only detect cancers to a minimum level of 1,000 cancers per 100,000 people to detect common cancers like lung cancer that occurs at rates of 57.5 people per 100,000 down to liver cancer at rates of 8.3 people 100,000.
Non-Hodgkin lymphoma affects 18.4 people per 100,000 in the United States. To positively determine if glyphosate does not cause this cancer an experiment would need a control group of 100,000 rats along with three dose groups of 100,000 rats each — 400,000 rats total. If this experiment showed no sign of non-Hodgkin lymphoma, then it would be statistically probable that it did not contribute to the 18.4 people per 100,000 with the disease. However, as far as I know, no such experiment has ever been done.
The fact is that the current testing protocols can only tell us if a pesticide causes cancer. It cannot tell us if a pesticide is safe. Finding no evidence of cancer in a study is not the same as saying that the chemical in question does not cause cancer.
In my opinion, it is a gross misrepresentation to say that any of the current published toxicology studies can be used to say that any of the thousands of pesticide products used in the world do not cause cancer and are safe, including glyphosate.
André Leu is the author of Poisoning our Children and The Myths of Safe Pesticides. He is the International Director of Regeneration International.
Dutch Economist Discusses Benefits Of Urban Agriculture
Jan Willem van der Schans
In my Ph.D. thesis, I focused on what the first advocates of free trade, John Locke, and Hugo Grotius, meant by the word ‘free’. At that time the Catholic church regulated international trade; the English, Dutch, Spanish and Portuguese fought wars about international trade routes.
by Jan Willem van der Schans
Locke stated that free doesn’t mean ‘free’ of competition, but it refers to being ‘free of unilateral domination’. This also means that basic needs like water and soil are to be protected from international exchanges, as it cannot be conceptualised that people will give up these without being forced to. Today we have again redefined ‘free trade’; to grow roses we go to Africa and use the local population’s water– so free trade has nowadays become completely unlimited. Economists need to rethink what free trade means and what its benefits are.
New balance
Getting back to food production, I’m talking about basic necessities: free trade is for the realm of the extras – bananas, coffee, et cetera, while the basic necessities should be locally provided. So this is a model where a city or family are self-serving in terms of basic needs, and this is the model which is developing in urban agriculture; it’s about being resilient for basic needs, finding a new balance between grow your own and international trade. Urban agriculture is about what’s feasible – what makes sense – not about what’s possible. So if it makes sense for a city to grow salad products instead of importing them, then that’s OK: it’s resilient, and it has a better quality.
Gardener or farmer
I’ve been working on urban agriculture for the last 10 years. In Rotterdam when we started, we looked at the allotments and how they are managed. Over half of these are worked by people with an ethnic background other than Dutch, and 100% of them use the gardens to grow food. For the municipality, these allotments are zoned as recreational however in these allotments the use is 100% farming; they grow the local herbs and vegetables they cannot buy in the Dutch supermarkets.
So, when are you a farmer? The basic ‘thought’ is: if it doesn’t provide your basic income, you’re a gardener. But if I look at Europe from an economist’s view, many of the farmers in many countries would then be also ‘gardeners’. Without subsidies, they would not be earning a living wage.
Social inclusion
At Wageningen, we are socially inclusive about urban agriculture – even herbs on a balcony are included; anything that contributes to food security and food resilience. In the situation where many farmers have no successors, urban small-holdings can be perceived as breeding grounds: locals learn how to grow food in their garden, move to the Westland greenhouses and learn the trade, and then move on to become farmers themselves.
In Malmo in Sweden, their policy is to welcome refugees and select those with an agricultural background and offer them training to be employed in the sector. They see urban food growing as a source of human capital.
Tastier strawberries
When vertical farming came along people said: what we have is already good, why do we need these? Dutch farmers are a little conservative, so that is a pitfall. But now, people become more aware of changes in fertilizer availability, energy dynamics, et cetera. By making agriculture more circular, we create places which not only produce, but also that sequester the carbon in the ground and are space efficient. Another point is that the quality is better: fruits like strawberries in vertical urban farms can be kept on the plant longer before harvesting so they are tastier! We have to pick the right high-value products.
Circular streams
They also predict that ultra-short supply chains will develop: wholesalers will no longer collect produce at the farm; they grow it in their own vertical farm. I’m an economist – so this is about economic dynamics.
Urban agriculture should become more circular and use waste streams, water and sewage from the city to grow food. In Rotterdam, there’s a great example where special mushrooms grow on coffee waste. Urban agriculture will become part of our urban metabolism; with a circular flow of waste streams.
Multidisciplinary futures
I can see that this Challenge is attracting a wider range of student skills than traditional production experts. We see students in artificial intelligence or finance modelers, involved; I really welcome these new skills. Often the traditional Wageningen students are too much production oriented, too much about low-value commodities. New ideas, new blood can help direct these production skills.
Source: Wageningen University & Research
Publication date: 8/16/201
Harvest Failures Due to Drought – Ground-Breaking Innovations In Food Production In Sight
Hürth 16 August 2018
nova-Institut GmbH (www.nova-institute.eu)
Food security is becoming an important issue even in Europe, where this year's summer drought has led to significant crop failures.
How can future food security be guaranteed in times of climate change? Are digitization, robotization, biostimulants and new possibilities of food production in cities, seas and biotech laboratories medium and long-term solutions?
The consequences of climate change require a fundamental restructuring of our food production and farmers worldwide are searching for alternatives to protect their yields from the impacts. The enduring drought in Europe draws attention to the need for comprehensive changes and alternatives.
The digitalization of agriculture, including various technologies for precision farming, artificial intelligence (AI), robots and drones, holds the promise to make modern agriculture more efficient, more sustainable and less susceptible. Comprehensive information on the climate, local weather or soils leads to profound decisions on plant selection, sowing, fertilization, crop protection and harvesting. The new technologies will not only make food and biomass production more ecological and safer but will also improve the ecological footprint of animal husbandry. Or, to put it in a nutshell: Less input, more output, and lower environmental footprint.
Additionally, organic farming and smallholder farmers will also benefit from these high-tech strategies, develop new concepts and still be able to adhere to their ideals. Drones and robots make crop protection without chemicals easier and more efficient, and biostimulants can target-specifically regenerate soil quality.
At the same time, latest plant breeding technologies enable an optimal adaptation of plants to local conditions and promise higher nutrient contents as well as an improved photosynthesis.
The multitude of, today or in the near future, market-ready technologies will be presented and discussed for the first time at the international conference “Revolution in Food and Biomass Production (REFAB)” (www.refab.info) on October 1 and 2 in Cologne, Germany. With the summer drought, the topics of the 50 speakers are more appropriate than ever in Europe.
Important changes are also expected in food production in cities, seas and biotech laboratories. Vertical agriculture in cities produces food close to the consumer and can thus deliver fresh. At the same time, the productivity per area can be up to 300 times higher compared to traditional agriculture. First commercial implementations of vertical farms show how highly automated and closed circuits can reduce water consumption by 90 percent, completely eliminate the use of pesticides, and even increase the nutrient content through the lighting of plants optimized by LEDs. Urban agriculture brings the production of high-quality vegetables to consumers in the cities, regardless of weather conditions.
New technologies can also open up new areas for food production, whether underwater – aquaculture for fish and algae – or in the desert. At the conference, scientists from Africa will for example show how surfaces in the Sahara can be successfully used for food production.
Another important question is how to reduce dependence on animal protein sources. Insects, algae and the direct use of CO2, with the help of bacteria, open up new protein sources, which considerably save resources and greenhouse gas emissions compared to classic meat production. At the REFAB conference, the “Future Protein Award” will be handed out, and already seven candidates have applied with very different concepts. Further candidates are welcome, the registration deadline is the end of August (www.refab.info/future-protein-award/).
How can these cross-pollinating sectors and actors develop solutions towards systemic change and how sustainable are these solutions in comparison to conventional agriculture? Answers to these questions will be given at the conference Revolution in Food and Biomass Production (REFAB), October 1 and 2 in Cologne (Germany). Leading global players will demonstrate how the agriculture of the future could look like by presenting their innovative technologies, existing alternatives, and visions for the future of food production. Major companies, such as BASF, Borregaard, Claas, DSM, Evonik, Lenzing, Microsoft, Osram and Tata, dozens of innovative SMEs and start-ups as well as leading research institutes and the European Commission are part of the agricultural revolution that is presented at the REFAB conference.
