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FDA Finds Cyclospora In U.S. Romaine In McDonald’s Investigation
September 18, 2018
( File photo )
Food and Drug Administration officials looking into the source of the Cyclospora parasites in McDonald’s salads found two samples of U.S.-grown romaine with the parasites, although they weren’t connected to the outbreak attributed to the fast food salads.
The FDA released the information Sept. 18 in a statement from Commissioner Scott Gottlieb on the prevalence of Cyclosporiasis cases in the U.S. this year. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported there have been 2,173 cases this spring and summer as of Sept. 12.
The rise in cases, in part, can be attributed to new FDA testing methods applied in routine tests on “appropriate commodities.” That includes cilantro, which along with basil, parsley, and processed avocado and guacamole is part of a current FDA sampling program. In July, the program found Cyclospora on U.S.-grown cilantro, and when FDA officials checked the farm where it grew, they found Cyclospora there.
That was the first time Cyclospora had been found in U.S.-grown produce; the romaine is the second.
In his statement, Gottlieb did not say where the romaine was grown.
“The discovery of Cyclospora in both domestic and imported produce raise both old and new concerns,” he said in the statement. “They underscore the importance of the FDA’s surveillance activities to better define risks, like investigating why different product types like vegetable trays are being linked to Cyclospora outbreaks, and how widespread Cyclospora may be in the U.S.”
In the past, FDA responses to Cyclospora outbreaks have focused on protecting consumers from imported produce, but the agency needs to “include actions that are more appropriate for addressing domestic contamination events,” according to the statement.
The romaine investigation was triggered by Cyclospora illnesses traced to McDonald’s salads sold in 14 states that were supplied by Fresh Express, Salinas, Calif. When the outbreak was declared over by the FDA and CDC on Sept. 12, 511 illnesses had been linked to the salads.
However, the investigation did not trace the Cyclospora to a grower or farm.
Another notable cyclospora outbreak, of 250 illnesses linked to Del Monte vegetable trays, was declared over on Sept. 6. The source could have been domestic or foreign — the broccoli was from Mexico — but “the findings were not conclusive regarding the source,” according to Gottlieb.
Ongoing investigations into illnesses linked to basil and cilantro from “Mexican-style restaurants” account for other Cyclospora illness clusters, according to Gottlieb’s statement.
“I want to reinforce to consumers that it’s our goal to figure out how these outbreaks happened,” Gottlieb said in the statement. “We take this obligation very seriously.
“That’s, in part, why we are intervening early. And it’s why we’ll be communicating regularly with the public to provide information and updates on all of the outbreaks we work on,” he said in the statement.
Gottlieb underscored the importance of the Food Safety Modernization Act and the Produce Safety Rule, and said the system needs to be “rigorous, nimble, and proactive in order to confront new challenges.”
Related Topics: Romaine Outbreak Food safety FDA
These Photos of Submerged North Carolina Livestock Farms Are Devastating
North Carolina’s rivers basins, now swollen with rainwater from Hurricane Florence, are home to thousands of large indoor hog and poultry farms, as well as cesspools of liquid hog waste. Predictably—just as happened two years ago in the wake of Hurricane Matthew—floods and factory-scale livestock farming are proving to be a toxic and deadly (for the animals) mix.
Millions of Animals Have Perished
TOM PHILPOTT SEPTEMBER 18, 2018
This is your chicken during a flood. Rick Dove/Waterkeeper Alliance
North Carolina’s rivers basins, now swollen with rainwater from Hurricane Florence, are home to thousands of large indoor hog and poultry farms, as well as cesspools of liquid hog waste. Predictably—just as happened two years ago in the wake of Hurricane Matthew—floods and factory-scale livestock farming are proving to be a toxic and deadly (for the animals) mix.
A group called the Waterkeeper Alliance sends pilots into the air in after North Carolina flood events to document the damage done to these operations. The group uploads aerial photo to a Flickr feed, which will be updated regularly over the next several days. The first flights went up Monday, after Florence’s rainstorms had petered out, and the imagery is stark. Below are some just-posted images the group took during Monday’s flights.
In this one, the four long, narrow structures are indoor poultry barns, almost completely submerged.
Rick Dove / Waterkeeper Alliance
This one shows a similar scene, in West of Trenton, NC: four poultry barns, mostly under water.
In the one below, a massive hog operation with multiple barns and a manure lagoon—that rectangular pink thing, top right—has barely escaped inundation. But note that river flows from the storm have not peaked, and more severe flooding could yet happen.
In this one, a hog operation in West of Trenton, NC, the barns are mostly underwater and the manure lagoon has been topped by flood waters.
Matt Butler / Sound Rivers
Then there’s the startling photo below, sent to me by Matthew Starr, the Upper Neuse Riverkeeper for Sound Rivers, taken from the air yesterday. It depicts a liquid manure from a hog lagoon being pumped directly into floodwater.
Larry Baldwin / Crystal Coast Waterkeeper
Since the rivers are still cresting, it’s too early to tell how much much toxic manure will flow into North Carolina’s waterways in Florence’s wake, or how many animals will perish. Early indications are chilling. Sanderson Farms, the nation’s third-largest chicken producer, issued a statement Monday revealing that 60 of the 880 chicken barns that grow birds under contract for the company had flooded, killing an estimated 1.7 million birds of the around 20 million the company currently holds in the state. The statement added:
In addition, approximately thirty farms, housing approximately 211,000 chickens per farm, in the Lumberton, North Carolina, area are isolated by flood waters and the Company is unable to reach those farms with feed trucks. Losses of live inventory could escalate if the Company does not regain access to those farms.
That means around 6 million additional chickens are currently cut off from feed deliveries and could soon perish.
In the next episode of Bite podcast, which will air Friday, I catch up with Watereeper Alliance about what they’re seeing as they document the destruction. I also talk to retired eastern North Carolina chicken farmer Craig Watts—who until January 2016 grew birds under contract with another giant chicken company, Perdue—about the stress and financial risks incurred by contract farmers during these increasingly frequent catastrophes.
Just two years ago, months after Watts retired, Hurricane Matthew wrought similar destruction upon North Carolina’s CAFO-intensive, river-crossed coastal plain. According to Waterkeeper’s Starr, “in the two years since, no action was taken by the [meat] industry” to shut down operations in flood-prone areas.
North Carolina’s Hog And Poultry Farmers Are Directly In The Path of Hurricane Florence. Are They Ready?
Previous storms prompted manure-related environmental disasters. This week, North Carolina could get very smelly.
September 11th, 2018
by H. Claire Brown
As of Tuesday afternoon, more than a million people are under mandatory evacuation orders in Virginia, North Carolina, and South Carolina as Hurricane Florence draws closer to the coast. Meteorologists are predicting that the Carolina coasts will start seeing tropical storm-force winds late Wednesday night, with hurricane-force winds arriving at around noon on Thursday and official landfall likely on Thursday night. North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper declared a state of emergency on Friday.
The governor also lifted restrictions on weight-limited vehicles like semi-trucks so that farmers could harvest crops ahead of the storm. Heather Overton, assistant director of public affairs at the North Carolina Department of Agriculture & Consumer Services, says the agency sent 12 regional agronomists to survey farmers around the state. They estimate about two-thirds of the state’s tobacco and three-quarters of the corn have already been harvested, but sweet potato and peanut harvests are just getting underway.
“Farmers are working to get as much out of the fields as they can,” Overton says. “We urge them and everybody else to take the situation seriously.”
Hog and poultry farmers have more to worry about than flooded barns.
Meanwhile, the state’s pork and poultry farmers are stocking up on feed and fuel and moving animals to higher ground. “Some of the farms will have sent their birds to the processing plant a little early to move them off the farm,” says Bob Ford, executive director of the North Carolina Poultry Federation. “We’re in pretty good shape,” he adds. The pork industry seems similarly nonchalant: Andy Curliss, the North Carolina Pork Council CEO told Bloomberg he’d only be concerned if the state got more than 25 inches of rain.
In reality, hog and poultry farmers have more to worry about than flooded barns. Animal agriculture produces about 10 billion pounds of wet waste a year in North Carolina, and a lot of that waste is stored in open lagoons. During Hurricane Floyd in 1999, those lagoons broke open and dumped waste into public waters, an environmental catastrophe that was later blamed for algal blooms and fish kills. During Hurricane Matthew in 2016, 14 lagoons flooded and millions of animals died. Yet in a blog post admonishing readers to “beware of misleading narratives and check facts,” the North Carolina Pork Council argued that the vast majority of lagoons operated as advertised during Matthew, which minimized the damage.
Overton says North Carolina hog farmers have begun spraying manure onto fields to free up space in the lagoons should major rainfall accompany Florence. Transferring waste from the pit to the field helps minimize the risk of a flooded lagoon, but the state’s Department of Environmental Quality regulates the amount of manure farmers are allowed to apply. Overton says that farmers have had several days to prepare. “From what we understand, they are in pretty good shape.”
North Carolina doesn’t always know where poultry farms are located.
