From MAILER-DAEMON Tue Nov 2 00:44:30 1999 Date: Tue, 2 Nov 1999 00:44:30 -0500 (EST) From: Mail System Internal Data Subject: DON'T DELETE THIS MESSAGE -- FOLDER INTERNAL DATA X-IMAP: 0938756466 0000003503 Status: RO This text is part of the internal format of your mail folder, and is not a real message. It is created automatically by the mail system software. If deleted, important folder data will be lost, and it will be re-created with the data reset to initial values. From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Sat Mar 13 11:32:01 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id LAA17639 for ; Sat, 13 Mar 1999 11:32:01 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id KAA27387 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Sat, 13 Mar 1999 10:34:19 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from imo12.mx.aol.com (imo12.mx.aol.com [198.81.17.2]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id KAA27382 for ; Sat, 13 Mar 1999 10:34:14 -0500 (EST) From: Sprinkraft@aol.com Received: from Sprinkraft@aol.com by imo12.mx.aol.com (IMOv19.3) id 7KNIa19425 for ; Sat, 13 Mar 1999 10:33:33 -0500 (EST) Message-ID: Date: Sat, 13 Mar 1999 10:33:33 EST To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Mime-Version: 1.0 Subject: GMO/organic crop insurance Content-type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 X-Mailer: AOL 4.0 for Windows 95 sub 206 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-MIME-Autoconverted: from quoted-printable to 8bit by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu id KAA27383 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 1 I guess my suggestion to inquire about insuring organic crops against GMO contamination wasn't so goofy after all: Spain makes transgenic crop producers pay into insurance fund [BARCELONA] The Spanish government has decided that companies that produce or plant genetically modified crops must contribute to a 90 million Euro (US$100 million) insurance fund intended to cover environmental accidents. The move reflects growing calls for tougher restrictions on such crops from opposition political parties, non-governmental organizations, and consumers' associations. As a result of this pressure, the government's approach to transgenic crops will be debated in parliament this week after two left-wing parties expressed concern that Spain has authorized the planting of genetically modified crops that have not yet been approved in other countries of the European Community. Environmental issues have become more controversial in Spain since last year's ecological disaster, when thousands of tons of toxic waste spilled into the Doñana national park last April after a retaining wall collapsed at the Aznalcóllar mines in Seville. One party, the Bloque Nacionalista Gallego, is seeking either a moratorium or a strict limit on the import of such crops. The movement Ecologists in Action, which includes more than 300 environment-related organizations, has called for a ban on the 22 experimental field trials by the company Monsanto that have already been approved by the country's biosafety commission. Concern has been triggered by the high importation of modified crops, especially maize and soya. Between 15,000 and 20,000 hectares are said to have already been planted with such maize from the company Novartis. The number of licences for test plantings has increased from 36 in 1996 to 124 by January of this year. Transgenic foodstuffs became an issue in Spain in 1996, when seven Greenpeace activists held a protest in Barcelona against a boat containing 45,000 tons of soya, 2 per cent of which was genetically modified. Cristina Narbona, the environment-commission spokesperson of the socialist party PSOE, has urged the government to support demands being made at the biodiversity protocol meeting in Colombia to base the protocol on the so-called "precautionary principle". Xavier Bosch ********************************************************* ********************************************************* Flavio Luiz Schieck Valente Global Secretariat Global Forum on Sustainable Food and Nutritional Security c/o Agora - Associacao para Projetos de Combate a Fome SGAN 905 Conjunto B 70790-050. Brasilia. DF Brasil tel +55 61 347 4914 fax +55 61 274 8822 347 9002 cel + 55 61 972 1455 e-mail agora@tba.com.br *********************************************************** *********************************************************** On Another Front: INDEPENDENT (London) March 12 Land planted with GM crops may fall in value By Charles Arthur, Technology Editor Surveyors warned yesterday that farmers who plant genetically modified (GM) crops could see their land values fall, and that tenants of such land might face bills to make up the shortfall. The Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) called for the creation of a land register through which potential buyers, and banks, could find out if and when GM crops had been planted or grown on a particular holding. In a separate move, the Government announced that the independent advisory group on planting of GM crops will investigate the effects on British wildlife and biodiversity of commercial growing. Lord Whitty, the environment minister, said that the remit of the Advisory Committee on Releases to the Environment (Acre) has been expanded, and a subgroup set up to examine biodiversity issues. "With these regulations in force, British wildlife species should be protected against effects from the commercial use of GM crops," he said in a Lords' written reply. However, the RICS report, sent to the Government's Office of Science and Technology and other departments, warned that growing such crops might lower the value of the land. In the case of tenant farmers, a landlord could, in effect, sue for any shortfall in land value caused by the tenant growing GM crops. Michael Chambers, director of the RICS's policy unit, said that if commercial growing goes ahead, it would require a permanent register of sites where GM crops were or had been. "It's very hard to see how it could be controlled once you grow on a widespread scale in the countryside," he added. ** NOTICE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. ** To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From london@metalab.unc.edu Thu Mar 11 23:29:45 1999 -0500 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id XAA17480 for ; Thu, 11 Mar 1999 23:29:45 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id WAA25471 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Thu, 11 Mar 1999 22:22:34 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from portal.txcyber.com (IDENT:root@portal.cy-net.net [205.140.147.1]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id WAA25414 for ; Thu, 11 Mar 1999 22:22:28 -0500 (EST) Received: from FLYLO (ppp230.cy-net.net [208.21.195.39]) by portal.txcyber.com (8.8.7/8.8.7) with SMTP id VAA07548 for ; Thu, 11 Mar 1999 21:22:24 -0600 Received: by FLYLO with Microsoft Mail id <01BE6C04.0136F340@FLYLO>; Thu, 11 Mar 1999 21:13:26 -0600 Message-ID: <01BE6C04.0136F340@FLYLO> From: Martha Wells To: "sanet-mg-digest@ces.ncsu.edu" Subject: prisoners as laborers Date: Thu, 11 Mar 1999 19:24:48 -0600 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 2 For some reason in Tx anyhow, you have to be grant-funded or some other gvmnt 'charity' org to be allowed prison labor help. I have a friend who runs an environmental outside school for kids, and she is allowed 'trustee' type laborers for most of the heavy work. They do it for community service hours taken off their sentence, and most stay after the term is up, helping her as friends. It is a unique situation here. (martha) To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From london@metalab.unc.edu Fri Mar 12 00:13:06 1999 -0500 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id AAA18232 for ; Fri, 12 Mar 1999 00:13:06 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id XAA01378 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Thu, 11 Mar 1999 23:14:04 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from imo22.mx.aol.com (imo22.mx.aol.com [198.81.17.66]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id XAA01314 for ; Thu, 11 Mar 1999 23:13:58 -0500 (EST) From: Sprinkraft@aol.com Received: from Sprinkraft@aol.com by imo22.mx.aol.com (IMOv19.3) id 7GFZa12647 for ; Thu, 11 Mar 1999 23:13:23 +1900 (EST) Message-ID: Date: Thu, 11 Mar 1999 23:13:23 EST To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Mime-Version: 1.0 Subject: Eat In Wichita Content-type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 X-Mailer: AOL 4.0 for Windows 95 sub 206 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-MIME-Autoconverted: from quoted-printable to 8bit by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu id XAA01326 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 3 Eat in Wichita by Steve Sprinkel 11 March 1999 Eat in Wichita, because if you don’t you will starve your way down the Interstate through all of southern Kansas and most of northern Oklahoma. Not that the bloom of fast food logos on the outskirts of Oklahoma City, poking far above the street-side bustle and fumes like mutant electronic dandelions should spur your appetite once you arrive there. Eat in Wichita, when and if the opportunity arises on the southbound route, for you will look nearly in vain for sustenance along I-35 thereafter. However, the short-term fasting may heighten one’s perceptions, but I shall let you be the judge of that. Road Food, which is playfully interpreted as Road Kill in Compostia, Texas, presents for the conscientious traveler a continual meal-time quandary, flanked by dietary and political considerations, time, and the lack of any alternative to what seems like a fabulous array of choices, but in reality are merely the same menu under different trademarks with variously sassy, coy or boisterous marketing strategies. Fried Chunk Food, which is also synonymous with Greasy Junk Food, is the staple design for these vittles and I believe we may have reached a definite apogee concerning their multiplicity as well as their ubiquity. Whole sections of cities are now formatted and zoned to provide for these places. The transportation department serves as their advertising agency on every appropriate off ramp. The entertainment industry pre-links their motion pictures with semi-disposable, quasi-collectable plastic ware, only falling short of creating Jurassic Burgers or DarthVader Dessert Pie. Fast Food, as in: somebody’s pulling a fast one. That other Junk Food outlet, television, and its allies in advertising, mercilessly pound home the message as if it was still necessary. But it's not. I saw the white flag of surrender fluttering in downtown South Haven, Kansas recently one afternoon. It is an agricultural dead-zone to match that big one off the coast of Louisiana.. In towns everywhere across the US Midwest, the echoing emptiness of the failed town-center, where even video-rental and antiques can not subsist, is the sure sign that the battle for the American Appetite is over. The bank doesn’t even post For Rent signs. Make mine Olestra, and keep the TP handy, you freaks. Gimme a double-shot of that fat-free grease, you Zombies! You craven Stalinists! I thought you fought for fifty years to keep us from living under the yoke of Central Planning! And now you say that all you sought was our own convenience. But I could not even obtain convenience. I got off the Kansas toll road at the ramp to Wellington, went through town only noting a crumbling Pizza Hut, turned south on US 81, and figured Rome or South Haven would be able to fix me up. It was after noon, but these small-town café proprietors will usually fry eggs even during the lunch hour. Rome turned out to be a big grain elevator. On the side of the road in "downtown" South Haven was the Blankspace Café. Just "Pepsi" , and then CAFÉ beneath the soda-sell. I walked in, checking first my wallet, and then the walls and the register to see if the magic words VISA or MASTERCARD were glued thereon. I was out of currency and South Haven was a foreign country that did not accept my VISA and which had been passed over by MASTERCARD. I didn’t even bother to ask them about accepting my check, although my bank, NorWest, is nearly as recognizable now as Ronald McDonald . When I said the words" credit card" to the beautiful Kansas matron behind the counter, her reaction was the same as if I had asked her if she had a wine list. Two long-retired couples ate sandwiches and sipped soup, somewhat startled to see anyone new in what was nearly equivalent to their own kitchen at home. Okey-dokey! I returned ravening to my muddy vehicle, thinking. My first thought was that I had been reckless in not loading up on rye bread, nuts and fruit at "Everybody’s" when I left Fairfield, Iowa, the day before. I mean to be pedantic: learn where the safe food is stored across this great wasteland of ours, because the health you protect may be your own. Every day is Y2K on the Interstate, my hippie sisters and brothers. I surveyed the jumbled contents of the Trooper. What do I have in here? I have three bottles of homemade organic pickles that Cissy Bowman made in Indiana. I have two Rye-Krisp ( TM) crackers left over from who knows when, and I have half a head of organic garlic. I also have some TUMS. Natch. I opted for the pickled okra, set aside the garlic as an antidote to my next experience eating a Hardee’s Fish Sandwich, savored the crackers and kept the TUMS in ready-reserve. I thank Providence that I had nearly a gallon of spring water on board. Like a grateful Crusoe, I turned south and headed back down to US 177 which took me to the NAFTAWAY, IH 35, and south towards Texas. Nearly like Dafoe’s hero, I could have called out " Chunks and calories everywhere, but not a bite of food to eat!" MacDonald’s, Burger King, Wendy’s, Whataburger, Arby’s, Hardee’s, Grandy’s, Denny’s, Applebee’s, Popeye’s, IHOP, Tastee Freeze, Jack in the Box A and W, In and Out, Long John Silver's, Dairy Queen, KFC, Chick-Fil-A , The Big Boy and Sonic. And that’s just the northern tier. Once you get below 35 degrees North latitude, you hit the Hot Sauce Zone: Taco Bell, Del Taco, Taco Cabana, Chili’s. Only Taco John seems to have carved out a niche for franchised tortilla vending in the northern climes. I could include the parallel food forms, such as those found at Subway, as well as the Italian Flatbread Conspiracy cartel of Pizza Hut, Mr. Gatti’s, and Domino’s. Only Chinese seems to be immune to this twisted menu, probably because fresh vegetables are involved. Beyond Fries, I think the one menu item that really sums up Frytown’s monotony is the battered, fried chicken chunk. I would have said " nugget" but the control on that word is governed by copyright. These generic chunks are what is wrong with not just the food supply, but agriculture generally: the planet is losing its diversity accidentally while greedily pursuing a business plan designed to provide fewer and fewer farmer and consumer choices. It is as if a big Hoover has roamed the countryside, pulling up farms and towns from their foundations. The economic alchemists have emptied the vacuum bag along the Interstates and in the concrete/neon outliers of "civilization". The miraculous recombination of these dissimilar, but formerly interactive and natural parts, being people, farms, animals, soil, merchants, government and service, is unquestioned progress. Libraries and the Lions Club, like the family farm, are endangered species. And the new cable-ready city-states do rule. Scratch cooking is only done for the rich. The homogeneity of the speed-fry menu is mirrored in the sameness of the countryside: its industrial. Its also easy! Its fun! And the kids like it too! Stay all day, and let ‘em wear themselves out in our neoprene playroom. Win free coupons for your favorite stuff, which is also plastic. And best of all, you too can be a stakeholder, with your own easy-to-run, internationally marketed, readily identifiable food product dispensary. Computer: Big Mac! Hold the onions, Hold the lettuce, Hold the tomato. Extra Mayonnaise. Why this is getting to be so darn convenient that someday machines can run the whole enterprise. Just one " partner" at the console, and all he/she has to do is make sure the trucks get unloaded and that the grease stays hot. Keep it cheap though. Got to go for market share and volume of sales in this game. Just like those bushels of corn at the CBOT, fortunes are made in pennies these days. The next idea is entirely contradictory because it relies on technology: Wouldn’t it be nifty to have a website that listed all the sources of organic foods across the country, so that no matter where you were, like in Cantril, Iowa, you would know there was an Amish store in the middle of the block across from the Post Office? Or that every Wednesday and Saturday you could go to Pure Luck Organic Farm in Dripping Springs, Texas, and buy goat cheese and vegetables? Or the location and time of every farmers market? God, I’ll stay off the interstate for that. I won’t mind the STOP signs, the combines and the horse buggies, just so long as I can dodge those chunks. Steve Sprinkel at the corner of Redbud and Bluebonnet Compostia, Texas To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From london@metalab.unc.edu Fri Mar 12 00:13:57 1999 -0500 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id AAA18242 for ; Fri, 12 Mar 1999 00:13:56 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id XAA02070 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Thu, 11 Mar 1999 23:14:40 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from imo25.mx.aol.com (imo25.mx.aol.com [198.81.17.69]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id XAA01970 for ; Thu, 11 Mar 1999 23:14:35 -0500 (EST) From: Sprinkraft@aol.com Received: from Sprinkraft@aol.com by imo25.mx.aol.com (IMOv19.3) id 7ZIVa13170 for ; Thu, 11 Mar 1999 23:13:25 +1900 (EST) Message-ID: <64478596.36e89465@aol.com> Date: Thu, 11 Mar 1999 23:13:25 EST To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Mime-Version: 1.0 Subject: Sinister Dane and the Kickapoo Disco Cosmonauts Content-type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 X-Mailer: AOL 4.0 for Windows 95 sub 206 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-MIME-Autoconverted: from quoted-printable to 8bit by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu id XAA01987 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 4 Allen Moody writes from La Farge, Wisconsin: All right folks, by popular demand, here are the latest lyrics for the “I’m Fixin’ to Mutate Rag” arranged by Country Joe McDonald, lyrics by Sinister Dane, as performed by "Sinister Dane and the Kickapoo Disco Cosmonauts" at the Upper Midwest Organic Farmers Conference, with 1200 in attendance. I'm not sure if Country Joe appreciates what we've done because no one asked him. But, if every thing goes right and according to plan, we'll have a big release scheduled for Earth Day in April. Maybe we'll get our fifteen minutes of fame after all, donate all the proceeds to charity, and put Country Joe back on the map. To those of you unaware of what's going on, the following song is sung to the tune of the "I'm Fixin' to Die Rag" (a Vietnam War protest song) made even more famous when Country Joe sang it in front of 300,000 people at Woodstock. If ever we needed a "hip" protest song to rally around, this one is it. As you go through the song, you will find out it is ripe for revision. Write your own lyrics to fit your own mood. There are as many versions to this song as there are people, but the message will always be the same. In the vernacular of the Sixties, "Peace, brother." Allen "I'm Fixin' to Mutate Rag" Verse I D7 Come on all you farming folks G Ol' Monsanto’s blowin smoke D7 They got genetic freaks and corporate greed G You can spray anything but you can't save seeds E7 A7 We’re changin’ Mother Nature’s rules D7 G There’s new genes in the pool CHORUS D/E D/F D/F# G And its one, two , three, what are we spraying for D7 G Don't ask me I don't give a damn, its a chemical promise land D/E D/F D/F# G And it's five, six, seven, get ready to perpetrate (or pollinate) E7 A7 D7 G Ain't no time to wonder why, you can kiss your farm goodbye Verse II Come on farmers, get off your ass Round Up Ready is here at last Sign away your privacy When you buy into technology You can be the first one on your block To grow genuine Frankenstein crops. CHORUS And its one, two, three, what are we spraying for Don't ask me I don't give a damn, its a chemical promise land And it's five, six, seven, get ready to propagate Cause, there ain't no time to wonder why, you can kiss your farm goodbye Verse III Come on scientists don't be slow This world needs GMO’s There's plenty of money to be made Choppin’ those genes with the tools of the trade Ya know we’re not GOD, yeah we’re throwin’ the dice That’s what happens when you cut and splice CHORUS And its one, two, three, what are we spraying for Don't ask me I don't give a damn, its a chemical promise land And it's five, six, seven, let's go exterminate Cause, there ain't no time to wonder why, you can kiss your farm goodbye Verse IV Come on mothers throughout the land Put your fate in Monsanto’s hands Come on fathers don't hesitate To lose your farm before its too late (or, count your sperm, it’s not that great) It’s all right you can trust in me Remember DDT CHORUS And its one, two, three, what are we spraying for Don't ask me I don't give a damn, it's a chemical promise land And it's five, six, seven, get ready to litigate Cause, there ain't no time to wonder why, you can kiss your farm goodbye (This last part is optional and works best in a nice rowdy arena. Don't forget to have everyone singing along with the CHORUS). Repeat FIRST verse and end with following CHORUS twice CHORUS And its one, two, three, what are we FARMING! for Don't ask me I don't give a damn, its a CORPORATE promise land And it's five, six, seven, get ready to TERMINATE Cause, there ain't no time to wonder why, you can kiss YOUR ASS goodbye (repeat twice at end) Allen Moody To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Sat Mar 13 17:57:33 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id RAA21974 for ; Sat, 13 Mar 1999 17:57:33 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id RAA17837 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Sat, 13 Mar 1999 17:06:54 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from eagle.ACNS.ColoState.EDU (root@eagle.ACNS.ColoState.EDU [129.82.100.90]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id RAA17813 for ; Sat, 13 Mar 1999 17:06:49 -0500 (EST) Received: from lamar.ColoState.EDU (lamar.ACNS.ColoState.EDU [129.82.100.75]) by eagle.ACNS.ColoState.EDU (AIX4.3/UCB 8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id PAA52032; Sat, 13 Mar 1999 15:06:50 -0700 Received: from edandsue (dialup0195.PPP.ColoState.EDU [129.82.53.39]) by lamar.ColoState.EDU (AIX4.3/UCB 8.8.8/8.8.8) with SMTP id PAA43348; Sat, 13 Mar 1999 15:06:49 -0700 Message-ID: <002f01be6d9d$019cd120$27355281@edandsue.colostate.edu> From: "Ed and Sue Sparling" To: "John Henning, Eco-Echo, McGill U., Montreal, Ca" Cc: Subject: Re: Key foundation offer to "educators" Date: Sat, 13 Mar 1999 14:59:37 -0700 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.72.3110.5 X-Mimeole: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.3110.3 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 5 Thanks to John Henning for pointing out the Key Foundation 'offer.' Not to belabor the obvious, but I can't resist copying the list of sponsors of the Key Foundation. Find the list below the next paragraph. Last Spring I renewed acquaintence with a childhood friend whom I discovered was employed virtually full time in running workshops like the one sponsored by the Key Foundation. She described herself as an 'activist' whose mission is to stem the tide of 'misinformation' and 'junk science' which suggests that agricultural chemicals are dangerous. Below is an excerpt from the Key Founation web page: Corporations Abitibi-Price AgrEvo Canada Agrium Avenor Celanese Contemporary Information Analysis Dow Canada DowAgraScience General Electric Canada IMC Kalium Canada Monsanto Canada Procter & Gamble Rhône Poulenc Saskferco Saskatchewan Wheat Pool Shippers Supply Simplot Tetra Pak Industry Associations Canadian Chemical Producers' Association Canadian Fertilizer Institute Coal Association of Canada Crop Protection Institute of Canada Industrial Biotechnology Association of Canada Ontario Forest Industry Association Ontario Waterworks Association Ontario Crop Protection Associaiton Packaging Association of Canada Packaging Career Council of Canada Human Resources Canadian Food Inspection Agency Industry Canada Natural Resources Canada Statistics Canada Private Foundations Donner Canadian Foundation (Toronto, Ontario) To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Sat Mar 13 21:02:37 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id VAA23626 for ; Sat, 13 Mar 1999 21:02:37 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id TAA08602 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Sat, 13 Mar 1999 19:27:22 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from ccshst09.cs.uoguelph.ca (ccshst09.cs.uoguelph.ca [131.104.96.18]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id TAA08572 for ; Sat, 13 Mar 1999 19:27:12 -0500 (EST) Received: from csnet.nw.uoguelph.ca (csnet.nw.uoguelph.ca [131.104.232.2]) by ccshst09.cs.uoguelph.ca (8.8.6/8.8.6) with ESMTP id TAA16469 for ; Sat, 13 Mar 1999 19:27:03 -0500 (EST) Received: from CSNET/MAILQ by csnet.nw.uoguelph.ca (Mercury 1.43); 13 Mar 99 19:25:41 GMT-5 Received: from MAILQ by CSNET (Mercury 1.43); 13 Mar 99 19:25:29 GMT-5 From: "E. Ann Clark, Associate Professor" Organization: Plant Agriculture, Univ. of Guelph To: Date: Sat, 13 Mar 1999 19:25:29 EST Subject: Re: Key foundation offer to "educators" X-mailer: Pegasus Mail v3.40 Message-ID: <9D2AD7B83@csnet.nw.uoguelph.ca> Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 6 Ed S. - I didn't want to bias the discourse, so held off commenting. But since you have gone to the trouble of posting the list, I'll mention that I was once (and only once) invited to make a presentation to a Key Foundation event. Not knowing any different, I made just the type of presentation you'd expect me to make about the dangers of pesticides. I wasn't invited back. This annual, all expenses paid vacation is a clever, or perhaps not so clever, effort to inculcate certain values into people who will then pass along the same values to their students. Each time, apparently, they have a token opposition person, like me. Otherwise, it is solid industry propaganda. Buyer beware. Nothing worth owning is free. Ann ACLARK@plant.uoguelph.ca Dr. E. Ann Clark Associate Professor Crop Science University of Guelph Guelph, ON N1G 2W1 Phone: 519-824-4120 Ext. 2508 FAX: 519 763-8933 http://www.oac.uoguelph.ca/www/CRSC/faculty/eac.htm To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Sat Mar 13 23:35:09 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id XAA25955 for ; Sat, 13 Mar 1999 23:35:09 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id WAA09270 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Sat, 13 Mar 1999 22:03:58 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id WAA09257 for ; Sat, 13 Mar 1999 22:03:53 -0500 (EST) Received: from m18.boston.juno.com (m18.boston.juno.com [205.231.101.191]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id WAA04560 for ; Sat, 13 Mar 1999 22:03:49 -0500 (EST) Received: (from eweigel@juno.com) by m18.boston.juno.com (queuemail) id D5MX4BP7; Sat, 13 Mar 1999 22:03:36 EST To: sanet-mg@amani.ces.ncsu.edu Date: Sat, 13 Mar 1999 19:51:19 -0700 Subject: nitrogen scavenging plants Message-ID: <19990313.195236.3582.2.eweigel@juno.com> X-Mailer: Juno 1.49 X-Juno-Line-Breaks: 0,7-8 From: Edna M Weigel Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 7 Dear SANETers: I recall someone looking for a non-nodulating alfalfa for scavenging excess nitrogen. There was much discussion about why one would want such a plant but don't remember any such alfalfa being reported. I just ran across a statement in Peaceful Valley's catalog description for TriosTriticale (Triticum X Secale) which is described as having an aggressive root system: "Use this crop to uptake excess nitrogen." Maybe this would do the job. --Edna ___________________________________________________________________ You don't need to buy Internet access to use free Internet e-mail. Get completely free e-mail from Juno at http://www.juno.com/getjuno.html or call Juno at (800) 654-JUNO [654-5866] To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Sun Mar 14 10:38:36 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id KAA09226 for ; Sun, 14 Mar 1999 10:38:36 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id IAA16502 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Sun, 14 Mar 1999 08:46:02 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from iac20.navix.net (iac20.navix.net [207.91.5.26]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id IAA16437 for ; Sun, 14 Mar 1999 08:45:45 -0500 (EST) Received: from navix.net (xyp111p1.navix.net [206.158.218.11]) by iac20.navix.net (8.9.1a/8.9.1) with ESMTP id HAA16721 for ; Sun, 14 Mar 1999 07:42:09 -0600 Message-ID: <36EBDDB0.9361815A@navix.net> Date: Sun, 14 Mar 1999 08:02:56 -0800 From: Richard Mazour X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.04 [en] (Win95; U) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: "sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu" Subject: Re: nicotine and Nabisco crackers References: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 8 Interesting story on RJR Nabisco. As a small investor in IRA's and SEP's, where do I find information on companies who's values are similar to mine? ( organic farmer not even hooked on coffee.) Thanks Rich Maroc wrote: > Misha, here's the NYT article on RJR's breakup, it's all greed and money, > human misery is not part of the equation except as it stimulates > litigation, which is more greed and money for lawyers. > > NYTimes: March 10, 1999 > > End of a Disaster: Dismembering RJR Nabisco > > By FLOYD NORRIS > > It's over. A decade after RJR Nabisco was bought in the > largest leveraged buyout in history, the company is being sliced into three > pieces. It is a sad saga for almost all involved. > "The story is what happens when you really overpay for a > company, and the debt levels are just too high," said Stephen F. Goldstone, > who will be the last person to hold the job of chairman and chief executive > of RJR Nabisco. > When all is finished, the only real winners will be those > who cashed out in 1989 -- primarily the shareholders who sold and the > investment bankers who arranged the buyout. > The losers include R.J. Reynolds and Nabisco, which almost > certainly would have been more vigorous competitors had they not been > saddled with more than $25 billion in debt from the buyout. Kohlberg Kravis > Roberts, the leveraged-buyout firm that engineered the deal, lost more in > reputation than it made in money. > Among the sufferers are investors who bought RJR Nabisco > stock in 1991, when the company went public again, two years after Kohlberg > Kravis took it private. > A $100 investment then is now worth $51. Over the same > period, the Dow Jones industrial average more than tripled. > Kohlberg Kravis gave up in 1994, trading its RJR Nabisco > stock for ownership of Borden Inc., the troubled food company. So far that > looks like a doubtful investment at best. > What went wrong at RJR Nabisco? The tobacco business proved > not to be as good a cash cow as the buyers thought it would be. The great > advantage of selling to addicted customers was reduced when price wars broke > out among cigarette companies. > Tobacco litigation proved to be a significant threat. > Those problems hurt RJR Nabisco more than its competitors. > Philip Morris, the largest tobacco company and the owner of Kraft Foods, has > seen its share price about double since 1991, while RJR Nabisco's price has > been cut in half. One difference was that Philip Morris had enough financial > flexibility to invest in promoting its products, including Marlboro > cigarettes and Maxwell House Coffee, while debt-ridden RJR Nabisco was > forced to cut back on promotional spending for Winstons and Oreos. Over > time, it hurt. > Now RJR Nabisco will sell its international tobacco business > for $8 billion to Japan Tobacco. That money, after taxes, will go to pay > debt. Then the domestic tobacco business will be spun off into a separate > company, with just $1 billion of debt. Shareholders of the current RJR > Nabisco will get the shares in that operation. > The remainder will be Nabisco, which will have two kinds of > common stock. One type, the Nabisco Holdings shares that already trade, will > have a stake in the profits from such products as Chips Ahoy and Ritz > Crackers. The other will have a stake in the same profits. But as the former > parent of the tobacco company, it will also be burdened with the possibility > of residual liability if lawsuits manage to bankrupt the tobacco company. > The discount between those two prices will show just how scared investors > are of tobacco litigation. > When all that is done, things will be almost back to where > they were in 1985, before R.J. Reynolds acquired Nabisco. Nabisco will again > be an independent company, albeit a weaker one than its predecessor. R.J. > Reynolds will also be independent, with a smaller market share in this > country and an international business that had to be sold to pay debt taken > on in one of the most misguided deals in Wall Street history. > In a more just world, the investment banks that made > hundreds of millions from the RJR Nabisco buyout might now join in the > suffering. Instead, they will collect more fees for their services in > dismembering the hobbled company. > > To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command > "unsubscribe sanet-mg". > To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command > "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". > > All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: > http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Sun Mar 14 10:42:34 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id KAA09340 for ; Sun, 14 Mar 1999 10:42:34 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id JAA27691 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Sun, 14 Mar 1999 09:10:40 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from mail.caribe.net (root@mail.caribe.net [209.91.196.5]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id JAA27651 for ; Sun, 14 Mar 1999 09:10:32 -0500 (EST) Received: from ddworley (ppp192.203dip.netdial.caribe.net [209.91.203.192]) by mail.caribe.net (8.9.0/8.9.0) with SMTP id KAA22429 for ; Sun, 14 Mar 1999 10:13:00 -0400 (AST) Message-Id: X-Sender: ddworley@mail.caribe.net X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Pro Version 4.0 Date: Sun, 14 Mar 1999 09:37:44 -0400 To: sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu From: Richard Wolfson (by way of Daniel Worley ) Subject: GEN3-11; Fwd, Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 9 [Reposted with permission] On March 11, the Agriculture and Forestry Committee of the Canadian Senate released its interim report on Genetically engineered BGH. They were very much against it. The full report can be found at: http://www.parl.gc.ca/36/1/parlbus/commbus/senate/com-e/agri-e/rep-e/repint ermar 99-e.htm Here are the main recommendations: LIST OF RECOMMENDATIONS 1.The Committee recommends that Health Canada ensure full adherence to its conflict of interest guidelines and, in cases of perceived conflict of interest, publicly declare its reasons for accepting the appointment of any individuals for whom a conflict is perceived. (page 10). 