Already 120 participants from 20 countries are registered, and up to 500 participants are expected to join the conference and exhibition.
Dr. Bronner’s (US) and BIOCOM AG (DE) are bronze sponsors of the conference. The Fachagentur für Nachwachsende Rohstoffe e.V., (FNR, (DE)) supports the event as premium partner.
Responsible for the content under German press law (V.i.S.d.P.):
Dipl.-Phys. Michael Carus (Managing Director)
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Why Is Trump Slashing The USDA’s Independent Research Arm? Look At Its Findings
The Economic Research Service has undercut Trump's claims about food stamps, farming, and the environment. Now, it's about to get booted from Capitol Hill.
August 20th, 2018
by Sam Bloch
Last Tuesday, staffers at the Economic Research Service (ERS), the research arm of the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), were called to a town hall meeting, where departmental leadership gave further details on what had been announced the week prior: The office was losing its independent status in the agriculture department, and being moved under the Office of the Chief Economist. It would also be moved out of Washington, D.C., likely to a Midwest location, by the end of next year.
The announcement of the move, which is expected to lead to mass buyouts and early retirements, took many in the agency by surprise. Indeed, ERS economists I contacted said veteran staffers intend to stay in Washington and find employment elsewhere, rather than move outside the Beltway.
“We’re finding out about this just as you are,” Howard Elitzak, a food markets economist, said when I reached him by phone. He declined to comment further, calling the move a “tenuous” situation.
What does ERS do, exactly? The agency of approximately 300 employees conducts a broad range of research on the American agricultural economy, issuing monthly commodity forecasts and trend reports on global trade, rural economics, food insecurity, and the changing face of family farms, among others. The agency’s releases are fundamental for policymaking, used by members of Congress and the office of the agriculture secretary, and a go-to source for reporters like me.
Photographed above is a USDA building in Washington, D.C. Engraved on it are the words: “Dedicated to the service of agriculture for the public welfare.”
In his announcement, USDA Secretary Sonny Perdue described the agency move, one that also includes the National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA)—the agency responsible for allocating research funding at land-grant universities—as a cost-saving measure. Indeed, President Trump’s last budget called for a 50-percent slash in funding for ERS. This follows a year of significant reorganizations in the agriculture department, and a culling of thousands of employees—more than in any other federal department.
Some observers say what’s happening to ERS is no ordinary belt-tightening. Since 1994, when ERS was first separated from the Office of the Chief Economist, the agency’s research has been seen as independent, objective, and crucially non-political within the agriculture department. Returning it to the chief economist’s office could potentially dissolve the “firewall” between the scientific and political arms of the department. Joseph Glauber, a former chief economist, disputes that assessment, telling Government Executive that the office is “objective.”
Others, including current ERS economists, see the move out of D.C., and the shrinking size, as consistent with actions of an administration that has been notoriously hostile toward scientific and research findings. It wouldn’t be unreasonable to think that an administration led by a president who’s been known to revoke security clearances from officials who’ve been critical of him, would also be happy to move a government office that puts out research that isn’t totally aligned with White House messaging—or policymaking—a little out of its way.
Contrary to what President Trump likes to say, the ERS hasn’t found that trade deals are killing farmers.
“ERS researchers cannot see a justification for the move,” says an ERS economist who asked not to be identified for fear of retaliation. “ERS’s purpose is to provide research integrity, statistical analysis, and valuable information for policymakers in the capitol. Can moving to the Midwest justify our purpose, from that perspective?”
Put another way: “There are 16 agencies at USDA. Why these two? And they’re both science- and statistics-based?” Ann Bartuska, a former acting undersecretary for research, education, and economics at USDA, told Politico.
Take, for example, what ERS has found about the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP, formerly food stamps). Farm bill negotiations ahead of the vote, which is expected at the end of September, have been held hostage over Republican efforts to push for stricter work requirements. Leaders have publically said—as has the president—that SNAP use is out of control, and as an anti-poverty program it’s failing because the number of Americans who rely on it is higher than ever.
Republican messaging is flatly contested by ERS. In a recent, peer-reviewed report—ERS studies are all peer-reviewed—researchers found that participation and federal spending on the program have dropped every year since 2013. Last year, those rates fell by 5 percent and 4 percent, respectively. (As of early August, participation sat around 41 million—more than a million fewer participants than the program had in 2017.)
ERS findings are also not in line with the Trump administration when it comes to issues surrounding the environment.
Contrary to what President Trump likes to say, the agency hasn’t found that trade deals are killing farmers. Years of agency reports, including one released in February of this year, have found that increased trade benefits American farmers. Nor has the agency found that “our farmers have been hurt for 15 and 20 years”—roughly as long as we’ve been selling soybeans to China. In fact, ERS analysis found that net farm income was on an upward trend from 2000, until hitting a peak in 2013. Meanwhile, farmers’ overall income, which includes off-farm earnings, has actually been rising since 2016.
The administration has also been hostile toward science and research that has proven climate change is real and affecting our weather patterns—among other things. A 2015 ERS report found that greater incidences of extreme weather and increased variability wreak havoc on farm production. By 2020, ERS predicts, production of corn, oats, and soybeans will have decreased by more than 8 percent due to changes in precipitation and added concentrations of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. The higher crop prices that will result won’t offset lost revenue from lower yields, the agency found. (ERS has also found that heat stress from climate change could lower dairy productivity.)
And here’s another thing: The Trump administration, and former Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Scott Pruitt, have attempted to roll back the Clean Water Act, and loosen restrictions on pollutants, like nitrogen, that enter waterways through soil runoff. But ERS research finds that cleaning those messes has been costly. Over the last two decades, the agency found, the agriculture department has spent $4.2 billion restoring and protecting wetlands, with the costs of removing nitrogen running up to $6,100 an acre in the Corn Belt. Hard to imagine that with looser restrictions we’ll end up spending less on clean up.
Then there’s crop insurance—a program that, among other conditions, allows grain farmers to receive government payments if their crop value falls below a set price. The president has promised farmers he’d make it work for them, and told Republican Congressman Mike Conaway, chairman of the House agriculture committee, to make it better and make it great.
“We’re finding out about this just as you are.”
But ERS research has found that crop insurance, while perhaps a useful safety net, doesn’t do much for growth: Farmers reported a 1-percent gain in grain acreage during years of increased participation. That finding, and other ERS research, was cited in a Congressional Budget Office (CBO) analysis of crop insurance, released late last year, that found the program was bloated, and costing billions of dollars that could be trimmed without a major loss in covered acreage. (During farm bill negotiations, an amendment to limit subsidies for high-earning policyholders, co-sponsored by Democratic Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois and Republican Senator Chuck Grassley of Iowa, was withheld from the Senate floor.)
That’s not to say that ERS research always conflicts with White House stances. In fact, ERS analysis of the Republican tax cuts, which was released last month, did find tax savings for the majority of farms of all sizes. At the Farm Bureau convention in January, Trump told the audience, basking in the afterglow of his successful push for tax reform, that “from now on, most family farms and small business will be spared—and it really is the word punishment—of the deeply unfair estate tax known as the death tax.”
That’s true, according to ERS: Trump’s tax reform will spare 99.89 percent of family farms from a tax liability. Of course, what he failed to mention was that his prognostication was, at the time, already a matter of fact—and that taxes under President Obama spared 99.14 percent.
Sam Bloch has written about arts, culture, and real estate for publications including L.A. Weekly, Artnet and Commercial Observer, and served as managing editor of Art Los Angeles Reader. His essay about Los Angeles' "shade deserts" will be published by Places Journal in 2018.
Reach him by email at: samuel.bloch@newfoodeconomy.org
Gene Editing – And What It Really Means to Rewrite The Code of Life
We now have a precise way to correct, replace or even delete faulty DNA. Ian Sample explains the science, the risks and what the future may hold.