Farmers are required to stop applying manure at a certain point after weather watches and warnings are issued by the National Weather Service—typically hours before the severe weather begins. This can put them in a double-bind: leave the manure in the lagoons and risk a breach caused by flooding, or break the law by applying it on the farm too late and risk letting it run off into the public water supply when the storm comes. There’s a powerful incentive to break the rules.
“We have consistently, in advance of similar storms even of lesser intensity, witnessed illegal spraying after that prohibition is triggered,” says Will Hendrick, staff attorney for the Waterkeeper Alliance, an environmental advocacy group. “That’s part of what we will be on the lookout for during our pre-storm monitoring.”
Hendrick’s team will also be monitoring agricultural flooding from the air so that it can alert state agencies to mobilize a response. He points out that the state of North Carolina doesn’t always know where poultry farms are located—they’re not required to apply for a permit.
“I don’t think anyone is as optimistic as to assume that there won’t be considerable damage in North Carolina,” Hendrick says. “We’re going to do our best to determine it, assess it—and in particular, the damage that’s caused by threats to water quality.”
ENVIRONMENT, FARM, HOME FEATURE, SYSTEMS,CAFO DISASTER PREPAREDNESS HURRICANE FLORENCE NATURAL DISASTERS NORTH CAROLINA
Take Charge of Your Food: Your Health is Your Business
Sunita Narain is Director-General of the Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) & Editor of Down to Earth magazine in New Delhi
NEW DELHI, Aug 17 2018 (IPS) - The minimum we expect from the government is to differentiate between right and wrong. But when it comes to regulating our food, it’s like asking for too much. Our latest investigation vouches for this. The Centre for Science and Environment (CSE)’s pollution monitoring laboratory tested 65 samples of processed food for presence of genetically modified (GM) ingredients.
The results are both bad and somewhat good. Of the food samples tested, some 32 per cent were positive for GM markers. That’s bad. What’s even worse is that we found GM in infant food, which is sold by US pharma firm, Abbott Laboratories, for toddlers with ailments; in one case it was for lactose intolerant infants and the other hypoallergenic—for minimizing the possibility of allergic reaction.
Sunita Narain. Credit: Center for Science and Education
In both cases, there was no warning label on GM ingredients. One of the health concerns of GM food is that it could lead to allergic reactions. In 2008 (updated in 2012), the Indian Council of Medical Research issued guidelines for determining the safety of such food, as it cautioned that “there is a possibility of introducing unintended changes, along with intended changes which may, in turn, have an impact on the nutritional status or health of the consumer”.
This is why Australia, Brazil, the European Union and others regulate GM in food. People are concerned about the possible toxicity of eating this food. They want to err on the side of caution. Governments ensure they have the right to choose.
The partial good news is that the majority of the food that tested GM positive was imported. India is still more or less GM-free. The one food that did test positive is cottonseed edible oil. This is because Bt-cotton is the only GM crop that has been allowed for cultivation in India.
This should worry us. First, no permission has ever been given for the use of GM cottonseed oil for human consumption. Second, cottonseed oil is also mixed in other edible oils, particularly in vanaspati.
Under whose watch is GM food being imported? The law is clear on this. The Environment Protection Act strictly prohibits the import, export, transport, manufacture, process, use or sale of any genetically engineered organisms except with the approval of the Genetic Engineering Approval Committee (GEAC) under the Ministry of Environment, Forests and Climate Change.
In fact, they will say, there is no GM food in India. But that’s the hypocrisy of our regulators–make a law, but then don’t enforce it. On paper it exists; we are told, don’t worry. But worry we must.
The 2006 Food Safety and Standards Act (FSSA) reiterates this and puts the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) in charge of regulating use. The Legal Metrology (Packaged Commodities) Rules 2011 mandate that GM must be declared on the food package and the Foreign Trade (Development and Regulation) Act 1992 says that GM food cannot be imported without the permission of GEAC. The importer is liable to be prosecuted under the Act for violation.
Laws are not the problem, but the regulatory agencies are. Till 2016, GEAC was in charge–the FSSAI said it did not have the capacity to regulate this food. Now the ball is back in FSSAI’s court. They will all tell you that no permission has been given to import GM food.
In fact, they will say, there is no GM food in India. But that’s the hypocrisy of our regulators–make a law, but then don’t enforce it. On paper it exists; we are told, don’t worry. But worry we must.
So, everything we found is illegal with respect to GM ingredients. The law is clear about this. Our regulators are clueless. So, worry. Get angry. It’s your food. It’s about your health.
What next? In 2018, FSSAI has issued a draft notification on labeling, which includes genetically modified food. It says that any food that has total GM ingredients 5 percent or more should be labeled and that this GM ingredient shall be the top three ingredients in terms of percentage in the product.
But there is no way that government can quantify the percentage of GM ingredients in the food—this next level of tests is prohibitively expensive. We barely have the facilities. So, it is a clean chit to companies to “self-declare”. They can say what they want. And get away.
The same FSSAI has issued another notification (not draft anymore) on organic food. In this case, it says that it will have to be mandatorily “certified” that it does not contain residues of insecticides. So, what is good needs to be certified that it is safe?
What is bad, gets a clean bill of health. Am I wrong in asking: whose interests are being protected? So, take charge of your food. Your health is your business.
Affinor Growers Signs Tom Baumann to Consult for Agriculture Development
VANCOUVER, British Columbia, July 16, 2018 - Affinor Growers Ltd. (“Affinor Growers”) (CSE:AFI), (OTC:RSSFF), (Frankfurt:1AF) is pleased to announce that it has signed a consulting agreement with Tom Baumann, a professor at The University Of The Fraser Valley, to assist the Company in developing and implementing the appropriate protocols required for growing fruits and vegetables and other related crops using the Company’s technology. The expertise Mr. Baumann brings will ensure our clients receive not only our towers, but the appropriate guidance and expertise to ensure their success.
Tom Baumann has a Masters Degree in Plant Science from Germany and a Masters Degree in Horticulture from the University of British Columbia. Mr. Baumann has been teaching at the University of the Fraser Valley (“UFV”) since 1991 and has been in charge of UFV’s greenhouse and field operations in Chilliwack, Langley and Qualicum. Mr. Baumann specializes in berries and has been employed by the BC Strawberry Growers Association and by the Raspberry Industry Development Council in the past. Mr. Baumann is also the President of Expert Agriculture Team Ltd. (“EAT”), a research and consulting company that provides expertise to numerous growers in the Fraser Valley.
Tom Baumann, commented that "I am extremely excited to join Affinor in this capacity. I have seen the technology in use and am grateful to have the opportunity to help implement this technology throughout the world. Climate change is causing significant changes to the way we grow crops and Affinor’s technology is a great example of technology and agriculture coming together to adapt to these changes."
Nick Brusatore CEO, commented that "We are very excited to have an expert of Mr. Baumann’s stature join the Affinor team. Mr. Baumann brings a wealth of knowledge and experience that, combined with our technology, will be a game changer in the agriculture industry."
About Affinor Growers
Affinor Growers is a publicly traded company on the Canadian Securities Exchange under the symbol ("AFI"). Affinor is focused on growing high-quality crops such as romaine lettuce, spinach, strawberries using its vertical farming techniques. Affinor is committed to becoming a pre-eminent supplier and grower, using exclusive vertical farming techniques.
Neither Canadian Securities Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the Canadian Securities Exchange) accept responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.
This news release may contain assumptions, estimates, and other forward-looking statements regarding future events. Such forward-looking statements involve inherent risks and uncertainties and are subject to factors, many of which are beyond the Company's control that may cause actual results or performance to differ materially from those currently anticipated in such statements.
AFFINOR GROWERS INC.
"Nicholas Brusatore"
For More Information, please contact:
Nicholas Brusatore, CEO
contact@affinorgrowers.com
Freaking Out About Heavy Metals In Your Food? Here's What You Should Know
Testing has many concerned, but don’t panic just yet.
By Sara Chodosh August 17, 2018
This baby has reason to be concerned about their food. Deposit Photos
Heavy metals aren’t just something to avoid if you don’t like Black Sabbath. But while you’ve probably heard of this group of elements (and the dangers associated with ingesting them), you might not know why they’re such a worry to health experts.
This is all especially relevant given how many products we’re finding heavy metals in. Baby food is just the latest. Consumer Reports tested a variety of the top brands and found every product has measurable levels of at least one heavy metal, and two-thirds had worrisome levels. You should read their full report, but even the basic outline of their findings raises some questions. How much is a ‘worrisome’ amount? Where do these metals come from? How many am I being exposed to? These are all important questions—some of them with surprising answers—so we boiled it down to the essentials so you can get the info you need.
What is a heavy metal?
There’s no strict definition for a heavy metal, but they’re generally considered to be high density, literally heavy metals, as in those elements in the metals section of the periodic table of elements. Some people also define heavy metals as those that are toxic, though some are biologically necessary in small quantities yet dangerous in large ones.