2.The Committee recommends that decisions about the safety of drugs for humans, and the safety and efficacy of drugs for animals, be left with Health Canada evaluators (page 11). 3.The Committee, having heard the suggestion of some witnesses, recommends that the government conduct an evaluation of Health Canada's drug approval process to ensure that it fully safeguards human and animal health and safety. This evaluation should be undertaken by independent experts, either in conjunction with any follow-up activities of the Auditor General of Canada regarding the Health Protection Branch or subject to review by the Auditor General (page 13). 4.The Committee recommends that no Notice of Compliance be issued for rBST until the manufacturer submits the long-term studies identified by Health Canada's rBST internal review team as data missing from its submission and until a review of those studies more precisely determines any risks to human safety (page 17). 5.The Committee recommends that Health Canada ask that the study requested by the evaluators of the former Central Nervous System/Endocrine/Antiparasitic Division be conducted and submitted in order to meet the requirement of section C.08.004.(2) of the Food and Drug Regulations (page 18). 6.The Committee recommends that once human and animal health and safety are assured, the government establish an ongoing mechanism that would stimulate public discussion on economic, trade, social, ethical and other considerations related to drugs and medical devices that are being considered by Health Canada. This mechanism should involve the Canadian Food Inspection Agency where relevant, and may be one outcome of the Health Protection Branch's Transition initiative (page 21). 7.The Committee recommends that Health Canada officials appear before the Standing Senate Committee on Agriculture and Forestry no later than June 1999 to provide information about the initiatives undertaken to resolve the management problems identified in this report (page 22). 8.The Committee recommends that any federal government department asked for information by a parliamentary committee fulfill that request completely and as expeditiously as possible. Information that the department believes to be proprietary should be presented to committees in camera, with a rationale for maintaining confidentiality (page 24). 9.The Committee recommends that Health Canada, and in particular the Health Protection Branch, explore means by which ongoing consultation with the public, and information dissemination to it, can continue following the Transition initiative (page 24). ....... Here is an inspiring personal report from: Paul Davis in UK Fri, 12 Mar 1999 Subject: B-GE: UK TV Brilliant TV program last night!!!! Covered the whole Pusztai story, 'substantial equivalence', Caul Mosaic Virus, lack of control in US, GM in baby food ....... Dr. Pusztai came out like a hero. Putting his reputation on the line because he found something wrong, even though he was the man who originally said the snowdrop lectin was fine. He was very calm, clear and like a shining light in contrast to his devious and unbelievable opponents. Nice touch in an american supermarket. At the check-out, the reporter asked which products contained GM - check-out girl had no idea. 'Has anyone asked you that before?', 'No sir, you're the first'. Good interview with an american scientist pointing out how unpredictable the science is. Also Dr. Howard of Liverpool, a leading expert in child toxology, had a great impact. His concerns for children's & babies health came over as very genuine. Prof. James of the Rowett must be fuming!!! Everyone is now qouting him as saying the current regulations are not comprehensive enough!!!! And Minister Jeff Rooker ranted on again how fed up he is people talking about the potato - 'This potato is not on the market'. However at the end of the program the reporter said that they had research Government & EU papers and had found that a number of crops containing the snowdrop gene are in the pipeline for approval - cauliflower, rice, maize..... and a POTATO!!!!! ....... posted by MichaelP Royal Society sets up inquiry on Pusztai expts. INDEPENDENT (London) March 11 Inquiry into work of GM food scientist By Steve Connor, Science Editor A high-powered team of scientists has been appointed to investigate the work of Dr Arpad Pusztai, whose findings triggered a furore over genetically modified (GM) food. The Royal Society, Britain's most eminent body of scientists, has asked six of the country's leading scientists to review the data that led Dr Pusztai to warn that people who eat GM food are "unwitting guinea pigs in a mass experiment". The six specialists were selected by the Royal Society for their expertise in different disciplines and their independence from the Pusztai affair. None has commented publicly on the controversy. It is almost unprecedented for the Royal Society to establish what is effectively an independent peer review of a scientist's unpublished work. It was brought about because of the intense publicity associated with the Pusztai affair. Last August, the Rowett Research Institute in Aberdeen suspended Dr Pusztai after he claimed in a television interview that rats fed GM potatoes had stunted growth and a defective immune system. The institute said Dr Pusztai had no evidence on which to base his assertions and claimed that he had become "muddled" over experiments that had not taken place. In February, 20 scientists, mostly friends of Dr Pusztai, signed a memorandum supporting him, citing new evidence. The members of the review team include experts in statistics, nutrition, animal genetics, epidemiology and pharmacology. They will report their findings next month. ........... Here is a recent Natural Law Party Press from release that I was forwarded from Europe: http://www.natural-law-party.org E-mail: nlp@euronet.nl 11 March 1999 SCIENTISTS ALERT MPs TO BAN GENETICALLY ENGINEERED FOODS A special all-party briefing for MPs of the British parliament was held on 8 March in London in a House of Commons committee room, given by scientists concerned about the introduction of genetically modified foods. Professor John Fagan, an eminent molecular biologist with 23 years of experience at the cutting edge of molecular genetics techniques in cancer research, called for greater caution in the introduction of genetically modified foods. "If genetic engineering is to be used in agriculture and food production, its implementation should be guided by the same kind of rigorous science and testing that is now used to assess new pharmaceuticals and food additives. Stringent short-term and long-term safety testing and environmental assessment are essential," Dr Fagan told MPs. An imprecise and uncontrolled process Using detailed charts to explain the process of genetic engineering, Dr Fagan showed how the insertion of specific new genes into an organism is an imprecise and uncontrolled process that may influence biological functioning in unpredictable ways. "There is always the risk that genetically engineered foods may contain unintended allergens and toxins, and may be reduced in nutritional value. Furthermore, genetically engineered crops may disrupt the ecosystem by reducing bio-diversity, damaging soil fertility, inducing the development of new pathogens, pests, and weeds, and increasing the use of toxic and carcinogenic agrochemicals." Dr Fagan is Professor of Molecular Biology and Biochemistry. He initiated world-wide debate on genetics research in 1994 when he returned almost two million dollars of grants from the US National Institutes of Health because of concerns about the dangers of genetic engineering and the hazards of releasing GM organisms into the environment. Dr Fagan is also chief scientific adviser to Genetic I.D., a company that provides genetic testing services to food, nutritional, and agricultural industries throughout the world. The tests Dr Fagan has devised are significantly more sensitive than any currently utilised by British authorities and can detect the minutest trace of any GMO. Medical and agricultural applications of genetic engineering Dr Michael Antoniou, Senior Lecturer in Molecular Pathology and head of a research group at one of London's leading teaching hospitals, explained the difference between clinical and agricultural applications of genetic engineering. "Genetic engineering in medicine tries to correct a genetic defect that is either inherited, as in muscular dystrophy or cystic fibrosis, or acquired, as in cancer. Strict regulations quite rightly demand that the use of genetic modification (GM) in medicine does not result in the intentional release of viable GM organisms (GMOs) into the environment," Dr Antoniou said. "In marked contrast, the use of GM in agriculture tries to 'repair' plants that have nothing inherently wrong with them. In agriculture, GMOs are produced specifically for their intentional release into the environment. "In medicine a new drug or therapy produced using GM must undergo pre-clinical and, more importantly, clinical trials to assess not only efficacy but also to detect any unexpected, undesirable side-effects. However, for GM food no tests with human volunteers are required by law for either toxicity or allergic reactions prior to marketing. "Medicines are clearly labelled, and they are taken voluntarily, and the effects are carefully monitored. None of this applies to GM foods. Under current EU regulations most foods (90%) containing GMO-derived ingredients need not be labelled. The lack of effective segregation means the public has no choice as to whether to eat GM foods or not, and finally post-release monitoring is non-existent. Any problem that subsequently arises would therefore be virtually impossible to trace," he said. Respecting natural boundaries "If BSE has taught us anything it is that we should think twice about using a technology in a manner that violates well established natural boundaries. Nature works according to the principle of 'least action' (maximum economy) suggesting that everything exists for a purpose. Natural boundaries or laws can be seen as the means by which the evolutionary direction and integrity of life is maintained. "We should not lull ourselves into a false sense of security: we should not think that by regulating something which is inherently unpredictable and uncontainable it automatically becomes safe," he said. Dr Antoniou is the author/co-author of more than 50 publications and is biotechnology adviser to many organisations including the Soil Association and the Society for the Promotion of Nutritional Therapy. A total ban Dr Geoffrey Clements, leader of the British Natural Law Party and a physicist by training, emphasised that the scientific knowledge behind the so-called technology is totally inadequate to guarantee that the GMOs now being produced are free from hazards. "It is like expecting a physicist trained under Newton to operate a nuclear reactor," Dr Clements said. "The actual methods employed are intrinsically dangerous and highly unnatural," he said, referring to the fact that genetic modification can involve pieces of DNA from scorpions, fish viruses, bacteria and other species being implanted in the DNA of cereals, vegetables, fruits and animals. "Contrary to the arguments being put forward, these are mutations of the DNA that could never occur in nature. They are being made to occur in isolated species over a time scale of one or two years. In nature, evolution of the DNA usually takes place over millions of years, in a natural environment of all species living together in balance. "This means that we have no way at all of predicting any adverse results that may happen. When the methods of genetic modification are understood - that they involve pieces of virus and bacterial DNA, for example - it is clear that we are unleashing potential disaster for all life forms. "The only safe way forward is a total ban on all new GM crops and foods, and a recall of all crops and products already being grown and prepared." The Natural Law Party was the first political party to declare itself opposed to GM foods, and it is now actively campaigning on the issue in 80 countries. ........ GM Farmers have Grounds for Concern Experts warn of fall in land values similar to effect of contamination or disease CHRISTOPHER CAIRNS Environment Correspondent Scotsman 11th march 1999 GENETICALLY modified crops could reduce the value of agricultural land across Britain and leave tenant farmers open to legal action, the Government has been told. In a warning which has sent tremors through the already crisis-hit farming industry, the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) has said GM crops could have the same effect on land values as contamination or the outbreak of disease. The RICS has sent a report to the Office of Science and Technology and several other Government departments calling for the setting up of a land register through which potential buyers and banks could find out if and when GM crops had been grown on a particular holding. Environmentalists have backed the RICS and warned of disastrous consequences for British agriculture if the Government presses ahead with commercial scale GM crop trials. ....... [This is top story for Mar 11, 1999 on OneWorld News [http://www.oneworld.org/news ] AGRICULTURE: Death To Monsanto, Say World Scientists By Ranjit Dev Raj NEW DELHI, Mar 11 (IPS) - Conscientious genetic engineers and activists from across the world Thursday called for a slow but sure death for Monsanto, the U.S seed giant they say threatens life on earth with its genetically modified crops. ''It must be death by a thousand cuts,'' said Tony Clarke, director of the Polaris Institute in Canada which assists social movements to develop tools, skills and strategies for fighting economic globalisation and corporate power. Clarke was among participants selected to devise future strategies against 'Genetic Engineering and Patents on Life' at the close of the two-day 'Biodevastation II' meet here. Monsanto figured high on the agenda because of stiff resistance put up in this country by farmers and activists to field trials in 40 widely separate locations of genetically engineered Bt cotton carried out by the corporation on doubtful authorisation. Said Pushpa Bhargava, a distinguished India biotechnologist who has the French Legion d'Honneur to his credit, ''clearance for the trials should have come from Indian Council of Agricultural research (ICAR) - instead clearance came from the Department of Biotechnology and after the trials had begun.'' ........ The Christian Science Monitor March 10, 1999, Wednesday SECTION: USA; GLOBAL REPORT; Pg. 1 Signs of the food fight to come BYLINE: Laurent Belsie, Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor DATELINE: ST. LOUIS HIGHLIGHT: Gene-spliced plants and hormone-treated beef raise ethical questionsabout how much to fool with nature. BODY: Geneticists are on the verge of revolutionizing agriculture and medicine in much the same way computers have transformed business. Labs around the world are working on crops that could feed a growing planet, plants that could clean up contaminated soils, and pigs whose organs may one day get trans-planted into people. But to do these things, scientists are fooling with nature's basic building blocks. As they do, they are kicking up dissent around the world as one nation tries to sell its genetically altered foods to another's grocers. The current food fight between the United States and Europe - over hormone-treated beef and genetically altered soy beans - could be just a prelude of arguments to come. That's because the greatest risks probably don't lie with today's simple genetic alterations. Future rounds of exotic agriculture pose bigger threats because they will put organisms to completely new uses. The fundamental question: How much should science manipulate nature to care for mankind? And there's no going back, scientists say. Consider the US experience. While Europeans debate how far to proceed with the new technology, Americans are quietly ingesting the new foods, often without knowing it. "The genie can't be put back," says Marshall Martin, an agricultural economist at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Ind. "Anyone who eats pizza or cheese on their hamburger has consumed genetically modified food.... We pulled the cork out of the bottle in a sense with the discovery of DNA." For example, three-quarters of America's cheese gets its start with a bioengineered enzyme. Nearly 1 out of 6 dairy farmers injects his cows with a genetically engineered growth hormone to boost milk production. And genetically modified crops are increasingly taking over farmlands - with some 70 million acres planted worldwide, 60 million of it in North America. This planting season promises more inroads. For example, half of America's soybeans, perhaps more of its cotton, and a third of its corn could be genetically modified - a remarkable adoption rate in the four years since the new seeds were introduced. Other countries are also moving rapidly to incorporate the technology. Last year, some 650,000 farmers in China planted genetically modified cotton. And this year Monsanto, which produces the cotton seed, expects to double that number. Even the European Union has approved bioengineered soybeans and corn. Small quantities of corn, genetically modified to resist pests, are being grown in Spain and, if approved by France's high court, could start showing up in the fields of Europe's largest corn producer. ....... Daily Express 12 March 99 Why soya is a hidden destroyer Exclusive by Mark Townsend Fresh fears over the safety of genetically modified foods surfaced faced yesterday after new research revealed that food allergies relating to soya Increased by 50 per cent last year A study by Europe’s leading specialists on food sensitivity found health complaints caused by soya - the ingredient most associated with GM foods - have increased from 10 in 100 patients to 15 in 100 over the past year. Researchers at the York Nutritional Laboratory said their findings provide real evidence that GM food could have a tangible, harmful impact on the human body. The findings were sent to Health Secretary Frank Dobson last night as scientists urged the Government to act on the information and impose an instant ban on GM food, while further safety tests are carried out. Dr Michael Antoniou, senior lecturer in molecular pathology at Guy's Hospital, Central London, said: "This is a very interesting if slightly worrying, development. It points to the fact that far more work is needed to assess their safety. At the moment no allergy tests are carried out before GM foods are marketed and that also needs to be looked at." John Graham, spokesman for the York laboratory, said: "We believe this raises serious new questions about the safety of GM foods because it is impossible to guarantee that the soya used in the tests was GM-free." It is the first time in 17 years of testing that soya has crept into the laboratory's top 10 foods to cause an allergic reaction in consumers. __________________________________ Richard Wolfson, PhD Consumer Right to Know Campaign for Mandatory labelling and long-term testing of genetically engineered food 500 Wilbrod Street, Ottawa, ON K1N 6N2 email: rwolfson@concentric.net http://www.natural-law.ca/genetic/geindex.html subcription to genetic engineering news is $35 for 12 months. __________________________________ To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Sun Mar 14 18:01:07 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id SAA22912 for ; Sun, 14 Mar 1999 18:01:06 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id RAA03616 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Sun, 14 Mar 1999 17:05:56 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from igc7.igc.org (igc7.igc.org [192.82.108.35]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id RAA03546 for ; Sun, 14 Mar 1999 17:05:46 -0500 (EST) Received: from igce.igc.org (igce.igc.org [192.82.108.49]) by igc7.igc.org (8.9.2/8.9.2) with ESMTP id OAA29689; Sun, 14 Mar 1999 14:05:10 -0800 (PST) Received: from [4.9.244.107] (PPPa21-PhiladelphiaA1-3R76.saturn.bbn.com [4.9.244.107]) by igce.igc.org (8.9.3/8.9.3) with ESMTP id OAA10583; Sun, 14 Mar 1999 14:04:52 -0800 (PST) X-Sender: libby@pop.igc.apc.org Message-Id: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Sun, 14 Mar 1999 17:08:34 -0500 To: OGL@LSV.UKY.EDU From: "Libby J. Goldstein" Subject: Spring Garden Rally Cc: Sally Wendkos Olds , sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu, Blaine Bonham , COMFOOD-L@SARDONYX.TUFTS.EDU, community_garden@ag.Arizona.EDU, jeg30@columbia.edu, SeyNah@aol.com Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 10 >Date: Sun, 14 Mar 1999 14:06:51 -0500 >From: Rachel Treichler >Subject: Spring Garden Rally >To: cyberpark@treebranch.com >Cc: Ted Lewis >X-Sender: ecobooks@pop.interport.net >Reply-To: cyberpark@treebranch.com > >===================================================== >The CYBERPARK mailing list >===================================================== >WHAT WOULD SPRING BE LIKE WITHOUT GARDENS? >IF WE DON'T ACT NOW, WE MAY FIND OUT! > >>From Mayor Giuliani's Plan to Auction Off >Community Gardens, To The Admission Fee at the >Brooklyn Botanic Garden, Our Access to Urban Green Space >Has Never Been So Threatened! > >JOIN US FOR AN EQUINOX CELEBRATION ADN RALLY! > >Rally to Save Our Community Gardens >Protest the Entrance Fee at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden >Celebrate the Arrival of Spring > >MUSIC (BRING AN INSTRUMENT!) GAMES, INFORMATION AND MORE > >WHEN: Sunday, March 21, 2:30 pm >WHERE: Eastern Parkway Entrance to the Brooklyn Botanic Garden > (between the library and museum) > Take the #2 Train to Eastern Parkway > >Sponsored by the Park Slope Greens >Call Ted Lewis at 718-437-2758 for more info > > > >=================================================================== >You are in Cyberpark, a public place. All opinions expressed here >are of the authors themselves, and not necessarily those of the >associations hosting this list. To remove yourself from Cyberpark, >send e-mail to listserv@treebranch.com with only the words >UNSUBSCRIBE CYBERPARK in the body of the e-mail. >To join send SUBSCRIBE CYBERPARK >=================================================================== >Add your events to the Treebranch Network Calendar! >http://www.treebranch.com/cgi-bin/calendar/calendar.cgi >=================================================================== >Cyberpark is a project of Neighborhood Open Space Coalition, Friends of >Gateway, and the Treebranch Network. Visit http://www.treebranch.com. >=================================================================== > libby@igc.apc.org Libby J. Goldstein phone & fax: 215-465-8878 Philadelphia USDA zone 7A Sunset zone 32 My garden must be n-dimensional if it's out here in cyberspace. To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Sun Mar 14 18:51:08 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id SAA24288 for ; Sun, 14 Mar 1999 18:51:08 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id RAA04540 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Sun, 14 Mar 1999 17:58:57 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from rs1s2.datacenter.cha.cantv.net (rs1s2.datacenter.cha.cantv.net [200.44.32.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id RAA04536 for ; Sun, 14 Mar 1999 17:58:52 -0500 (EST) Received: from redfox (nas4-103.ras.mbo.cantv.net [161.196.247.232]) by rs1s2.datacenter.cha.cantv.net (8.9.1a/8.9.1/1.0) with SMTP id SAA27204; Sun, 14 Mar 1999 18:58:42 -0400 (VET) Message-ID: <0ed401be6e6f$802cd6c0$11ecc4a1@redfox> From: "Red Fox" To: , "Libby J. Goldstein" Cc: "Sally Wendkos Olds" , , "Blaine Bonham" , , , , Subject: Links to the World Labor Markets Date: Sun, 14 Mar 1999 19:07:48 -0400 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="Windows-1252" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 5.00.0810.800 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.00.0810.800 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 11 http://members.tripod.com/lagofox Links to the World Labor Markets, Bolsas Electronicas, and Information on Career Planning and its Life Cycle. To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Sun Mar 14 20:05:06 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id UAA26186 for ; Sun, 14 Mar 1999 20:05:06 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id TAA19943 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Sun, 14 Mar 1999 19:13:32 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id TAA19875 for ; Sun, 14 Mar 1999 19:13:27 -0500 (EST) Received: from UNLVM.UNL.EDU (unlvm.unl.edu [129.93.200.1]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with SMTP id TAA20873 for ; Sun, 14 Mar 1999 19:13:26 -0500 (EST) Received: from phcglen (12.2.59.7) by UNLVM.UNL.EDU (IBM VM SMTP V2R4) with TCP; Sun, 14 Mar 99 18:14:27 CDT Message-Id: <2.2.32.19990315000719.00697860@unlvm.unl.edu> X-Sender: phrc031@unlvm.unl.edu X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Pro Version 2.2 (32) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Sun, 14 Mar 1999 17:07:19 -0700 To: sanet-mg@amani.ces.ncsu.edu From: Jane Sooby Subject: answers to simple-minded question Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 12 Following are some of the direct responses to my question, > Can someone briefly explain why antibiotics are used as > growth promoters in livestock? Aside from controlling minor diseases, certain antibiotics increase feed use efficiency, presumably by reducing the amount of energy spent growing big crops of bacteria in the gut. Dale Wilson It seems to have something to do with a thinning of the intestinal layers-of course has not been well studied, but it was found that the animals absorb more caloric value from their feed. I think you'll have trouble finding much of a mechanistic explanation, given the hostility toward basic science research which has persisted now for many years. They noticed faster weight gain, so they decided to feed antibiotics. L. Muldowney Antibiotics are used in livestock for a higher feed efficiency. The livestock have a better rate of gain meaning the farmer will not have to feed the animals as long. What it all translates to is that in these highly competative times, if the farmer's neighbor is using it he better use it as well or he won't be farming very long and the other farmer will get farther ahead and be in a better position down the road to make purchases such as equipment and additional land and leaving him in a stronger position all around. Paul To use antibiotics as weight gaining substances seems bizarre to me. If the payoff is that the antibiotics we need to fight infection in humans are losing their effectiveness, is this a choice our society wants to make? It intrigues me how this issue brings together so many disparate factors. Jane Sooby University of Nebraska-Lincoln alternative crops research technician Nebraska Sustainable Agriculture Society western organizer High Plains Ag Lab 3257 Rd. 109 Sidney, NE 69162 308-254-3918 308-254-2402 (FAX) 308-254-0725 (HOME) To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Mon Mar 15 10:10:26 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id KAA18886 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 10:10:25 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id IAA15767 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 08:46:28 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from igcb.igc.org (igcb.igc.org [192.82.108.46]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id IAA15697 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 08:46:22 -0500 (EST) Received: from igce.igc.org (igce.igc.org [192.82.108.49]) by igcb.igc.org (8.9.2/8.9.2) with ESMTP id FAA12349 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 05:46:18 -0800 (PST) Received: from [4.9.122.69] (PPPa47-NewYorkB2-1R163.saturn.bbn.com [4.9.122.69]) by igce.igc.org (8.9.3/8.9.3) with SMTP id FAA25810 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 05:46:08 -0800 (PST) Date: Mon, 15 Mar 1999 05:46:08 -0800 (PST) X-Sender: corevaluesne@pop2.igc.org Message-Id: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu From: corevaluesne@mothers.org (CORE Values Northeast) Subject: Job Opening Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 13 Job Opportunity: Please Post EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR Leading green consumer education and advocacy organization seeks dynamic, hands-on Executive Director that's always looking over the next hill to orchestrate all phases of organization development and growth, including long-range and programmatic planning, staff and board development and management, fiscal management, public relations and communications. Requirements: strategic leadership skills in non-profit fundraising, organizational and financial management and administration/operations; strong communications and interpersonal skills; proven team building and problem solving skills; demonstrated interest in environmental health issues, food and agriculture, and consumer activism; high level of motivation and drive; lots of energy; creativity, and a zest for what you do. Apply: Send resume to ED Search, Mothers & Others, 40 West 20th Street, New York NY 10011; fax, 212-242-0545; email, wgordon@mothers.org Francine Stephens Program Associate Mothers & Others "Take Your Planet Personally" To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Mon Mar 15 10:39:07 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id KAA19859 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 10:39:07 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id JAA15886 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 09:36:53 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from alpha.matrixinet.com (alpha.matrixinet.com [205.254.232.10]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id JAA15806 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 09:36:46 -0500 (EST) Received: from [205.254.241.214] (term6-22.vta.west.net [205.254.241.214]) by alpha.matrixinet.com (8.9.1a/8.9.1) with SMTP id GAA18016 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 06:35:02 -0800 (PST) X-Sender: colibri@west.net (Unverified) Message-Id: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Date: Mon, 15 Mar 1999 06:36:24 -0700 To: From: colibri@west.net (Beth von Gunten) Subject: Spain: Transgenic Crop Producers Must Pay into Insurance Fund Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-MIME-Autoconverted: from quoted-printable to 8bit by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu id JAA15819 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 14 Spain makes transgenic crop producers pay into insurance fund [BARCELONA] Saiu na Nature v397n6721, pp636.... The Spanish government has decided that companies that produce or plant genetically modified crops must contribute to a 90 million Euro (US$100 million) insurance fund intended to cover environmental accidents. The move reflects growing calls for tougher restrictions on such crops from opposition political parties, non-governmental organizations, and consumers' associations. As a result of this pressure, the government's approach to transgenic crops will be debated in parliament this week after two left-wing parties expressed concern that Spain has authorized the planting of genetically modified crops that have not yet been approved in other countries of the European Community. Environmental issues have become more controversial in Spain since last year's ecological disaster, when thousands of tons of toxic waste spilled into the DoÒana national park last April after a retaining wall collapsed at the AznalcÛllar mines in Seville. One party, the Bloque Nacionalista Gallego, is seeking either a moratorium or a strict limit on the import of such crops. The movement Ecologists in Action, which includes more than 300 environment-related organizations, has called for a ban on the 22 experimental field trials by the company Monsanto that have already been approved by the country's biosafety commission. Concern has been triggered by the high importation of modified crops, especially maize and soya. Between 15,000 and 20,000 hectares are said to have already been planted with such maize from the company Novartis. The number of licences for test plantings has increased from 36 in 1996 to 124 by January of this year. Transgenic foodstuffs became an issue in Spain in 1996, when seven Greenpeace activists held a protest in Barcelona against a boat containing 45,000 tons of soya, 2 per cent of which was genetically modified. Cristina Narbona, the environment-commission spokesperson of the socialist party PSOE, has urged the government to support demands being made at the biodiversity protocol meeting in Colombia to base the protocol on the so-called "precautionary principle". Xavier Bosch To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Mon Mar 15 10:39:12 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id KAA19868 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 10:39:12 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id JAA16096 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 09:37:19 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from