We now have a precise way to correct, replace or even delete faulty DNA. Ian Sample explains the science, the risks and what the future may hold
Ian Sample Science editor @iansample
2018
Gene editing has the potential to treat or prevent thousands of forms of human disease. Illustration: Guardian design team
So what is gene editing?
Scientists liken it to the find and replace feature used to correct misspellings in documents written on a computer. Instead of fixing words, gene editing rewrites DNA, the biological code that makes up the instruction manuals of living organisms. With gene editing, researchers can disable target genes, correct harmful mutations, and change the activity of specific genes in plants and animals, including humans.
What’s the point?
Much of the excitement around gene editing is fuelled by its potential to treat or prevent human diseases. There are thousands of genetic disorders that can be passed on from one generation to the next; many are serious and debilitating. They are not rare: one in 25 children is born with a genetic disease. Among the most common are cystic fibrosis, sickle cell anemia and muscular dystrophy. Gene editing holds the promise of treating these disorders by rewriting the corrupt DNA in patients’ cells. But it can do far more than mend faulty genes. Gene editing has already been used to modify people’s immune cells to fight cancer or be resistant to HIV infection. It could also be used to fix defective genes in human embryos and so prevent babies from inheriting serious diseases. This is controversial because the genetic changes would affect their sperm or egg cells, meaning the genetic edits and any bad side effects could be passed on to future generations.
What else is it good for?
The agricultural industry has leaped on gene editing for a host of reasons. The procedure is faster, cheaper and more precise than conventional genetic modification, but it also has the benefit of allowing producers to improve crops without adding genes from other organisms – something that has fuelled the backlash against GM crops in some regions. With gene editing, researchers have made seedless tomatoes, gluten-free wheat, and mushrooms that don’t turn brown when old. Other branches of medicine have also seized on its potential. Companies working on next-generation antibiotics have developed otherwise harmless viruses that find and attack specific strains of bacteria that cause dangerous infections. Meanwhile, researchers are using gene editing to make pig organs safe to transplant into humans. Gene editing has transformed fundamental research too, allowing scientists to understand precisely how specific genes operate.
So how does it work?
There are many ways to edit genes, but the breakthrough behind the greatest achievements in recent years is a molecular tool called Crispr-Cas9. It uses a guide molecule (the Crispr bit) to find a specific region in an organism’s genetic code – a mutated gene, for example – which is then cut by an enzyme (Cas9). When the cell tries to fix the damage, it often makes a hash of it, and effectively disables the gene. This in itself is useful for turning off harmful genes. But other kinds of repairs are possible. For example, to mend a faulty gene, scientists can cut the mutated DNA and replace it with a healthy strand that is injected alongside the Crispr-Cas9 molecules. Different enzymes can be used instead of Cas9, such as Cpf1, which may help edit DNA more effectively.
An illustrated example of Crispr in action
Guardian graphic
Remind me what genes are again?
Genes are the biological templates the body uses to make the structural proteins and enzymes needed to build and maintain tissues and organs. They are made up of strands of genetic code, denoted by the letters G, C, T and A. Humans have about 20,000 genes bundled into 23 pairs of chromosomes all coiled up in the nucleus of nearly every cell in the body. Only about 1.5% of our genetic code, or genome, is made up of genes. Another 10% regulates them, ensuring that genes turn on and off in the right cells at the right time, for example. The rest of our DNA is apparently useless. “The majority of our genome does nothing,” says Gerton Lunter, a geneticist at the University of Oxford. “It’s simply evolutionary detritus.”
What are all those Gs, Cs, Ts and As?
The letters of the genetic code refer to the molecules guanine (G), cytosine (C), thymine (T) and adenine (A). In DNA, these molecules pair up: G with C and T with A. These “base pairs” become the rungs of the familiar DNA double helix. It takes a lot of them to make a gene. The gene damaged in cystic fibrosis contains about 300,000 base pairs, while the one that is mutated in muscular dystrophy has about 2.5m base pairs, making it the largest gene in the human body. Each of us inherits about 60 new mutations from our parents, the majority coming from our father.
But how do you get to the right cells?
This is the big challenge. Most drugs are small molecules that can be ferried around the body in the bloodstream and delivered to organs and tissues on the way. The gene editing molecules are huge by comparison and have trouble getting into cells. But it can be done. One way is to pack the gene editing molecules into harmless viruses that infect particular types of cell. Millions of these are then injected into the bloodstream or directly into affected tissues. Once in the body, the viruses invade the target cells and release the gene editing molecules to do their work. In 2017, scientists in Texas used this approach to treat Duchenne muscular dystrophy in mice. The next step is a clinical trial in humans. Viruses are not the only way to do this, though. Researchers have used fatty nanoparticles to carry Crispr-Cas9 molecules to the liver, and tiny zaps of electricity to open pores in embryos through which gene editing molecules can enter.
Does it have to be done in the body?
No. In some of the first gene editing trials, scientists collected cells from patients’ blood, made the necessary genetic edits, and then infused the modified cells back into the patients. It’s an approach that looks promising as a treatment for people with HIV. When the virus enters the body, it infects and kills immune cells. But to infect the cells in the first place, HIV must first latch on to specific proteins on the surface of the immune cells. Scientists have collected immune cells from patients’ blood and used gene editing to cut out the DNA that the cells need in order to make these surface proteins. Without the proteins, the HIV virus can no longer gain entry to the cells. A similar approach can be used to fight certain types of cancer: immune cells are collected from patients’ blood and edited so they produce surface proteins that bind to cancer cells and kill them. Having edited the cells to make them cancer-killers, scientists grow masses of them in the lab and infuse them back into the patient. The beauty of modifying cells outside the body is that they can be checked before they are put back to ensure the editing process has not gone awry.
What can go wrong?
Modern gene editing is quite precise but it is not perfect. The procedure can be a bit hit and miss, reaching some cells but not others. Even when Crispr gets where it is needed, the edits can differ from cell to cell, for example mending two copies of a mutated gene in one cell, but only one copy in another. For some genetic diseases, this may not matter, but it may if a single mutated gene causes the disorder. Another common problem happens when edits are made at the wrong place in the genome. There can be hundreds of these “off-target” edits that can be dangerous if they disrupt healthy genes or crucial regulatory DNA.
Will it lead to designer babies?
The overwhelming effort in medicine is aimed at mending faulty genes in children and adults. But a handful of studies have shown it should be possible to fix dangerous mutations in embryos too. In 2017, scientists convened by the US National Academy of Sciences and the National Academy of Medicine cautiously endorsed gene editing in human embryos to prevent the most serious diseases, but only once shown to be safe. Any edits made in embryos will affect all of the cells in the person and will be passed on to their children, so it is crucial to avoid harmful mistakes and side effects. Engineering human embryos also raises the uneasy prospect of designer babies, where embryos are altered for social rather than medical reasons; to make a person taller or more intelligent, for example. Traits like these can involve thousands of genes, most of them unknown. So for the time being, designer babies are a distant prospect.
How long before it’s ready for patients?
The race is on to get gene editing therapies into the clinic. A dozen or so Crispr-Cas9 trials are underway or planned, most led by Chinese researchers to combat various forms of cancer. One of the first launched in 2016 when doctors in Sichuan province gave edited immune cells to a patient with advanced lung cancer. More US and European trials are expected in the next few years.
What next?
Base editing
A gentler form a gene editing that doesn’t cut DNA into pieces, but instead uses chemical reactions to change the letters of the genetic code. It looks good so far. In 2017, researchers in China used base editing to mend mutations that cause a serious blood disorder called beta thalassemia in human embryos.
Gene drives
Engineered gene drives have the power to push particular genes through an entire population of organisms. For example, they could be used to make mosquitoes infertile and so reduce the burden of disease they spread. But the technology is highly controversial because it could have massive unintended ecological consequences.
Epigenome editing
Sometimes you don’t want to completely remove or replace a gene, but simply dampen down or ramp up its activity. Scientists are now working on Crispr tools to do this, giving them more control than ever before.