Either way, the list of heavy metals generally includes arsenic, lead, cadmium, mercury, chromium, copper, zinc, nickel, selenium, silver, antimony, manganese, and several others. The Food & Drug Administration only has specific safety levels for a few of these—cadmium, lead, arsenic, and mercury—because those are the elements within this category that most commonly make their way into the food supply. The Environmental Protection Agency also monitors heavy metals, since they’re environmental contaminants. But all this being said, there’s no one definition of “heavy metal” and they’re not all equally dangerous. Generally, health experts agree that the most worrying members of this category, are arsenic, cadmium, chromium, lead, and mercury.
Why are heavy metals dangerous?
The short answer is that heavy metals react with your cellular machinery in ways that are often problematic. Small amounts can get filtered out with your urine, but heavy metals mostly stick around in various tissues, as well as in your bones and blood, so taking in too much can cause the metals to accumulate—that’s when you run into problems.
For some, reaching a dangerous level is tough. Heavy metals like iron and zinc, are not just useful but essential for your body to function. Iron allows your red blood cells to bind oxygen molecules. Various enzymes in your body require zinc in order to work properly. Too much of either would result in similar symptoms to other heavy metal poisonings, we just don’t commonly get exposed to dangerous levels so you don’t hear about them when we talk about heavy metal poisoning.
Other metals, like copper, are both necessary and alarming. You need trace amounts to help enzymatic reactions inside your cells, but you can get copper poisoning if your drinking water is contaminated (the EPA considers anything over 1.3 milligrams per liter to be too much). The same reactivity that allows it to feed reactions also causes it to produce free radicals, which can damage DNA and other cellular components.
Many of the heavy metals you hear about, though, fall into a third category: safe in small quantities, but mostly just dangerous. Arsenic, for instance, is virtually everywhere, so it’d be close to impossible to avoid it entirely. But in larger than trace quantities, it’s a huge problem. It inhibits a wide variety of enzymes, and arsenic poisoning manifests as a host of upsetting symptoms including seizures, brain hemorrhages, vomiting, bloody diarrhea, anemia, muscle aches, and hardening of the skin.
Not all heavy metals give you quite this range of dire medical manifestations, but most of them will give you severe gastrointestinal and nervous systems problems. We’re not even sure precisely how most of the heavy metals damage the human body, but the common thread is that they interrupt enzymes and interact with DNA in such a way that basic cellular processes shut down.
Lead is the main exception to the rule, it primarily exerts its influence on the human body thanks to its molecular mimicry of calcium (though it also interferes with enzymes.) Your nerves rely on calcium to send signals to each other. All the protein channels and enzymes that use calcium to open or close get confused by lead, prompting them to malfunction as the metal accumulates. Researchers aren’t sure of all the mechanisms by which this interference causes problems, but the end result is a variety of neurological issues. Symptoms can take time to show up, but chronic ingestion causes confusion, headaches, seizures, and in the long-term prevents neurological development, making it particularly worrying for young children whose brains and bodies are still developing.
How much is too much?
It’s surprisingly hard to track down specific numbers on precisely how much of any given heavy metal is problematic. In part, that’s because experts have a hard time agreeing on what qualifies as a safe quantity for these elements. Consumer Reports points out in some cases there have been recommendations to change the “safe” amount that hasn’t been confirmed yet. The EPA considers arsenic levels to be acceptable at 10 parts per billion in drinking water, while the FDA has considered lowering that in food to 100 parts per billion. The FDA says that mercury is dangerous at 1 part per million.
Even if you had a complete list of the dangerous levels, though, you’d need to know how much is actually in your food. The FDA regularly tests various food products and publishes those results as part of the Total Diet Study. You can check out the full results, but it’s all averages. It’s a useful resource, but still can’t tell you whether a particular brand is riskier, and the FDA isn’t able to test all food products on the market.
The safest bet is simply to minimize your exposure. As the director of food safety research at Consumer Reports notes, “no amount of heavy metals such as lead can be considered safe.”
What can I do to decrease my exposure?
Since you’re not going to be able to test all of your food for heavy metals before every meal, the best and easiest way to minimize heavy metal exposure is to avoid those products known to have high levels of those substances. The biggest one? Rice. Rice readily absorbs arsenic from the soil and water, and though as an adult you’re certainly not eating enough pure rice for it to be a problem, babies shouldn’t have many rice-based snacks. And if you are concerned about your own diet, Consumer Reports suggests opting for white basmati rice from California, India, or Pakistan or choosing brown rice—all of these had much lower levels of arsenic than rice from other places in the world.
You can also avoid consuming protein powder and steer clear of high-mercury fish like bigeye tuna and swordfish. Packaged foods also tend to contain rice, since it’s a cheap and useful additive, so avoiding processed products will help. None of these is likely to cause a problem individually, but it can’t hurt to reduce your exposure. In doing so, you’ll also move towards a diet full of whole foods that are naturally low in heavy metals. Though many plants can absorb trace amounts of dangerous metals from the soil or from contaminated water, pretty much all fruits and veggies are very low in or entirely free from heavy metals. Dairy is also safe, as is most meat besides seafood.
Again, there’s no reason to be fearful. Heavy metals are dangerous, but it’s easy to reduce your exposure and you’re unlikely to be consuming high quantities already anyway.
Technology Promises To Calculate "True" Shelf Life
One of the causes of food waste is produce that goes bad earlier than expected. Of course, shipping produce that is fresh is the goal of every grower. In what manner it arrives and how fresh it remains once in the store, however, is largely out of their control. Furthermore, it is also in the retailer's best interest for the produce to remain fresh and tasty for customer's enjoyment.
Zest Labs, a company based in San Jose, California, has come up with a solution called Zest Fresh that allows growers and shippers to know how long each pallet of their produce will remain fresh. Using IoT sensors placed in each pallet at the time of harvest and cloud-based analytics, Zest Fresh takes into consideration temperatures at time of harvest, cut-to-cool duration, as well as conditions at each point right up until the receiver, and based on this data, calculates what the "true" remaining shelf life is.
"IoT sensors in each pallet use predictive analytics, machine learning and other functions to calculate a freshness metric of the dynamic remaining shelf life for each pallet," said Kevin Payne of Zest Labs. "We have profiled produce from different regions to determine the maximum freshness duration. Consider us as a postharvest freshness management solution. The reason is that despite a batch of produce coming out of the same field on the same day, the conditions in which they were harvested and eventually placed in the cooler can vary significantly. A pallet of strawberries picked at 7:00am and placed in the cooler at 8:00am will have a different shelf life than the pallet picked at 2:00pm during the heat of the day and placed in the cooler at the end of the day. This causes the 'true' remaining shelf life to be different for each pallet."
Kevin Payne and Todd Clayton with Zest Labs
Sending the pallets to the optimal destinations
Data collection and analysis is great, but varying forms have been around for a long time. Zest Labs noted that the point of difference with their Zest Fresh technology is that something can be done about proactively solving the problem. "Many solutions out there tend to be reactive, meaning an action can only take place after the fact," Payne explained. "However, we believe we offer the only proactive solution, by using the predictions and allowing the shipper to make decisions based on insights and information."
Fundamentally, the idea is to utilize the information to send pallets to destinations most appropriate for the calculated freshness. Most obviously, the greater the shelf life remaining, the further the produce can be sent. "When the calculated shelf life of one pallet is, say, 3 days shorter than another, it can be sent to a receiver that is closer, in order to maximize the shelf life for the receiver," Payne added. "The data is collected continuously and is read at pre-determined waypoints, such as being placed in the cooler, in the truck, moving out of the warehouse, arrival at the receiver, etc. This produces a dynamic shelf life, updated at each interval to give the most accurate shelf life at any one time."
Payne further noted that growers can use the data to monitor their processes to ensure they're being adhered to, adjusting procedures accordingly. "Zest Fresh empowers workers to keep product on process with real-time tools that reflect each process step – such as received inventory, time and temperature of product staged for pre-cool, pre-cooling, and shipping," he said. "It also drives notifications when preset process parameters are exceeded, focusing workers on the most acute problems in real-time."
The ZIPR Code
To help with the monitoring process, Zest Fresh collects, stores and displays all the data in a unique, automatically-generated code, called the "ZIPR Code" which stands for Zest Intelligent Pallet Routing, the industry’s first freshness metric. The ZIPR Code references the dynamic remaining shelf-life of individual pallets and then users can view and manage that pallet's information.
"Once Zest Fresh combines the data and applies a score, it creates the ZIPR Code for each pallet," Payne explained. "This ZIPR Code is then matched to pending orders to ensure each pallet has sufficient remaining freshness to meet the retailer’s needs. The ZIPR Code ensures that customer shipments are loaded correctly, and that quality is tracked through actual delivery – providing the grower with visibility of delivered quality."
"The ZIPR Code can be integrated into a warehousing management solution, providing alerts and updates on whether the pallet is still in a suitable condition and routing," he added. "It is designed to be autonomous and wireless."
Practicalities
The company said the sensors themselves are small and easy to handle. They can be inserted into pallets at any time, depending on whether the grower wishes to monitor the entire supply chain, or just certain sections.