alpha.matrixinet.com (alpha.matrixinet.com [205.254.232.10]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id JAA16006 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 09:37:07 -0500 (EST) Received: from [205.254.241.214] (term6-22.vta.west.net [205.254.241.214]) by alpha.matrixinet.com (8.9.1a/8.9.1) with SMTP id GAA18081; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 06:35:27 -0800 (PST) X-Sender: colibri@west.net (Unverified) Message-Id: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Mon, 15 Mar 1999 06:36:49 -0700 To: , From: colibri@west.net (Beth von Gunten) Subject: Canada: Climate Change Called Farm Issue Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 15 Canada: Climate Change Called Farm Issue Western Producer March 11, 1999 Internet: http://www.producer.com/current_news/this_week/news/03111999news03b.html Imagine farming with more drought, more wind and more hail. Those are some reasons farmers should worry about climate change, natural resources minister Ralph Goodale told the recent Canadian Federation of Agriculture annual meeting. "Most of the available models predict that the world can expect more severe and more frequent climatic change," he said. "We all need to move more decisively to mitigate the threat." Goodale urged more participation by the agricultural industry in meeting the climate change challenge. He said producers should be concerned because they could face a significant amount of adaptation. Agriculture generates at least 10 percent of Canada's greenhouse gas emissions, which are causing climate change, he said. Identifying agricultural soils as carbon sinks is one way Canada can help meet its Kyoto Protocol commitment to reduce emissions to six percent below 1990 levels between 2008 and 2012. "Work done by Agriculture and Agri-food Canada indicates that, within a few short years, agricultural soils will have shifted from being a net source of greenhouse gases to a net sink," Goodale said. He added that Canada has made progress in having agricultural soils recognized, but officials need more research and arguments to convince other countries. "The Canadian position is clear," Goodale told delegates. "We see the carbon-storing capacity of the soil as a tremendous opportunity for farmers around the world to be part of the climate change solution." He said agriculture research needs to be broadened to include climate change factors. For example, work on soil conservation, the use of pesticides and fertilizers, water quality and manure management all have greenhouse gas implications. Research has shown that reduced tillage and less summerfallow help soils incorporate carbon dioxide. Goodale said including sinks in the climate change equation would be incentive for sound land management, and an accompanying improvement in soil quality, plant production, water conservation and the bottom line. Ken Kelly, a delegate from the Ontario Federation of Agriculture, asked Goodale if there would be any tangible compensation for early action by farmers. Goodale said that is being discussed as part of a crediting system for early action by any sector. "If we can produce such a program ... that would be a very green program," Kelly said. Delegates passed a resolution calling on the CFA to lobby for minimum-till agriculture to be recognized as a carbon sink, and to lobby against increasing input costs through a carbon tax without compensating farmers for the carbon they are removing. OFA delegate Sharon Rounds said large corporations shouldn't be given credit for work done in other countries. "We feel that we have the best carbon sink mechanism," she said. "We're dreaming in technicolor when we think we can plant rainforests in other countries." Bob Down, also from Ontario, said it's "time to get our oar in the water on this issue." Delegates heard that same message from Chris Pierce of the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers. He told them to be innovative in how they plan to live and work in a carbon-constrained world. "Make sure your voices are being heard in Ottawa," he said. To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Mon Mar 15 10:44:24 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id KAA20296 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 10:44:24 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id JAA15885 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 09:36:54 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from alpha.matrixinet.com (alpha.matrixinet.com [205.254.232.10]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id JAA15807 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 09:36:46 -0500 (EST) Received: from [205.254.241.214] (term6-22.vta.west.net [205.254.241.214]) by alpha.matrixinet.com (8.9.1a/8.9.1) with SMTP id GAA18022 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 06:35:05 -0800 (PST) X-Sender: colibri@west.net (Unverified) Message-Id: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Mon, 15 Mar 1999 06:36:26 -0700 To: From: colibri@west.net (Beth von Gunten) Subject: CARE Rejects Plan to Work with Monsanto Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 16 CARE Rejects Plan to Work with Monsanto St. Louis Post-Dispatch; 03/12/99 After meetings in St. Louis this week, the international relief agency CARE said it would not enter a partnership with Monsanto Co. because of worries by farmers in developing countries about Monsanto's genetically engineered crops. Milo Stanojevich, CARE's chief of staff, said Thursday that it became clear at the end of two days of discussions that brought CARE representatives from around the world that his organization had no interest in an alliance that St. Louis-based Monsanto was suggesting. The partnership could have meant contributions from Monsant for CARE's projects. The rejection is a setback for Monsanto, which stood to boost its image around the world and perhaps counter suspicion of its genetic technologies that exists widely outside of North America. But Stanojevich said his organization wasn't persuaded that genetically modified crops would benefit subsistence farmers in developing countries where CARE works. He said the concerns reflected fears by many farmers that they could become dependent on Monsanto if the use of modified seeds becomes dominant in farming. "There are concerns about the dependence it may create on one company," Stanojevich said, speaking by telephone from Atlanta. "What we said was that at this point, there are open questions about this technology and that we didn't really see how continued bilateral talks would be fruitful." But he added that CARE hopes to involve other organizations in future discussions about genetic engineering with biotechnology companies. CARE is one of the world's largest privately run relief and development organizations, operating in 60 countries. It was founded in 1946 as a means to help European survivors of World War II. Monsanto's chief operating officer, Robert B. Shapiro, had suggested the St. Louis meetings, which drew a 10-member CARE delegation to St. Louis from as far away as Africa and Asia. Shapiro also took part in the discussions. Monsanto asserts that its technologies can help farmers in developing countries to combat pests and drought, and that farmers will always have a choice in the seeds they plant. Philip Angell, **Monsanto**'s chief of corporate communications, described the meetings with CARE as preliminary. He said that they were not aimed at reaching an agreement on details of a partnership, although such an arrangement might have evolved later. "It was designed to start these two organizations talking to each other," he said. A partnership, Angell added, "would only have been a decision after dialogue and more back and forth." Soybeans, corn and other crops modified by genetic engineering are rapidly taking root in the United States. But in most of the rest of the world, it is another story. Europe and many developing countries have erected barriers to commercial production of modified crops. They worry that the safety hasn't been demonstrated over time and that its introduction could disrupt their farm economies and give a few companies too much control over their food and farmers. Those concerns were voiced loudly last month at U.N. biosafety negotiations in South America. In those talks, the United States, Canada and a handful of allies blocked a drive to establish global regulations governing the trade in modified organisms. Monsanto tried last year to establish an alliance with another respected international entity - the Grameen Bank of Bangladesh. The Grameen Bank is famous in development and lending circles for "microcredit" - loans to small farmers and the disadvantaged. But after being scolded by advocacy groups around the world, the bank backed out of an arrangement in which Monsanto had promised $150,000 to support its activities. Exactly what kind of partnership that Monsanto and CARE were talking about was unclear. CARE's Stanojevich said that "philanthropy" by Monsanto had been discussed but that the talks hadn't reached the point of specifics. CARE has a range of partnerships from licensing agreements in which companies use CARE's name on their products to simpler deals in which companies donate to help with projects in parts of the world where they do business. Two of CARE's best-known partnerships are with Starbucks and Delta Airlines. The main critic of **Monsanto**'s attempted alliances is Rural Advancement Foundation International, an advocacy group with offices in the United States and Canada. With its e-mail and fax network, the foundation already had begun to pressure CARE to avoid an alliance with Monsanto. Rural Advancement's executive director, Pat Mooney, said: "I think some of this is quite genuine on Monsanto's part and that they might have something to help solve problems. The danger in working with farmers who are the poorest of the poor is giving them loans tied to Monsanto's technology." To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Mon Mar 15 10:47:49 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id KAA20405 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 10:47:48 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id JAA16123 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 09:37:22 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from alpha.matrixinet.com (alpha.matrixinet.com [205.254.232.10]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id JAA15987 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 09:37:04 -0500 (EST) Received: from [205.254.241.214] (term6-22.vta.west.net [205.254.241.214]) by alpha.matrixinet.com (8.9.1a/8.9.1) with SMTP id GAA18057 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 06:35:19 -0800 (PST) X-Sender: colibri@west.net (Unverified) Message-Id: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Mon, 15 Mar 1999 06:36:40 -0700 To: From: colibri@west.net (Beth von Gunten) Subject: LA Times: Japanese Choke on American Biofood Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 17 Sunday, March 14, 1999 Japanese Choke on American Biofood Genetically altered produce reaps opposition. But moves to label it threaten $11 billion in U.S. sales. By SONNI EFRON, LA Times Staff Writer TOKYO--The video whirs, and an American food exporter's nightmare rolls across the screen. A potato bug is shown munching on the deep green leaf of a potato plant--genetically engineered in the United States, the narrator says, to produce a toxin that kills Colorado potato bug larvae. The bug falls off the leaf, flailing its legs in the air in what looks like insect agony. "They say this is safe, but I don't want to eat it. Do you?" asked the filmmaker, Junichi Kowaka, in an interview. Surveys show that most Japanese do not. In this land where food is considered most delicious when eaten raw or as close to its natural state as possible, genetically manipulated food is seen as synthetic, unwholesome and definitely unappetizing. To blunt a nascent consumer rebellion, the Japanese government has proposed labeling bioengineered food to give consumers the freedom to reject it. That in turn has alarmed the United States, which fears that the move could threaten its $11-billion annual sales--including about $1.3 billion from California--to Japan, the No. 1 market for U.S. agricultural exports. Japan is not the only nation gagging at the idea of genetically altered fare. A truly global food fight is underway. The outcome of the regulatory, marketing and public perception battle that has been joined in Japan could have far-reaching effects on what U.S. farmers plant next year, on the skyrocketing U.S.-Japan trade imbalance and on the struggle between biofood promoters and foes for the hearts and palates of consumers around the world. At issue in the emotional political debate that has erupted worldwide is how much to regulate and whether and how to label genetically modified organisms, known in biospeak as GMOs. These organisms are created when new genes--sometimes from another species--are introduced into a plant or animal to produce "desirable" traits, such as resistance to cold, pests, disease, spoilage or even a particular brand of herbicide. While U.S. farmers are quickly increasing the acreage planted with GMO seeds--to 40% or more of some crops--there is growing opposition in Europe, Japan and in some Third World countries on environmental, health, philosophical or religious grounds. The European Union has slapped restrictions on genetically modified plants and passed a law requiring GMO foods to be labeled. Well-organized environmental groups are crusading against what they have branded "Frankenstein food," fanning doubts about the products from Iceland to New Zealand. Anti-GMO protests have been staged in the Philippines, India and Hungary, according to activists, who are flooding the Internet with virulent attacks on biofoods. In London, where foes dumped bags of bioengineered soybeans onto Downing Street in protest last month, a poll by the Independent newspaper found that 68% of Britons were "worried" about eating GMO food. Only 27% said they were happy to eat it. Not all countries are hostile to foods altered by gene-splicing: GMO seeds reportedly have received a warm welcome in Russia, China and Argentina. And plenty of consumers have nothing against GMO foods so long as they know what is on the menu. A 1994 poll in Australia, for example, found that 61% were happy to try GMO foods, but 89% wanted them labeled. Australia and New Zealand are now trying to set up a common labeling system. New Zealand Prime Minister Jenny Shipley said earlier this month that consumers have a right to know whether their food contains GMOs. Nevertheless, a heated battle broke out last month at a U.N.-sponsored conference in Cartagena, Colombia, where delegates from more than 130 countries failed to agree on an international treaty to govern biosafety and trade in GMOs. The U.S. government warned that the restrictions being debated in Cartagena would paralyze international trade. According to media reports and conference participants, the United States and five other agricultural exporters that opposed labeling GMOs were bitterly accused by the other nations of torpedoing a global environmental pact to safeguard the interests of their farmers and biotech firms. The debate is by no means limited to food. Genetically modified material is being used in a wide range of products, from textiles to pharmaceuticals. Food Draws the Most Emotional Response Yet it is food that seems to generate the most emotional response. Consumer advocates say that people must have the right to know--and thus reject--food that has been subjected to genetic "tampering." Biotech backers say that requiring such labels is tantamount to branding demonstrably safe food as inedible and would raise food prices for all consumers. Proponents of bioengineering also say "genetically enhanced" species are essential to generate the crop yields needed to nourish the world's exploding population and to reduce use of herbicides and pesticides. They say the foods have been exhaustively tested and demonstrated to be safe enough to pass muster with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the Environmental Protection Agency, as well as international regulators. Foes assert that long-term studies on the effects of eating GMO foods have been inadequate. They question the environmental risks of developing pest-resistant or chemical-resistant crops, and they fear that bionic organisms could crowd out native species. A subtext in many countries is suspicion of scientific "miracles," new technologies and imperfect regulators, and the perception that the U.S. biotech industry has been heavy-handed in trying to shove new foods down frightened consumers' throats, said Beth Burrows, president of the nonprofit Edmonds Institute in Edmonds, Wash., who attended the Cartagena conference. Europeans have been sensitized to food-safety issues by the outbreak of "mad cow" disease. In Japan, the credibility of the Ministry of Health and Welfare was severely damaged by the 1996 revelation that its bureaucrats had knowingly allowed the sale of HIV-tainted blood products--a scandal that broke the same year that the ministry approved the first of 22 GMO crops for human consumption here. Availability of GMO foods in Japan has not led to acceptance. More than 80% of those questioned in a 1997 government survey said they have "reservations" about such foods, and 92.5% favored mandatory labeling. Unease is beginning to translate into action. The city of Fujisawa, near Tokyo, has banned all GMO foodstuffs from its school lunches. A tofu maker has begun advertising its product as "recombinant-DNA-soybean free." And a number of powerful food-buying co-ops--which claim nearly 20 million members, or about 1 in every 6 Japanese--are trying to screen out or label GMO foods. "It seems Americans only care about the quantity of their food, but Japanese are concerned about the quality," filmmaker Kowaka said. "Nobody wants to eat this stuff." Kowaka is a food-safety activist with the Japan Descendants Fund, a nonprofit group that has succeeded in provoking widespread concern among Japanese consumers about chemical-emitting plastics in food packaging and the use of post-harvest chemicals on food. Last year, a number of ramen makers changed their packaging after Kowaka's group reported that chemicals suspected of disrupting the human endocrine system leached from the plastic bowls when boiling water was poured over the dried noodles. Kowaka's current video, titled "The Dangers of Recombinant-DNA Food," has sold about 1,000 copies at $130 each and is being shown at lectures and gatherings by consumer, environmental and religious groups, he said. The Japanese government is countering anti-GMO groups like Kowaka's with a campaign to convince a skeptical Japanese public that genetically altered foods are not only safe but desirable. In fact, despite its draft proposal for a GMO labeling law, the Japanese government has been actively promoting biotechnology as a vital technology for the coming century and is investing billions to try to turn Japan into a world-class competitor. It is even attempting to genetically engineer strains of rice that will be tastier and hardier than conventional varieties. The politics of genetically engineered food here have been complicated by the fact that all the GMO foods offered for sale so far have been imported. Japanese companies have not dared introduce gene-spliced foods of their own, and although farmers can legally plant GMO seeds, so far none has chosen to do so, said Kazuhiko Kawamura, who deals with the labeling issue at the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries. Foreign food producers complain that Japan's powerful agricultural interests are trying to scare off consumers from GMO foods as part of a campaign to boost domestic agriculture. "Over the last 30 years, there has been a concerted effort here in Japan to paint imported foods as being dangerous, as being less desirable," said Dennis Kitch, Japan director of the U.S. Grains Council. The effort has included everything from asserting to Japanese that their intestines are ill designed for digesting Western beef to convincing them that foreign produce is more chemical-laden than home-grown fare. Though false, U.S. officials and industry sources say, such claims have succeeded in instilling alimentary xenophobia. Kowaka's video is no exception. As the narrator warns that "we Japanese are being used as guinea pigs" for inadequately tested GMO foods, the camera shows unwitting children eating French fries--by suggestion, those made from genetically altered plants that kill potato bugs--at that archetypal American eatery, McDonald's. "They think all imported food is bad. That gets to be protectionist," said a U.S. government official who argues that GMO labeling should not be used to reinforce unfounded consumer fears. U.S. Wants Japan to Accept Standards The United States has decided to require labels on genetically altered foods that are nutritionally different from traditional fare, that might contain allergens or that pose religious problems--such as a plant containing a pig gene--if and when any are introduced. Yet it doesn't require labeling of foods whose chemistry is essentially unchanged, solely on the basis of genetic origin. GMO foes in the United States have filed suit in an attempt to reverse that decision, but meanwhile, the U.S. government is lobbying Japan to accept its standards. "We're asking them not to have a labeling requirement that stokes the fear that these foods are bad without any basis in fact," said a U.S. official, adding that there is no evidence these foods are unsafe. Kowaka insisted, however, that a potato with an inborn insecticide is no ordinary spud, and should bear a warning label if it cannot be banned altogether. The Japanese committee studying labeling for the Agriculture Ministry has not yet ruled on the issue or decided what any label would say. The influential American Chamber of Commerce in Japan warns that GMO labeling "will create new nontariff trade barriers to imports." And while U.S. officials are trying to keep their criticisms scientific and low-key, they also have hinted to Japan that they may protest any mandatory labeling requirement to the World Trade Organization--as they have done over the European Union law. Japanese consumer advocates are outraged by the American stance. Setsuko Yasuda, who runs the "No! GMO" campaign for the Consumers Union of Japan, said Americans should not meddle with Japan's right to regulate food safety and quality. If Americans truly believe in free trade and consumer choice, she said, they should label GMO food for what it is and let international customers make up their own minds. "But to try to hide information [about product origin] and force-feed people what they don't want to eat . . . is wrong," Yasuda said. "It is American arrogance, and it will provoke anti-American sentiment here. You will lose hearts around the world." For Japan and the United States, the stakes in the GMO battle are high. Japan absorbs nearly 20% of all U.S. food exports. With the American farm economy ravaged by the Asian economic crisis, the affluent Japanese market is one that farmers and food processors can ill afford to lose, grain lobbyist Kitch said. Japan's decision on labeling will be vital, and not just because of the size of its market; Tokyo's decisions tend to influence regulators in other Asian capitals. For Japanese, who must import more than half of the calories they consume each day, the increasing prevalence of GMOs in their food supply reinforces a feeling of food vulnerability. For example, 97% of Japan's soybeans are imported, mostly from the United States, and are turned into tofu, fermented miso, natto and other staples of the Japanese diet. However, 28% of last year's U.S. soybean crop came from GMO seeds, according to the American Soybean Assn. That percentage could double when farmers plant this spring's crop. "We will have to find non-GMO sources," Yasuda said, adding that if American farmers want Japan's business, they will have to segregate crops. Trouble is, U.S. farmers often plant GMO and traditional crops in the same field, use the same machinery to harvest and transport them, and pour their grains into container ships that bring a river of food across the Pacific to Japan. However, DNA testing is so sensitive that it can detect one GMO part per trillion, Kitch said. That means a few stray kernels of GMO corn could "contaminate" bushels. To certify a product GMO-free would require costly testing and segregation at every stage in the processing and distribution chain, he said. These obstacles have so far prevented Europe from fully implementing its labeling law, industry sources said. As GMO crops or livestock come to dominate the U.S. market, genetically pristine products will become scarcer and more costly. No one knows how much more expensive--though some estimate a "GMO-free" label could add 30% or more to the price, and wonder whether Japanese consumers will be willing to pay it. Japan's draft proposal on labeling does not specify how pure a non-GMO product would have to be. But without a threshold standard, a can of California tomato paste containing a smidgen of cornstarch that might have been made partly from GMO corn could wind up with a warning label--even if the tomatoes are all natural, Kitch said. Consumer advocate Yasuda and her allies say that imperfect labeling is better than none. And the fewer the "food miles" from farm to dinner table the better, they argue, even if home-grown fare is more costly. "Now, with globalization, we don't know where our food comes from, how it is produced, and what kind of contaminants it might contain," Yasuda said. "Does free trade automatically mean that the cheapest food is the best food? We don't think so." Copyright 1999 Los Angeles Times. All Rights Reserved To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Mon Mar 15 10:49:17 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id KAA20459 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 10:49:16 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id JAA15976 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 09:37:03 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from alpha.matrixinet.com (alpha.matrixinet.com [205.254.232.10]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id JAA15913 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 09:36:56 -0500 (EST) Received: from [205.254.241.214] (term6-22.vta.west.net [205.254.241.214]) by alpha.matrixinet.com (8.9.1a/8.9.1) with SMTP id GAA18032; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 06:35:08 -0800 (PST) X-Sender: colibri@west.net (Unverified) Message-Id: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Mon, 15 Mar 1999 06:36:30 -0700 To: , From: colibri@west.net (Beth von Gunten) Subject: Genetic Engineering, Factory Farming, & Organics Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 18 Genetic Engineering, Factory Farming, & Organics Ronnie Cummins and Ben Lilliston Rural America / In Motion Magazine URL: http://www.inmotionmagazine.com/geff.html News from Europe, India, Colombia, Mexico, Canada, and the U.S. Ronnie Cummins and Ben Lilliston Little Marais, Minnesota In what the Financial Times of London characterized on February 23 as a "public relations disaster for transgenic foods," global resistance to Monsanto and genetic engineering (GE) has sharply intensified over the past 60 days. As reported previously Monsanto Under Attack: Global Pressure Builds Against Monsanto, the international anti-GE movement is rapidly developing into a serious threat to Monsanto and other biotechnology titans. The growing crisis over gene-foods has reached the point where financial analysts are warning the Clinton administration that the European Union will not back off on efforts to label untested GE foods. Many believe this controversy could spawn a major trade war within the World Trade Organization (WTO). In Britain, commentators have similarly warned Prime Minister Tony Blair that his cozy relationship with Bill Clinton and Bill's favorite corporation, Monsanto, could do severe damage to Blair. It has been a rough last several months for Monsanto and the ag biotech special interests. Here is a chronological blow by blow account: * The Fall/Winter 1998 issue of the Union of Concerned Scientists' Gene Exchange warns of recent US research showing that genetically engineered Bt crops are building up Bt toxins in the soil, thereby damaging the soil food web and harming beneficial insects. * On December 15, 1998 attorneys from the Center for Food Safety, on behalf of a broad coalition, filed a legal petition in Washington, D.C. against the FDA to have rBGH taken off the market. The legal action received major attention from the mass media, including a widely-viewed segment on ABC TV national news. The CFS petition cites mounting evidence that the original testing of rBGH was flawed. In 1990 the FDA said BGH was "safe for human consumption." Part of its findings were based on 90-day rat feeding studies in which they reported "no toxicologically significant changes..." Based largely on this conclusion, FDA did not require human toxicological tests usually required for a veterinary drug. However in April of 1998, researchers from Health Canada, the Canadian equivalent to FDA, issued a report which contradicted FDA's findings. Canadian researchers found studies showing that rats were absorbing rBGH after all. In fact, between 20 and 30 percent of the rats were developing distinct immunological reactions. Additionally, cysts formed in the thyroid of some male rats and infiltrated the prostate--both warning signs for potential cancer hazards. "These are toxicologically significant changes in the rats and they should have triggered a full human health review, including assessment of potential carcinogenic and immunological effects," said Dr. Michael Hansen, an expert on rBGH and a scientist with the Consumer Policy Institute, a division of Consumers Union. According to CFS attorneys it is "unclear" how or why these results were overlooked in the original FDA review of rBGH. Monsanto says it submitted the studies to the FDA, while the agency says it only saw summaries of the rat tests. "We're going to go to the courts and say--you were lied to," said Andrew Kimbrell, lead counsel for the CFS. "Essentially it was fraud by the agency and fraud by Monsanto in telling the court that there were no human health effects possible from consuming these products made with rBGH treated milk." The EU has already banned rBGH, but this policy comes up for review later this year. The US government has warned that they will file for damages under the WTO if the EU continues to ban Monsanto's rBGH. * Australian trade authorities announced on Jan. 8, the largest shipment of canola (rapeseed) ever exported from Australia. The $16.5 million dollar shipment is bound for oilseed crushing plants in Europe. According to Graham Lawrence, managing director of the New South Wales Grains Board, "Europe has moved to become a major buyer this year because Australia is the only country to guarantee non-genetic modified canola." Canada has lost $300-400 million in canola sales to Europe over the last year because government authorities have followed the US model of co-mingling GE and non-GE grains. This year over 50% of Canada's 13.4 million acres of canola are genetically engineered. * The mid-January 1999 issue of the California Farmer magazine reports that Bt resistance has emerged among pink bollworms, a major cotton pest, in Arizona cotton fields Biotech critics have warned for years that genetically engineered Bt crops will cause major crop pests to develop resistance to Bt, thereby destroying the usefulness of the world's most important natural biopesticide. * On Jan. 14 Canadian government officials announced that they were not going to allow Monsanto's controversial recombinant Bovine Growth Hormone (rBGH or rBST) to be injected into Canada's dairy cows. The ruling came after nine years of heavy lobbying by Monsanto and a major nationwide debate. Although the Canadian government and the media stressed that the permanent ban on rBGH was based primarily on animal health concerns, the data posted on their web site by the Canadian scientists who reviewed the drug made it clear that human health hazards were also a consideration, namely increased antibiotic residues and elevated levels of a potent human growth hormone factor and cancer promoter called IGF-1 found in rBGH-derived milk and dairy products. (For further information on the hazards of rBGH, see and ) * * On Jan. 22, the St. Louis Post Dispatch reported that financial difficulties were forcing Monsanto to slash 1700 employees from its global workforce of 28,000. As indicated in previous Food Bytes, Monsanto now finds itself strapped for cash in the wake of last fall's failed merger with the American Home Products Corp. Monsanto's recent aggressive multi-billion dollar acquisitions of seed companies, research labs, and grain trading operations have increased their power and control over world markets, but have drastically reduced their available capital and lowered their stock values, leaving them potentially vulnerable to an unfriendly takeover by Dupont or Dow or another mega-corporation. Wall Street investment analyst William Fiala told the St. Louis Post Dispatch, "It seems like they (Monsanto) bit off more than they could chew after the merger collapsed. They are taking a risk that they could cut too deep in terms of personnel or could sell things out of necessity that are still good investments. Their debt is beyond Monsanto's comfort level and beyond most analysts' comfort level." * * Almost 200 cotton farmers in Georgia, Florida, and North Carolina are suing Monsanto for damages after crop failures of Monsanto's Bt and Roundup Ready cotton seeds, according to a news story in the Augusta (Georgia) Chronicle on Jan. 25. In a separate lawsuit 25 cotton farmers in Texas, Oklahoma, Mississippi, and Louisiana are suing Monsanto for fraud and misrepresentation--also in regard to Bt cotton crop failures. * * On Feb. 5, Carrefour, France's largest supermarket chain, announced that they were taking all genetically engineered foods off their shelves. A representative from Greenpeace France, Arnaud Apoteker, told anti-biotech activists at an conference in Cuernavaca, Mexico on Feb. 7 that Greenpeace and their allies were planning on driving all GE foods and crops out of France by the end of next year. * * On Feb. 12 