What is
Genetically Modified Food?
There's plenty of genetically modified food in your local grocery store. About 80% of the packaged foods contain genetically modified ingredients. The FDA has determined that genetically modified (GM) foods don't need to be labeled, because they are "substantially equivalent to conventional foods". But are they? I have my doubts about this new "food". To make a genetically modified food, scientists transfer genes from one species of plant or animal to another. Genes are taken from animals, insects, viruses, vaccines, pharmaceutical drugs, and spliced into a plant. The genes are re-arranged to create desirable traits in the plant, such as drought resistance, or to create medicine. Pesticides and vaccines can be inserted right into the plant! So we have fish genes inserted into tomatoes, scorpions crossed with potatoes. No wonder Europeans call this "frankenfood", farms brought to you by mad scientists! I know that plants are intelligent. Their genes are in a certain order for a reason, and plants evolve in an ecosystem, full of the right mix of soil, bees, birds, seasons, earthworms, all interconnected. To splice in new genetic information has got to disrupt the plants intelligence. Genetically modified food is not labeled and any safety tests are done by the biotech companies themselves, an obvious conflict of interest! Agribusiness and government are working together to allow more genetically modified food into the food supply. Currently they have taken over corn, soy, cotton and canola. These plants are used extensively in processed foods in the form of corn starch, corn oil, soy oil, canola oil, high fructose corn syrup and more. The grocery store foods are full of these ingredients. The genetically modified plants have pollen that cross pollinates with other plants, changing their genetic codes. They are entering the ecosystem, the web of life. What are the consequences?
Concerns with Genetically Modified Food
--Monarch butterflies have died after eating pollen from genetically modified food. Could GM pollen be killing the bee population as well?
--Scientists in Oregon found that a genetically engineered soil organism completely killed essential soil nutrients
--Soy allergies in the UK increased by 50% after genetically modified soy was introduced
--Hundreds of laborers in India report allergic reactions to handling GM cotton
--Studies with mice and rats show allergic reactions, atrophied livers, reproductive problems, infant mortality, smaller offspring, damaged organs, and immune system damage
--When sheep graze on GM cotton plants, within a week one in four died. Shepherds estimate 10,000 sheep deaths in one region of India
--Farmers in Europe and Asia say that cows, buffalo, chicken and horse died from eating GM corn varieties
--Filipinos in at least five villages fell sick when nearby GM corn variety was pollinating
Source: Genetic Roulette, By Jeffery Smith
On March 19, 2009, the American Academy of Environmental Medicine called for an immediate moratorium on genetically modified food. Board member Dr Amy Dean said: "Multiple animals studies have shown that GM foods cause damage to various organ systems in the body. With this mounting evidence, it is imperative to have a moratorium on GM foods for the safety of our patients and the public's health."
Avoiding Genetically Modified Foods
How can you avoid genetically modified food? Avoid packaged foods that contain corn, canola, cotton (as cottonseed oil) and soy. Yes, that includes so called "natural foods". The natural foods label has no meaning at all! The only food not GM is organic foods. So choose organic grains, beans, vegies, fruits, nuts, seeds, and pure animal foods when you can. Bovine growth hormone in conventional beef is a genetically modified hormone! With packaged foods, the fewer the ingredients on the label, the less likely it is to be genetically modified.
Food and Seed Activists
One of my heroes lives in India, Dr. Vandana Shiva. She has an organic farm, called Navdanya, whose mission is "to protect nature and people's rights to knowledge, biodiversity, water and food. Dr. Shiva write books and articles and makes speeches to raise awareness of genetically modified food. Check out her website Navdnaya here. India in particular has been impacted by GM seeds. There has been an epidemic of farmer suicides, as farmers are being forced to switch to GM seeds that have made the soil infertile, causing loss of crops and indebtedness. Seeds are patented and owned by biotech multinational companies, and seeds savings of GM seeds is illegal. Dr. Shiva says she bases her work on the values of Ghandi and Indian self sufficiency. One major mission of her work is to save organic, heirloom seeds. The biotech companies are buying up seed companies and want to corner the market and patent life. In the US, researcher Jeffery Smith has a book, Seeds of Deception, documenting the health and environmental hazards of GM food, as well as the gov't and media involvement with the GM technology companies. For these food activists, one corporation stands out as the worst, and that is Monsanto. Monsanto are the folks who created agent orange, napalm and aspartame. Now they are buying seeds and creating GM seeds. There is even a documentary film called "The World According to Monsanto", exposing their world view. Monsanto has sued farmers who have saved their patented seed, or had GM pollen drift by the wind onto their property, and cross into their plants. As if the farmers can control the wind! It's a real David and Goliath story, the huge multinational corporation vs. the farmers. The big question is, who will control our food supply? Do we want a multinational corporation to control our seeds and food? And do we want GM seeds to cross pollinate with organic and heirloom seeds? check out this video of farmer Percy Schmeiser who fought Monsanto in court:
Farmer vs. Monsanto
Our World View
Genetic engineering reduces living beings to property of the biotech companies. Life is now bits of information to be arranged by scientists. Yet the more we manipulate nature, the less life force it has.An alternative view comes from the organic farmers, gardeners, Native Americans, and indigenous cultures who say that nature is sacred and interconnected and we are a part of her. Life is not separate parts but whole, a web of life, and there is intelligence in nature and ecosystems. Man keeps trying to manipulate her cycles and each time we create suffering for plants, the earth, animals and ourselves. We need scientists who understand this, who work with nature.
Food for Thought: "This we know: all things are connected, like the blood which unites one family. All things are connected. Whatever befalls the earth, befalls the sons of the earth. Man did not weave the web of life. He is merely a strand in it. Whatever he does to the web, he does to himself". --Chief Seattle
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More articles you may enjoy: Organic gardening basics Permaculture, a new holistic way to garden It's time to choose green agriculture to save the bees What are organic eggs? Organic food, the answer to GMO. The locavore, eat what is local!
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