"The IoT sensors are about the same size as a deck of cards and are placed in the pallet in the field or at any point along the way," Payne described. "They are reusable and can also be used for certain segments. The software to view information is cloud-based, with the desktop and mobile tags operated by access points. A technician will install these and all that is required is power and a network connection."
The Zest Fresh "dashboard"
Zest Labs is aiming to be at the forefront of technology, so Payne shared that Zest Fresh has Blockchain capability for those that desire it. "Blockchain, which is basically a secure way to exchange and share information, is one of the aspects that I get asked about often," he said. "We do have the support for it although it is not required."
What types of produce and where?
According to Payne, the most common produce type that growers use Zest Fresh for are highly perishable fruits like berries. This is no surprise as these fruits are the ones that feel every effect of temperature changes and inadequate cooling times, for example. Currently, the company is working with growers in North America, and has also worked with suppliers in Central and South America.
"Zest Fresh can be used for any produce type, however most growers and retailers start by using them for the highly perishable produce items like berries, closely followed by leafy greens," Payne said. "We have also seen interest in grapes, cherries and stone fruit. Right now, our technology is used across North America, and we have also worked with growers in Central and South America, particularly in the northern winter. We are aiming to be at the forefront of technology and modernize the supply chain for the fresh produce industry."
For more information:
Kevin Payne
Zest Labs
Tel: +1 (408) 200-6527
Publication date: 7/10/2018
Author: Dennis M. Rettke
Copyright: www.freshplaza.com
US: One Supplier Named In Separate Salad And Pre-Cut Fruit Outbreaks
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) confirmed a total of 476 cyclospora illnesses in 15 states linked to salads sold at McDonald’s restaurants in an August 16th update.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) confirmed a total of 476 cyclospora illnesses in 15 states linked to salads sold at McDonald’s restaurants in an August 16th update. According to FDA, the salad ingredients were supplied by a company that has also been implicated in a separate fruit-related outbreak that was declared over last month.
The FDA has named Indianapolis-based Caito Foods LLC—the same supplier named in a Salmonella Adelaide outbreak linked to pre-cut fruit. That outbreak sickened 77 people in 9 states between April and July. The contaminated fruits included fresh-cut watermelon, honeydew melon, cantaloupe and fresh-cut mixed fruit products.
As of July 13, McDonald’s voluntarily stopped selling the implicated salads in 14 states. The fast-food chain now has a new salad supplier in those states.
On July 30, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) issued a public health alert on beef, pork and poultry salad and wrap products potentially contaminated with Cyclospora that were distributed by Caito Foods. The alert was prompted by a notification from Fresh Express—who supplied salads to McDonald’s—that the chopped romaine in these products was being recalled.
The FDA has stated they have no evidence to suggest that the McDonald’s/Fresh Express/Caito Foods Cyclospora outbreak is connected to the recent Del Monte vegetable tray Cyclospora outbreak.
According to foodsafetymagazine.com, the FDA and USDA continue to investigate this outbreak, and they are reviewing distribution and supplier details.
Publication date: 8/20/2018
American Healthcare Doesn’t Care About Curing Anything
Instead of working with and listening to our bodies, we plow right on by them. We beat our bodies like rented mules, and then when they start to break down from strain, we pump them full of drugs and beat them some more.
Author of Idea to App, founder of Pufferfish Software, OSU class of 2017. Recovering entrepreneur, almost-homeless traveling writer. www.meganeholstein.com
Today while cooking breakfast, I saw a magazine on my kitchen island open to this ad.
This ad represents everything that is wrong with America. This ad’s message is this:
When you overeat, your body is damaged by heartburn. Heartburn causes pain as a warning message. Nexium allows you to ignore this message and continue damaging yourself by engorging on pizza endlessly.
That’s what healthcare is like in America. When our health deteriorates, we don’t address the causes of our problems (like our sedentary, unhealthy lifestyles). We go to the pharmacy, where doctors prescribe and dispense pills that allow us to ignore it.
Example #1: Two years ago, my mother had shoulder pain. She went to the doctor. The doctor prescribed her an anti-inflammatory pill and tried to send her on her way. When my mother asked “What about physical therapy? As a long-term solution?” the doctor balked.
Example #2: When Americans are diagnosed with heart disease (which is extraordinarily common), the first line treatment is medication. Second and third line treatments involve surgical intervention. But instead of artificial intervention through medication and surgery, reversing heart disease might be as simple as being vegan. But in America, we don’t talk about that.
Example #3: One in six Americans take psychiatric medicine. I find it difficult to believe a solid 16% of Americans (54 million) have mental health problems so intractable that they require medication. Exercise is a very effective treatment for anxiety and depression, but 80% of Americans don’t get their recommended amount of exercise. Typical — we skip right over the lifestyle change and head straight for the pills.
Instead of working with and listening to our bodies, we plow right on by them. We beat our bodies like rented mules, and then when they start to break down from strain, we pump them full of drugs and beat them some more.
This isn’t to shame people who are fat, disabled, in poor health, etc. A lot of people in America are victims of a larger medical system which kicks them around like a soccer ball. I was one of them.
A few years ago, I ran into some digestive and mental health trouble. Wanting to get better, I took the pills the doctor prescribed. But the pills didn’t address the underlying issues. I watched as my health spiraled down and my prescriptions got larger and larger to address it.
The reason I am not still trapped in that system today is cannabis. Cannabis did what all my prescriptions did not, and gave me the ability to make the lifestyle changes I needed to make. First I was able to eat again, something my gut problems took from me. It evened out my moods, enabling me to get off of the dangerous and addictive psychiatric medication my doctor put me on. One year later, I was off all my regular medication. Two years later, I am barely smoking any cannabis (for medical purposes, at least).
This isn’t meant to be a plug for cannabis. What I’m getting at is that my prescriptions did nothing but attempt to manage symptoms. Once I found a way to make the right dietary and lifestyle changes, my condition started to improve.
Almost every day, I meet someone with chronic health problems. They can list a string of medications as long as their arm that they have tried. But the moment you ask them about lifestyle changes (“have you tried exercise?” “Have you tried being gluten-free (for digestive problems)?”) I get the fish eye.
I can’t blame them. When they ask their doctors about these things, their doctors hand-wave. Their doctors are typically family practitioners who spend most of their time doing physicals for high school athletes and prescribing antibiotics for sinus infections. They don’t have time to research the latest lifestyle interventions for Irritable Bowel Syndrome. So, they defer to what they learned in their medical degree several years ago and hand-wave the concerns away.
This is why homeopathic medicine has a strong and growing following. It isn’t because Americans have suddenly come over with an anti-science fever. It’s because our doctors and our medical system aren’t spending enough energy researching these things.
Yes, a lot of homeopathic medicine is complete nonsense. But I’d rather try 50 homeopathic remedies to find the one that reverses my gut damage than spend my entire life on pills attempting to manage the symptoms. It would be great if the healthcare system researched for me, so I didn’t have to, but they aren’t. It’s left up to me.
So, to other chronically ill people: I urge you to look outside the pills which manage your symptoms. Try wacky diets or odd lifestyle interventions. Most of them are going to be crap, but one or two of them aren’t.
To everyone at large: Take care of your bodies. Listen to what they tell you. If you feel yourself getting sick or tired, don’t cram your body full of drugs, listen to it. Give it what it needs.
To the medical establishment: Stop stuffing us full of pills that make our symptoms go away and get us out of your offices. That’s like giving a baby whiskey to make it stop crying. Please, take care of us instead. We depend on you.
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.
Singapore’s Largest Indoor Farm To Give Food Firms And National Food Security A Boost
By Lester Wan
08-Aug-2018
VertiVegies will use full-scale production hardware from Sanan Bio.
Land-scarce Singapore will receive a timely boon with the republic’s largest indoor farm boosting local produce and giving food firms greater locally-sourced options.
With investment and support from one of the most technologically-advanced indoor vertical farming companies, Sanan Sino-Sciences Photobiotech (SananBio), Singapore’s VertiVegies is building a 20,000m2 indoor vertical plant factory in the Lim Chu Kang area.
“After years of intensive research in this upcoming disruptive sector, we are pleased to enter the Singapore market with our local partner, VertiVegies. Singapore’s unique situation where there is limited land availability makes the deployment of high-technology farming very important, and we are excited to provide effective solutions through our technology for Singapore and the region, to facilitate necessary steps towards food security,” said Zhan Zhuo, CEO of SananBio.
“We hope this partnership will give a significant boost to Singapore’s agri-tech industry, catalyse future research collaborations, and create opportunities for regional expansion,” added Png Cheong Boon, CEO of Enterprise Singapore.
For industry and nation
The new indoor vertical plant factory will produce many varieties of fresh and sustainable vegetables to supply the country, which includes leafy greens, microgreens, herbs and fruits.
One of VertiVegies' directors, Veera Sekaran, told FoodNavigator-Asia that local food manufacturers and processors would now have the new option to use or process local varieties, which was something “previously inconceivable” . The facility and its produce will also “improve their operations” due to the food safety, traceability, nutrition and improved shelf life offered.