front-page headline stories in the British press revealed that Dr. Arpad Pusztai's explosive research findings on the potential human health dangers of genetically engineered potatoes--first aired in the UK media last August--had been verified by a panel of 20 international scientists. Dr. Pusztai, a world renowned researcher on plant lectins, was fired last August from the government-funded Rowett Institute in Scotland, under very suspicious circumstances, shortly after he went public with research indicating that laboratory rats fed genetically engineered potatoes had suffered significant damage to their immune systems, thymuses, kidneys, spleens, and guts. According to press reports, Pusztai's firing and the ensuing scientific coverup by the UK government were a direct consequence of ongoing White House pressure on Tony Blair to keep the door open to Monsanto and other biotech companies to market and grow GE products in Britain and across the EU. * When Dr. Pusztai fed conventional potatoes and snowdrop lectin (GNA) to rats, no damage occurred. But when Pusztai fed the rats an equivalent amount of potatoes which were gene-spliced with the snowdrop lectin, significant and startling damage became quickly evident. Despite deliberately false U.K. government allegations that Dr. Pusztai's experiments were purely theoretical, a number of biotech companies are currently carrying out similar lab and field tests on gene-spliced potatoes, rapeseed, rice, and cabbage, calculating that snowdrop-spliced food crops will repel crop pests. * Perhaps even more alarming than Pusztai's mutant potatoes, scientists have subsequently pointed out that Bt (Bacillus thuringiensis), a gene routinely spliced into millions of acres of US corn, cotton, and potatoes is now considered to be a form of lectin. And more alarming yet, another scientist, Dr. Stanley Ewen, said that a commonly used vector or production aid in gene-splicing, the Cauliflower Mosaic Virus, may have caused serious damage to the stomach and internal organs of the rats in Pusztai's study. If the Cauliflower Mosaic Virus (CaMV) is confirmed as being hazardous to mammals, this could literally become the "Chernobyl of Biotech"--since Roundup Ready soybeans, Bt corn, and most other GE crops are produced using the CaMV as a genetic splicing vector. * On Feb. 13, eight days after Carrefour's announcement in Paris, a major British supermarket chain, Asda, announced that they were going to remove all genetically engineered ingredients from their own-brand goods. Asda's move comes in the wake of similar moves by other UK retail chains, including Iceland and Marks and Spencer. As Sheila McKechnie of the UK Consumers Association pointed out in the Daily Mail newspaper on Feb. 11, grocery chains banning GE foods like Carrefour will now "have an enormous competitive advantage" in the marketplace. * Bloomberg News reported on February 13 that EU authorities had rejected Monsanto's request to grow GE Roundup Ready and Bollgard Bt cotton plants in Europe. Two days earlier the European Parliament voted to tighten GE regulations, demanding that GE corporations be compelled to purchase liability insurance to cover any and all damages resulting from gene-altered crops or foods. The Parliament also demanded stricter measures for the prevention of gene transfers from GMOs to other crops or wild species, as well as a ban on antibiotic-resistance marker genes in genetic crops. * On February 18, an international coalition of public interest organizations, led by attorneys from the Center for Food Safety (Food Bytes and the Campaign for Food Safety are affiliated with the CFS) filed a lawsuit in Federal District Court in Washington, D.C. to have all Bt crops taken off of the market because of the hazards they pose to the environment and public health. The February 18 Bt lawsuit was announced at a well-attended press conference in Washington, and generated significant coverage in the US press. Last May (see Food Bytes #13) the Center for Food Safety sued the FDA to have all genetically engineered foods taken off the market on the grounds that they are neither properly labeled nor safety-tested, and that lack of mandatory labeling illegally restricts the freedom of choice of those who would choose--on religious or ethical grounds--to avoid GE foods. * "Genetically engineered crops are a threat to farmers, consumers, and the environment," said Charles Margulis, a spokesperson for Greenpeace, one of the plaintiffs in the lawsuit. Joseph Mendelson, Legal Director of the Center for Food Safety stated, "EPA has shown a blatant disregard for federal law and its own regulations by approving Bt crops without fully assessing their environmental safety. Their continuing failure to regulate this untested technology forces us to turn to the courts for protection." For further information on these lawsuits see * On Feb. 23, the Daily Mail newspaper in the UK reported that three of Britain's fast-food giants--McDonald's, Burger King, and Kentucky Fried Chicken--are responding to customer pressure by eliminating genetically engineered soya and corn ingredients from their menus. According to McDonald's spokesperson Jackie Graveny: "Our aim is to have McDonald's GM (genetically modified) free as soon as possible." Similarly Burger King stated: "The company is set to ban GM food as soon as possible." In a related development the Agriculture Minister in the UK, Nick Brown, announced on Jan. 31 that UK restaurants will soon be required to start labeling "meals which contain certain types of genetically modified food." * With more and more major food retailers, restaurants, and processors in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, France, Scandinavia, the UK, and other nations going "GE-free" a tremendous market now exists for certified "non-GE" and organic products. This makes it increasingly difficult for governments such as the US, Canada, and Brazil to keep telling farmers that their "no labeling and no segregation" policies on co-mingling GE and non-GE grains and crops make good economic sense. * On Feb. 23 India's Supreme Court ruled that all field trials of Monsanto's genetically engineered Bt Cotton must be halted. The court ruling and temporary legal injunction came in response to a legal petition filed by veteran Indian activist Dr. Vandana Shiva, director of the Research Foundation for Science, Technology and Ecology. According to Dr. Shiva, "This case does not merely have national significance, it has international significance. Around the world scientists, environmentalists, consumer groups and farmers are calling for a moratorium on commercial releases of genetically engineered crops because of growing evidence of ecological hazards and threats to food safety." The court ruling comes in the wake of months of protests by Indian farmers and consumers, many of whom have organized themselves into a Monsanto "Quit India" movement. Dr. Shiva and other activists brought together over 100 grassroots organizations in Hyderabad on Jan. 7 to launch a nationwide campaign against Monsanto. * A major backlash has developed against the United States and major transnational biotech corporations after an international Biosafety Protocol treaty was sabotaged in Cartagena, Colombia. The Biosafety Protocol, supported by over 135 nations and public interest groups worldwide, would have tightened regulations on the international transfer and trade of genetically engineered seeds, grains, and foods. In a vote on Feb. 24 the US and five of its allies, the so-called "Miami Group" (Canada, Australia, Argentina, Uruguay, and Chile) managed to prevent the passage of the internationally binding treaty. As US biosafety expert Beth Burrows of the Edmonds Institute told the New York Times, "There was no moral high ground here (on the part of the US). There was no scientific higher ground. It was just cheap power politics." According to the Financial Times of London and other EU sources, the US' bully boy tactics at the Biosafety Protocol meetings will only serve to exacerbate anti-biotech feelings in Europe. A recent statement by George Monbiot in the London Guardian (Feb. 19) aptly sums up the mood of EU consumers: "Food scares happen... because people feel they have no control over what they eat. Our decisions are made for us by invisible and unaccountable corporations." * On Feb. 25 a group of US activists in San Francisco calling themselves fabRAGE (Fabulous Resistance Against Genetic Engineering) stripped off their clothes and disrupted a conference panel on genetically engineered cotton featuring a speaker from the Monsanto Corporation. "We'd rather go naked than wear genetically modified cotton!" shouted Biogrrl, a fashion diva at the event, as half a dozen activists charged through the room and stripped off their biohazglam gowns, chanting: "We don't want it, won't buy it, and won't wear it. Super Gene Girl, in a biohazard suit shouted, "Gene-spliced cotton is not sustainable!" Monsanto representatives appeared apoplectic in the face of the action. * On Feb. 27 Greenpeace activists in Mexico City hung banners protesting "Genetic Imperialism" and the US sabotage of the Biosafety Protocol on a historic monument, the Angel of Independence, in the center of the city. Police arrested the demonstrators, but the banner-hanging generated significant coverage in the Mexican media, where until recently there has been very little discussion of the GE foods controversy. * On March 2 the Reuters news agency reported that the UK's Advertising Standards Authority wil soon "censure" Monsanto for a misleading series of ads on the safety of genetically engineered foods which appeared last year in the British press. _____________________ Ronnie Cummins is National Director of the Pure Food Campaign (PFC) http://www.purefood.org a non-profit, public interest organization dedicated to building a healthy, safe, and sustainable system of food production and consumption in the U.S. and the world. The PFC's primary strategy is to help build a national and international consumer/farmer/labor/progressive retailer boycott of genetically engineered and chemically contaminated foods and crops. To subscribe to the monthly electronic newsletter, Food Bytes, send an email message to: < majordomo@mr.net > with the simple message: subscribe pure-food-action _________________________________________________________________ Email, Opinions & Discussion If you have any thoughts on this or would like to contribute to an ongoing discussion in the E-mail, Opinions & Discussion column click here to send e-mail to publish@cts.com. _______________________________ <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> The address for any administrative command like unsubscribe, subscribe or help is: GENTECH-REQUEST@gen.free.de The searchable WWW list archive is available at http://gen.free.de/archives.html To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Mon Mar 15 11:22:23 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id LAA21891 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 11:22:23 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id KAA12726 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 10:18:57 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id KAA12707 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 10:18:52 -0500 (EST) Received: from uni03mr.unity.ncsu.edu (uni03mr.unity.ncsu.edu [152.1.1.166]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id KAA06910 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 10:18:50 -0500 (EST) Received: from unity.ncsu.edu (2405p200.ppath.ncsu.edu [152.1.176.53]) by uni03mr.unity.ncsu.edu (8.8.8/8.8.8/UR01Feb99) with ESMTP id KAA17189 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 10:18:51 -0500 (EST) Message-ID: <36ED25A0.B12C5FAB@unity.ncsu.edu> Date: Mon, 15 Mar 1999 10:22:08 -0500 From: Russ Bulluck X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.5 [en] (Win95; U) X-Accept-Language: en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Sustainable Ag Subject: Re: Prison labor, free labor References: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 19 I've been watching this thread with much interest. Many of you have some very good points. I live (and work/go to school) in North Carolina, where prison labor is used in many different ways. Here prisoners are only allowed to work for the state, which comes in handy when I need to harvest tomatoes at one of the two research stations I did research on. As for how the prisoners are compensated, the way it was explained to me (by a prisoner) is that there are several levels, based on security risk. Level five prisoners make ~$0.75 a day. These are prisoners often seen in "chain gangs," at least 2 guards, with shotguns, feet shackled, etc. There are gradations to level 1. A prisoner must work his way up (get promoted if you will) to a level 1. These prisoners make ~$5.00 per day. They are more like work-release prisoners, and several of the ones I've worked with, I wouldn't hesitate to hire. They are mainly hard workers, many of whom can operate heavy equipment expertly. While I don't believe prisoners should be forced to work (and I don't believe _any_ of the prisoners in North Carolina are forced to participate), I also don't think that these people should be able to sit in an air-conditioned cell and watch TV all day. It costs a large amount of money for each prisoner (I can't remember the latest figure I heard, but I'm sure it was more than $30,000 a year) to house, clothe, and feed them. By allowing them to work (that's right allowing them to _choose_ to work or not to work) we can offset some of those costs, save money for the state in other ways (i.e. our tax dollars), and possibly provide a work ethic for someone who didn't have one. One more factor. Prison laborers are often released early (either by through early parole, or because pay was not only $5.00 a day, but also a day off the sentence). By the way, in 1997, we harvested approximately 2000 lbs of organically-grown processing tomatoes (made a great sauce). Since they were produced at a State-owned research station, we couldn't sell them. Several hundred pounds went to the state prison where several of the inmates were housed. I realize that this probably only adds fuel to the fire, and hopefully everyone will read this far before getting generally annoyed at a grad student with an attitude. I am opposed to prison labor being used by the general public or corporations. I do believe, however, that prisoners should be allowed to work for the state, and contribute to their own room and board. Last year, after a hurricane, level 1 prisoners were sent to farms to set up tobacco plants. I'm sure they cost less than the National Guard. . .Just my two cents worth. . . (okay. . .maybe a buck's worth). . .Russ -- Russ Bulluck Ph.D. Student Department of Plant Pathology North Carolina State University PO Box 7616 Raleigh, NC 27695-7616 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The soil population is so complex that it manifestly cannot be dealt with as a whole with any detail by any one person, and at the same time it plays so important a part in the soil economy that it must be studied. --Sir E. John Russell The Micro-organisms of the Soil, 1923 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Mon Mar 15 12:53:08 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id MAA25630 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 12:53:08 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id LAA08037 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 11:56:20 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id LAA07978 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 11:56:14 -0500 (EST) Received: from server1.mich.com (IDENT:root@server1.mich.com [198.108.16.2]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id LAA09555 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 11:56:13 -0500 (EST) Received: from [207.74.178.57] (pm002-017.dialip.mich.com [207.74.178.81]) by server1.mich.com (8.8.7/8.8.7) with SMTP id LAA17541 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 11:56:10 -0500 X-Sender: donald@mail.mich.com Message-Id: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Mon, 15 Mar 1999 11:58:57 -0500 To: sanet-mg@amani.ces.ncsu.edu From: donald@mich.com (Donald E Davison) Subject: Big Business into Organic Farming Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 20 ------------ Forwarded text ------------ Date: Mon, 15 Mar 1999 09:27:24 +0100 To: "English edition dispatch" From: Le Monde diplomatique Subject: Le Monde diplomatique - March 1999 Sender: LE MONDE DIPLOMATIQUE _________________________________________________________________ Le Monde diplomatique english edition March 1999 ORGANIC FOOD: LIES AND PROFITS Bio business is big business * by Chantal Le Noallec What is the future for suppliers of organic produce now that the big marketing and distribution companies are moving in? Will they survive the shock? As a result of the "mad cow disease" panic, organic farming is enjoying an unprecedented boom. Consumer demand has never been so strong. The major retail stores are filling more and more of their shelves with organic produce. Organic shops and supermarkets - or at least claiming to be organic - are shooting up everywhere. However, now that organic farming is coming into its own and is also receiving subsidies, it has become a juicy market niche ripe for exploitation. Faced with the encroachment of big business, the organic lobby seems uncertain which way to turn. http://www.monde-diplomatique.fr/en/1999/03/16bio.html Translated by Ed Emery - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Joke: God created the mule and told him: "You will be mule, working constantly from dusk to dawn, carrying heavy loads on your back. You will eat grass and you will lack intelligence. You will live for 50 years." The mule answered: "To live like this for 50 years is too much. Please, give me no more than 20." And it was so. Then God created the dog and told him: "You will hold vigilance over the dwellings of Man, to whom you will be his greatest companion. You will eat his table scraps and live for 25 years." And the dog responded: "Lord, to live 25 years as a dog is too much. Please, no more than 10 years." And it was so. God then created the monkey and told him: "You are the monkey. You will swing from tree to tree, acting like an idiot. You will be funny, and you shall live for 20 years." And the monkey responded: "Lord, to live 20 years as the clown of the world is too much. Please, Lord, give me no more than 10 years." And it was so. Finally, God created Man and told him: "You are Man, the only rational being that walks the earth. You will use your intelligence to have mastery over the creatures of the world. You will dominate the earth and live for 20 years." And the man responded: "Lord, to be Man for only 20 years is too little. Please, Lord, give me the 30 years the mule refused, the 15 years the dog refused, and the 10 years the monkey rejected." And it was so. And God made Man to live 30 years as a man, then marry and live 20 years like a mule working and carrying heavy loads on his back. Then, he is to have children and live 15 years as a dog, guarding his house and eating leftovers after they empty the pantry; then, in his old age, to live 10 years as a monkey, acting like a fool to amuse his grandchildren. And it was so. *** To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Mon Mar 15 13:01:08 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id NAA25947 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 13:01:08 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id LAA08445 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 11:57:01 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from vesuvius.gr8brdg.net (vesuvius.gr8brdg.net [209.96.136.2]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id LAA08370 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 11:56:54 -0500 (EST) Received: from greatbridge.net (cox139ppp190.gr8brdg.net [209.96.139.190]) by vesuvius.gr8brdg.net (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id LAA08295 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 11:56:53 -0500 Message-ID: <36ED3C9D.3076E9E5@greatbridge.net> Date: Mon, 15 Mar 1999 12:00:13 -0500 From: Ben and Sasha Goldberg Reply-To: goldberg@greatbridge.net X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.05 [en] (Win95; U) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: sanet-mg Subject: Care: Support Care: Make a Donation Content-Type: multipart/mixed; boundary="------------C143C241A5F805C4522A355B" Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 21 This is a multi-part message in MIME format. --------------C143C241A5F805C4522A355B Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Below is the on-line site for CARE if anyone is interested sasha http://www.care.org/support/donation.html --------------C143C241A5F805C4522A355B Content-Type: text/html; charset=us-ascii; name="donation.html" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Disposition: inline; filename="donation.html" Content-Base: "http://www.care.org/support/donation.h tml" Care: Support Care: Make a Donation
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--------------C143C241A5F805C4522A355B-- To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Mon Mar 15 13:20:18 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id NAA26754 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 13:20:18 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id MAA27703 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 12:29:17 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id MAA27670 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 12:29:12 -0500 (EST) Received: from catena.soils.umn.edu (root@catena.soils.umn.edu [128.101.77.1]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id MAA10119 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 12:29:12 -0500 (EST) Received: from S431B.soils.umn.edu (x160-75.soils.umn.edu [134.84.160.75]) by catena.soils.umn.edu (8.9.3/8.9.3) with SMTP id LAA27333 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 11:29:12 -0600 (CST) Message-Id: <1.5.4.32.19990315172904.00f5f0ec@soils.umn.edu> X-Sender: alewand@soils.umn.edu X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Light Version 1.5.4 (32) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Mon, 15 Mar 1999 11:29:04 -0600 To: sanet-mg@amani.ces.ncsu.edu From: Ann Lewandowski Subject: Re: nitrogen scavenging plants Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 22 ARS researchers at the University of Minnestoa, and an environmental remediation company have been using non-nodulating alfalfa to clean up an anyhdrous ammonia spill from a rail accident in North Dakota. They are using a variety called Ineffective Agate. For information, see the magazine article in the February/March 1998 issue of Soil and Groundwater Cleanup, p.11. Or contact Michael Russelle (USDA-ARS) at the University of Minnesota. -Ann Lewandowski At 07:51 PM 3/13/99 -0700, you wrote: >Dear SANETers: > I recall someone looking for a non-nodulating alfalfa for >scavenging excess nitrogen. There was much discussion about why one >would want such a plant but don't remember any such alfalfa being >reported. I just ran across a statement in Peaceful Valley's catalog >description for TriosTriticale (Triticum X Secale) which is described as >having an aggressive root system: "Use this crop to uptake excess >nitrogen." Maybe this would do the job. >--Edna > >___________________________________________________________________ >You don't need to buy Internet access to use free Internet e-mail. >Get completely free e-mail from Juno at http://www.juno.com/getjuno.html >or call Juno at (800) 654-JUNO [654-5866] > >To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command >"unsubscribe sanet-mg". >To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command >"subscribe sanet-mg-digest". > >All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: >http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail > > ______________________________________________ Ann M. Lewandowski NRCS Soil Quality Institute Department of Soil, Water, and Climate 1991 Upper Buford Circle University of Minnesota St. Paul, MN 55108-6028 alewand@soils.umn.edu 612-624-6765 fax: 612-625-2208 ______________________________________________ To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Mon Mar 15 16:05:23 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id QAA02654 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 16:05:23 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id PAA00824 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 15:09:01 -0500 (EST) Received: from luna.oit.unc.edu (luna.oit.unc.edu [152.2.22.4]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id PAA00737 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 15:08:54 -0500 (EST) Received: from titan.oit.unc.edu (titan.metalab.unc.edu [152.19.254.14]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id PAA00359 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 15:14:44 -0500 (EST) Received: from localhost (london@localhost) by titan.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id PAA03741 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 15:08:53 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: titan.oit.unc.edu: london owned process doing -bs Date: Mon, 15 Mar 1999 15:08:53 -0500 (EST) From: Larry London X-Sender: london@titan.oit.unc.edu To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Subject: Rampaging Rustics! Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 23 Rampaging Rustics! By David Ivins >From the New York Times In case you city dwellers and suburbanites haven't noticed, be warned: the countryside is slowly creeping up on you. Like a rapidly growing weed that smothers everything in its path, rural areas are encroaching on our cities and suburbs, and no one -- not our elected officials, public interest groups or citizens -- is doing anything to stop this rural sprawl. In countless confrontations, rural extremists are preventing businesses from building industrial parks, shopping malls, condominiums, single-family homes, theme parks, airports and sports arenas. They are even fighting the construction of new highways! What would the country be without the network of freeways and parkways linking our cities, suburbs, shopping malls, theme parks and sports arenas? Rural sprawl began quietly with the infiltration, in ever-increasing numbers, of wildlife -- squirrels, rabbits, songbirds and other small, cuddly, apparently innocuous creatures -- into our suburbs and the fringes of our major cities. Now it seems that these small animals were only the advance guard of a cunningly planned invasion that also includes deer, coyotes, beavers, mountain lions, bears and other despoilers of our cherished suburban and urban habitats. Areas that otherwise would be given over to job creation and highly profitable logging, strip mining and oil drilling are being expropriated by wild animals, which are inherently valueless since they contribute nothing to our economy. Once these beasts establish themselves, shielded by hellbent wildlife-protection groups and misguided politicians from Al Gore to Christie Todd Whitman, they can never be dislodged. But these animals are only the unwitting servants of the quaint-seeming "country folk" whose diabolical plan is to eradicate or make unlivable our suburbs and cities by covering our streets, sidewalks and highways with grass, shrubbery and trees. They want to inundate shopping malls and sports arenas with lakes, ponds and streams; replace our condo developments with "picturesque" villages and hamlets and our suburban tract homes with drafty, old-fashioned farmhouses. The ultimate goal of these fanatical rustics is to return all of us to lives of unsophisticated rural primitivism. Is this the kind of life we want to lead? Fight rural sprawl now, before it's too late! David Ivins is a freelance writer. Copyright 1999 The New York Times 2/25/99 To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Mon Mar 15 17:01:24 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id RAA04498 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 17:01:24 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id PAA13929 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 15:29:17 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id PAA13856 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 15:29:12 -0500 (EST) Received: from aae.wisc.edu (aae.wisc.edu [144.92.122.133]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id PAA14174 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 15:29:10 -0500 (EST) Received: from mojo.aae.wisc.edu ([144.92.244.223]) by aae.wisc.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.0) with SMTP id OAA10674 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 14:29:10 -0600 Message-Id: <199903152029.OAA10674@aae.wisc.edu> Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "Michele Gale-Sinex/CIAS, UW-Madison" To: sanet-mg@amani.ces.ncsu.edu Date: Mon, 15 Mar 1999 14:28:59 -0500 Subject: OP poisoning/Fresno Co./ProMED X-mailer: Pegasus Mail for Windows (v2.53/R1) Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 24 Howdy, all-- Thought this might interest you pesticide watchers. From the ProMED list. peace mgs >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> ORGANOPHOSPHATE PESTICIDE POISONING - USA (CALIFORNIA) ********************************************************** A ProMED-mail post [This is posted to emphasize that it is not only the Third World that suffers pesticide poisoning problems - Mod.JW] Date: Sat 13 Mar 1999 From: ProMED-mail Source: CDC MMWR February 19, 1999 / 48(06);113-116 [edited] Farm Worker Illness Following Exposure to Carbofuran and Other Pesticides -- Fresno County, California, 1998 In California, suspected pesticide-related illnesses and suspected work-related illnesses and injuries are reportable conditions. On July 31, 1998, the Occupational Health Branch of the California Department of Health Services (CDHS) received a report from the California Department of Pesticide Regulation (CDPR) of a pesticide exposure incident in Fresno County involving 34 farm workers. CDHS investigated this incident by reviewing medical records of the 34 workers and interviewing 29. The findings indicated that the workers became ill after early reentry into a cotton field that had been sprayed with a cholinesterase-inhibiting carbamate pesticide. On July 31 at 4 a.m., a cotton field was sprayed aerially with a solution containing as active ingredients 0.26% carbofuran (n-methyl carbamate), 0.05% abamectin (macrolytic lactone), and 0.05% mepiquat chloride (growth regulator). Although carbofuran, when used on cotton, has a restricted entry interval (REI) ** of 48 hours and requires both posting of treated fields and oral notification of workers, neither warning was provided. At 6 a.m., the 34 workers (age range: 13-64 years; median: 31 years) entered the field to complete weeding begun the previous day. After weeding for approximately 4 hours, the workers were transported to a second field 2-1/2 miles away that had been sprayed 2 days earlier with a solution containing cyfluthrin (synthetic pyrethroid), diclofol (organochlorine), and mepiquat chloride. The REI for these pesticides is 12 hours. Within approximately 1/2 hour of entering the second field, the workers began feeling ill and stopped working. Symptoms most commonly reported by the 34 farm workers were nausea (97%), headache (94%), eye irritation (85%), muscle weakness (82%), tearing (68%), vomiting (79%), and salivation (56%); the most commonly observed signs were bradycardia (21%), diaphoresis (15%), and miosis (pupillary constriction) (12%). Thirty (88%) workers were transported immediately to a medical clinic; the other four went home, showered, and sought medical care 3-17 days later. All workers evaluated at the clinic were decontaminated by clothing removal and showering and were sent to six area hospitals. Twenty-nine were evaluated and released the same day. One worker was hospitalized overnight for new-onset atrial fibrillation. All workers received hospital treatment for symptoms, and most (28 {82%}) lost at least 1 day of work. - -- **No worker without prescribed protective clothing should enter a treated area to perform a hand labor task until the REI expires. The length of the REI depends on the specific pesticide but generally can be no less than 12 hours. [MMWR] Editorial Note - -------------------------------- Pesticide exposure can cause serious acute illness among farm workers. In the incident described in this report, workers entered a field well before the end of a label-specified REI and incurred pesticide exposure that resulted in moderately severe illness (as defined by the American Association of Poison Control Centers {1}). The incident demonstrates that 1) posted and oral warnings based on the REI are necessary to prevent illness among workers performing hand labor in fields recently treated with pesticides and 2) failure to adhere to an REI can result in substantial morbidity among exposed workers. Because this incident demonstrates that sole reliance on these control measures may be inadequate, the substitution of safer, less toxic alternative pesticides should be adopted when feasible. Prompt, appropriate medical attention, including decontamination by clothing removal and showering, probably prevented more acute illness in this incident. However, some exposed workers went home before decontamination, increasing the potential for secondary contamination of children and other family members. Secondary contamination can be reduced by developing in advance appropriate procedures for decontaminating clothing, homes, and vehicles (2). Illnesses among family members exposed to the workers were not reported. Although the incident involved exposure to several pesticides, the agent with the greatest acute systemic toxicity is the broad-spectrum insecticide/nematocide carbofuran. Carbofuran exposure was the probable cause of illness based on biologic evidence (foliage and clothing samples and urine metabolites), signs and symptoms of cholinergic excess (voluntary and involuntary muscle movement, exocrine gland overactivity, and central nervous system effects), and laboratory evidence of cholinesterase depression. Although atrial fibrillation has been reported with other cholinesterase-inhibiting pesticides (3), this is the first report following carbofuran exposure. In 1995, 248,000 lbs of cholinesterase-inhibiting carbamate pesticide were used in California, primarily on alfafa, rice, table and wine grapes, and cotton (4). During 1995, carbamate pesticides composed 1.8%, by weight, of all pesticides used and alone caused 30 (1.9%) of pesticide-related illnesses reported to CDPR. Clinical diagnosis of carbamate toxicity is based primarily on known or suspected history of carbamate use and presence of cholinergic symptoms and signs (5). Isolated cases may be less recognizable, resulting in delays in diagnosis and treatment. Because cholinesterase inhibition by carbamates is rapidly reversible, cholinesterase testing may be unreliable in diagnosing carbamate poisoning. The incident described in this report also illustrates the importance of limiting the time between cholinesterase collection and analysis, placing specimens on ice, and using the most appropriate analytic techniques to conduct cholinesterase assays (6). Measurement of urinary metabolites may be useful to confirm suspected carbamate-related illness, but because this assay is highly chemical-specific and is performed only by certain reference laboratories, it is not a practical tool for most clinicians. Treatment of carbamate poisoning includes decontamination, supportive care, and the use of atropine in severe exposures. References - ---------------- 1.Litovitz TL, Smilkstein M, Felberg L, Klein-Schwartz W, Berlin R, Morgan JL. 1996 annual report of the American Association of Poison Control Centers Toxic Exposure Surveillance System. Am J Emerg Med 1997;15:447-500. 