Further reading
A Crack in Creation: Gene Editing and the Unthinkable Power to Control Evolution by Jennifer Doudna and Samuel H. Sternberg
The Gene: An Intimate History by Siddhartha Mukherjee
The Epigenetics Revolution: How Modern Biology is Rewriting our Understanding of Genetics, Disease and Inheritance by Nessa Carey
Modern Prometheus: Editing the Human Genome with Crispr-Cas9 by Jim Kozubek
'Bullied and Bamboozled' - Millions Against Monsanto
On Friday, July 29, Dr. Charles Benbrook took the stand, the last witness to testify on behalf of the plaintiff in the trial of Dewayne Johnson vs. Monsanto Co.
Benbrook is an agricultural and toxicology scientist, a Harvard graduate and former executive director of the National Academy of Sciences. Since 2000, he has studied the link between glyphosate, the key active ingredient in Monsanto’s Roundup herbicide, and non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, the type of cancer Dewayne “Lee” Johnson, a former school groundskeeper who was required to use Roundup, now has.
Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., who has been providing OCA with first-hand accounts of the trial, reported that Benbrook told the jury that Monsanto had repeatedly killed internal company studies suggesting that Roundup is carcinogenic. And when a study mandated by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) showed clear evidence of glyphosate’s carcinogenicity, the company bullied and bamboozled the EPA to withdraw it.
Benbrook also testified that our Monsanto-friendly EPA’s focus on glyphosate alone is a sham, intended to gloss over the more important question of “whether the Roundup formulation itself, not just a single ingredient, is toxic and carcinogenic.” He told the court that Monsanto uses a potent surfactant that dramatically amplifies Roundup’s toxicity.
Read ‘Plaintiff’s Final Live Witness Testifies in Monsanto Trial’
Follow OCA’s coverage of the Monsanto trial
Make a tax-deductible donation to OCA’s Millions Against Monsanto campaign
Cattle Operation May Have Caused E. coli Outbreak Linked to Romaine, FDA Says
Monday’s announcement is the first indication that the agency suspects water contamination from animal agriculture may have been the outbreak’s original source.
August 6th, 2018
by Joe Fassler Kate Cox
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) on Monday shed new light on what may have caused the E. coli outbreak that was traced to romaine lettuce from the Yuma, Arizona growing region earlier this year. The outbreak, which sickened at least 210 people in 36 states and killed five, was declared officially over as of June 28.
Now, an agency press release shows that FDA, along with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and state and local partners, has zeroed in on a potential suspect: a 100,000-head cattle operation located near lettuce fields in Yuma.
On the same day, the outbreak was declared finished, FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb had issued a statement indicating that “Several environmental samples of canal water in the area have been found to contain E. coli O157:H7 that genetically match the strain of bacteria that caused the outbreak.” But Monday’s announcement is the first indication that the agency suspects water contamination from animal agriculture may have been the outbreak’s original source. “FDA notes that the canal is close to a Concentrated Animal Feeding Operation (CAFO), a facility with a large number of cattle on the premises,” the agency wrote in its statement, “…and the FDA traceback information showed a clustering of romaine lettuce farms nearby.”
Food safety lawyer Bill Marler, who is representing 105 people sickened in the romaine outbreak, told AZCentral he’d never heard of an E. coli case tied to an irrigation canal. But FDA’s hunch that a cattle operation may be to blame is not altogether surprising. Fresh produce outbreaks often begin with animal agriculture, even if it’s actually salads that are making people sick.
In 2006, a deadly E. coli outbreak linked to spinach was traced back to a cattle ranch in San Benito County, California, a highly productive agricultural region in the Salinas Valley. In that instance, too, irrigation wells too close to animals and their feces were named as a likely cause.
Animals, whether it’s livestock or wild animals like birds and rodents, are a major cause of food safety issues with fresh produce—and they’re a constant headache for growers. In Yuma, farmers are experimenting with falcons to keep rodents and wild birds at bay. The revelation that polluted canals may have been the source is sure to vex the region’s lettuce producers, who will need to find new ways to make sure their water supplies are safe.
Unlike the Salinas Valley, which is known as America’s Salad Bowl and is responsible for growing upwards of 70 percent of the country’s leafy greens and lettuce year-round, Yuma is often referred to as America’s Winter Vegetable Capital, producing 90 percent of our leafy greens from November through March (which accounts for the timing of the recent outbreak).
Much of the area is dedicated to growing lettuce, and according to the Yuma County Chamber of Commerce, the region is also home to nine salad plants producing bagged lettuce and salad mixes to the tune of 2 million pounds a day during peak months.
In its Monday statement, FDA said that it will continue to examine the links between the CAFO and adjacent water. Environmental assessments are ongoing, the results of which will be released to the public when complete.
Court Orders EPA To Ban Chlorpyrifos, A Pesticide Linked To Brain Damage In Children
Flickr / USDA
The 2-to-1 decision vacates an order made by former EPA chief Scott Pruitt earlier this year to allow the pesticide’s continued use on farms.
August 9th, 2018
by Jessica Fu
The United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit on Thursday ordered the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to ban nearly all use of the pesticide chlorpyrifos in a 2-to-1 ruling.
In a decision that’s sure to please environmentalists and farmworker justice advocates, the court vacated EPA’s 2017 decision “to maintain a tolerance for chlorpyrifos in the face of scientific evidence that its residue on food causes neurodevelopmental damage to children.” Of particular importance, EPA was also ordered to revoke all tolerances and cancel all registrations for chlorpyrifos within 60 days.
Chlorpyrifos is commonly sprayed on a wide range of common crops, including corn, soybeans, fruit and nut trees, and more, to control against soil-borne insects.
Previously, under the Obama administration, EPA had begun working toward a ban on the widely used chemical, following the results of a 2016 agency study that showed exposure to chlorpyrifos posed health risks to fetuses and children, as well as to agricultural workers.
However, in March of this year, then-EPA chief Scott Pruitt rejected the findings of his own agency and ordered a reversal on the chlorpyrifos ban. According to the Associated Press, Pruitt had met briefly with Andrew Liveris, CEO of Dow Chemical, which manufactures chlorpyrifos, just weeks before he ordered the ban reversal. AP has since issued the following correction to that story: “A spokeswoman for the EPA says the meeting listed on the schedule was canceled, though Pruitt and Liveris did have a “brief introduction in passing.” (Pruitt had been nominated EPA chief by President Donald Trump in 2017, but Pruitt resigned in July of this year, after months of ethics scandals unrelated to chlorpyrifos.) Also of note: After Donald Trump’s election in 2016, Dow Chemical made a $1 million contribution to the president’s inaugural committee.
After Pruitt’s reversal, a coalition of farmworker-justice associations filed a lawsuit against EPA to overturn it. They were represented by Earthjustice, a non-profit litigation group focused on environmental issues, and the suit was soon joined by numerous states, including New York, Washington, and California, as well as the District of Columbia.
This ruling comes at the very same moment another product made by one of the world’s largest agrochemical companies—Monsanto’s Roundup weedkiller, which contains the controversial ingredient glyphosate—is under intense legal scrutiny. A California jury this week is deliberating whether or not years of use caused school groundskeeper Dewayne Johnson’s diagnosis of terminal cancer. It is the first such case to go to trial.
Weird New Fruits Could Hit Aisles Soon Thanks to Gene-Editing
Supermarkets stocked with peach-flavoured strawberries and seedless tomatoes on horizon, scientists say
Supermarkets stocked with peach-flavored strawberries and seedless tomatoes are on the horizon, scientists say
20 July 2018
A red-fleshed apple of the Redlove hybrid variety. Unusual fruits such as this could soon become more common thanks to use of technologies such as Crispr. Photograph: Bailey-Cooper Photography/Alamy Stock Photo
Smooth or hairy, pungent or tasteless, deep-hued or bright: new versions of old fruits could be hitting the produce aisles as plant experts embrace cutting-edge technology, scientists say.
While researchers have previously produced plants with specific traits through traditional breeding techniques, experts say new technologies such as the gene-editing tool Crispr-Cas9 could be used to bring about changes far more rapidly and efficiently.
It could, they say, potentially open the door to a new range of fruits and vegetables that look, taste and feel very different to those we are used to.
Gene-editing is already being used by scientists to change the characteristics of food. One such endeavor used Crispr to make mushrooms that don’t brown, while a team in Spain has been using the approach to try to produce wheat that can be eaten by people with coeliac disease. Still, others are looking at using gene-editing to give crops resistance to particular environmental problems or pathogens.