He said the company would explore all sales channels, including food processors and “other B2B avenues” , and has already initiated discussions with various local customers.
As for the nation, the produce will be for the local market and will provide an array of fresh, nutritious and safe vegetable products, boosting the island’s so-far limited agricultural produce.
“This (factory) will be able to produce all year round, irrespective of external climatic conditions,” another director, Ankesh Shahra, told us.
“We will reduce dependency on Old World industrial food supply chains that transport our food from miles and miles away. We will finally have a choice to consume locally, and that will reduce our dependency on a carbon-fuelled journey that promotes waste and greenhouse emissions.”
The new indoor vertical plant factory is expected to be ready by May 2019.
High-tech solutions
VertiVegies said the facility’s controlled environment cultivation has the power to positively impact Singapore’s food landscape by fulfilling the four pillars of food security: nourishment, waste reduction, resilience to climate change and local production.
The chemical-free facility will use hydroponics to grow plants, thereby eliminating the need for soil. There will be no chemical or pesticide used in the farming of the vegetables as compared to traditional soil-based farms.
The produce will be cultivated in high-end clean rooms with special filters and ultraviolet (UV) light, all designed to enhance food safety and nutrition. Moreover, Sanan Group, the parent company of SananBio, is the market leader in the manufacturing of efficient LEDs — providing a competitive advantage in cost-efficient cultivation.
Additionally, the intuitive system will automatically regulate temperature, water, humidity and the input of nutrients.
The factory utilises 90% recycled water, further preserving Singapore’s limited resources.
Other sustainability features of the facility include bio waste management and the use of renewable energy with solar power. The design of the facility also manages its energy requirements and minimises the overall energy outgo with optimised air circulation and cooling systems.
“We are providing radical solutions to very specific and continuing problems that Singapore faces, and this is the biggest motivation for us to innovate and persevere,” said Ankesh.
According to the firm, the factory’s automation will also provide jobs for domestic talent in Singapore for operating and maintaining these advanced facilities, which will require unique skillsets. The dependency on foreign labour for manual processes will therefore also be reduced.
Standards helping industry
Just a few months ago, Singapore launched its first organic standard , which officials believed was the world’s first organic standard for produce grown in urban and indoor conditions.
Previously, if producers wanted to sell their produce as “organic” in Singapore, they had to obtain certification from an overseas accreditation body.
“We welcome certification as regulation will help the industry,” Veera told us.
“We will comply with all the requirements set forward by the Singapore Standards Council.”
According to the agreement, SananBio will invest for an equity stake of 25% in VertiVegies Pte Ltd. The remaining 75% stake will be held equally by Veera and Ankesh, the directors and promoters of VertiVegies.
VertiVegies will also use full-scale production hardware from Sanan.
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RELATED TAGS: indoor farming, vertical farming, Organic agriculture, Singapore, South east asia, Food security
RELATED TOPICS: Business, Industry growth, South East Asia, Traditional and staple foods
Congresswoman Chellie Pingree Explains Why Food Is An Important Issue for All Americans
BY JESS BARRON AUGUST 10, 2018
LIVESTRONG.COM traveled to Washington, D.C., and met with U.S. Congressional leaders and their teams to find out what consumers and citizens need to know about the safety and health of the American food system and what we can do to get involved.
We interviewed Congresswoman Chellie Pingree, a Democrat representing Maine, at the Rayburn House Office Building as part of our Stronger Women interview series.
Pingree is currently the only organic farmer serving in U.S. Congress. She is a leader on food policy, including issues involving local food, food waste and organic agriculture. You can view the legislation sponsored or co-sponsored by Pingree here.
Organic and Local Food Should Not Be Considered a Partisan or Elitist Issue
According to Pingree, agriculture and the food that we put onto our tables should be concerned that bridge the gap between Republicans and Democrats.
“People want healthy food, and they want it at all economic levels and certainly at all ages,” she says. “The truth is today that the majority of parents who choose to buy baby food go with organic. And they do so because a parent of any economic level is worried from the start about what they’re going to put in their kid.”
Pingree points out that this is true whether a person is shopping at Whole Foods or at Walmart.
“Walmart is attempting to be the largest retailer of organic foods in the country right now, and they wouldn’t be going after that market if they didn’t think that everyone at every income level wanted to eat more organic food,” she says.
She explains that locally grown produce is important to Americans as well.
“I’m pretty convinced from the people I talk to that wherever you are economically and wherever you are politically that people want to buy more locally grown produce,” Pingree says. “They love the idea that they would know who the farmer was and they could know where it came from.”
Pingree’s efforts have included making it easier to use SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program) benefits to purchase local food.
“I have a bill right now to support more organic research because as our interest has gone up in organic food our supply has declined in this country,” she says. “And we’re actually importing a lot more corn and wheat that is organically grown outside our country than we ever have before because we can’t get them here.”
How Being a Farmer Prepared Her for Serving in Congress
Farming takes a lot of work, and Pingree says she didn’t come to her position with any particular ideology, but rather more of a “commonsense idea of how you get things done.”
According to Pingree, as a member of Congress it’s essential to be persistent and to be comfortable dealing with the public.
“I’ve always had a farm stand, and today I own a restaurant and an inn in addition to the farm, so I’m very comfortable dealing with the public or people’s complaints or the issues. You kind of get a thick skin, and you’re not uncomfortable working hard.”
Concerns About the EPA and USDA
Pingree said she has concerns about the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and about some of the rulings that the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) has made.
“One of my jobs here in Washington is to be a watchdog, to fight back — whether it’s issues on ruling that they’ve made on chemicals that should have more testing or some of the rules that have come before the USDA where they should be more directive about making sure that a free-range chicken is actually out on the range, pecking in the grass, picking up healthy nutrients in bugs,” explains Pingree.
She serves on two committees — one that has oversight on the EPA and another that oversees the USDA.
“You can follow us at any time. And we are regularly going after them — whether it’s about chemicals like Roundup, which we see too much of today, or some of the rules that govern how we technically administer the organic farming regulations and making sure that they’re strict and that everyone follows the right rules,” she says.
How Can Americans Get Involved Right Now to Improve Our Food Supply?
According to Pingree, consumers and citizens can make a huge difference. One way is voting with our pocketbooks and how we choose to spend our money.
“If you’re buying food from the local farm down the road or you’re joining a CSA, you’re showing that farmer that you care about what they do and sometimes you’re willing to pay a little extra to make sure they can stay in business. And you’re looking them right in the eye and saying: ‘I want you to tell me how this was grown,’” she says.
Pingree points out that contacting your state legislators and members of Congress is incredibly important because they count the emails and phone calls they get on each issue.
“If all we ever hear from is the very well-financed major food lobbyists — and, in fact, there are more lobbyists on the Hill and more money spent on lobbying food, food processing and agriculture than there is in the defense industry, and people don’t often understand that,” she explains. “So we need to hear all your voices on whatever concerns you.”
RELATED: Congresswoman Mia Love Encourages Women to Step Up and Lean In
See more of LIVESTRONG’s Stronger Women interviews.
About the Author
JESS BARRON is Editor-in-Chief and GM for LIVESTRONG.COM, a leading healthy lifestyle website with more than 32 million unique monthly viewers. In addition to LIVESTRONG, her writing has appeared in Entrepreneur, Fortune and MyDomaine. She has been interviewed about her advice for female entrepreneurs by Inc., HuffingtonPost and FabFitFun. Jess has appeared on MSNBC, CNN and ABC News and has been a keynote speaker at Health Further and a panelist at SXSW, Create & Cultivate and Digital Hollywood. Follow Jess on Instagramand Twitter at @jessbeegood!
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)
nova-Institut GmbH, Chemiepark Knapsack, Industriestraße 300, DE-50354 Hürth (Germany)
Internet: www.nova-institute.eu – all services and studies at www.bio-based.eu
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nova-Institute is a private and independent research institute, founded in 1994; nova offers research and consultancy with a focus on bio-based and CO2-based economy in the fields of food and feedstock, techno-economic evaluation, markets, sustainability, dissemination, B2B communication, and policy. Every year, nova organizes several large conferences on these topics; nova-Institute has 30 employees and an annual turnover of more than 2.5 million €.
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Food Safety, Sustainability And Frontier Tech Leading An Evolution In Agriculture
By Paul Ausick August 13, 2018
By Gene Munster and Austin Bohlig of Loup Ventures
- Due to advancements in technology, as well as consumers’ growing appetite for locally grown leafy greens and vegetables that are both high in nutritional value and come with improved taste, an evolution is underway in the agriculture space.
- This is changing the way produce is produced, and where it is being grown.
- This new method is called Indoor Ag, commonly known as Controlled Environment Agriculture (CEA).
- We see Indoor Ag as an attractive investment opportunity and believe frontier tech will play a prominent role in this flourishing market.
Why now?