2.Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry. Managing hazardous materials incidents. Vol. I-II. Atlanta, Georgia: US Department of Health and Human Services, Public Health Service, CDC, 1992. 3.O'Malley MA. Systemic illnesses associated with exposure to Mevinphos in California, 1982-1989. Sacramento, California: California Department of Pesticide Regulation, California Environmental Protection Agency, 1992. 4.California Department of Pesticide Regulation. Pesticide use report, 1995. Sacramento, California: California Department of Pesticide Regulation, California Environmental Protection Agency, 1996. 5.World Health Organization. Carbamate pesticides: a general introduction. Environmental Health Criteria 64. Geneva, Switzerland: World Health Organization, 1986:90. 6.Wilson BW, Sanborn JR, O'Malley MA, Henderson JD, Billitti JR. Monitoring the pesticide exposed worker. Occup Med: State of the Art Reviews 1997;12:347-63. <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< Michele Gale-Sinex, communications manager Center for Integrated Ag Systems UW-Madison College of Ag and Life Sciences Voice: (608) 262-8018 FAX: (608) 265-3020 http://www.wisc.edu/cias/ >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Dennis: Anarcho-syndicalism is a way of *preserving* freedom! His Wife: Oh, Dennis, *forget* about freedom! We 'aven't got enough mud! To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Mon Mar 15 17:21:10 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id RAA05136 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 17:21:10 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id QAA09982 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 16:17:33 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from renoir1.spidernet.net (renoir1.spidernet.net [194.154.128.10]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id QAA09969 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 16:17:27 -0500 (EST) Received: from mail0.spidernet.net by renoir1.spidernet.net (ElectricMail-MESSAGE-2.0-GAMMA) id XAA00977; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 23:23:53 +0200 Received: from spidernet.com.cy (nic-c53s01-l111.spidernet.net [194.154.136.239]) by mail0.spidernet.net (ElectricMail-MESSAGE-2.0-GAMMA-SSM1.1-ANTISPAM) id XAA27694; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 23:18:52 +0200 (EET) Message-ID: <36ECCFB7.260C2ABB@spidernet.com.cy> Date: Mon, 15 Mar 1999 11:15:35 +0200 From: Lee Row X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.5 [en] (Win95; I) X-Accept-Language: en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Subject: [Fwd: ECON: Small farmers' seed rights up for grabs?] Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 25 -------- Original Message -------- Subject: ECON: Small farmers' seed rights up for grabs? Date: Sat, 6 Mar 1999 21:43:04 -0500 From: "Kelly J. Morris" Reply-To: "Kelly J. Morris" To: TOGO-L@LISTSERV.AOL.COM COTONOU, (Mar. 5) IPS - Entering the global economy, some African researchers say, calls for trade-offs, and Francophone nations recently had no trouble trading small farmers' rights to store and exchange seed. Francophone members of the African Organization of Intellectual Property (OAPI) put their signatures to the 1991 Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants Convention (UPOV 91) in the Central African capital of Bangui. Inventors of new crops now have their discoveries protected in the OAPI countries as per the terms of UPOV 91. Adopted in Paris in 1961, this Convention has been amended several times, but most members follow its 1978 Convention which is widely interpreted by governments to allow farmers to save and exchange seed. But UPOV's 1991 Convention assumes that farmers cannot save seed unless governments permit specific exceptions, and up until the signing last week by the OAPI countries, only 11 developed countries had adopted the 1991 Convention. The Francophone members of the OAPI are Benin, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Central Africa Republic, Chad, Congo, Djibouti, Gabon, Guinea, Cote d'Ivoire, Niger, Mali, Mauritania, Senegal and Togo. While the Canadian-based International Rural Advancement Foundation (RAFI) believes that African countries may have been pushed too quickly into the arms of a western-dominated intellectual property cartel, Francois Adande of Benin says Africa must create "trust" that it can protect intellectual property rights. Adande, head of judicial and trademark services at Benin's National Center of Industrial Property (CENAPI), believes that the UPOV Convention is important in so far as it protects inventions coming from Western countries that are much more able and equipped in research, especially in genetic engineering. "Globalization is scaring the whole world. Those who have something are scared. Infringements are occurring more and more, and if Western inventions are not protected, they will be investing in research at a loss," Adande says. Africa, he continues, can only gain by creating trust in its ability to protect acquired crops. "But if one does not create that trust, there will not be any kind of technological transfer, since each would guard their own secret and our situation would improve much more slowly." Other Francophone African experts also are not so alarmed by RAFI's concern that the more than 20 million small farmers in the Francophone African nations would have no right to store and exchange seeds, because of their governments' signing UPOV 91. The 1991 Convention, argues Badiou Ouattara, head of a crop research centre in Burkina Faso, "has nothing to do with seed supply for farmers. "It's like a musician that writes music. The whole world can buy a tape, but it is registered internationally under the composer's name," Ouattara continues. Hien Mathieu, head of the Intellectual Property Services in the Ministry of Commerce, Industry, and Crafts of Burkina Faso, oh the other hand, says that while African nations must be cautious in negotiations on intellectual property rights, globalization requires trade offs. "If after investment-financed research someone finds varieties of millet or corn (suitable) for the Sahel, they must be compensated for their discovery," Hien says. "Our countries must make the necessary arrangements and adjustments, because globalization is here. We cannot afford to marginalise ourselves," Hien adds. "We need a rational policy on research. If the Europeans come to do research, you have to be a partner to them so they do not take and protect everything over there." Hien adds that the protection, in this case UPOV 91, does not mean that no one else can use "your product", but that whoever has developed a crop can use it or permit others to use it. Bassane Jean Toe in Burkina Faso's Ministry of Agriculture says that adding the Francophone African nation's signatures to UPOV 91 is like adding a "voice of reason." "It's a necessity. African nations have ample knowledge of UPOV, so they have nothing to worry about," Toe says. ***************************************************************************** This posting is provided to the individual members of this group without permission of the copyright owner for purposes of criticism, comment, scholarship, and research under the "Fair Use" provisions of U.S. Government copyright laws and it may not be distributed further without permission of the copyright owner. The sender does not vouch for the accuracy of the content of the message, which is the sole responsibility of the copyright holder. ****************************************************************************** ~~~~~~~ TOGO-L - THE FRIENDS OF TOGO DISCUSSION GROUP ~~~~~~~ Too much mail every day? Send mail to: LISTSERV@LISTSERV.AOL.COM In the body of the message, type: SET TOGO-L DIGEST Sign off the List? 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All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Mon Mar 15 17:26:23 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id RAA05341 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 17:26:22 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id QAA00784 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 16:53:13 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id QAA00756 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 16:53:08 -0500 (EST) Received: from alpha.matrixinet.com (alpha.matrixinet.com [205.254.232.10]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id QAA16815 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 16:53:07 -0500 (EST) Received: from [205.254.241.137] (term5-9.vta.west.net [205.254.241.137]) by alpha.matrixinet.com (8.9.1a/8.9.1) with SMTP id NAA23411 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 13:51:25 -0800 (PST) Message-Id: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Mon, 15 Mar 1999 13:52:47 -0700 To: From: colibri@west.net (Beth von Gunten) Subject: EPA Extends Comment Period on Proposed Rule to Expand Chemical Right-to-Know Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 26 EPA Extends Comment Period on Proposed Rule to Expand Chemical Right-to-Know On January 5, 1999, the EPA issued a proposed rule to lower the reporting thresholds and to add certain persistent bioaccumulative toxic chemicals to the Toxics Release Inventory. This proposed action will potentially increase reporting about the public's Chemical Right-to-Know by 25 percent. In response to several requests, the EPA is extending the comment period on this proposed rule by 30 days. The EPA has determined that extending the comment period is appropriate and that it will not cause a significant delay in the evaluation of the proposed rule. The comment period was scheduled to close on March 8, 1999; it will now close on April 7, 1999. Written comments must be received by the EPA on or before April 7, 1999. Comments may be submitted by mail, electronically, or in person. For further information contact Daniel R. Bushman, Petitions Coordinator, 202-260-3882, e-mail: bushman.daniel@epamail.epa.gov. For specific information on the proposed rule or for more information Community Right-to-Know, contact the Environmental Protection Agency, Mail Code 5101, 401 M St., SW., Washington, DC 20460. You may also call toll free: 1-800-535-0202, and in Virginia and Alaska call: 703-412-9877 or call toll free TDD: 1-800-553-7672. Electronic copies of this document and the January 5, 1999, proposed rule can be obtained from the EPA Internet Home Page at http://www.epa.gov/ . On the Home Page select "Laws and Regulations" and then look up the entry for this document under the "Federal Register - Environmental Documents." You can also go directly to the "Federal Register" listings at: http://www.epa.gov/fedrgstr/. To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Mon Mar 15 17:28:17 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id RAA05417 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 17:28:16 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id QAA00803 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 16:53:19 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id QAA00793 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 16:53:15 -0500 (EST) Received: from alpha.matrixinet.com (alpha.matrixinet.com [205.254.232.10]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id QAA16829 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 16:53:14 -0500 (EST) Received: from [205.254.241.137] (term5-9.vta.west.net [205.254.241.137]) by alpha.matrixinet.com (8.9.1a/8.9.1) with SMTP id NAA23460 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 13:51:32 -0800 (PST) Message-Id: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Mon, 15 Mar 1999 13:52:54 -0700 To: From: colibri@west.net (Beth von Gunten) Subject: EU Scientific Committee decides against rBGH Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 27 Conclusions and Recommendations of the Scientific Committee on Animal Health and Animal Welfare on the Animal Welfare Aspects of the Use of Bovine Somatotrophin (Adopted 10 March 1999) Full text is on website http://europa.eu.int/comm/dg24/health/sc/scah/out21_en.html General conclusion BST is used to increase milk yield, often in already high-producing cows. BST administration causes substantially and very significantly poorer welfare because of increased foot disorders, mastitis, reproductive disorders and other production related diseases. These are problems which would not occur if BST were not used and often results in unnecessary pain, suffering and distress. If milk yields were achieved by other means which resulted in the health disorders and other welfare problems described above, these means would not be acceptable. The injection of BST and its repetition every 14 days also causes localised swellings which are likely to result in discomfort and hence some poor welfare. Recommendation BST use causes a substantial increase in levels of foot problems and mastitis and leads to injection site reactions in dairy cows. These conditions, especially the first two, are painful and debilitating, leading to significantly poorer welfare in the treated animals. Therefore from the point of view of animal welfare, including health, the Scientific Committee on Animal Health and Animal Welfare is of the opinion that BST should not be used in dairy cows. To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Mon Mar 15 17:31:29 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id RAA05507 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 17:31:29 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id QAA21554 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 16:38:11 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id QAA21513 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 16:38:06 -0500 (EST) Received: from fw1.phibred.com (firewall-user@fw1.phibred.com [204.233.143.2]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with SMTP id QAA16417 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 16:38:03 -0500 (EST) Received: by fw1.phibred.com; id LAA14004; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 11:23:44 -0600 Received: from orion.phibred.com(170.54.241.13) by fw1.phibred.com via smap (4.1) id xma006557; Mon, 15 Mar 99 11:18:33 -0600 Received: by orion.phibred.com with Internet Mail Service (5.5.2448.0) id ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 11:18:33 -0600 Message-ID: <8FEE1BDA0910D111BEB500805F1999C7FFC025@vela.phibred.com> From: "Wilson, Dale" To: "'Jane Sooby'" , sanet-mg@amani.ces.ncsu.edu Subject: RE: answers to simple-minded question Date: Mon, 15 Mar 1999 11:18:31 -0600 MIME-Version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2448.0) Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 28 Jane, Paul said > Antibiotics are used in livestock for a higher feed efficiency. > The livestock have a better rate of gain meaning the farmer will > not have to feed the animals as long. Jane said > To use antibiotics as weight gaining substances seems bizarre > to me. If the payoff is that the antibiotics we need to fight > infection in humans are losing their effectiveness, is this a > choice our society wants to make? When you put it like that, of course not. But what do you think of use of classes of antibiotics that cannot, or for some reason, will not be used in human disease control? Also, there are apparently other (non-antibiotic) ways to manipulate intestinal flora, such as special strains of bacteria, and foods that promote their growth. A lot of work is underway on this subject. Dale To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Mon Mar 15 17:32:07 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id RAA05535 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 17:32:07 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id QAA28849 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 16:47:58 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from mailhost.rodaleinst.org (mailhost.rodaleinst.org [205.147.214.3]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id QAA28833 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 16:47:52 -0500 (EST) Received: from kmaure.rodaleinst.org ([205.147.214.43]) by mailhost.rodaleinst.org (Netscape Mail Server v1.1) with SMTP id AAA8567 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 16:41:04 -0500 Received: by kmaure.rodaleinst.org with Microsoft Mail id <01BE6F03.D3242920@kmaure.rodaleinst.org>; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 16:49:43 -0500 Message-ID: <01BE6F03.D3242920@kmaure.rodaleinst.org> From: Laura Gurk To: "'sanet-mg-digest@ces.ncsu.edu'" Subject: Job posting Date: Mon, 15 Mar 1999 16:49:39 -0500 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-MIME-Autoconverted: from quoted-printable to 8bit by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu id QAA28834 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 29 Job Opportunity: Please post Tour Guide Internship Do you enjoy working with children and adults? Do you enjoy spending time outdoors in a rural farm setting? If you answered "yes" to these questions, then an internship at The Rodale Institute Experimental Farm is waiting for you. There are intern position(s) currently available to become a Rodale Institute tour guide from May 1st through October 31st. Learn about organic gardening and farming first-hand, while giving tours of the gardens and farm to children, youth and adult groups. Flexible working hours (approx. 25 hours/week) in a Tuesday-Saturday work schedule. A willingness to learn and a bright, cheery attitude is all that is required to become part of The Rodale Institute family. To apply: Send a resume to: Rodale Institute Experimental Farm, c/o Tour Guide Internship, 611 Siegfriedale Rd. Kutztown, PA 19530; fax to: (610)683-9175; or email: Lgurk@rodaleinst.org. The Rodale Institute is located in Kutztown, Pennsylvania which is between Allentown and Reading, PA. To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 16 05:28:52 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id FAA26107 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 05:28:51 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id EAA26057 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 04:32:34 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id EAA25868 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 04:32:24 -0500 (EST) Received: from mail.iatp.org (iatp-2.InnovSoftD.com [208.141.36.66]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id EAA26370 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 04:32:22 -0500 (EST) Received: from markbert ([208.141.36.107]) by mail.iatp.org (Netscape Messaging Server 3.56) with SMTP id 543; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 03:36:33 -0600 Message-Id: <3.0.5.32.19990316033449.030ebb80@iatp.org> X-Sender: mritchie@iatp.org X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Pro Version 3.0.5 (32) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 1999 03:34:49 -0600 To: Gary Elliott , Shoshanah Inwood From: "Mark Ritchie" Subject: Re: Prison labor, free labor Cc: "Michele Gale-Sinex/CIAS, UW-Madison" , sanet-mg@amani.ces.ncsu.edu, iffs@nal.usda.com, wrdc@execpc.com, dkaufman@discover-net.net, rlwills@execpc.com, fgoodman@mwt.net, cclp@mwci.net, pln2@wtrt.net, klemme@aae.wisc.edu, pjdietma@facstaff.wisc.edu, stevenson@aae.wisc.edu, mister3d@pbi.net, yolanda.p.cruz@oberlin.edu, Marylee Haughwout , Jenna Hill In-Reply-To: <36E9ECD2.E8A8AC21@london.skyscape.net> References: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 30 Greetings, Great postings on the prison labor conversation. Thought I might put my two cents worth in the pot on prison labor. First of all this is not the way we build a sustainable society ... locking up young men who applied 100 times for a job at Company "X" on the street and was told he was not qualified, instantly becomes qualified to work in prison for Company "X" when he gets 25 years for possession of crack cocaine ... so much for free enterprise. A little history: Prison industries, using inmate labor to manufacture goods was a booming business right after slavery up to the 1930's. Here in Alabama a lot of the mining was done by contract prison labor (and a lot of those prisoners were enslaves that were picked up on flaky vagrancy laws for the express purpose of creating a prison labor pool). As a matter of fact, entire prison facilities here in Alabama were leased out to private manufactures and farmers so they could use the prisoners for cheap labor (that is documented by a University of Alabama professor, I will have to find the title of the book again... he has great stories and documentation of prison labor practices and conditions during this time period). Any way in in the 1930's the sale of "open market prison made products" was banned by Congress. Labor was crying foul and the man on the street was out of work do to the depression. Fast forward... in 1979 Congress quietly lifted the ban on the interstate transportation and sale of prison made goods providing that they passed the "Private Industry Enhancement Certification Program". Basically this program certifies that inmate workers are paid local prevailing wages(jive talk) and the local work forces is not displaced by prison labor . The largest player in the prison labor game is the mighty Federal Prison Industries ($495.4 million in sales FY 1996) that is a half of billion folks ... serious cash money . Please check out Occupational Training or Slave Labor by David Martin: http://www.zolatimes.com/V2.13/FPI.html You might also want to read "Workfare" And Prison Forced Labor: New Strategies To Reduce Wages by Mark Cook: http://metalab.unc.edu/prism/Nov96/forced.html Tracy Huling, I do agree with you concerning the "bored and angry" phrase. It is trash talking in its purest form. We need to look at the real social and economic consequences of expanding the prison labor work force. We also need to understand true implication when a state like California corrections budget is larger than the entire state budget for higher education. And of course every year more prisons are being build to capitalize on ____________. You fill in the blank. Stan Johnson stanjj@mindspring.com http://www.alarise.org Mark Ritchie, President Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy 2105 First Ave. South Minneapolis, Minnesota 55404 USA 612-870-3400 (phone) 612-870-4846 (fax) mritchie@iatp.org www.iatp.org/iatp To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 16 06:25:06 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id GAA27185 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 06:25:05 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id FAA12524 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 05:43:10 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from hil-img-7.compuserve.com (hil-img-7.compuserve.com [149.174.177.137]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id FAA12506 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 05:43:06 -0500 (EST) Received: (from mailgate@localhost) by hil-img-7.compuserve.com (8.8.6/8.8.6/2.18) id FAA12896 for sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 05:42:37 -0500 (EST) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 1999 05:40:13 -0500 From: BILL DUESING <71042.2023@compuserve.com> Subject: Re: Organic Farming Economics Responce To: SANET-mg Message-ID: <199903160542_MC2-6E16-FACE@compuserve.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 31 In this country, 80 cents of every dollar spent on food is used to get the food from the farm to the eater. Only 20 cents gets to the farmer who spends on average 15 cents on inputs (labor, etc.) It seems that shrinking that 80 percent sector might prove more productive than shrinking the 15 percent one. And, according to USDA, the whole dollar is spent on agriculture-even when it buys Madison Avenue's services, TV time, packaging, supermarket shelf fees, etc. Bill Duesing To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 16 09:36:46 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id JAA01618 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 09:36:46 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id IAA03086 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 08:34:47 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from webserf.net (webserf.net [204.77.122.1]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with SMTP id IAA03056 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 08:34:42 -0500 (EST) Message-Id: <199903161334.IAA03056@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu> Received: from bluestem [204.77.126.155] by webserf.net (SMTPD32-4.03) id ADD381D2007A; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 07:34:11 CST From: "Bluestem Associates" To: "sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu" Date: Tue, 16 Mar 1999 13:30:46 Reply-To: "Bluestem Associates" X-Mailer: PMMail 98 Professional (2.01.1600) For Windows 98 (4.10.1998) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Subject: Organic Farming Economics Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 32 On Tue, 16 Mar 1999 05:40:13 -0500, BILL DUESING wrote: >In this country, 80 cents of every dollar spent on food is used to get the >food from the farm to the eater. Only 20 cents gets to the farmer who >spends on average 15 cents on inputs (labor, etc.) That's on produce. For commodities it's often 10 cents or less. John Ikerd and Charles Benbrook have each done some excellent work in this domain that is, alas, substantially more discouraging than your numbers. Benbrook has compared the ensemble of US production agriculture to other sectors of the agri-food industry, and the results are not pretty. Farming's aggregate return on gross revenues is 2.1%, compared to Food Service -- 3.4%; Retail Grocery -- 4.6%; Pesticides -- 5.9%; Food Processing -- 7.0%; and Seeds -- 12%. When looking at profits against assets, things are worse yet. Food Service -- 16.1%; Retail Grocery 10.6%; Food Processing -- 9.1%; Pesticides -- 3.9%; Seeds -- 3.7%; and finally, Farming -- a piddling 0.4%. If you adjust Benbrook's profits against assets numbers to account for average equity in those assets, farming's return on investment (ROI) is *still* under 1% (and actually closer to 0.7% !) That is roughly one-seventh the ROI to be had by putting the same money in a totally-safe US Treasury bond. And let's remember, too, that over three-quarters of US farmers have gross revenues under $50,000 and on average show a net *loss* of $3,000 per year. >It seems that shrinking that 80 percent sector might prove more productive >than shrinking the 15 percent one. Yes, indeed, though I'm not convinced that organic production (in itself) is the answer. As organics is currently evolving, we have a $4.00 box of organic corn flakes for which the farmer sees about 4 cents. Please explain how that is a substantial improvement on $3.00 conventional corn flakes, for which the farmer sees 3 cents. To survive, farmers need to think more like the shareholders of a corporation, focusing *first* on maximizing ROI. Getting our hands on a bigger chunk of that 80 per cent is a major element of that process. Most farmers, unfortunately, are content to work as staff for a business that has no over-arching internal management structure. As a result, the functions of VP Finance usually end up in the hands of the Banker. The role of VP Production goes to major input suppliers. And VP Marketing is most often the Buyer. All these external people are understandably trying to fatten their own bottom lines, which is how you end up with the kind of comparative returns that Benbrook cited. Farmers have a greater chance of financial success if they think *more* like business people, not less, and that success at least allows them the option of taking better care of their land. Farmers who have their backs against the wall financially are not particularly willing to change *anything* because they simply can't afford to make a mistake. Therein lies the core of our challenge in popularizing sustainable and organic agriculture. Attempting to address the agronomic issues before the management challenges are resolved it unlikely to be especially satisfying or effective. Bart Hall, Lawrence, Kansas To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 16 09:36:47 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id JAA01622 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 09:36:47 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id IAA01304 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 08:30:38 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from mail.caribe.net (root@mail.caribe.net [209.91.196.5]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id IAA01233 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 08:30:28 -0500 (EST) Received: from ddworley (ppp202.203dip.netdial.caribe.net [209.91.203.202]) by mail.caribe.net (8.9.0/8.9.0) with SMTP id JAA27818 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 09:33:12 -0400 (AST) Message-Id: X-Sender: ddworley@mail.caribe.net X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Pro Version 4.0 Date: Tue, 16 Mar 1999 05:44:00 -0400 To: sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu From: Richard Wolfson (by way of Daniel Worley ) Subject: GEN3-13; Fwd, Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 33 [Reposted with permission] ...... Sydney Morning Herald Saturday, March 13, 1999 Label gene food, says jury By DEBORAH SMITH After deliberating through the night until dawn, a citizen's jury at Australia's inaugural consensus conference brought down a unanimous report yesterday recommending that all genetically modified (GM) foods be labelled. The 14-member lay panel also called, in effect, for a short moratorium on any new commercial releases of GM foods in Australia, or the importation of unlabelled ones, until a better regulatory system was in place. It criticised the present regulatory bodies, including the Australia and New Zealand Food Authority which assesses the safety of new GM foods, for not serving community interests. It said: "The decision-making process is currently inaccessible and open to bias." It recommended a new statutory authority be established to oversee the introduction of gene technology, and that its deliberations be public. "The speed at which GM organisms have been developed and introduced by multinational companies and the scientific community has left many people completely unaware of and uninvolved in the process," the panel said. ........ posted by To: Date: Fri, 12 Mar 1999 PUBLICATION: The Spectator (UK) DATE: Fri 12 Mar 1999 BYLINE: Laurent Belsie Guess what's coming to dinner!: We are what we eat. But what are we eating? Gene-spliced plants and hormone-treated beef raise serious ethical questions about the way the world is fooling with Mother Nature Geneticists are on the verge of revolutionizing agriculture and medicine in much the same way that computers have transformed business. Labs around the world are working on crops that could feed a growing planet, plants that could clean up contaminated soils, and pigs whose organs may one day get trans-planted into people. But to do these things, scientists are fooling with nature's basic building blocks. As they do, they are kicking up dissent around the world as one nation tries to sell its genetically altered foods to another's grocers. The current food fight between the United States and Europe -- over hormone-treated beef and genetically altered soy beans -- could be just a prelude of arguments to come. That's because the greatest risks probably don't lie with today's simple genetic alterations. Future rounds of exotic agriculture pose bigger threats because they will put organisms to completely new uses. The fundamental question: How much should science manipulate nature to care for mankind? And there's no going back, scientists say. Consider the U.S. experience. While Europeans debate how far to proceed with the new technology, North Americans are quietly ingesting the new foods, often without knowing it. ``The genie can't be put back,'' says Marshall Martin, an agricultural economist at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Ind. ``Anyone who eats pizza or cheese on their hamburger has consumed genetically modified food ... We pulled the cork out of the bottle in a sense with the discovery of DNA.'' For example, three-quarters of America's cheese gets its start with a bio-engineered enzyme. Nearly one out of six dairy farmers injects his cows with a genetically engineered growth hormone to boost milk production. And genetically modified crops are increasingly taking over farmlands -- with some 70 million acres planted worldwide, 60 million of it in North America. This planting season promises more inroads. For example, half of America's soybeans, perhaps more of its cotton, and a third of its corn could be genetically modified -- a remarkable adoption rate in the four years since the new seeds were introduced. Other countries are also moving rapidly to incorporate the technology. Last year, some 650,000 farmers in China planted genetically modified cotton. And this year Monsanto, which produces the cotton seed, expects to double that number. Even the European Union has approved bio-engineered soybeans and corn. Small quantities of corn, genetically modified to resist pests, are being grown in Spain and, if approved by France's high court, could start showing up in the fields of Europe's largest corn producer. Biotech companies such as Monsanto hope that resistance to the technology will crumble once European farmers begin to adopt the new strains. That move is likely, companies say, because the new-fangled crops typically improve yields and cut costs. ``It's likely to be adopted because the value of the benefits will be recognized,'' says Philip Angell, a Monsanto spokesman. Take cotton, one of the world's most pest-prone crops. By incorporating the genes of a natural insecticide, scientists have created a pest-resistant strain that requires fewer chemicals. It ``has been massively beneficial,'' says Val Giddings, a vice president of the Biotechnology Industry Organization in Washington. In the three years since they began using it, U.S. farmers have saved the equivalent of 850,000 gallons of pesticides -- the equivalent of 48 railroad tank cars of chemicals. Cutting pesticide use saves money. According to newly released figures by one of Britain's leading plant-research centres, bio-engineered soybeans saved farmers an average $30 US a hectare (because they used 40 per cent less herbicide. Pest-resistant corn saved $42 per hectare. (A hectare represents some 2 1/2 acres.) Doug Powell, associate professor in the department of plant agriculture at the University of Guelph sees genetic engineering as ``one additional tool that allows farmers and food processors to provide nutritious, low-cost food. ``We always need to be vigilant but I am confident there is a system in place for this.'' Despite these benefits, environmentalists worry the new crops pose a bigger hazard to human health and the environment. They've caught the ear of many Europeans. The environmental group Greenpeace, for example, has mounted an effective campaign across Europe to block the sale of genetically modified food. In February, it persuaded biotech giant AgrEvo (Hoechst) not to conduct field trials of such crops in Austria. In January, it organized anti-bio-engineering protests at the national offices of three European food companies in nine countries. Thanks to a Greenpeace suit, France's highest administrative court in December upheld its preliminary ban on genetically modified corn from a Swiss firm. The debate rings loudest in Britain, where memories of the government's mishandling of ``mad-cow'' disease remain fresh. The issue has gone all the way to the top: Prime Minister Tony Blair is risking his popularity to support genetically modified foods, while Prince Charles says he will never eat any of them. Further confounding the issue have been the findings of Arpad Pusztai, a Scottish researcher who ignited the whole controversy. Last summer he was quietly feeding potatoes to rats. Then he went public with concerns about the genetically modified rations he was using. On one hand, the researcher claims he's enthusiastic about bioengineering's potential. But he warns that it has to be done right because genetically modified potatoes stunted the growth of rats and depressed their immune system. Pusztai has not released his full results for review by other scientists -- a traditional practice. And when an internal audit committee evaluated his study, it disputed the findings. But 20 scientists, including one from Canada, have come forward since, saying Pusztai may have a point. Whatever the outcome, even biotech executives acknowledge the controversy is likely to continue. ``I think we have to be very, very careful about how these technologies are applied,'' says Richard Gill, senior vice-president and general manger of BTG International Inc., a tech-transfer company with offices in the US, Britain, and Japan. ``There needs to be ... more information shared with people in a form that can be understood.'' Even in the United States, activists remain hopeful they can slow down the technology. Dairy farmer associations and consumer groups, for example, continue to battle the milk-boosting growth hormone. ``Americans are expressing their concern with genetic engineering and agribusiness in general, not in a political way but in the marketplace,'' says Ben Lilliston of the Center for Food Safety. That's why organic products are growing so rapidly, he says, and why some 200,000 citizens complained when U.S. agricultural officials proposed including bio-engineered food as organic. Concern is justified, scientists say, because no one can predict how nature will react when new organisms appear. ``We're not talking about killer tomatoes. We're talking about plants that will pick up genes,'' says Norm Ellstrand, a geneticist at the University of California at Riverside. Genes can only transfer to relatives. So genetically modified corn in Iowa doesn't pose much danger because it has no wild relatives there. But planted in central America, it could create super-weeds that could out-compete the corn. And the risks increase as more of these genetically modified plants get released into the wild and interact. __________________________________ Richard Wolfson, PhD Consumer Right to Know Campaign for Mandatory labelling and long-term testing of genetically engineered food 500 Wilbrod Street, Ottawa, ON K1N 6N2 email: rwolfson@concentric.net http://www.natural-law.ca/genetic/geindex.html subcription to genetic engineering news is $35 for 12 months. __________________________________ To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 16 09:46:46 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id JAA01750 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 09:46:45 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id IAA01252 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 08:30:31 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from mail.caribe.net (root@mail.caribe.net [209.91.196.5]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id IAA01169 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 08:30:23 -0500 (EST) Received: from ddworley (ppp202.203dip.netdial.caribe.net [209.91.203.202]) by mail.caribe.net (8.9.0/8.9.0) with SMTP id JAA27764 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 09:32:56 -0400 (AST) Message-Id: X-Sender: ddworley@mail.caribe.net X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Pro Version 4.0 Date: Tue, 16 Mar 1999 05:38:59 -0400 To: sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu From: Richard Wolfson (by way of Daniel Worley ) Subject: GEN3-14; Fwd, Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 34 [Reposted with permission] Here is a newsletter of GE news Mothers for Natural Law Biweekly News 99/03/14 1. Industrial Enzymes are Top Allergens 2. Australia: Study reveals side effects of synthetic insulin 3. Yield of GE crops 4. Bt resistance has emerged among pink bollworms 5. Australia: Label gene food, says jury 6. Malaysia: GM food must be labelled 7. NZ: DOCTORS WANT EXTREME CAUTION ON ALTERED FOOD 8. Australia: Gene food conference says more information needed 9. Third World rejects GM 10. UK: Fast-food outlets turn against GM food 11. S.Africa produces first gene-modified maize Articles have been aggressively shortened. ------------------ Subject: Industrial Enzymes are Top Allergens Summary of an article in the Swiss health magazine "PulsTip" posted by: creuss@bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Industrial enzymes are top triggers of allergies and asthma, according to a new dissertation from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH). A study with 110 participants showed that for 90% of asthma patients and 80% of neurodermitis patients, the symptoms either disappeared or were strongly reduced by eliminating industrial enzymes from their diet and from laundry detergents. Neurodermititis and food allergies have boomed since the 1960s when the industry started to artificially add enzymes to foods and laundry detergents. Industrial enzymes are used in a wide range of foods, to improve gains, processability, shelf-life, taste and other properties in flour, starches, pop drinks, fruit juices, oils, beer, whine, cheese and meat. These artificially-added enzymes don't have to be declared on the labels, and it is hard to avoid them. Many of these enzymes are produced by genetically modified organisms (GMOs), usually molds and bacteria. Since the produced enzymes are subsequently separated from the GMOs, the use of GMOs doesn't have to be declared. However, the separation is often incomplete, and residuals of the molds and bacteria are the main culprits of allergies. Industrial enzymes are a vast business. Novo Nordisk, the Danish market leader, makes about $500 million per year with industrial enzymes. The gains in the food industry by using these enzymes and the market of anti-allergy drugs are even bigger (billion$). It's not surprising that the industry and allergy research establishment refused to comment or cooperate on the new ETH research. ------------------ Copyright 1999 AAP Information Services Pty. Ltd. AAP NEWSFEED March 10, 1999, Wednesday Nationwide General News; Australian General News Study reveals side effects of synthetic insulin Up to 40,000 Australian diabetics may unwittingly be suffering adverse side-effects from taking genetically engineered synthetic insulin, The Sydney Morning Herald reported today. The paper was quoting British research completed six years ago but only now released. It said the availability of animal-derived alternatives, which doctors agreed suited some patients better, was about to be further limited by the withdrawal of the main brand of cattle-derived "beef" insulin from the market. Novo Nordisk would withdraw from the market in July, citing commercial reasons. The Herald said "pork" insulin was withdrawn in 1990 although the firm made it available to some people on "compassionate grounds". The UK research, commissioned by the British Diabetics Association, had found up to 10 per cent of diabetes patients might suffer side effects as a result of taking synthetic "human" insulin, the paper reported. ------------------ http://members.tripod.com/~ngin/farming.htm Low yielding GM-beet and rape in UK Farmers Weekly (UK) for the 4th December 1998 reveals that the latest crop trials from the UK's National Institute of Agricultural Botany (NIAB) show yields from GM winter oilseed rape and sugar beet were up to 7% and 8% less than high yielding conventional varieties when the crops were managed using conventional weed control techniques. Even with the use of a total herbicide on the GM-beet, to which it was modified to be resistant, only a 2% improvement in yield was achieved in 1997 and 1998, leaving it still significantly outperformed by the conventional varieties. Interestingly, this appears to be the first report in the popular farming press of GM trial crop performance results for varieties grown in the UK. The usual source of performance information is the biotechnology companies themselves. http://www.ucsusa.org/Gene/su98.rain.html Low-Yielding Bt cotton in Arkansas According to the April 1998 Cotton Grower, Bt-cotton growers in Arkansas had less than a banner year last season. A University of Arkansas study of several Bt and non-Bt cotton fields showed that on average Bt cotton yielded fewer pounds and lower income per acre. One farm showed a remarkable difference in yield--Bt cotton produced 168 fewer pounds per acre than the non-Bt variety. Bt cotton, on the farms studied, yielded an average of 24 fewer pounds per acre. Also, the new varieties required more growth regulator to synchronize plant development and had to be picked twice at harvest. Non-Bt cotton is typically picked only once. ------------------ FOOD BYTES #17 March 2, 1999 Ronnie Cummins & Ben Lilliston The mid-January 1999 issue of the California Farmer magazine reports that Bt resistance has emerged among pink bollworms, a major cotton pest, in Arizona cotton fields Biotech critics have warned for years that genetically engineered Bt crops will cause major crop pests to develop resistance to Bt, thereby destroying the usefulness of the world's most important natural biopesticide. ------------------ Sydney Morning Herald Saturday, March 13, 1999 Label gene food, says jury By DEBORAH SMITH After deliberating through the night until dawn, a citizen's jury at Australia's inaugural consensus conference brought down a unanimous report yesterday recommending that all genetically modified (GM) foods be labelled. The 14-member lay panel also called, in effect, for a short moratorium on any new commercial releases of GM foods in Australia, or the importation of unlabelled ones, until a better regulatory system was in place. ------------------ Copyright 1999 New Straits Times Press (Malaysia) Berhad New Straits Times (Malaysia) March 11, 1999 GM food must be labelled ... genetically-modified foods taste and look very much like their naturally-grown counterparts. The unsuspecting and uninformed consumer thus is totally unaware that he is buying GM food. Although the dangers of consuming these food have not been scientifically established, evidence is mounting that they can cause increased levels of toxins in humans and animals, a higher susceptibility to allergies and resistance to antibiotics. The more troubling aspect of these GM foods is that no quick scientific method exists to identify these produce. Adding to the problem, is the fact that these foodstuffs are not labelled. Information on these GM foods had been available over the past several years. But only in specialised publications and science articles. But thanks to a food security conference held in Penang last week the controversial issue was extensively discussed and publicised. The gist of the discussions was the call for the need to label these foods. The conference organiser, F. Josie of Consumers International's Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific, pointed out the problems these foodstuffs would pose. For one, the European Union has banned these foods. Thus countries like Malaysia are at a "high risk of being treated as a dumping ground for these items". For another, nothing is being done to prevent the entry of such foods. More importantly, we do not have any law that requires description of how the food was produced. Clearly then the Government must act fast before the dangers of consuming the GM food manifest themselves at the cost of the health, and worse, the lives, of consumers. It must enforce legislation that lets the people know what they are buying and eating. ------------------ Copyright 1999 AAP Information Services Pty. Ltd. AAP NEWSFEED March 10, 1999, Wednesday Nationwide General News; Overseas News NZPA News Bulletin DOCTORS WANT EXTREME CAUTION ON ALTERED FOOD WELLINGTON - Doctors have warned the Government to take "exceptional caution" about genetically modified food because research was incomplete and biased. The Royal New Zealand College of General Practitioners chairman Ralph Wiles said much of the research on genetically altered food raised serious health and environmental safety concerns. "Much of the information available is from the proponents of the technology - who stand to make a lot of money if it's widely approved - but we're now hearing more from independent scientists whose research points to significant risks," Dr Wiles said in a statement. "It's not being alarmist to urge that exceptional caution be applied until such time as we have available sufficient information to satisfy a reasonable person that the products of this technology are safe." ------------------ Copyright 1999 AAP Information Services Pty. Ltd. AAP NEWSFEED March 13, 1999, Saturday Nationwide General News; Australian General News Gene food conference says more information needed By Stephen Spencer CANBERRA, March 12 AAP - A landmark conference today called for the comprehensive labelling of genetically modified food and a halt to its import and development until a new regulatory regime is established. However the food industry welcomed the findings, saying they gave the green light to genetically modified foods to be sold here, and earn billions of dollars in exports. The consensus conference brought together 14 lay people who questioned experts of genetically modified foods and others with an interest in the topic. Their report released today was hailed by Australian Democrats Deputy Leader Natasha Stott Despoja, because of its call for comprehensive labelling to allow consumers to decide whether or not they bought such foods. ------------------ Sunday Independent (London) Feb 28, 1999 Third World rejects GM By Geoffrey Lean, Environment Correspondent The world's hungriest nations have resolved to oppose genetically modified foods. A senior Ethiopian government official last night told the Independent on Sunday they were "absolutely united" in resisting US plans to "decide what we eat". Dr Tewolde Gebre Egziabher was speaking after last week's talks collapsed in Cartagena, Colombia, following the United States' accusation that the developing countries were endangering free trade. An international treaty to regulate trade in GM produce had been discussed by 132 nations. ------------------ http://news2.thdo.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/uk/newsid%5F292000/292829.stm Monday, March 8, 1999 Published at 16:39 GMT UK Fast-food outlets turn against GM food Some restaurants are banning GM ingredients A survey has revealed further signs that consumers are turning against genetically-modified (GM) food. Almost half of the UK's leading fast-food outlets are turning their backs on GM food, according to research conducted by environmental group Friends of the Earth. The organisation asked 11 fast food chains with 50 or more outlets whether they were going to remove GM ingredients from the food they sold. Between them the 11 companies have 3,548 outlets across the UK. Three of the chains - Wimpy, Pizza Express and Domino's Pizza - already believe they are GM-free. Two others - Burger King and KFC - are in the process of removing all GM ingredients from their products. And McDonald's and Perfect Pizza said they were currently considering going GM-free. ------------------ S.Africa produces first gene-modified maize 10:06 a.m. Mar 05, 1999 Eastern By Allan Seccombe PRETORIA, March 5 (Reuters) - South Africa's first genetically modified grain has been grown commercially and will be sold on the market mixed with other grains, a leading seed seller said on Friday. ``Up to 50,000 hectares of genetically modified maize has been planted this season and will be sold in the commercial market,'' he said. Two strains of yellow maize, both resistant to stalk borer, a pest that attacks maize, were being commercially cultivated. Copyright 1999 Reuters Limited. ------------------ Mothers for Natural Law http://www.safe-food.org ==================================================== ......... Sunday Independent 14 Feb 1999 (UK) Stop GM Foods - Scientists find banned soya in UK products Government controls fail to stop illegal beans entering the food chain, writes Rachel Sylvester UNLICENSED genetically modified crops are entering the food chain in Britain because the Government is unable to control the import of ingredients. Traces of genetically modified soya beans which have not been licensed as safe for human consumption in Europe have been identified in products on sale in this country. ....... Sunday Indpendent (UK) 14 Feb 1999 Stop GM Food - Stray seeds land farmer in court By Marie Woolf in Bruno, Saskatchewan Farmers who find that stray genetically modified seeds have blown on to their land from neighbours' fields and then taken root could face massive fines if the agrochemical giant Monsanto wins a test case in a Canadian court. Percy Schmeiser, a farmer in Saskatchewan, Canada, is being pursued by Monsanto for damages and the profits from his fields because the company claims that the patent on its genetically modified (GM) seeds has been violated. GM canola (rape) plants from Monsanto seeds were found growing among his crops. The farmer believes that the seeds blew on to his land. If Monsanto wins the test case, due to go to court this autumn, British farmers in similar situations could also face court cases culminating in having to pay thousands of pounds in compensation. But Mr Schmeiser never signed a contract to grow Monsanto's GM canola and says he is not liable to the big fines the company imposes for using seed from crops. His fields run along a main road which links a grain silo and a rubbish dump where used seed sacks are thrown away. The prairies can be windy and cut crops are often blown on to neighbouring fields. ....... Sunday Independent 14 Feb Secret deal will ban GM crops until 2002 By Marie Woolf, Political Correspondent Genetically modified crops are to be banned for three years under a landmark deal being secretly negotiated between the Government and biotechnology companies. After weeks of confidential talks, ministers are poised to announce a breakthrough. Seed companies will agree to a voluntary freeze on growing GM crops in Britain until at least the year 2002. The deal, expected to be announced within the next three weeks, will mark a victory for campaigners, including the Independent on Sunday, who have called on the Government to delay planting GM crops in Britain until there have been more tests on their environmental effects. The new freeze will allow scientists to examine the effect of growing GM crops on other plants, birds and animals. __________________________________ Richard Wolfson, PhD Consumer Right to Know Campaign for Mandatory labelling and long-term testing of genetically engineered food 500 Wilbrod Street, Ottawa, ON K1N 6N2 email: rwolfson@concentric.net http://www.natural-law.ca/genetic/geindex.html subcription to genetic engineering news is $35 for 12 months. __________________________________ To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 16 10:45:37 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id KAA03174 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 10:45:37 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id JAA09788 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 09:37:37 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from bean.epix.net (bean.epix.net [199.224.64.57]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id JAA09598 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 09:37:27 -0500 (EST) Received: from epix.net (qrvl-243ppp102.epix.net [205.238.243.102]) by bean.epix.net (8.9.3/8.9.0/1998093001/Philippe Levan) with ESMTP id JAA21904; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 09:37:24 -0500 (EST) Message-ID: <36EE6D27.727BA0DC@epix.net> Date: Tue, 16 Mar 1999 09:39:36 -0500 From: Steve Groff Reply-To: sgroff@epix.net Organization: Cedar Meadow Farm X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.5 [en] (Win95; I) X-Accept-Language: en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Bluestem Associates CC: "sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu" Subject: Re: Organic Farming Economics References: <199903161334.IAA03056@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 35 Bluestem Associates wrote: > And let's remember, too, that over three-quarters of US farmers have > gross revenues under $50,000 and on average show a net *loss* of $3,000 > per year. > Bart, Is this actually true? How can 75% of US farmers have under $50,000 gross when we have all these big farms? Example: A 400 acre corn farmer @ only 100 bu/acre x 2.00 bu. is $80,000 gross. Something doesn't seem right about this info or maybe my personal intuiton is on the blink today. Steve Groff -- "New Generation Cropping Systems": the cutting edge of sustainable agriculture http://www.cedarmeadowfarm.com Steve Groff Cedar Meadow Farm 679 Hilldale Rd Holtwood PA 17532 USA Ph. 717-284-5152 To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 16 11:17:30 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id LAA04264 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 11:17:30 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id KAA08707 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 10:28:34 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from cornell.edu (cornell.edu [132.236.56.6]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id KAA08647 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 10:28:29 -0500 (EST) Received: from [128.253.49.40] (D5640.DIALUP.CORNELL.EDU [128.253.49.40]) by cornell.edu (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id KAA25880 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 10:28:26 -0500 (EST) X-Sender: rjt5@postoffice.mail.cornell.edu Message-Id: In-Reply-To: <36EE6D27.727BA0DC@epix.net> References: <199903161334.IAA03056@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Tue, 16 Mar 1999 10:28:14 -0500 To: "sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu" From: Bob Torres Subject: Re: Organic Farming Economics Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 36 At 9:39 AM -0500 3/16/1999, Steve Groff wrote: >Bluestem Associates wrote: > >> And let's remember, too, that over three-quarters of US farmers have >> gross revenues under $50,000 and on average show a net *loss* of $3,000 >> per year. >> > >Bart, >Is this actually true? How can 75% of US farmers have under $50,000 gross when >we have all these big farms? Example: A 400 acre corn farmer @ only 100 >bu/acre >x 2.00 bu. is $80,000 gross. Something doesn't seem right about this info or >maybe my personal intuiton is on the blink today. > >Steve Groff Hi, Seems to me that Bart's figure is right. I've been digging through the census of ag for the last few weeks looking at exactly this data. The majority of counties have a majority of farmers (somewhere quite close to that 75% figure) which sell less than $50,000 per year. Although this is an eye opener, these results might be misleading on their own because of the way in which the census categories a farm...the minimum income to be considered a farm is low, (can't remember the exact amt., though I think it is around $2000 in sales) so this might skew things downward and count lots of part time farms. But it is still quite telling of the state of ag in the US. Bob Torres -*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-* Bob Torres Ph.D. Student Department of Rural Sociology Cornell University 133A Warren Hall Ithaca, NY 14853 tel:607-255-9672 fax:607-254-2896 To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 16 12:08:22 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id MAA05319 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 12:08:21 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id LAA08763 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 11:20:06 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from hevanet.com (root@hevanet.com [198.5.254.1]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id LAA08747 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 11:20:01 -0500 (EST) Received: from [204.119.60.82] (pa-ppp46.hevanet.com [204.119.60.82]) by hevanet.com (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id IAA21543; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 08:19:59 -0800 (PST) Message-Id: <199903161619.IAA21543@hevanet.com> X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express for Macintosh - 4.01 (295) Date: Tue, 16 Mar 1999 08:22:16 -0800 Subject: FW: A Salad That Diamondback Moths Can't Resist From: "Lon J. Rombough" To: Bargyla Rateaver CC: SANET , OGL@lsv.uky.edu Mime-version: 1.0 X-Priority: 3 Content-type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 37 ---------- From: "ARS News Service" To: "ARS News List" Subject: A Salad That Diamondback Moths Can't Resist Date: Tue, Mar 16, 1999, 6:45 AM STORY LEAD: A Salad That Diamondback Moths Can't Resist ----------- ARS News Service Agricultural Research Service, USDA March 16, 1999 Tara Weaver-Missick, (301) 504-1619, tweaver@asrr.arsusda.gov ----------- What's a good way to stop hungry diamondback moths from nibbling on a farmer's cabbage, broccoli, kale and other cole crops? Agricultural Research Service scientists have an answer: give the pests a heaping serving of collard greens. Entomologist Everett Mitchell, at the ARS' Center for Medical, Agricultural and Veterinary Entomology in Gainesville, Fla., says giving the pest collards spoils its appetite for cabbage. The moths can't resist the all-you-can-eat collards when they're planted completely around cabbage field edges, a strategy called trap cropping that could also work to protect other cole crops. Invading diamondbacks stop and deposit their eggs on the collards rather than on adjacent cabbage plants. Diamondback populations continue to re-cycle in collards as long as plants remain green and continue to grow. Diamondback moths, named for the diamond-shaped markings on their wings, are becoming resistant to many chemicals. Spraying pesticides can be costly, ranging from about $10 to $21 an acre for each application, depending on which pesticides are used. It typically costs growers $80 to $168 per acre or more each season to produce a crop. Mitchell conducted recent experiments on farms in northeast Florida that showed the moths prefer to feed on highly fertilized collard plants. He tested this approach for more than two years. In all cases, he says, damage to cabbage by diamondback moth larvae was minimal. This simple, low-tech, cost-effective method also reduces pesticide use. Cabbage fields surrounded by collards required 75 to 100 percent fewer sprays to control diamondback moth than fields treated conventionally with pesticides. An in-depth article on this research appears in the March issue of Agricultural Research magazine. The story is also on the World Wide Web at: http://www.ars.usda.gov/is/AR/archive/mar99/diam0399.htm ARS is USDA's chief research agency. ---------- Scientific contact: Everett Mitchell, ARS Center for Medical, Agricultural and Veterinary Entomology, Gainesville, Fla., 32604, (phone) 352-374-5710, (fax) 352-374-5804, emitchell@gainesville.usda.ufl.edu. ---------- This item is one of the news releases and story leads that ARS Information distributes on weekdays to fax and e-mail subscribers. You can also get the latest ARS news on the World Wide Web at http://www.ars.usda.gov/is/pr/thelatest.htm. * Feedback and questions to ARS News Service via e-mail: isnv@ars-grin.gov. * ARS Information Staff, 5601 Sunnyside Ave., Room 1-2251, Beltsville MD 20705-5128, (301) 504-1617, fax 504-1648. To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 16 12:09:36 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id MAA05339 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 12:09:36 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id LAA08640 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 11:19:11 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from aurora.nal.usda.gov (aurora.nal.usda.gov [192.54.138.38]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id LAA08557; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 11:18:20 -0500 (EST) Received: by aurora.nal.usda.gov with Internet Mail Service (5.5.2448.0) id ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 11:21:23 -0500 Message-ID: From: Sustainable Agriculture Network To: "'sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu'" Cc: "'san-comm-mg@ces.ncsu.edu'" Subject: Excerpts from SAN cover crop book on the web Date: Tue, 16 Mar 1999 11:21:22 -0500 MIME-Version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2448.0) Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 38 Sanet: Most of you know already about the Sustainable Agriculture Network (SAN) publication on cover crops: Managing Cover Crops Profitably, 2nd Edition. 1998. We have posted excerpts of the full book on the web at http://www.sare.org/san/mccp2/ Hope you'll find these of interest! See the chapter on Cereal Rye for an idea of the comprehensive information on each cover crop. See also http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/pubs/ for excerpts or full text of other SAN publications. Andy Andy Clark, Ph.D. Sustainable Agriculture Network (SAN) Coordinator c/o AFSIC, Room 304 National Agricultural Library 10301 Baltimore Ave. Beltsville, MD 20705-2351 PH: 301-504-6425 FAX: 301-504-6409 san@nal.usda.gov http://www.sare.org To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 16 16:01:26 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id QAA12029 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 16:01:26 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id OAA09222 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 14:50:52 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id OAA09211 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 14:50:47 -0500 (EST) Received: from eagle.ACNS.ColoState.EDU (root@eagle.ACNS.ColoState.EDU [129.82.100.90]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id OAA08304 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 14:50:43 -0500 (EST) Received: from lamar.ColoState.EDU (lamar.ACNS.ColoState.EDU [129.82.100.75]) by eagle.ACNS.ColoState.EDU (AIX4.3/UCB 8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id MAA61596 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 12:50:46 -0700 Received: from edandsue (dialup0381.PPP.ColoState.EDU [129.82.53.225]) by lamar.ColoState.EDU (AIX4.3/UCB 8.8.8/8.8.8) with SMTP id MAA136262 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 12:50:36 -0700 Message-ID: <005401be6fe5$7da34ac0$e1355281@edandsue.colostate.edu> From: "Ed and Sue Sparling" To: Subject: Monsanto & GM seeds to be subject of NPR "All Things Considered" Date: Tue, 16 Mar 1999 12:44:56 -0700 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary="----=_NextPart_000_004F_01BE6FAA.CBB34700" X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.72.3110.5 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.3110.3 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 39 This is a multi-part message in MIME format. ------=_NextPart_000_004F_01BE6FAA.CBB34700 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable This afternoon "All Things Considered" will feature a special on = Monsanto and its GM seeds. A related item: DuPont is buying the rest of Pioneer Hybrid (see NY = Times or Wall St Journ). Ed Sparling Ag Econ Dept Colorado State Univ.=20 ------=_NextPart_000_004F_01BE6FAA.CBB34700 Content-Type: text/html; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable
This afternoon "All Things = Considered"=20 will feature a special on Monsanto and its GM seeds.