Earlier this year, biotech firm Monsanto invested $125m in a new gene-editing company called Pairwise that reportedly has goals such as sweeter-tasting strawberries, while scientists in Japan have used the technique to produce seedless tomatoes. Another team have been using Crispr to change the architecture of tomato plant branches and the spacing of fruit.
nside a lab in Norwich where researchers from a startup called Tropic Biosciences are using Crispr to create a better banana. Photograph: Tatum Reid/Tropic Biosciences
Among the genes flagged in the new study in the journal Trends in Plant Science are those behind the production of a family of substances known as MYBs, which are among the proteins that control whether other genes are switched on or off.
“MYBs are great targets because they are central to several consumer traits or features like colour, flavour [and] texture,” said Andrew Allan, a co-author of the review from the University of Auckland whose own projects include working on red-fleshed apples and changing the colour of kiwi fruits. “Russet skin in apple and pear [is linked to MYBs]. Hairs on peaches but not nectarines – another type of MYB.”
Dr Richard Harrison, head of genetics, genomics and breeding at the horticultural organisation NIAB EMR, who was not involved in the article, said tweaking MYB genes or the way such genes are themselves controlled was a fruitful approach.
“For fruits,” he said, “MYB genes have long been known to be associated with expression of molecules such as anthocyanin, a red-coloured compound that gives strawberries or blood-red oranges their colour. “Increasingly, MYBs are being implicated in the production of other important compounds, hence the interest in this family of genes that are conserved between many plant species.”
Gene-editing of MYB genes and other genes could bring a host of benefits, Harrison said, adding: “There is a large opportunity to improve the nutritional profile of fruits and vegetables in the future using gene-editing technology, as well as other techniques.” Such techniques, he said, introduce the same sort of DNA changes as plant breeders have introduced by artificially selecting traits that cropped up through spontaneous DNA mutation – but much faster.
Hybrid purple raspberries of the Glen Coe variety. Crispr may make such specimens more common. Photograph: PR/Suttons
“Red-fleshed apples developed through conventional breeding have taken decades to even come close to market acceptability,” he said, “due to the multiple rounds of breeding and selection that have had to occur to take the naturally occurring red-fleshed gene variant from a wild species of apple and introduce it into a commercially acceptable variety.
“In our normal breeding work, we often see seedlings produced purely from conventional breeding with a range of colour and flavour profiles that simply never make it to the market, such as peach-flavoured strawberries [and] super-dark purpleish strawberries.”
The review is timely: next week the European Court of Justice will announce if or how plants that have been gene-edited using techniques such as Crispr will be regulated, and whether they will be treated like genetically modified plants. The US has already ruled against serious restrictions, provided the changes could have been produced through traditional plant-breeding techniques.
“We are interested in making produce more healthy, sustainable and convenient so that people will eat more produce,” Dr Haven Baker, Pairwise’s chief business officer, said, noting that gene-editing could be used to increase levels of anthocyanins, improve taste, increase shelf life, improve yields, boost disease resistance or even lengthen the season of availability.
Such approaches, said Baker, could not only boost consumers’ nutrient intake, but could also reduce food waste and produce adaptations needed to weather climate change: “We are trying to solve problems that matter to both consumers and the agricultural systems.”
No, Vertical Farms Won’t Feed the World
While they are well-intentioned, new indoor “farms” won’t help feed the world or reduce the environmental impacts of agriculture. We would be better to focus our efforts elsewhere.
Lettuce grown in my garden. Photograph © 2016 Jonathan Foley
August 1, 2018
While they are well-intentioned, new indoor “farms” won’t help feed the world or reduce the environmental impacts of agriculture. We would be better to focus our efforts elsewhere.
We’re beginning to see a new fad in agriculture — so-called “vertical farms” that grow food indoors with energy-intensive, artificial life support systems.
In the last few years, a number of tech companies have designed “farms” that utilize artificial lights, heaters, water pumps, and computer controls to grow crops inside. These systems glow with a fantastic magenta light — from LEDs that are specially tuned to provide optimal light for photosynthesis — often with stacked trays of plants, one on top of the other. Some of this technology is new, especially the LEDs, although pot growers have used tools like this for years.
Some of the more notable efforts to build indoor “farms” include Freight Farms in Boston. And there is a group at MIT that is trying to create new high-tech platforms for growing food inside, including “food computers”. These folks are very smart and have done a lot to perfect the technology.
At first blush, these “farms” sound great. Why not completely eliminate food miles, and grow food right next to restaurants, cafeterias, or supermarkets? And why not grow crops inside closed systems, where water can be recycled, and pests can (in theory) be managed without chemicals.
It sounds great, doesn’t it? But there are many challenges.
First, Vertical Farms Cost a Fortune
But there are costs to these farms. Huge costs.
First, these systems are really expensive to build. The shipping container systems developed by Freight Farms, for example, cost between $82,000 and $85,000 per container — an astonishing sum for a box that just grows greens and herbs. Just one container costs as much as 10 entire acres of prime American farmland — which is a far better investment, both in terms of food production and future economic value. Just remember: farmland has the benefit of generally appreciating in value over time, whereas a big metal box is likely to only decrease in value.
Second, food produced this way is very expensive. For example, the Wall Street Journal reports that mini-lettuces grown by Green Line Growers costs more than twice as much as organic lettuce available in most stores. And this is typical for other indoor growers around the country: it’s very, very expensive, even compared to organic food. Instead of making food more available, especially to poorer families on limited budgets, these indoor crops are only available to the affluent. It might be fine for gourmet lettuce, or fancy greens for expensive restaurants, but regular folks may find it out of reach.
Finally, indoor farms use a lot of energy and materials to operate. The container farms from Freight Farms, for example, use about 80 kilowatt-hours of electricity a day to power the lights and pumps. That’s nearly 2–3 times as much electricity as a typical (and still very inefficient) American home, or about 8 times the electricity used by an average San Francisco apartment. And on the average American electrical grid, this translates to emitting 44,000 pounds of CO2 per container per year, from electricity alone, not counting any additional heating costs. This is vastly more than the emissions it would take to ship the food from someplace else.
And none of it is necessary.
But, Wait, Can’t Indoor Farms Use Renewable Energy?
Proponents of indoor techno-farms often say that they can offset the enormous sums of electricity they use, by powering them with renewable energy —, especially solar panels — to make the whole thing carbon neutral.
But just stop and think about this for a second.
These indoor “farms” would use solar panels to harvest naturally occurring sunlight, and convert it into electricity so that they can power…artificial sunlight? In other words, they’re trying to use the sun to replace the sun.
But we don’t need to replace the sun. Of all of the things we should worry about in agriculture, the availability of free sunlight is not one of them. Any system that seeks to replace the sun to grow food is probably a bad idea.
Besides, “Food Miles” Aren’t a Big Climate Problem
Sometimes we hear that vertical farms help the environment by reducing “food miles” — the distance food items travel from farm to table — and thereby reduce fuel consumption and greenhouse gas emissions.
This sounds logical, but it turns out to be a red herring.
Strange as it might seem, local food typically uses about the same amount of energy — per pound — to transport as food grown far away. Why? Short answer: volume and method of transport. A larger food operator can ship food more efficiently — even if it travels longer distances — because of the gigantic volumes they work in. Plus, ships, trains, and even large trucks driving on Interstate highways use less fuel, per pound per mile, than small trucks driving around town.
Plus it turns out that “food miles” aren’t a very big source of CO2 emissions anyway, whether they’re local or not. In fact, they pale in comparison to emissions from deforestation, methane from cattle and rice fields, and nitrous oxide from over-fertilized fields. And local food systems — especially organic farms that use fewer fertilizers, and grass-fed beef that sequesters carbon in the soil — can reduce these more critical emissions. At the end of the day, local food systems are generally better for the environment, including greenhouse gas emissions. Just don’t worry about emissions from food miles too much.