According to Indoor Farm Economics, there were 15 commercial-scale Indoor Ag farms in the US in 2016. In Spring 2017, there were 56, and the number continues to grow at a healthy rate. While Indoor Agriculture is not new and has been most recently used to grow cannabis, farmers are beginning to explore these methods because of the quality and cost benefits it offers consumers, as well as consumers growing concern over food safety. In addition, technological innovations have improved profitability and are beginning to create a more sustainable method over traditional processes as the world population continues to grow. For these reasons, we see indoor ag as an attractive investment opportunity and believe frontier tech will play a prominent role in its rise.
Industry overview
Indoor agriculture is the process of growing produce using hydroponics, aquaponics, and aeroponic techniques in standardized form factors such as warehouses, greenhouses, and containers. Today, indoor agriculture farms primarily produce leafy greens, microgreens, herbs, and tomatoes. In addition, strawberries, nutraceutical plants, and pharmaceutical plants are under intense R&D and are now starting to come to market. The biggest advantages of moving to an Indoor Ag model, include:
- Year-round availability of any and all produce items at competitive wholesale pricing.
- Time to market is measured in hours versus days contributing to a better, more nutritious product that tastes better and minimizes transportation costs and carbon emissions.
- Superior “science” of growing can be applied using advanced LED lighting, controls, and mechanisms to guarantee a perfect crop every time regardless of outside weather or location.
- Grown without chemicals and drastically more efficient use of water plus ability to recapture/recycle.
These CEA advantages improve food safety and sustainability. However, the industry still has a long way to go until Indoor Ag becomes mainstream. The biggest challenges holding this up include:
- The lack of capital from banks and VCs that will invest in this theme.
- Gaining sufficient scale to service accounts like a Wal-Mart.
- Concerns around profitability due to the limited size of the growing building.
Key frontier tech
The emergence of Indoor Ag startups creating innovative tech has been a material catalyst to adoption and improving profitability. Specifically, technological advancements around LEDs, robotics, and genomics have helped meaningfully.
- Excessive heat can be incredibly damaging to plants. GrowFilm, a Minnesota startup (growfilm.ag), has developed light emitters that operate around 93º F, allowing them to be placed closer to plants. This also eliminates the need for multiple lamps and lighting systems, which can increase yields by 40%. Additionally, a better understanding of how photosynthesis is impacted by different light spectrums is allowing Indoor Ag locations to work with cost-effective LEDs to further “tune” their grow recipe.
- Given indoor robotics is considered a “lab” environment by the US Labor Department, personnel requirements are more stringent than the migrant workers used to pick 70%+ of the nation’s produce. In addition, rising farm wages and labor shortage have been headwinds. Advancements in robotics and artificial intelligence have lowered the cost of labor and increased productivity. This includes cameras and sensors to enhance grow cycles and provide real-time feedback. Tortuga AgTech is a startup developing robotic systems for harvesting fresh produce in controlled environments.
- Advanced indoor farmers are turning their attention to how they can create seeds that are better designed for indoor systems, producing higher yields. Some are turning to heirloom seeds because they cost less and produce more nutritious foods than hybrid seeds, which are the primary seeds used in traditional agriculture.
Indoor Ag economics
One of the arguments against indoor farms historically has been the limited size of the growing form factor, and many struggled to reach profitability. While this was a challenge, the technological improvements discussed above, new CEA farms capable of producing over one million leafy green products per month, recycling resources, and lowering transportation costs are making indoor ag economics very favorable. Another advantage of indoor ag is it is less exposed to the cyclical nature of traditional agriculture due to the ability to steadily produce the same amount all year long. Plus, given labor shortages to harvest field grows, the dynamics of CEA farming become compelling.
Venture committed to this theme growing
While receiving capital has been another challenge for indoor farmers, VC dollars increased 3-fold in 2017 to $300M year/year. This was primarily driven by Softbank’s $200M investment into Plenty, which also included an investment from Jeff Bezos. We think the opportunity in indoor agriculture is large and believe it is an attractive theme for frontier technology over the next decade.
Disclaimer: We actively write about the themes in which we invest: virtual reality, augmented reality, artificial intelligence, and robotics. From time to time, we will write about companies that are in our portfolio. Content on this site including opinions on specific themes in technology, market estimates, and estimates and commentary regarding publicly traded or private companies is not intended for use in making investment decisions. We hold no obligation to update any of our projections. We express no warranties about any estimates or opinions we make.
Report Finds Traces Of A Controversial Herbicide In Cheerios And Quaker Oats
Glyphosate is a popular weedkiller used on crops worldwide, but it has been at the center of a debate over its presence in foods. A new report found traces in Cheerios, Quaker Oats and other breakfast foods.CreditSeth Perlman/Associated Press
By Mihir Zaveri
- August. 15, 2018
- The New York Times
An environmental research and advocacy group has found traces of a controversial herbicide in Cheerios, Quaker Oats and other breakfast foods that it says could increase cancer risk for children.
The report comes amid longstanding debate about the safety of the chemical glyphosate, which federal regulators maintain is not likely to cause cancer.
In its report, released Wednesday, the Environmental Working Group said that it tested 45 samples of breakfast foods made from oats grown in fields sprayed with herbicides. Then, using a strict standard the group developed, it found elevated levels of glyphosate in 31 of them.
“There are levels above what we could consider safe in very popular breakfast foods,” said Alexis Temkin, the group’s toxicologist who helped with the analysis in the report.
The findings by the group, which has opposed the use of pesticides that may end up in food, were reported widely. But the question of whether glyphosate is safe is not so simple.
In fact, it is central to a raging international debate about the chemical that has spawned thousands of lawsuits, allegations of faulty research supporting and opposing the chemical and a vigorous defense of the herbicide from Monsanto, the company that helped develop it 40 years ago and helped turn it into the most popular weedkiller in the world.
Scott Partridge, a vice president at Monsanto, said in an interview on Wednesday that hundreds of studies had validated the safety of glyphosate and that it doesn’t cause cancer. He called the Environmental Working Group an activist group.
“They have an agenda,” he said. “They are fear mongering. They distort science.”
Central to critiques of the glyphosate, which prevents plants from photosynthesizing, is a 2015 decision by the World Health Organization’s International Agency for Research on Cancer to declare glyphosate a probable carcinogen.
That spurred a federal case in the United States over such claims and prompted California to declare it a chemical that is known to cause cancer.
Last week, a California jury found that Monsanto had failed to warn a school groundskeeper of the cancer risks posed by its weedkiller, Roundup, of which glyphosate is an active ingredient. The man’s lawyers said he developed non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma after using the weedkiller as part of his job as a pest control manager for a California county school system.
Monsanto was ordered to pay $289 million in damages. The company says it is facing more than 5,200 similar lawsuits.
Some research points to other potential health effects of glyphosate. In a study published last year in Scientific Reports, a journal from the publishers of Nature, rats that consumed very low doses of glyphosate each day showed early signs of fatty liver disease within three months, which worsened over time.
But many regulators and researchers say glyphosate is safe.
The classification by the International Agency for Research on Cancer has been disputed by United States and European regulators. And a recent major study, published by researchers at the National Institutes of Health, “observed no associations between glyphosate use and overall cancer risk.”
In December 2017, the federal Environmental Protection Agency issued a draft human health risk assessment that said glyphosate was most likely not carcinogenic to humans.
The E.P.A. is currently reviewing public comments on that assessment as part of a standard review, and will decide on whether or not the agency needs any “mitigation measures” by 2019, a spokesman said Wednesday.
The United States Food and Drug Administration, which regulates domestic and imported food to make sure it does not exceed levels set by the E.P.A., said that based on 2016 samples, it had not found any violations of E.P.A. standards with glyphosate. More recent samples are still under review, an agency spokeswoman said.
The F.D.A. said Wednesday that it would consider the Environmental Working Group’s findings.
Both Quaker Oats and General Mills, which makes Cheerios, said that their products were safe and met federal standards.
“While our products comply with all safety and regulatory requirements, we are happy to be part of the discussion and are interested in collaborating with industry peers, regulators and other interested parties on glyphosate,” a Quaker spokesman said Wednesday.
A General Mills spokeswoman said, “Our products are safe and without question they meet regulatory safety levels.”
Follow Mihir Zaveri on Twitter: @MihirZaveri.
A version of this article appears in print on Aug. 15, 2018, on Page B2 of the New York edition with the headline: Report Says Traces of a Disputed Herbicide Were Found in Some Cereals.
Indoor Farmers Are “Way Too Complacent” About Food Safety
“If you mess up indoors, everything is magnified,” says Sarah Taber.
Taber is an independent food safety consultant specializing in indoor farming. Previously she served as director of food safety for The Aquaponics Association after earning a Doctorate of Plant Medicine. At the association, she saw startups pitch to investors a risk-free way of farming, and that’s where the worrying began, says Taber.
Since then she has worked with half a dozen hydroponic indoor farming operations of various sizes, funding sources, and technologies and her early worries are now full-blown concerns about the safety of the food grown on indoor farming for consumers. And with food safety scandals increasingly hitting the headlines — just last month thousands of pounds of romaine lettuce were recalled when 200 people became ill and five died — it’s time some indoor ag players stopped being “way too complacent” and woke up to the dangers, says Taber. (She chose not to name the farms due to non-disclosure agreements.)