 
A related item: DuPont is buying the = rest of=20 Pioneer Hybrid (see NY Times or Wall St Journ).
 
Ed Sparling
Ag Econ Dept
Colorado State = Univ. 
 
 
 
 
------=_NextPart_000_004F_01BE6FAA.CBB34700-- To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 16 16:59:12 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id QAA13952 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 16:59:11 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id PAA17528 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 15:56:54 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id PAA17454 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 15:56:47 -0500 (EST) Received: from aae.wisc.edu (aae.wisc.edu [144.92.122.133]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id PAA09638 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 15:56:43 -0500 (EST) Received: from mojo.aae.wisc.edu ([144.92.244.223]) by aae.wisc.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.0) with SMTP id OAA03338; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 14:56:45 -0600 Message-Id: <199903162056.OAA03338@aae.wisc.edu> Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "Michele Gale-Sinex/CIAS, UW-Madison" To: sanet-mg@amani.ces.ncsu.edu, iffs@nal.usda.gov Date: Tue, 16 Mar 1999 14:56:38 -0500 Subject: Health problems/pesticide and fertilizer mixes CC: len.maurer@ccmail.adp.wisc.edu, dkaufman@discover-net.net, rlwills@execpc.com, klemme@aae.wisc.edu, stevenson@aae.wisc.edu, mperry@hsph.harvard.edu X-mailer: Pegasus Mail for Windows (v2.53/R1) Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 40 Howdy, all-- The following story can be found at: http://www.news.wisc.edu/thisweek/Research/Bio/Y99/pesticide.html Thought it would interest some of you. peace misha >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Pesticide, fertilizer mixes linked to range of health problems (posted 3/15/99) The natural mix of chemical pesticides and fertilizers, such as occurs when agricultural chemicals seep into groundwater, may have a broad range of effects on human and animal health, a new study shows. The study, published in the current issue of the journal Toxicology and Industrial Health, suggests that combinations of commonly used agricultural chemicals, in concentrations that mirror levels found in groundwater, can significantly influence the immune and endocrine systems as well as neurological health. Conducted over five years, the study of mice suggests that current methods used by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and others for studying the toxic effects of low-levels of pesticides may be flawed. "The single most important finding of the study is that common mixtures, not the standard one-chemical-at-a-time experiments, can show biological effects at current concentrations in groundwater," said Warren P. Porter, the lead author of the study and a UW-Madison professor of zoology and environmental toxicology. Although used worldwide, "tests for these compounds in combination are very rare, although they frequently co-occur." The experiments performed by Porter's group suggest that children and the developing fetus are most at risk from the pesticide-fertilizer mixtures. Their influence on developing neurological, endocrine and immune systems, said Porter, portend change in ability to learn and in patterns of aggression. The privately funded Wisconsin study focused on three commonly used farm chemicals: aldicarb, an insecticide; atrazine, a herbicide; and nitrate, a chemical fertilizer. All three are in wide use worldwide and are the most ubiquitous contaminants of groundwater in the United States. In the series of experiments, when mice were given drinking water laced with combinations of pesticides and nitrate, they exhibited altered immune, endocrine and nervous system functions. Those changes, according to Porter, occurred at concentrations currently found in groundwater. Effects were most noticeable when a single pesticide was combined with nitrate fertilizer. This was true for herbicide as well as insecticide, said Porter, and chips away at the notion that herbicides have no significant influence on animals. "Herbicides can have neurological impacts and hormonal impacts and immune impacts," he said. "They are not the harmless chemicals they are sometimes portrayed to be. They can be every bit as biologically active as insecticides or fungicides." The apparent influence of pesticide and fertilizer mixtures on the endocrine system -- the system of glands such as the thyroid that secrete hormones into the bloodstream -- may have a cascade effect, spilling over to the immune system and affecting fetal brain development. "Thyroid disruption in humans has multiple consequences," Porter said. Some of these include effects on brain development, level of irritability, sensitivity to stimuli, ability or motivation to learn, and altered immune function. A curious finding of the study is that animals may be more vulnerable to the influence of such chemicals depending on the time of year: "Our current working hypothesis is that animals are seasonally vulnerable because of subtle modulation of natural seasonal variation in hormone levels," according to Porter. "For example, thyroid hormone level varies seasonally and we have now shown that two different chemical mixtures will modulate thyroid hormone levels." The new study, Porter contends, adds to a growing body of evidence that current testing methods required for the registration and use of chemical pesticides are fundamentally flawed. In addition to a lack of testing of combinations of chemical compounds, Porter said there is a narrow focus on looking principally for carcinogenic effects or obvious cell mutations. Neurological, immune and endocrine tests for pesticides have been mandated by federal law for almost three years, but there has been no enforcement of these laws, Porter said. "Toxicological testing so far has been extremely limited in scope and focused on mechanisms that require extensive mutations or cell damage to show any effects. They do not adequately assess the potential for biological effects under real world exposure scenarios." Co-authors of the paper include James W. Jaeger of the UW-Madison Department of Zoology, and Ian H. Carlson of the Endocrinology Laboratory, University of Wisconsin Hospital. C 1999 Board of Regents of the University of Wisconsin System Source: UW-Madison Office of News and Public Affairs <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< Michele Gale-Sinex, communications manager Center for Integrated Ag Systems UW-Madison College of Ag and Life Sciences Voice: (608) 262-8018 FAX: (608) 265-3020 http://www.wisc.edu/cias/ >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> If you knew what life was worth, you would look for yours on earth. --Bob Marley To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 16 17:07:46 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id RAA14483 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 17:07:46 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id QAA21094 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 16:04:07 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from ccshst09.cs.uoguelph.ca (ccshst09.cs.uoguelph.ca [131.104.96.18]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id QAA21065 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 16:04:03 -0500 (EST) From: EWALL@envsci.uoguelph.ca Received: from fesnet.nw.uoguelph.ca ([131.104.238.2] (may be forged)) by ccshst09.cs.uoguelph.ca (8.8.6/8.8.6) with ESMTP id QAA10728; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 16:03:54 -0500 (EST) Received: from FESNET/SpoolDir by fesnet.nw.uoguelph.ca (Mercury 1.31); 16 Mar 99 15:53:38 GMT-5 Received: from SpoolDir by FESNET (Mercury 1.31); 16 Mar 99 15:53:26 GMT-5 Organization: Environmental Science To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu, rvanstaveren@iatp.com, cpieri@worldbank.org, csas001@unlvm.unl.edu, cflora@iastate.edu, Ray Bollman , Elin Gwyn , Helen Aitkin , Anne Wilcock , gr6xu@geonet.css.uoguelph.ca Date: Tue, 16 Mar 1999 15:53:24 EDT Subject: Call for Papers reminder for April 1 X-mailer: Pegasus Mail v3.1 (R1a) Message-ID: <131BEDB12818@fesnet.nw.uoguelph.ca> Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 41 Hello: Just a reminder to get your abstracts in to me by April 1; details are repeated below. Information about our conference can be found at our web site: www.oac.uoguelph.ca/FSR/ Apologies for duplications. Please pass on to interested colleagues. ***CONFERENCE ANNOUNCEMENT AND CALL FOR PAPERS*** Sustaining Agriculture in the 21st Century: Thinking "Outside the Box" Biennial Meeting - North American Chapter Association for Farming Systems Research and Extension (AFSR/E)October 20-23, 1999 University of Guelph, Guelph, Ontario, CANADA Linkages between agriculture and the changing social, economic, and bio-physical environment need to be understood and optimized if agriculture is going to meet the challenges of the 21st century. We invite you to submit abstracts for papers, posters, and panels that relate to one or more of the following 4 topics: 1. Farming Systems and Environmental Management Increasingly, agri-environmental schemes are being seen not only as vehicles for environmental enhancement, but also as a potentially important factor in marketing. Papers for this session should focus on: * Local, national and international standards for environmental management systems * Farming systems approaches to improve management of bio-physical resources * Public policy as a stimulus or constraint to implementation of environmental management systems. 2. Farming Systems and Technological Innovations In Ontario and throughout North America, consumer demand for food and food products that come from sustainable operations is on the increase. Papers for this session should focus on: *Identifying and exploiting new marketing opportunities *Farm level impacts of volatile financial markets and changing consumer preferences *Improving market access through alternative production practices and biotech products. 3. Farming Systems and Rural Communities Agriculture continues to dominate the physical landscape and cultural history of most regions even though its economic impact at the community level is reduced. Papers in this session should focus on: * Agriculture's role in re-building and enriching rural community life in the 21st century * Strategies that foster positive community-agriculture interactions * The effect of rural community change and service sector restructuring on the viability and quality of farm life 4. Farming Systems and Human Health Recent concerns about food safety have led directly to investigations about farming practices and their consequences for food production. Papers in this session should focus on: * Preventing food contamination on the farm * Implications of vertical integration for food safety * Occupational Health and Safety in agricultural production. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- The conference will combine formal paper sessions, panel discussions, and poster presentations along with informal conversations with local farmers experienced in "out of the box" thinking. Abstracts (maximum 250 words), should be submitted to the conference contact by April 1/1999. Abstracts accepted will be printed and made available to conference participants. An edited collection of selected papers will be published in a refereed conference proceedings to be made available in the year 2000. Details concerning the preliminary program, registration, and accommodation will be supplied in a second circular to be distributed in April, 1999. Conference Contact: Ellen Wall Email: ewall@envsci@uoguelph.ca Phone: 519 824 4120 ext 8480; Fax : 519 763 8933 Check the FSR website for more details: http://www.oac.uoguelph.ca/FSR/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Ellen Wall Research Scientist Farming Systems Research Plant Agriculture University of Guelph Guelph, Ontario, Canada N1G 2W1 phone: 519 824 4120 ext 8480 fax: 519 763 8933 To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 16 18:37:06 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id SAA17449 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 18:37:05 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id RAA23509 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 17:43:53 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id RAA23482 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 17:43:48 -0500 (EST) Received: from eagle.ACNS.ColoState.EDU (root@eagle.ACNS.ColoState.EDU [129.82.100.90]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id RAA12791 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 17:43:43 -0500 (EST) Received: from lamar.ColoState.EDU (lamar.ACNS.ColoState.EDU [129.82.100.75]) by eagle.ACNS.ColoState.EDU (AIX4.3/UCB 8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id PAA63824 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 15:43:45 -0700 Received: from edandsue (dialup0515.PPP.ColoState.EDU [129.82.54.104]) by lamar.ColoState.EDU (AIX4.3/UCB 8.8.8/8.8.8) with SMTP id PAA181474 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 15:43:43 -0700 Message-ID: <001201be6ffd$a7b4b700$68365281@edandsue.colostate.edu> From: "Ed and Sue Sparling" To: Subject: Re: Dupont--Pioneer Article Date: Tue, 16 Mar 1999 15:37:10 -0700 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.72.3110.5 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.3110.3 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 42 >From NY Times March 16, 1999 DuPont Paying $7.7 Billion for Pioneer Hi-Bred, Top Supplier of Farm Seed Related Article Dupont and Pioneer Discussing the Possibility of a Combination (March 13) Forum Join a Discussion on Merger Mania By DAVID BARBOZA uPont Co., seeking to create an agricultural powerhouse to match its giant chemical business, said Monday that it would pay more than $7.7 billion in cash and stock to buy the remaining 80 percent of Pioneer Hi-Bred International, the world's largest producer of seed corn. The deal -- which the companies had said on Friday was in the works -- is part of DuPont's effort to push aggressively into the life sciences arena, where it would compete in the race to create and develop genetically engineered seeds and crops. In acquiring Pioneer, a company that sells corn, soybean and other seeds, DuPont hopes to develop genetically altered seeds and sell them directly to farmers worldwide in tandem with DuPont's herbicides and pesticides. DuPont, which already owned 20 percent of Pioneer, said on Monday that it would acquire the remainder by paying the equivalent of $40 a share, with 45 percent of that in cash and 55 percent in stock. Shares of Pioneer, which is based in Des Moines, rose $4.0625 on Monday, or 11.8 percent, to $38.375. DuPont, based in Wilmington, Del., fell $1.50, to $56.25. Over the last year, analysts say, some of the world's largest drug and life sciences companies have been scrambling to position themselves in the fast-growing field of genetically engineered crops and drugs, and companies like DuPont want to be involved with seeds to guarantee greater access to that business. "The seed companies are the key to the whole world of biotech," said Leonard G. Teitelbaum, an analyst at Merrill Lynch & Co. "How do you get your seeds to the farmer? You don't put them in an envelope and mail them. It's through seed companies." At a news conference on Monday, Charles O. Holliday Jr., the chief executive of DuPont, said that while DuPont had not expected to make a large acquisition that might weaken the company's stock, rapid developments in the life sciences made such a deal urgent. Calling it "one of the most important mergers in U.S. history," Holliday said the acquisition of Pioneer would allow DuPont to participate in the creation of higher-yielding crops and more nutritious foods in a world where the amount of available arable land will soon be inadequate to handle a growing population. When asked why such a deal needed to take place now, he replied: "Speed. Speed. Speed." The company simply could not sit around and wait for things to happen, he said. If the acquisition is approved by regulators, DuPont will take control of the last remaining giant seed company, making DuPont a formidable competitor to Monsanto Co., which has acquired more than $8 billion worth of large seed companies over the last two years, adding the heft of being the world's largest seed company to its strengths in herbicides and genetic research. Monday's announcement appears to preclude any deal between DuPont and Monsanto, coming just weeks after executives close to the companies said the two were considering a giant combination that would join their life sciences and pharmaceutical divisions. Wall Street analysts say a deal between Monsanto and DuPont could now run into antitrust problems because of their dominant positions in seeds. Analysts praised Monday's deal, saying that there were indications that Pioneer had pushed itself into a marriage with DuPont after reports circulated about a DuPont-Monsanto deal. Still, several analysts said they were puzzled by the deal and how swiftly it had occurred. Beginning in late 1997, DuPont spent about $1.7 billion for a 20 percent stake in Pioneer, and the two companies agreed to collaborate on research and development. But under the terms of the agreement, DuPont agreed not to increase its stake for 16 years. The two companies have scrapped that agreement and over the weekend the boards of both companies agreed to the deal, which lets Pioneer retain its name and its headquarters in Des Moines, Iowa. "Pioneer had to be looking over its shoulder, and DuPont was looking to get deeper into life sciences," said George S. Dahlman, an analyst at Piper Jaffrey. "They had a chance to work with each other, so that made the deal easier." DuPont said that financing for some of the cash portion of the offer would come from the $4.4 billion raised in the spinoff last year of the Conoco energy unit. Holliday acknowledged that DuPont, which had revenue of more than $25 billion last year, had shown lackluster earnings growth last year. But he said DuPont was steering a new course toward pharmaceuticals and agriculture. DuPont said last week that it would create a separate tracking stock for its life sciences business to allow the operations to participate more actively in industry consolidation. The company also said that it planned to seek alliances in the pharmaceuticals business. Pioneer, which was founded in 1926 by Henry Wallace, who was a vice president under Franklin D. Roosevelt, has about 5,000 employees; DuPont has about 92,000 employees. The Wallace family currently has a 14 percent stake in Pioneer. To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 16 18:48:33 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id SAA17719 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 18:48:33 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id SAA09450 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 18:10:19 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id SAA09337 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 18:10:14 -0500 (EST) Received: from eagle.ACNS.ColoState.EDU (root@eagle.ACNS.ColoState.EDU [129.82.100.90]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id SAA13224 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 18:10:10 -0500 (EST) Received: from lamar.ColoState.EDU (lamar.ACNS.ColoState.EDU [129.82.100.75]) by eagle.ACNS.ColoState.EDU (AIX4.3/UCB 8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id QAA49698; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 16:10:10 -0700 Received: from edandsue (dialup0515.PPP.ColoState.EDU [129.82.54.104]) by lamar.ColoState.EDU (AIX4.3/UCB 8.8.8/8.8.8) with SMTP id QAA114276; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 16:10:08 -0700 Message-ID: <002e01be7001$587e4120$68365281@edandsue.colostate.edu> From: "Ed and Sue Sparling" To: Cc: Subject: NPR Report on Monsanto Date: Tue, 16 Mar 1999 16:04:27 -0700 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary="----=_NextPart_000_002B_01BE6FC6.AB0B3A00" X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.72.3110.5 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.3110.3 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 43 This is a multi-part message in MIME format. ------=_NextPart_000_002B_01BE6FC6.AB0B3A00 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Dear Sustainable Ag Network Subscribers: How did you all react to the "All Things Considered piece on Monsanto?" = My reaction was that the Monsanto PR dept had a big hand in it. = Interesting that Clinton is going to give Fraley (former PR man for = Monsanto) a medal. Ouch!=20 I have to wonder if tommorow's part 2 will incorporate a serious = consideration of concerns about the effects of bt GM plants on the = organic farming sector. It seems pretty irresponsible reporting if Dan = Charles (NPR reporter) hasn't talked to Charles Benbrook (for example).=20 Ed Sparling Professor Emeritus Dept Agric Economics Colorado State University ------=_NextPart_000_002B_01BE6FC6.AB0B3A00 Content-Type: text/html; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable
Dear Sustainable Ag Network=20 Subscribers:
 
How did you all react to the = "All Things=20 Considered piece on Monsanto?" 
 
My reaction was that the Monsanto PR = dept had a=20 big hand in it.  Interesting that Clinton is going to give Fraley = (former=20 PR man for Monsanto) a medal.  Ouch! 
 
I have to wonder if tommorow's part = 2 will=20 incorporate a serious consideration of concerns about the effects of bt = GM=20 plants on the organic farming sector.  It seems pretty = irresponsible=20 reporting if Dan Charles (NPR reporter) hasn't talked to Charles = Benbrook (for=20 example). 