And These Vertical “Farms” Can’t Grow Much
A further problem with indoor farms is that a lot of crops could never develop properly in these artificial conditions. While LED lights provide the light needed for photosynthesis to occur, they don’t provide the proper mix of light and heat to trigger plant development stages — like those that tell plants when to put on fruit or seed. Moreover, a lot of crops need a bit of wind to develop tall, strong stalks, needed later when they are carrying heavy loads before harvest. As a result, indoor farms are severely limited and have a hard time growing things besides simple greens.
Indoor farms might be able to provide some garnish and salads to the world but forget about them as a means of growing much other food.
A Better Way?
I’m not the only critic of indoor, high-tech, energy-intensive agriculture. Other authors are starting to point out the problems with these systems too (read very good critiques here, here, here, and here).
While I appreciate the enthusiasm and innovation put into developing indoor farms, I think these efforts are, at the end of the day, counterproductive.
Instead, I think we should use the same investment of dollars, incredible technology, and amazing brains to solve other agricultural problems — like developing new methods for drip irrigation, better grazing systems that lock up soil carbon, and ways of recycling on-farm nutrients. Organic farming and high-precision agriculture are doing promising things, and need more help. We also need innovation and capital to help other parts of the food system, especially in tackling food waste and getting people to shift their diets towards more sustainable directions.
An interconnected network of good farms —real farms that provide nutritious food, with social and environmental benefits to their communities — is the kind of innovation we really need.
Dr. Jonathan Foley (@GlobalEcoGuy) is a global environmental scientist, sustainability advisor, author, and public speaker. These views are his own.
© 2018 by Jonathan Foley. All rights reserved.
NOTE: parts of this piece were adapted from an earlier blog article of mine called “Local Food is Great, But Can It Go Too Far?”
USDA Invests $21 Million to Encourage Low-Income Families to Buy Healthy Food Options
USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture sent this bulletin at 08/02/2018 02:00 PM EDT
Media contact: Kelly Sprute, 202-744-2574
WASHINGTON, D.C. August 2, 2018 – The U.S. Department of Agriculture's (USDA) National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA) today announced 24 grants totaling $21 million to help Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) participants increase their purchases of fruits and vegetables by providing incentives at the point of purchase. The funding comes from the Food Insecurity Nutrition Incentive (FINI) program, authorized by the 2014 Farm Bill.
“We are encouraging low-income families to choose affordable and healthy food options to feed their families. NIFA has on ongoing commitment to improve the diet and health of all Americans,” said Acting NIFA Director Tom Shanower. "At the same time, the program helps growers take advantage of direct marketing and other opportunities to bolster their sales thereby improving their bottom line."
FINI is a joint program between NIFA and USDA’s Food and Nutrition Service, which oversees SNAP and is responsible for evaluating the impact of the variety of incentive programs that are deployed by FINI grantees. The program brings together stakeholders from different parts of the national food system to improve the nutrition and health status of SNAP households. The FINI program supports a wide range of small pilot projects; multi-year community programs; and multi-year, large-scale initiatives.
Among the grant participants this year, Wholesome Wave Georgia provides fresh local produce to Georgia’s food-insecure families through Georgia Fresh for Less (GF4L) incentive program. GF4L wants to implement an “e-incentive” technology and expand the program into additional sites throughout Georgia.
Another program participant, The Arkansas Coalition for Obesity Prevention will implement a "Double Up Food Bucks (DUFB) program that provides retailers a dollar-for-dollar market match for fresh fruit and vegetable purchases by eligible SNAP participants. Arkansas Coalition for Obesity Prevention wants to create a statewide unified DUFB program of matching markets in every region of the state.
Grants being announced, by state, include:
FINI Pilot Projects (up to $100,000, not to exceed 1 year):
- Sustainable Molokai, Hawaii, $99,963
- The Land Connection, Illinois, $21,000
- Pillsbury United Communities, Minnesota, $97,231
- South Dakota State University, South Dakota, $82,223
- West Virginia Food & Farm Coalition, Inc., West Virginia, $100,000
More information about these projects is available on the NIFA website.
Multi-year community-based projects (up to $500,000, not to exceed 4 years):
- Arkansas Coalition for Obesity Prevention, Arkansas, $500,000
- International Rescue Committee, Inc., Arizona, $400,000
- LiveWell Colorado, Colorado, $466,951
- DC Central Kitchen Inc., District of Columbia, $500,000
- Wholesome Wave Georgia, Georgia, $442,134
- Presence Chicago Hospitals Network, Illinois, $394,916
- The Experimental Station 6100 Blackstone, Illinois, $413,534
- Chicago Horticultural Society, Illinois, $492,793
- Iowa Healthiest State Initiative, Iowa, $480,044
- Community Food and Agriculture Coalition Inc., Montana, $267,153
- Rural Advancement Foundation International - USA, North Carolina, $363,880
More information about these projects is available on the NIFA website.
Multi-year large-scale projects ($500,000 or greater, not to exceed 4 years):
- Pinnacle Prevention Corp., Arizona, $974,050
- SPUR-San Francisco Bay Area Planning & Urban Research Assc., California, $623,430
- Feeding Florida, Inc., Florida, $3,047,755
- Fair Food Network, Michigan, $1,544,196
- Reinvestment Partners, North Carolina, $1,000,544
- Produce Perks Midwest Inc., Ohio, $2,276,890
- Farm Fresh Rhode Island, Rhode Island, $4,628,765
- Local Environmental Agriculture Project, Virginia, $1,797,548
More information about these projects is available on the NIFA website.
Increasing low-income communities’ abilities to purchase fresh fruits and vegetables not only helps to improve the health of families, but also expands economic opportunities for farmers. FINI provides grants on a competitive basis to projects that help low-income consumers participating in SNAP purchase more fresh fruits and vegetables through cash incentives that increase their purchasing power at locations like farmers markets.
NIFA invests in and advances agricultural research, education, and extension and promotes transformative discoveries that solve societal challenges. NIFA's integrated research, education, and extension programs support the best and brightest scientists and extension personnel whose work results in user-inspired, groundbreaking discoveries that combat childhood obesity, improve and sustain rural economic growth, address water availability issues, increase food production, find new sources of energy, mitigate climate variability, and ensure food safety.
To learn more about NIFA’s impact on agricultural science, visit www.nifa.usda.gov/impacts, sign up for email updates or follow us on Twitter @USDA_NIFA, #NIFAimpacts.
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NIFA invests in and advances agricultural research, education, and extension, and promotes transformative discoveries that solve societal challenges
New State Grant Program Awards Quarter Million to Urban Agriculture Projects
Beneficiaries of the Minnesota Department of Agriculture program include schools and the Sioux community.
JULY 31, 2018
Nine projects designed to encourage urban youth agricultural programs will receive $233,750 in funding through a new Minnesota Department of Agriculture program.
The AGRI Urban Agriculture Grant Program is the result of a 2016 state report that found there was interest among Minnesota residents in having government support for urban agriculture. The program was inspired by a failed bill, authored by Representative Karen Clark (DFL-Minneapolis), with a similar mission.
“Promoting urban agriculture, especially with youth, will allow kids growing up in urban environments to see that they too can be a part of the food system through agriculture,” says Erin Connell, grant program administrator.
Having grown up in an urban environment, Connell says she knows the challenge of exposing city kids to farming.
“At age 10 I was convinced that in order to be involved in agriculture you had to be a farmer and live in rural Minnesota.”
In college, however, Connell’s eyes were opened to opportunities in urban agriculture. That’s the goal of the grant program: “not to decrease the value of the rural farmer, but to allow for urban communities to have a hand in creating their own food system.”
The 2018 AGRI Urban Agriculture Grant recipients who will work in this space are:
- Appetite for Change: A Minneapolis-based company that will provide job readiness training to North Minneapolis youth through urban farming and farmers’ market participation
- Frogtown Farms: A St. Paul-based company that will provide high-level, hands-on urban agricultural education
- Lakeview Elementary School: This Robbinsdale school will be able to expand its garden by adding a greenhouse and outdoor classroom
- Little Earth Community: Based in Minneapolis, this company will focus their community-led urban farm production on Indigenous principles and perspectives
- Prairie Island Indian Mdewakanton Sioux Community: The Red Wing community will implement a micro-farm aquaponics system to educate youth and address health disparities related to food access experienced in the area
- Project Sweetie Pie: This Minneapolis endeavor will transform a greenhouse into a youth and adult education center
- University of Minnesota Bee Lab: This facility in Falcon Heights will host 5 field days of hands-on learning activities and workshops for local students focused on pro-pollinator practices that enhance productivity
- University of Minnesota Extension: K-12 youth in the Virginia, Minnesota “Virginia Grows” program will be invited to participate in afterschool 4-H programming at a nearby greenhouse
- Youth Farm: This Minneapolis entity will expand its Farm Stewards Fellowship curriculum which focuses on educating youth on skill development related to food, social change, and urban agriculture.