Often called controlled environment agriculture (CEA), indoor farming is not new. Commercial greenhouses have been around since the 1920s, but in the last few years, CEA startups have started to raise large amounts of funding for high tech farming operations, often in urban areas. The basic formula is a controlled environment — where the temperature and ventilation can be controlled — soilless growing, using some form of hydroponics system, and in some cases, artificial light from specially designed LEDs. The promises of these farms are many: decrease the distance food must travel from farm to table, use less water and fewer agrochemicals, grow seasonal items all year round and in climates where it otherwise would not be possible.
Controlling every variable from temperature to humidity to plant nutrition while using artificial light perfectly calibrated for each plant is a pitch that has obviously sparked the imagination of the public and investors when you look at the more than $300 million invested in the space last year. And it can be very good business. Just ask the Netherlands, which is second only to the US in food exports despite having 270 times less landmass thanks to its prolific CEA industry.
But a controlled environment does not automatically mean produce is exempt from food safety issues. And with investor appetite for big-ticket, high-tech indoor farms growing, particularly in the US, the sector is full of relatively new players growing plants and businesses very quickly — many spreading the idea that indoor farms are plant factories where the outcome is as assured as a Detroit auto assembly line.
The proclaimed dominance of technology over biology by this category of entrepreneurs has left some food safety experts concerned that consumers could be getting the wrong idea and startups may be drinking their own kool-aid.
“As a consultant, a lot of my time is spent grief counseling people over the loss of the innocence they had when they thought that food safety wasn’t a problem [indoors],” says Taber. “When you’re outside you have air circulation and sunlight that can brush back some of your mistakes. Temperature and humidity can get out of control indoors in a way it can’t outdoors and that can grow bacteria,” she continues.
What’s the risk? People and a lack of vigilance
It’s true; growing indoors inside a building or other structure can protect plants from contamination from above, like bird droppings and chemical drift. Isolated from other farming operations also means that the plants are safe from the inadvertent spreading of agrochemicals or animal waste — major causes of salmonella and e.coli contamination in outdoor farming.
But, based on currently available CEA technology, indoor farmers are not immune to other food safety challenges, says Jeff Brandenburg. Vigilance is still very much needed.
Brandenburg is president of the JSB Group, a Massachusetts-based consultancy for every link in the produce supply chain. He has a masters degree in food safety and teaches good agricultural practices at various universities including UC Davis. He says that local farming, no matter the growing method, is often perceived as safer, not just by the public, but by the growers.
“You get these greenhouses and high tech operations that don’t have a fundamental understanding of food safety and how it works, and they think that it’s not their problem because of how their farms are built; that’s a problem,” says Brandenburg. “It might be slightly safer because you’re in a more controlled environment, but if that controlled environment gets out of control, then you’ve got a big problem. Bacteria is not biased. It doesn’t grow more on the west coast than it does on the east coast,” he adds.
All of the experts consulted for this report emphasized that people are the number one source of food safety problems in indoor farming. People bring in bacteria on clothes, shoes, and skin. With proper controls such as hairnets, face masks, foot baths, single-use or clean suits, the risk can be mitigated, but there is still plenty of room for error and these practices are not commonplace all over the industry.
Though eventual automation is part of the promise of the major indoor farming technology companies, it hasn’t become a reality in any meaningful way yet, so there are still a lot of people involved.
“Everybody’s talking about automation, but nobody is actually doing it, so there’s a huge amount of contact from workers. That’s the same as outdoor farming,” says Taber.
How is all this monitored?
The food safety of most commercial farms, indoor or outdoor, is monitored through audits and certifications where an outside body verifies that food safety practices and preventative measures are being carried out over varying lengths of time — sometimes several hours, sometimes several days.
The government body that oversees foods safety in the US is the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), but historically they have played a larger role in the aftermath of an outbreak than in its prevention.
The real pressure to keep up standards (other than the honest and genuine desire not to hurt people) comes from retailers that often require audits before they take on a new vendor and increasingly send their own auditors directly to farms.
The most stringent and widely-recognized family of audits are under the umbrella of the Global Food Safety Initiative (GFSI), which was established by the industry in 2000 to reduce food safety risks and streamline the audit process in an effort to lower costs for operators while improving overall food safety. GFSI certifications include Primus GFS Food Safety Management Systems, Global Good Agricultural Practices (GAP), Canada GAP, and Hazard Analysis Critical Control Points — HACCP, and SQF – considered to be the most stringent audit of the group.
The USDA also offers a Good Agricultural Practices audit, which experts say is less stringent than the GFSI certifications, but is accepted by some retailers.
Venture-backed certifications
We asked some of the major venture-backed US indoor farms what certifications they had achieved. https://www.brightfarms.com/ and Bowery Farming both have SQF certifications. Plenty and Gotham Greens are both GFSI GAP certified (Gotham Greens manufacturing facilities for pesto and other products are comparably certified) and AeroFarms is USDA GAP certified.
A lack of advanced certifications does not necessarily mean that the practices required to pass such an audit are not in place, say several farmers consulted for this report. Farms often build their food safety capacity over time and only go through the time and expense of an audit when processes are finalized and unlikely to change.
Paul Lightfoot, CEO of Bright Farms, a hydroponic grower with four farms in four different US states, said that his company only underwent an SQF audit for each of its farms when the design of their farm was finalized and ready to be replicated in all new locations without alteration.
As many of the venture-backed farms are still iterating their technology, advanced certifications may be less likely, but food safety experts pointed out that one thing that makes high food safety standards much easier to achieve is ample funding.
“I don’t think the type of capital matters. I do think an insufficient amount of it might make a difference. Food safety requires investment. It changes the design of your facility. It changes how you staff your facility” says Lightfoot.
But funding is also no guarantee according to Brandenburg, “I’ve worked with a couple of startup operations that were venture capital-backed and the people had wonderful intentions, but knew nothing about the agricultural world. There’s a feeling of how hard can it be?”
On top of audits, farms are also subject to Food and Drug Administration regulation, most importantly the Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA) — a newly enacted policy that is intended to give the administration better tools for preventing outbreaks rather than simply responding to them.
The first compliance date for the FSMA Produce Rule was January 26, 2018, and farms with annual sales over $500,000 are affected.
The new rule establishes protocols for how produce farmers harvest, wash, package, and store fruits and vegetables usually consumed raw. Standards for microbial water quality, biological soil amendments, managing livestock and wild animals, health and hygiene, and equipment, tools and building make up the majority of the law.
Some experts doubt whether the rule will reduce instances of food-borne illness in a meaningful way, and many small-scale farmers worry about the costs of coming into compliance.
“In the past, it could be a dusty binder sitting on a shelf and when you think you’re going up for an audit you just backfill in information, which is really problematic,” says Allison Kopf, CEO of Agrilyst, a farm management software platform and app for indoor growers. She says that though many farms were ready for FSMA, some used it as on opportunity to digitize some very analog systems of food safety control.
She adds that farmers have a real fear of hurting people and they want regulation that will actually help with that. What they don’t want is regulation that will add to their workload without helping with that.
The CEA Food Safety Coalition
Indoor farming executives speak about the possibility of a foodborne illness stemming from the industry with palpable fear. In order to allay that fear, they’re teaming up – a big deal for an industry laser-focused on proving and registering unique intellectual property.
Next week a group of indoor farming companies will meet at the United Fresh FreshTEC trade show in Chicago to hash out details of a new organization: the Controlled Environment Agriculture Food Safety Coalition.
The group is the brainchild of Lightfoot and counts AeroFarms and Massachusetts hydroponic farm Little Leaf Farms as founding members. Eleven other indoor farms have expressed interest.
Lightfoot said the idea was inspired by the recent romaine lettuce scandal. Bright Farms went through its own scare in the Fall of 2017 when it voluntarily recalled all of its products from four midwest supermarket chains for potential e. coli risk. No illnesses were reported.
Now the former software executive is working to spread the idea that food safety best practices should never be proprietary, with the knowledge that if one farm has a major food safety incident, all players in this young industry could feel the pain.
The goals of the coalition, according to Lightfoot, are to develop guidelines on food safety and protocols specific to indoor farming; to create a list of resources for coalition members; to establish a board of advisors to help members navigate food safety incidents; to build website to educate growers and address the public when needed.
But a lot is still yet to be decided before the work can even begin. At the conference in Chicago, the farms that have so far shown interest will meet to elect a steering committee. Eventually there may be a certain food safety certification requirement to join, but currently its open to all comers.
And while the industry is hoping and working to never see a major outbreak, Taber says that the outbreaks are the best teachers despite their sometimes tragic results.
“When you get down to it, the way people learn about fallibility, and that you can fail even if you didn’t mean to, is by seeing it happen. folks in the ag industry may not have had an outbreak on their farm, but they know someone its happened to. For them it is real.”
'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
Why Were Damages in Monsanto’s Roundup Trial So High? Not only Is The Giant Liable, But It Caused Harm Deliberately
What the $289-million verdict in favor of a former groundskeeper suffering from terminal cancer means for hundreds of other, similar lawsuits awaiting trial.
August 13, 2018
by Jessica Fu
A California Superior Court jury on Friday found agrochemical company Monsanto liable for making a product that contributed to former school groundskeeper Dewayne “Lee” Johnson’s terminal cancer and awarded him $289 million in damages. It’s a verdict that could propel hundreds of similar lawsuits against the company going forward.
Beginning in 2012, Johnson, now 46, worked as a groundskeeper for the Benicia Unified School District in a suburb north of San Francisco. During his employment, he routinely applied Monsanto’s flagship herbicide Roundup, a product made with the highly controversial ingredient glyphosate, to control weeds on school property. According to CNN, Johnson suffered two incidents during his tenure that accidentally soaked him in the product. In 2014, he was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin lymphoma, a type of cancer that affects the immune system.
In early July of this year, a federal judge cleared for trial the hundreds of existing cases that have been brought against Monsanto in recent years by cancer survivors, family members, and estates, saying there was enough evidence related to glyphosate for a jury to hear them. Johnson’s was the first such case to go to trial. In cases like his, California law permits dying plaintiffs to be granted expedited trials.
Johnson’s win bodes well for the future of other cases awaiting trial against Monsanto.
The jury took three days to reach its verdict. In its decision, it found that Monsanto failed to warn Johnston of Roundup’s potential risks, and that “the lack of sufficient warnings” was a “substantial factor in causing harm to Mr. Johnson.” In a statement, Monsanto vice president Scott Partridge said the company will appeal the decision:
“Today’s decision does not change the fact that more than 800 scientific studies and reviews —and conclusions by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the U.S. National Institutes of Health and regulatory authorities around the world—support the fact that glyphosate does not cause cancer, and did not cause Mr. Johnson’s cancer.”
It’s worth noting, however, that at least some of those findings have since come under suspicion. In March of last year, a federal court unsealed internal Monsanto documents showing that the company had ghostwritten positive research on the herbicide and that a senior Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) official had tried to suppress a government study on it, as well.
Johnson’s win bodes well for the future of the other cases currently awaiting trial against Monsanto, says T. Micah Dortch, a managing partner at the Houston, Texas-based Potts Law Firm, which is representing over 100 clients with claims that mirror Johnson’s.
Technically, juries don’t determine the language used to find for or against a plaintiff in civil lawsuits. Instead, judges give juries a “charge,” or a set of questions that guide them in their deliberations. Charges serve as a flowchart of sorts to help a jury determine its verdict.
Dortch points out that, in Johnson’s case, the language used in the judge’s charge was of particular import. It reads as follows:
“Was the Roundup Pro design a substantial factor in causing harm to Mr. Johnson? Did Roundup Pro have potential risks that were known or knowable in light of the scientific knowledge that was generally accepted in the scientific community at the time of their manufacture, distribution, or sale? Did Monsanto fail to warn of the potential risks? Was the lack of sufficient warnings a substantial factor in causing harm to Mr. Johnson?”
“Almost any court that tries around [a similar] case will have a similar set of questions like this that go to the jury.”
In other words, this charge didn’t require the jury to decide whether Roundup—the product—causes cancer, but instead whether the product was a substantial contributor to “harm.” More critically, however, it asked the jury a bigger question: whether or not Monsanto knew about the product’s potential risks and whether the company failed to properly warn its users of them—indicating that Monsanto’s failure was somehow deliberate.
“The jury’s answer to all that is very indicative of what future juries will also find. Those are important questions because […] it’s one thing to find that Roundup causes cancer, but it’s another thing to find that it causes cancer, [Monsanto knew] it causes cancer, and [Monsanto] left it on the shelf,” Dortch says. “What this jury ultimately concluded was: [Monsanto] knew it causes cancer and left it on the shelf and that’s probably why the verdict is so big.
“Almost any court that tries around [a similar] case will have a similar set of questions like this that go to the jury.”
In July of last year, California added glyphosate to Prop 65, the state’s list of chemicals that may cause cancer, which in turn gave Monsanto an August 2018 deadline to label its Roundup product with a cancer warning.
Monsanto was acquired by German pharmaceutical company Bayer for more than $60 billion in June, after surviving many months of antitrust scrutiny by E.U. and U.S. regulators. As my colleague Joe Fassler reported at the time, the merger resulted in an “agricultural powerhouse on an unprecedented scale,” which would have the combined capacity to sell over 20 percent of the world’s pesticides and herbicides. Shortly after the acquisition, Bayer announced that it would be retiring the Monsanto brand name.
Bayer shares had already taken a hit on Friday, the final day of Johnson’s trial, and plummeted further on Monday morning, from $26.59 to $23.82 a share.
Chipotle Facing 2 Lawsuits After Hundreds of Diners Reported Getting Sick
Health Officials Are Currently Investigating The Cause of The Food Poisoning Scare
by Lyn Mettler / Aug.08.2018 / 5:09 PM ET / Source: TODAY
Bloomberg via Getty Images
After a spate of foodborne illnesses in 2015 affected restaurants across the country, Chipotle Mexican Grill vowed to clean up its act by implementing new food handling processes in both its restaurants and at the supplier level.
But in the past few weeks, Chipotle has been hit with another food poisoning scare — and it may be the largest the company has ever faced. More than 600 people who ate at a Chipotle restaurant outside Columbus, Ohio, at the end of July have since reported gastrointestinal symptoms.
According to the Delaware General Health District in Delaware, Ohio, to date 624 people claimed that they have experienced nausea, vomiting and diarrhea after dining at a restaurant in Powell, Ohio, between July 26 and 30.
While the store closed immediately following the reports “to implement ... food safety response protocols that included total replacement of all food inventory and a complete cleaning and sanitation of the restaurant,” a Chipotle spokesperson told TODAY Food, the location at on Sawmill Parkway has since reopened.
The Health District says preliminary testing results have been negative for salmonella, E.coli, norovirus, and shigella, but tests are ongoing and, after the initial inspection, found no reason that the facility should not reopen.
AUG. 6, 2018 CHIPOTLE UPDATE
“The health of our guests and employees is our top priority,” the Chipotle spokesperson told TODAY Food.
But Chipotle already faced some backlash recently after their much-hyped promotion for free guacamole on National Avocado Day went awry.
While the latest outbreak has only been linked to one location, the fast-casual Mexican restaurant chain being sued over the incident. According to a press release for the law firm filing the suit on behalf of two individuals, this is the seventh time in two years the company has faced a food contamination crisis.
AP
“Through this lawsuit and with the dozens of claims we are investigating, we will determine where and how Chipotle once again failed to protect its customers,” Mark A. DiCello, a partner at DiCello Levitt & Casey, one of the firms filing the suit, stated in the press release. “This has become far too routine at Chipotle, and ultimately we want to make sure that the company doesn’t let this happen again.”
In the complaint, one plaintiff, Filip Szyller, says he bought three chicken tacos at the restaurant and the next day began to experience diarrhea, severe abdominal pain, nausea, headaches, as well as hot and cold flashes. In a separate lawsuit, another plaintiff, Clayton Jones, is claiming that he ate a burrito bowl with chicken, fajita vegetables, pico de gallo, rice, sour cream and lettuce and experienced similar medical issues.
The response to the latest health scare has been mixed on social media with many saying they aren't phased by the incident.
There’s another food borne illness outbreak from Chipotle? I’ll gladly take my chances
@ChipotleTweets it doesn’t matter how many articles my boyfriend sends me about the food poising outbreak it won’t stop me from devouring a burrito #chipotle #thatswhatinsuranceisfor
Every time @ChipotleTweets ends up in the news with a food poisoning outbreak all it does is make me crave Chipotle. sooooo I think they're fine
Others, however, are saying it's time for the chain to admit defeat or vowing never to eat at the restaurant again.
Aquarian Goddess@ReneeBr56236293
Chipotle just needs to close up and call it a done deal
Man it seems like eating at chipotle's is like Russian roulette! Constantly seeing illness from food issues. Had incident myself. C'mon guys get your act together.
- Aaron Allen, CEO of the global restaurant consulting firm Aaron Allen & Associates, told TODAY Food that the company still has life despite these repeated incidents, though it’s not doing itself any favors. “You want to bet on this boxer, but he just keeps punching himself in the face," he said.
He explained that Chipotle has installed a new executive leadership team this year, which he said likely hasn’t had time to get the company reorganized. Despite the setbacks, however, Allen said investors are becoming desensitized to the food poisoning scares, and understand that Chipotle is more prone to these issues with the number of stores nationwide and the amount of fresh food they handle daily. Allen even sees its potential international growth soon.
However, Allen added that Chipotle isn't totally immune to blowback and that these scenarios can’t continue forever. “If these [food scares] keep happening, it’s going to be increasingly difficult to recover from it,” he said.