The beneficiaries of this round were chosen by the Commissioner of Agriculture and a review committee comprised of experts from various agriculture-related fields. Funding for the program has been assigned for two fiscal years, 2018 through 2019. Connell says they’ll invite proposals for the next round as soon as possible.
North Carolina Jury Awards Neighbors $473.5 Million In Smithfield Hog Waste Suit
On August 3, a jury awarded the plaintiffs $473.5 million—the largest of three matching verdicts that seem to indicate the momentum is in favor of the plaintiffs as the remaining trials advance through the courts. Though compensation will be limited by the state's cap on damages.
August 3rd, 2018
by H. Claire Brown
UPDATE, AUGUST 3, 2018, 12:50 P.M., EST:
Since the first trial’s conclusion in April (which we cover below), two juries have reached the same verdict in subsequent nuisance lawsuits against Murphy-Brown, a subsidiary of Smithfield Foods. On August 3, a jury awarded the plaintiffs $473.5 million—the largest to date. The three matching verdicts seem to indicate the momentum is in favor of the plaintiffs as the remaining trials advance through the courts. Though, actual compensation is likely to be quite limited by North Carolina’s cap on damages.
A North Carolina jury ruled on Thursday, April 26, 2018, that Murphy-Brown LLC, a subsidiary of Smithfield Foods, the world’s largest pork processor, and hog producer, must pay its neighbors $50 million in damages as the result of a nuisance lawsuit. It’s a major win for advocates who have fought the pork industry for decades.
In the lawsuit, filed in 2014, the 10 plaintiffs argued that waste from Kinlaw Farm, a hog producer that contracts with Murphy-Brown, smelled so bad it limited their access to the outdoors in rural Bladen County, North Carolina. They also argued that the farm’s open waste lagoons attracted buzzards and flies and that trucks full of dead animals passed their houses at all hours of the day and night.
“Even in your sleep, you got to be disturbed by odor and truck lights and stuff,” says Naeema Muhammad, organizing co-director of the North Carolina Environmental Justice Network, a group that has advocated on behalf of local residents. She adds that this is the first time anyone has ever filed an action of this magnitude in court. “I tell you, it is pretty historic.”
The win may be inspirational for other communities organizing against industrial agriculture’s interests.
This was the first of 26 nuisance cases local residents have brought against the company, and the results indicate that the momentum is on the side of the plaintiffs. Nuisance lawsuits—particularly nuisance lawsuits filed against meat producers in states where the industry employs powerful lobbyists—are notoriously difficult to bring to trial, much less to win.
The jury, in this case, ruled that each plaintiff should be awarded $75,000 in compensatory damages and $5 million in punitive damages.
“It’s been a long, hard-fought battle. This is decades old in this state,” Muhammed says.
Yet the pork industry appears to be one step ahead of the plaintiffs: Less than a year go, the North Carolina Legislature passed a law that limits the amount of money agricultural entities have to pay in damages in nuisance suits, North Carolina Policy Watch reports. The industry-backed North Carolina Pork Council has donated $90,000 to legislative candidates since the year 2000, and Muhammad says the congressman who sponsored the bill hailed from the largest pork-producing county in the state.
Compensatory damages—that’s the money a jury awards for recovery from property devaluation, medical bills, and lost wages—were limited to loss of property value only, not loss of quality of life. North Carolina statute also limits punitive damages to triple the amount of compensatory damages, Politico’s Morning Agriculture reports.
Smithfield has already announced its plan to appeal this decision.
What this means is that, even though this North Carolina jury awarded the plaintiffs $5 million in compensatory damages, each individual is likely only to receive $225,000 (or triple the value of the $75,000 in compensatory damages). Had the new legislation not passed last year, that $75,000 figure might have been much higher since it would’ve included money that accounted for reduction in quality of life.
Muhammad says she isn’t familiar with the state’s specific limits on punitive damages, but for her, the win is about more than money. “Even if that’s the case, the victory is in making this industry pay for the damages they’ve done to people. They were looking to walk scot-free,” she says.
The jury’s decision did not include a mandate that Murphy Brown change its manure management practices, but Muhammad says she hopes the pork industry will see the writing on the wall.
The plaintiffs’ win may prove inspirational for other communities where residents are organizing against industrial agriculture’s interests. “I believe that this case, this judgment in North Carolina, is really going to send a strong message to communities across the country that are threatened by industrial farms that they don’t have to take it, they don’t have to take being rolled over by these huge industries,” says Kendra Kimbirauskas, CEO of the Socially Responsible Agricultural Project, an advocacy group that organizes in opposition to factory farms. “It’s definitely going to give folks hope and keep them fighting back.”
“I tell you, it is pretty historic.”
Smithfield has already announced its plan to appeal, Indy Week reports. In a statement, the company called the lawsuits an “outrageous” attack on animal agriculture, adding that “from the beginning, the lawsuits have been nothing more than a money grab by a big litigation machine.”
According to Politico’s Morning Agriculture, Murphy Brown could potentially appeal to place the blame on its contractor, Kinlaw Farm, which was not named as a defendant in the original lawsuit. That would mean that the growers—not Murphy Brown or Smithfield, who handle everything except the actual animals and their manure—would be responsible for paying the damages.
“The industry owns everything except the waste, that’s what the growers have been told,” Muhammad says. “They [the industry] own the animals, they own the feed, they own the trucks.” She says she hopes contract growers will be spurred to act when they realize they may have to foot the bill for the Murphy Brown lawsuits.
“Maybe this will encourage the growers to take a stand, because they need to take a stance on this industry as well,” she adds. “They were sold a bag of goods that was full of ants.”
The Aquaponic Association - U.S. Farm Bill - 300 Aquaponic Signatures to Congress
August 7, 2018
U.S. Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, & Forestry 328A Russell Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
House Committee on Agriculture
1301 Longworth House Office Building Washington, DC 20515
Dear Senators and Representatives:
Aquaponic growers around the country are glad to see that the Senate’s recent Farm Bill draft includes provisions for aquaponics and other sustainable growing methods like hydroponics, aeroponics, vertical growing, rooftop growing, and controlled-environment greenhouses.
Our planet is already grappling with environmental stress and resource depletion, and global population is expected to grow 1.5 Billion by 2050. Investments in sustainable agriculture are critical to a prosperous future.
The Aquaponics Association and the undersigned institutions and individuals urge you to ensure that the final draft of the 2018 Farm Bill supports aquaponics and related sustainable agricultural methods.
BACKGROUND
Aquaponic growers around the world have proven that we can provide the freshest, healthiest produce in any environment with the fewest resources. We employ water-based, recirculating systems of fish, plants and bacteria to produce vegetables, fruits and fish (edible or ornamental).
In every state across the country, aquaponic growers are supplying markets and restaurants; growing for their own diet; teaching STEM education; and contributing to sustainability research.
Aquaponic agriculture has many nationwide benefits:
• Less water use - Aquaponic systems use over 90% less water than traditional agriculture per pound of produce.
Local economic growth - Aquaponics can be performed from cities to deserts, offering jobs and regional economic growth anywhere.
No antibiotics - Aquaponic systems are naturally incompatible with antibiotics; growers rely on a diverse microbial ecosystem for natural disease suppression.
Fewer food miles - Aquaponics can deliver fresh produce in any environment which will reduce carbon use, food spoilage, and nutrient depletion.
Better food safety - Controlled-environment greenhouses minimize the risk of outdoor contamination hazards that cause most outbreaks.
Food security – More local food leads to better food security in times of extreme weather or systemic crises.
No toxic runoff - Aquaponic systems are closed-loop and do not emit the harmful agricultural runoff that causes aquatic dead-zones.
No synthetic chemicals - Aquaponic systems do not require synthetic pesticides or fertilizers.
Less land-use and soil erosion - Aquaponics can be practiced anywhere from rooftops to old industrial buildings. Plants can yield over 150% more produce than traditional agriculture per grow area.
Aquaponics can help meet the nutrition needs of a growing population, generate local economic growth, and benefit our environment. Please ensure that the 2018 U.S. Farm BiIl supports aquaponics and other new sustainable growing methods, in the same manner, it supports traditional agriculture.
This letter was prepared by the Aquaponics Association 2018 Farm Bill Coalition.
Please Click Here to View The Letter and Signators
OASIS®Grower Solutions Horticubes® Retail Pack Offers Growers Foam Media for Fast, Clean and Consistent Growing for Hydroponics
Smithers-Oasis Company offers a new retail pack of its Oasis® Grower Solutions Horticubes® growing media, a lower density and higher drainage foam that is specially engineered for hydroponic seed germination of vegetables and herbs.
Oasis® Horticubes retail packs ideal for smaller and hobby growers, as well as larger growers to use for trials..
KENT, Ohio – August 2018 – Smithers-Oasis Company offers a new retail pack of its Oasis® Grower Solutions Horticubes® growing media, a lower density and higher drainage foam that is specially engineered for hydroponic seed germination of vegetables and herbs.
Horticubes higher drainage design helps to maintain an ideal air-to-water balance, even under heavy watering conditions. The enhanced drainage keeps the top of the media drier, helping to minimize algae growth and the lower density of the foam media enables superior root growth.
Manufactured in sheet style, Oasis Horticubes fit easily into the industry’s standard 1020 trays. Each Horticubes sheet is pre-scored for easy separation of single cubes, blocks of cubes or strips of cubes. Pre-dibbled seed holes, available in single-seed dibbles or multi-seed dibbles, are uniform in depth and spacing, making it ideal for automated seeding processes.
The new retail pack is available in three sizes, 276-, 104- and 50-count sheets, containing two sheets of the foam media per box. Designed with smaller or hobby growers in mind, the Horticubes retail packs are also ideal for larger growers to use for trials before purchasing in bulk quantities, which are also available.
“The success of our Rootcubes® retail packs inspired us to offer our Horticubes in packs perfectly sized for smaller or hobby growers and ideal for larger growers to use for trials prior to purchasing in bulk,” said Jeff Naymik, global marketing manager, Oasis Grower Solutions. “This initiative reflects the Smithers-Oasis continued commitment to a scientific approach to providing solutions for optimal growing and solving growers’ needs.”
The foam media is sterile and pathogen-free to help reduce disease and insect issues. Horticubes are ideal for lettuce, herbs and other vegetable crops.
With a solution for the entire plant journey, Oasis® Grower Solutions products include foam medium for tissue culture, plant propagation Rootcubes®, Terra Plug, Fertiss®, PlantPaper, Horticubes®, Oasis® Easy System, hydroponic fertilizer, Soax® wetting agent, disease control, and greenhouse cleaners. It also offers an ecologically sustainable (eS) line of products.
Oasis Grower Solutions provides for the strong, healthy, clean start and post-harvest care and handling of plants and flowers throughout their lifecycle to ensure the best consumer experience. The entire plant journey includes the breeder, propagator, growers, retailers, distributors and finally, the end consumer.
About Smithers-Oasis
Smithers-Oasis’ global expertise of the plant and flower business stretches from propagation to presentation. With locations in 20 countries and resources around the world, Smithers-Oasis manufactures floral foam products, postharvest products, growing media and flower arranging supplies for the floriculture industry. OASIS® and Floralife® are two of the company’s most recognized brands founded in 1954 and 1938, respectively. With more than 60 years of experience with foaming technology, Smithers-Oasis also develops specialty foams for a wide variety of applications including packaging, impression, absorption and molding. The company’s driving purpose is “to help people express and experience emotion by adding value to flowers and plants.” Smithers-Oasis, a privately owned company, is headquartered in Kent, Ohio, USA.
For more information on Oasis Grower Solutions Horticubes retail packs, contact Global Marketing Manager, Jeffrey Naymik at jnaymik@smithersoasis.com or visit www.oasisgrowersolutions.com.
Media Contact:
Rosemarie Ascherl Rosemarie@NMVStrategies.com 216.970.4329
Photo caption: Oasis® Grower Solutions Horticubes® retail packs are ideal for smaller, hobby growers or for trial runs with larger growers.
AgFunder Closes First In Series Of Food & Ag Tech Funds Enabled By AI
Online venture capital platform AgFunder, which builds its own technology and A.I. to support its investment team, has raised a $2.25 million fund from the AgFunder community to invest in transformational food and agriculture startups (click here to signup for early access to invest in the next fund). The fund, which will co-invest alongside AgFunder, closed at the end of March, one month after opening to AgFunder’s global network. The fund has already made five investments.
Nearly 40 accredited and institutional investors contributed to the fund including personal investments by senior and C-level executives at some of the major food and agriculture companies who have been following AgFunder for years. Other individual investors include Jason Camm, Chief Medical Officer of Peter Thiel’s family office Thiel Capital.
Institutional investors include SYSTEMIQ, an advisory and investment firm dedicated to the creation of sustainable economic systems in energy, materials, and land use; impact investment fund C9 Capital; and a major US grain merchant.
“We are investing in AgFunder’s Co-Investment Fund due to the quality of deal flow and their expertise in global agtech. We have already begun working closely with the team and hope to contribute to the fund’s future success,” said Ryan Gralia from SYSTEMIQ.
The co-investment fund will invest alongside AgFunder’s own internal fund that counts AgFunder’s founders, investors, advisors, and leading agrifood tech entrepreneurs including Sid Gorham who sold Granular to DuPont (Now Corteva) last year for $300m, Rob Saik who sold Agri-Trend to Trimble, ex-Portfolio Managers of Cargill’s BlackRiver, and Kip Tom who was recently appointed U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. for Food and Ag.
AgFunder will be launching its next co-investment fund in the fall.
“You shouldn’t have to be a Silicon Valley VC to access to some of the best investment opportunities transforming our agrifood tech system. By giving our global network of accredited and institutional investors an opportunity to invest alongside us through these co-investment funds we open the agrifood tech sector to a wider global audience of investors and add value through an engaged ecosystem,” said Rob Leclerc, CEO of AgFunder. “We’ve always believed that the smartest, most value-add investors for the industry are successful entrepreneurs and food and ag professionals. This is an opportunity to tap into that talent pool and it gives us an incredibly smart and dialed-in scout and mentor network.”
The co-investment fund will invest alongside the internal fund in the next 10-12 startups that AgFunder invests in, operating across the value chain, from farm to fork. AgFunder is targeting startups at seed to Series B stage.
The co-investment fund’s first publicly announced portfolio company is Connecterra, the AI-powered dairy technology startup, which we announced in May. The fund has made another four investments in food tech, ag genomics, and remote sensing, all of which will be announced in due course.
AgFunder’s unique model allows it to tap into its global network of over 50,000 members and subscribers to source opportunities, assist with due diligence, and facilitate business development for its portfolio companies. AgFunder’s software engineers are also developing a range of technologies utilizing artificial intelligence to help identify new opportunities, speed up due diligence, analyze markets, and provide support for its portfolio companies.
“We believe that there is an enormous opportunity investing in early-stage companies that are developing digital and deep technology solutions for the many problems inherent across the food system. Our global platform and AI-enabled data engine allow us to compare technologies across multiple geographies, informing our investment decision-making process, and ultimately deliver superior returns for our fund investors,” said AgFunder CIO, Michael Dean.
“The days of VC as a lifestyle business are over, and in 10-years Limited Partners will be asking VCs how many engineers they have on their team,” added Rob Leclerc. “It’s not enough anymore to rely on brains, referrals, chance encounters or one’s ‘Rolodex’. This industry is moving too fast and so to drive superior returns we knew we needed a technology edge to help source, diligence, and support our companies. Ultimately we’re running AgFunder like a startup by building technology in-house to do VC smarter.”