 
Ed Sparling
Professor Emeritus
Dept Agric Economics
Colorado State=20 University
------=_NextPart_000_002B_01BE6FC6.AB0B3A00-- To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 16 18:58:50 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id SAA17915 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 18:58:50 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id SAA15863 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 18:21:11 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from scaup.prod.itd.earthlink.net (scaup.prod.itd.earthlink.net [207.217.120.49]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id SAA15807 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 18:21:04 -0500 (EST) Received: from ip176.wheeling2.wv.pub-ip.psi.net (ip176.wheeling2.wv.pub-ip.psi.net [38.30.202.176]) by scaup.prod.itd.earthlink.net (8.8.7/8.8.5) with SMTP id PAA25994 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 15:21:01 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <36EF10FF.292F@earthlink.net> Date: Tue, 16 Mar 1999 18:18:39 -0800 From: Robert DuBoff & Heather Crocker Organization: Hero Enterprises, Inc. X-Mailer: Mozilla 2.0 (Win95; I; 16bit) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Subject: Re: npr story on monsanto GE References: <199903161332.IAA02238@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 44 Hi all- Just finished listening to a story on National Public Radio - All Things Considered about Monsanto's difficulties with selling the world on GE seeds. Much of the story was Monsanto reps talking about what a blessing Roundup Ready and seeds with Bt are to farmers. The rest covered resistance in the UK and India, and some discussion of terminator technology. Except for a BRIEF interview with Hope Shand from RAFI, there was inadequate explanation of the potential adverse consequences of GE. Another segment on Monsanto/GE is scheduled for tomorrow (3/17) on All Things Considered. I'm about to scurry around getting some hard data to send in my response to the story - does anyone have any suggestions for a concise but really thorough stats on GE? Would love to hear other people's impressions of the story too - anybody hear it? Thanks! Heather Crocker St. Clairsville, OH To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 16 21:20:19 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id VAA21056 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 21:20:19 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id UAA13739 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 20:34:24 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from alpha.matrixinet.com (alpha.matrixinet.com [205.254.232.10]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id UAA13612 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 20:34:17 -0500 (EST) Received: from [205.254.241.236] (term6-34.vta.west.net [205.254.241.226]) by alpha.matrixinet.com (8.9.1a/8.9.1) with SMTP id RAA25156 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 17:32:30 -0800 (PST) Message-Id: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Date: Tue, 16 Mar 1999 17:34:00 -0700 To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu From: colibri@west.net (Beth von Gunten) Subject: DuPont Press Release on Merger w/Pioneer Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-MIME-Autoconverted: from quoted-printable to 8bit by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu id UAA13647 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 45 Pioneer Merger Another Major Step in DuPont Life Sciences Strategy As reported in yesterday's news flash edition of Network News, DuPont and Pioneer HiBred International have announced a definitive agreement for a stock and cash merger that will result in DuPont's complete ownership of Pioneer. DuPont currently has a 20 percent interest in Pioneer. "This transaction is another major step in DuPont's life sciences strategy and will strengthen and accelerate its capability to discover, develop and commercialize a new generation of products across the value chains for food and feed crops, food ingredients, industrial applications and nutrition science," according to a news release issued yesterday. Under the terms of the agreement, Pioneer shareholders will receive USD 40 per share, with 45 percent of the shares receiving cash and 55 percent of the shares receiving DuPont stock. Pioneer shareholders will have certain rights to elect which form of consideration they receive. The merger is expected to close during the summer of 1999. The total equity value of the transaction is estimated to be approximately USD 7.7 billion for the 80 percent of Pioneer not currently owned by DuPont. "One of the Most Important Mergers in U.S. History" "I believe this is one of the most important mergers in U.S. history," DuPont Chairman and CEO Chad Holliday said at a news conference in New York City yesterday following the announcement of the merger agreement between DuPont and Pioneer. "We are joining with an old friend, to fundamentally improve the quantity and quality of food per acre." Chad went on to make six points: "We do have the critical mass to lead now" in life sciences. "With Pioneer we are leaders in the input and output traits of farming" (adding value for the farmer and for the ultimate consumer). "Pioneer is a leader in germ plasma." "Pioneer has a first-rate management, under Chuck Johnson." "Our interests are closely aligned." "Pioneer will operate under its own name, in its own home of Des Moines, Iowa, and with its own culture." Chuck Johnson, chairman and CEO of Pioneer, said: "This will be the most powerful agricultural technology force in the world. We know DuPont and we have a common vision of increased production for farmers and the quality of the products they grow. Plant genetics are the only way for farmers to increase production without opening up new, fragile land." In answer to a question, he said Pioneer had some 60 hybrids in the pipeline and "a whole stream of opportunities to add traits" in the years ahead. DuPont Chief Financial Officer Gary Pfeiffer said the deal was expected to be closed by the end of the third quarter. In a later interview on CNBC TV, Chad said: "By August this year there will be six billion people in the world and it is our ambition to feed them the most nutritional food possible." He reiterated that "DuPont is a science company" incorporating different kinds of science, including materials science. Chad: "Let's Welcome the People of Pioneer" In his latest letter to employees, DuPont Chairman and CEO Chad Holliday talks about the acquisition of Pioneer, declaring: "It is a major step in our sustainable growth strategy and our plans to increase shareholder value. "This transaction will strengthen and accelerate our ability to discover, develop and commercialize a new generation of products for food and feed crops, food ingredients, industrial applications and nutrition science," he continued. "It fully supports our goal of helping improve the world's food supply by increasing the quantity and quality of nutrition per acre. It is truly another 'leap' for DuPont Ö and will enhance an already outstanding science and technology platform and marketing capability. It will Ö accelerate the integration of DuPont's biology, chemistry and genomics with Pioneer's leading market position and research and development capabilities. The end result should be significantly increased shareholder value. "Both of our companies share a strong focus on customers and have compatible cultures and values," he concluded. "Please join me in welcoming the people of Pioneer fully into the DuPont family." DuPont Pioneer Merger Provides Mutual Benefits Commenting on the agreement for DuPont to acquire Pioneer, The Wall Street Journal noted yesterday that there were mutual benefits. "DuPont, whose scientists have probably had the most success at genetically altering the nutritional attributes of crops, would get direct control of the world's biggest proprietary seed bank as well as a global seed sales force," the article suggested. "Pioneer's agreement to be acquired represents a big cultural change for the 73-year-old company, which was founded by one-time U.S. Vice President Henry A. Wallace," The Wall Street Journal pointed out. However, it noted benefits to Pioneer, including what DuPont brings to the table in terms of genes and "deep pockets". Subscribers to The Wall Street Journal Interactive Edition can read the full report at http://interactive.wsj.com/articles/SB921268716949898331.htm --------- Further info: http://www.dupont.com/corp/whats-new/newsfile/990316.html#one To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 16 21:22:41 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id VAA21079 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 21:22:41 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id UAA12230 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 20:33:06 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from alpha.matrixinet.com (alpha.matrixinet.com [205.254.232.10]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id UAA12051 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 20:32:56 -0500 (EST) Received: from [205.254.241.236] (term6-34.vta.west.net [205.254.241.226]) by alpha.matrixinet.com (8.9.1a/8.9.1) with SMTP id RAA24816 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 17:31:10 -0800 (PST) Message-Id: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Tue, 16 Mar 1999 17:32:40 -0700 To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu From: colibri@west.net (Beth von Gunten) Subject: Fwd: Korean Action Against Genetic Crops Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 46 DATE: Tue, 16 Mar 1999 15:20:29 From: DAMN To: damn@tao.ca Title: Korean Action Against Genetic Crops Date: 12-MAR-1999 Source: "Antti.rautiainen" Korean students and environmental activists today organized a direct action against the irresponsible use of GM(genetically-modified) technology, at the center of Korean agricultural biotechnology - the National Institute of Agricultural Science and Technology (NIAST). NIAST, funded by the Korean Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry (MAF), proclaims itself to be the key research institute responsible for the development of sustainable agricultural technologies that are environment-friendly. However, it was revealed last year that NIAST had secretly carried out the field trials of GM crops even though Korea did not have anylegislations regarding the release of GMOs into the environment. On February this year, the Rural Development Administration (RDA) announced that NIAST developed eight different GM crops, including Rice, Cayenne,Chinese cabbage, Tobacco, and Tomato. According to the RDA, these GM crops will be put on market by 2001. And yet, the Korean government keeps silent about the issues of biosafety and bioethics. The action started at 11 a.m. when about ten students and activists occupied and blockaded the greenhouse at the NIAST, where the field trials of GM crops were being conducted. They placed a big banner with the "X" symbol over the greenhouse, and chained themselves to its entrance. Other activists demonstrated outside the greenhouse with placards raised, which read "No Genetic Engineering". "Koreans are shaken by the fact that the government allows the field trials of GM crops while it does not even have a legislation or agency to monitor and regulate the experiments," said one participant. "Genetic engineering is good for the economy, they say. But can this be a good excuse for ignoring the environment, public health and ethical considerations?" "We're here today to let the government and those researchers involved know how the public feels about their incompetence, arrogance, and lack of responsibility." The students and activists called for: 1) Immediate ban on the release of GMOs into the environment (including GM foods and field trials) 2) Immediate ban on the import of GM crops and foods. 3) Moratorium on agricultural R&Ds using GM technology. until strict legislations regarding biosafety and bioethics have been enacted and come into force. They also demanded: 4) Establishment of an independent institution to organize democratic debates on the health, ecological, societal and ethical consequences of Genetic Engineering. 5) Democratic participation in the regulatory decision-making. The action wasstopped around 3 p.m. when the police intervened to break the protest. Some of the activists and students were arrested and were released after being held for 3 hours. This is the DAMN News Email list http://damn.tao.ca To unsubscribe, send an email to majordomo@tao.ca Asking to: unsubscribe damn ***DAMN DISCLAIMER - IMPORTANT PLEASE NOTE*** DAMN receives many unsolicited reports and tries but can not verify all information contained within. DAMN therefore disclaims responsibility for the information in this message and urges you to contact the reporter personally for further verification. To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 16 21:25:08 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id VAA21106 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 21:25:08 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id UAA05598 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 20:22:45 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id UAA05590 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 20:22:40 -0500 (EST) Received: from sp2n17.missouri.edu (sp2n17-t.missouri.edu [128.206.2.27]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id UAA14964 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 20:22:37 -0500 (EST) Received: from mail.coin.missouri.edu (Mizzou-AS2-10.missouri.edu [128.206.205.58]) by sp2n17.missouri.edu (8.9.0/8.9.0) with ESMTP id TAA729172 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 19:22:14 -0600 Message-ID: <36EF0503.3EA126F1@mail.coin.missouri.edu> Date: Tue, 16 Mar 1999 19:27:32 -0600 From: Kevin Webb Reply-To: kwebb01@mail.coin.missouri.edu Organization: b01 X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.5 (Macintosh; I; PPC) X-Accept-Language: en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: sanet-mg@amani.ces.ncsu.edu Subject: Re: NPR Report on Monsanto References: <002e01be7001$587e4120$68365281@edandsue.colostate.edu> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; x-mac-type="54455854"; x-mac-creator="4D4F5353" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 47 Was there a story too? I just heard the commercial for Monsanto... Ed and Sue Sparling wrote: > Dear Sustainable Ag Network Subscribers: How did you all react to the > "All Things Considered piece on Monsanto?" My reaction was that the > Monsanto PR dept had a big hand in it. Interesting that Clinton is > going to give Fraley (former PR man for Monsanto) a medal. Ouch! I > have to wonder if tommorow's part 2 will incorporate a serious > consideration of concerns about the effects of bt GM plants on the > organic farming sector. It seems pretty irresponsible reporting if > Dan Charles (NPR reporter) hasn't talked to Charles Benbrook (for > example). Ed SparlingProfessor EmeritusDept Agric EconomicsColorado > State University To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 16 21:31:12 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id VAA21203 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 21:31:12 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id UAA21105 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 20:48:21 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from snipe.prod.itd.earthlink.net (snipe.prod.itd.earthlink.net [207.217.120.62]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id UAA21003 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 20:48:15 -0500 (EST) Received: from earthlink.net (pool033-max1.ds6-ca-us.dialup.earthlink.net [207.217.230.33]) by snipe.prod.itd.earthlink.net (8.8.7/8.8.5) with ESMTP id RAA12541; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 17:48:08 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <36EE72FE.72F0AF8A@earthlink.net> Date: Tue, 16 Mar 1999 07:04:30 -0800 From: Bargyla Rateaver X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.04 [en] (Win95; I) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Argall Family CC: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Subject: Re: UW release: acid linked to soil aging References: <000901be6c17$13d498a0$2b3325cb@p2> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 48 It is easy to see why the writers zeroed in on legumes and blame them. They will tell any kind of lies to support their opposition and sneering at organic methods, which in this case is done in a slanting/hidden way. Of course it is a lie. Everyone knows that legumes build up soil value, in any kind of rotation. I am grateful to these writers to hear about acacia value. I see that they readily fall down, did not know it was helpful to cut them at year 3 and utiize their soil addition. Also the idea of a legume monoculture. Thanks for that info. ===================== Argall Family wrote: > I am newly subscribed to Sanet. I have had a (very small) certified organic > orchard in south eastern Australia for some years, previously did some > conventional cattle farming, also very small. > > Steve Diver wrote > > >1. Why did the researchers suggest that natural sources of > nitrogen such as legumes (clovers, vetches, cover crops) > cause as much acidification as chemical nitrogen sources > (ammonium nitrate, anhydrous ammonia, etc.)??? > > This generalisation about plant effects does seem to need qualification. > Acacia spp actually raise pH while also fixing nitrogen. Hence, the value of > allowing/encouraging natural [here in Australia] regeneration of wattle > [Acacia] trees in an orchard when it is young. The wattles, a major pioneer > species here, grow quickly, most of them would if left alone fall over at > age 15-20, but if removed at 3 years or so will noto nly have done a major > job opening rock with invasive root systems, but also will (easily observed) > produce a nitrogen effect in the root area, for other trees/plants/pasture > for a couple of years at least. The rotting root systems also provide soil > benefit, apart from the nitrogen nodulation. These trees do not sucker, > unlike the nitrogen fixing pioneer Alder. > > Sadly, these facts on the value of wattles are known better to permaculture > people than to conventional farmers here, who clear out wattles (woody > weeds) and plant pasture adding superphosphate, believing that the rapid > performance of the newly cleared land is due to the phosphorus when it is > probably almost entirely due to the clearance of the nitrogen fixers and the > sulphuric acid in the super bag. > > I would think a major distinction should be made between use of legumes as > rotation, where they die or are dug back in, and constant maintenance of a > leguminous pasture. I have always had the (intuitive) view that no nitrogen > fixing plant with any brains, any more than any other organism, is concerned > about looking after others rather than itself. Maximum nitrogen effects are > likely to arise from allowing a succession away from the nitrogen fixer. > Keeping a nitrogen fixer in one place for a long time is likely to have > deleterious effects as with any other monoculture. > > Which is not to say that I disagree with the following, which emphasises > that it is not the legumes per se but the cultural practices associated with > their use which impact on soil negatively or positively. > > >If you think [Steve said] about long-term studies and real life situations > where > side by side farms are managed by organic or conventional > methods, I am pretty sure you'd find wide enough differences > in soil quality characteristics to disprove the statement that > nitrogen from legumes is just as harmful as chemical nitrogen.... > especially when viewed from a whole farm perspective, there are > humus complexes and soil foodwebs that can bind and fix nitrogen > thus preventing its ability to contribute towards soil acidification. > > Steve also wrote: > > >Interestingly, compost is known to raise the pH of acid soils > closer to neutral, as well as lowering the pH of basic soils > closer to neutral. Compost helps soils adjust towards neutral > whether the pH is high or low. > > ...which is why it is useful to regard composting as essentially simply an > acceleration, centralisation and intensification of good soil building > techniques, with some further health benefits if high temperatures are > established. > > One green manure technique for bringing available calcium into the > biological content of the soil, which is inexpensive on a small property, is > to spread inexpensive feed oats and cut the young (calcium scavenging) crop, > before it goes to seed. > > Dennis Argall > > To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command > "unsubscribe sanet-mg". > To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command > "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". > > All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: > http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 16 21:36:23 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id VAA21263 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 21:36:23 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id UAA21417 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 20:48:42 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from snipe.prod.itd.earthlink.net (snipe.prod.itd.earthlink.net [207.217.120.62]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id UAA21287 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 20:48:31 -0500 (EST) Received: from earthlink.net (pool033-max1.ds6-ca-us.dialup.earthlink.net [207.217.230.33]) by snipe.prod.itd.earthlink.net (8.8.7/8.8.5) with ESMTP id RAA13132; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 17:48:28 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <36EE84C3.6AE82950@earthlink.net> Date: Tue, 16 Mar 1999 08:20:19 -0800 From: Bargyla Rateaver X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.04 [en] (Win95; I) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: "Anita Graf (Staff)" CC: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Subject: Re: prison labor in organic ag References: <124471940958@agecon.uga.edu> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 49 One main thing I heard from Ms. Sneed, was how/why so many of those people turned to crime. She really understands the frustration of those who have so many strikes on them to start with, and to the same hopeless environment to which they have to return.. She tries to give them some hope for something better, altho knowing some mayl never really change. The overall record for her is success--this program has really changed thinking of some, and all get something better to do than just sit inside and hate. I think people should all see her and hear her talk ==================== Anita Graf (Staff) wrote: > Hi Loren, > I just had to tell you that I think you were really harsh on the > person who proposed prison labor for organic farms. He/she might have > been totally off base for the reasons you mentioned, but I fully > believe that his/her intentions were good and didnt' deserve such a > cyber bashing. Maybe prison labor shouldn't be "farmed" out to > commercial operations, but surly the plight of prisoners is a sorry > one (and those of all the rest of us who then have to live with > criminals who come out of prisons even worse than when they entered) > and seeking solutions to this should be applauded, even if those > solutions need some tweeking. I almost never hear anyone proposing > anything constructive and regenerative for prisoners to do; all I ever > see on tv are people wanting to "lock 'em up forever and throw away > the key." Personally, I think there's enough work to go around for > all and prisoners just like immigrants aren't ever going to be in a > position to swipe all those good paying jobs from the rest of us. I > would rather see prisoners working on something constructive than just > honing their criminal skills and deepening their anger and violence > toward themselves and the rest of us (either we're "paying" their > salaries). So, please, stop screaming and overreacting to one > person's vision of a viable solution. > > > Date: Fri, 12 Mar 1999 12:41:47 -0800 > > From: Loren Muldowney > > Subject: Re: Organic Farming Economics > > > > > I've surmised that organic agriculture is so expensive because > > > the labor is so expensive. There is a free labor source waiting to be > > > tapped--prisons. > > > > This is probably a joke. I hope so. If I believed it could be sincere, > > I would respond with the following: > > > > - ------------------------------------- > > > > I may never stop screaming. > > > > I specifically boycott all goods made by prison labor, since it is > > exploitative of not only of prisoners, but more importantly of those > > working people who have NOT turned to crime as a lifestyle. > > > > The organic agriculture paradigm was created by shunning short-term > > economic theory. I don't think this will ever fly, if the consumers > > know about it; it would have to be kept from them intentionally. Since > > the point of organic marketing is to make full information available to > > the consumer, this lovely scenario would be better pursued in the > > "conventional" agriculture sphere. I just heard they are cutting the > > tails off of dairy cows for "economic" reasons, so probably they > > wouldn't bat an eye at this suggestion either. > > > > Not only that, but some our more sleazy mall stores have been using the > > "made in america" marketing, which appeals to those who deliberately > > support working non-criminal fellow citizens, to label goods made by > > prisoners as "made in america." It is a "solution" which "works" right > > at this moment, because many people are simply unaware that it is going > > on. Most people currently believe it to be illegal, being so clearly > > repugnant a concept. > > > > I can't wait to post this incredible suggestion at the natural foods > > coop and see everybody mobilize for the boycott. > > > > Anita Graf > 313-F Conner Hall > Dept. of Agricultural and Applied Economics > University of Georgia > Athens, GA 30602-7509 > (706) 542-1915 phone > (706) 542-0739 fax > agraf@agecon.uga.edu > > To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command > "unsubscribe sanet-mg". > To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command > "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". > > All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: > http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 16 21:36:56 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id VAA21272 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 21:36:56 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id UAA21486 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 20:48:47 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id UAA21277 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 20:48:31 -0500 (EST) Received: from snipe.prod.itd.earthlink.net (snipe.prod.itd.earthlink.net [207.217.120.62]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id UAA15432 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 20:48:28 -0500 (EST) Received: from earthlink.net (pool033-max1.ds6-ca-us.dialup.earthlink.net [207.217.230.33]) by snipe.prod.itd.earthlink.net (8.8.7/8.8.5) with ESMTP id RAA12864; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 17:48:19 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <36EE806B.38E8738A@earthlink.net> Date: Tue, 16 Mar 1999 08:01:47 -0800 From: Bargyla Rateaver X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.04 [en] (Win95; I) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Shoshanah.Inwood@oberlin.edu CC: Loren Muldowney , sanet-mg@amani.ces.ncsu.edu, yolanda.p.cruz@oberlin.edu, jenna.hill@oberlin.edu Subject: Re: Organic Farming Economics Responce References: <1658552.3130251199@pac2.public.oberlin.edu> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 50 Ms Sneed was "lucky" to be able to use a large empty field right beside the prison. She never suggested that prisoners be sent to farms to learn how to grow food. She tried to find a way to give them ssomething productive to do, and realized the pleasure they would get from seeing a plant they grew by themselves--something creative, something productive from their own hands. Most of them would never have even a yard to use, but some would go on and utilize the new skill. But at least it was good for them to work thiss way, and they were never required, just offered the chance. It was a wonderful idea and helped many in several ways. You should just hear her and see her slides. ================== Shoshanah.Inwood@oberlin.edu wrote: > --On Fri, Mar 12, 1999 4:40 PM -0500 "Shoshanah Inwood" > wrote: > > > Thank-you Michael for so eloquently explaining Catherine Sneeds program at > > the San Francisco prison. I believe her program is a model that can be > > expanded and applied throughout the country. > > > > Loren allow me to respond to your comments and expand on my initial > e-mail: > My initial e-mail was written in very simplistic terms and ideas for a > number of reasons. I was looking to gage the responsiveness of participants > in the field of organic/sustainable agriculture. I am fully aware that just > stating that prisoners should be put to work on organic farms is an > idealistic statement that leads to endless questions: such as how many and > what types of prisoners should be allowed to work on farms and how to ensure > farmer, community and prisoner safety. > I was looking to see how receptive people are to this idea especially the > farmers, where is their level of convertibility at? > > All one needs to do is read a newspaper to see how high recidivism rates > are. This indicates that the present criminal justice system is not > effective at deterring crime or "rehabilitating" prisoners. You object to > supporting those who have chosen a "criminal lifestyle", we need to ask why > have they chosen that life style. And if this is the only means of survival > they know, then it is logical to conclude that they will return to this > lifestyle once released from prison unless they are presented with other > alternatives. I am curious why you think that training prisoners to do farm > labor is so wrong, especially if it is non-exploitive. By boycotting > products made by prisoners you deny their existence and their right to be > productive citizens. People who are in prison have broken the law and > usually deserve to go to prison. But once they aquire the label of > "prisoner" do they automatically loose their humanity and all of their > rights? And I might add that even if an individual is in prison they are > still an American. > > > >> Many programs throughout the country involving prisoners growing > food(such as Sneed's project in San Francisco) donate a portion of the crop > to soup kitchens, back to the community from which many of the prisoners > came from. The prisoners are working to give something back to their > community and are learning about responsibility and building marketable job > skills. By working on farms, especially small organic farms prisoners would > have the opportunity to learn about marketing, accounting and advertising, > giving them experiences, which can open up worlds to them never before > known. > > > > Why would consumers not be told about who was growing there food? I > > would think people would appreciate knowing that the food they are buying > > is also an investment in their community. To reduce the anger and reduce > the crime rate, isn't this one of the major concerns in almost every city > and town in America? I have been a member of many different types of co-ops > and one of their commonalties is to promote and support improving local > communities: socially, politically and economically. Prison labor would be > helping local growers to increase their crop yield and their economic > survival. > > The future is a rapidly changing place, everyday we learn more about the > agri-chemical/life science companies genetically engineered products, along > with the effects of herbicides and pesticides. The challenge to organic > farming is to make it more cost effective so that it can be marketed and > readily available to a greater number of people at a lower cost. Yes this > is our capitalistic society. These are the confines we must operate within. > Sometimes you play with the bosses rules in order to win the game > > Shoshanah Inwood > > On Fri, 12 Mar 1999, Loren Muldowney wrote > >> > >> ------------------------------------- > >> > >> I may never stop screaming. > >> > >> I specifically boycott all goods made by prison labor, since it is > >> exploitative of not only of prisoners, but more importantly of those > >> working people who have NOT turned to crime as a lifestyle. > >> > >> The organic agriculture paradigm was created by shunning short-term > >> economic theory. I don't think this will ever fly, if the consumers > >> know about it; it would have to be kept from them intentionally. Since > >> the point of organic marketing is to make full information available to > >> the consumer, this lovely scenario would be better pursued in the > >> "conventional" agriculture sphere. I just heard they are cutting the > >> tails off of dairy cows for "economic" reasons, so probably they > >> wouldn't bat an eye at this suggestion either. > >> > >> Not only that, but some our more sleazy mall stores have been using the > >> "made in america" marketing, which appeals to those who deliberately > >> support working non-criminal fellow citizens, to label goods made by > >> prisoners as "made in america." It is a "solution" which "works" right > >> at this moment, because many people are simply unaware that it is going > >> on. Most people currently believe it to be illegal, being so clearly > >> repugnant a concept. > > > > > > > >> I can't wait to post this incredible suggestion at the natural foods > >> coop and see everybody mobilize for the boycott. > > > > > > >> > Much of the prison population is illiterate, farm work is a learned low > >> > skill profession that does not require literacy. Individuals would be > >> > outside growing food which would provide emmence psychological and self > >> > esteem benefits as well as practical job skills for their futures after > >> > prison. > >> > >> Sounds like a great idea, if you propose that these people should be > >> taught to grow their own organic food for their own consumption. They > >> would learn all the skills and improve their diets. > >> > >> > What happens when > >> > they are released? How are they any better off? > >> > >> Then when they are released, they will know enough to begin organic > >> farming, and ride the crest of this wonderful wave of commerce. Surely > >> that's what you mean? > >> > > > > > > > > I'm curious if there are any farmers out there, who > >> > contract out to prisoners, and how open growers are to this idea. > >> > >> I suppose we'd all like to know that! Well, here's one more reason to > >> only buy from people we know personally. So much for the integrity of > >> commerce. > >> > >> Just when I think I can no longer be surprised..... > >> > >> Loren Muldowney > >> > > > > To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command > "unsubscribe sanet-mg". > To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command > "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". > > All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: > http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 16 21:45:32 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id VAA21397 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 21:45:32 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id UAA20905 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 20:48:11 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from snipe.prod.itd.earthlink.net (snipe.prod.itd.earthlink.net [207.217.120.62]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id UAA20772 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 20:48:04 -0500 (EST) Received: from earthlink.net (pool033-max1.ds6-ca-us.dialup.earthlink.net [207.217.230.33]) by snipe.prod.itd.earthlink.net (8.8.7/8.8.5) with ESMTP id RAA12293; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 17:48:00 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <36EE6FDB.6637A65A@earthlink.net> Date: Tue, 16 Mar 1999 06:51:08 -0800 From: Bargyla Rateaver X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.04 [en] (Win95; I) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Bluestem Associates CC: "sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu" , "steved@ncatark.uark.edu" Subject: Re: UW release: acid linked to soil aging References: <199903111459.JAA24887@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 51 Oh, Oh, I think I recognize your name. Too bad. Anyway, I just must reply because there is a basic error in all of this, and that is the old, definitely outdated idea of ion absorption. People apparently just can't get out of this old rut. Plants do NOT absorb ions, they absorb whole molecules or particles, that are collections of molecules. The old idea, pictured in textbooks, of a root as being a naked projection of the stem, is floating in a soil solution of ions off the clay particles. That makes a nice neat picture, with 50 cents worth of ions from the root exchanging places with 2x25 cents worth from the clay particles--that kind of "exchange". All false. Based on academia's determination to get chemical fertilizer company grant money. Plants absorb molecules by endocytosis. It is time for everyone in agriculture to wake up and see what the real truth is. There was a time when endocytosis was a new discovery, with only a few scientists utilizing their electron mics to show this, but now you can find literally THOUSANDS of reports on endocytosis in plants, yes, in plants, in addition to the many more thousands of reports on endocytosis in other living entities. Also, calcium's importance is not concerning pH, but the actual tissue need by plants of this mineral. Albrecht was a strong advocate of the need for calcium, and altho his followers avidly quote almost all he said, and he based his writings on his extremely carefully acquired data from careful experiments, they still are stuck with the cation CEC stuff. He had to segregate individual ions to prove his point about the need and use of each mineral, but his followers have extrapolated, extended that to mean all fertilizing has to be properly based on CEC. They all forget that he stated that "nutrients to not have to be SOLUBLE to be AVAILABLE ". That was a very penetrating comment, esp. since at his time the electron mic photos were not extant. Had he seen those, I feel sure he would have corrected the huge trend today to continue basing ideas on CEC. His followers are not able to see how brilliant he was to recognize, without photographic proof, that plants could absorb items not is soluble (ionic) form. Albrecht was very insistent on the need for calcium because of what calcium does, as a mineral, not as a part of CEC. Current science literature is loaded with fairly new info on the many ways calcium is utilized by plants. For him to say it was the "prince of nutrients" was very smart of him, and now the current literature proves him right. Now there are whole books written about the important calcium uses. He should have lived to our time to see that. He was right, academia was wrong. Bluestem Associates wrote: > On Wed, 10 Mar 1999 19:56:55 +0000, Steve Diver wrote: > > >> Thirty-seven years of data collected from a plot at the University > >> of Wisconsin-Madison's Arlington agricultural research station is > >> yielding alarming results: acidification from excess fertilizer is > >> wearing out the soil. > [snip] > >A couple of points come to mind: > > > >1. Why did the researchers suggest that natural sources of > >nitrogen such as legumes (clovers, vetches, cover crops) > >cause as much acidification as chemical nitrogen sources > >(ammonium nitrate, anhydrous ammonia, etc.)??? > > > [snip] > >2. The report also noted the importance of calcium, magnesium, > >and potassium; cation exhange capacity; and liming. > > > >This brings to mind the notion that eco-farming advisors who've > >been emphasizing base saturation and high calcium lime all these > >years may have clued into an important principle of good soil > >management way ahead of their time. > > I have not read the original paper yet, so what I say should be seen > more as an observation triggered by the comments than as a dierct > response to them. > > It seems at least reasonably logical that natural sources of nitrogen > will have somewhat the same effect as chemical analogues, especially in > high rainfall areas when nitrification rates are high. All nitrates are > soluble --- at least I can't remember a single metal that would > precipitate nitrate out of a solution --- so high nitrate situations > will result in calcium leaching, given enough water. > > Removing calcium from a soil has some fairly unfortunate effects on its > structure, usually reflected as a greater susceptibility to compaction. > Compaction robs yields, and as yields disappoint, what is the response > of most farmers (and Extension folks) ? --- more nitrogen --- which > strips more calcium, and off we go. I think this is one of the > least-appreciated vicious cycles in all agriculture, and there's no > compelling agronomic reason why it can't happen with leguminous > nitrogen or manure nitrogen, especially if the nitrogen is being > cranked up to push the yields. [editorial comment: just what we need, > eh? more #2 yellow corn ...] > > The "destruction of CEC" part of that article is intriguing. One > possibility might actually be only indirectly related to nitrogen. The > tendency in Wisconsin has been to keep soils absolutely awash in > soluble potash, while largely ignoring calcium. Apart from potatoes and > a couple of other horticultural crops, calcium is added to the soil > only to the extent that it is incidental to liming intended to adjust > pH. In high nitrate soil environments much of the exchangeable calcium > will be stripped off colloids, but that (in itself) shouldn't damage > the exchange site. > > Here's where the potassium may come into play. Those potassium ions can > sneak between the layers on the clay particles and (especially with > certain types of clay), pull the two clay layers together around the > ion, and lock the whole thing up. Those exchange sites will be > effectively lost to the soil from then on. So I'm speculating that the > nitrogen (by stripping calcium) *enables* potash to tighten up the > edges of certain clays, making their exchange sites unavailable for > future use. > > The effect may be particularly pronounced in conventional agriculture, > owing to that system's marked tendency to sacrifice organic matter for > short term yields (which may also feed into this whole loop by > increasing the compaction effect). Typical organic matter has a CEC of > about 200 meq/100g, or roughly ten times that in a clay loam. > Consequently, 2% OM in a soil is responsible for about 4 meq of CEC. On > the good organic farms there is enough OM in the soil that the portion > of CEC attributable to the clay fraction is of reduced functional > significance. > > Most university researchers try to hold equal all factors except those > under study. In the case of the UW work it leads me to suspect that in > the "organic" systems potash levels were kept just as high as on the > conventional side. If potash is actually a significant part of the > problem it would be quite likely that organic sources of nitrogen would > have something of the same effect as the "chemical" sources. > > I'd have to read the details of experimental design and see the data > before I went any farther down this path, but I don't think it's an > outrageous stretch to suggest that calcium and potash management may > have at least as much to do with the observed phenomena as the nitrogen > > Bart Hall > Lawrence, Kansas > > To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command > "unsubscribe sanet-mg". > To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command > "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". > > All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: > http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Wed Mar 17 02:54:24 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id CAA25712 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 02:54:23 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id CAA12140 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 02:05:20 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id CAA12113 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 02:05:12 -0500 (EST) Received: from alpha.matrixinet.com (alpha.matrixinet.com [205.254.232.10]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id CAA19812 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 02:05:08 -0500 (EST) Received: from [205.254.241.236] (term5-21.vta.west.net [205.254.241.149]) by alpha.matrixinet.com (8.9.1a/8.9.1) with SMTP id XAA01818 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 23:03:24 -0800 (PST) Message-Id: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Tue, 16 Mar 1999 23:04:54 -0700 To: sanet-mg@amani.ces.ncsu.edu From: colibri@west.net (Beth von Gunten) Subject: USTR Working on Draft Retaliation List In Hormone-Raised Beef Spat With EU Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 52 Daily Report for Executives Tuesday, March 16, 1999 USTR Working on Draft Retaliation List In Hormone-Raised Beef Spat With EU The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative is finalizing a list of European Union products that could be subject to trade retaliation as early as July in a long-standing dispute over hormone-raised beef, U.S. Special Trade Negotiator for agriculture Peter L. Scher said March 15. Scher spoke to reporters after a Senate Finance Subcommittee on International Trade hearing on agriculture trade with China and the European Union. "We will exercise our rights," he said, affirming USTR's stance that the EU will face sanctions if it fails to meet a World Trade Organization deadline for bringing its regime into compliance with its international obligations. The USTR has already taken steps to slap $520 million in retaliatory tariffs on Europe for the EU's banana regime, which was twice ruled WTO-illegal. Importers of various products are required to post bonds on certain products to cover potential 100 percent tariffs. In beef, the WTO Appellate Body in January 1998 confirmed an earlier ruling by a WTO dispute settlement panel that the decade-old EU policy of banning hormone-treated beef was illegal under WTO rules. A WTO arbiter last May ordered the EU to comply with the ruling and lift the ban by May 13, 1999. The senators were skeptical. "My guess is come May 13 we're still talking," subcommittee chairman Sen. Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa) said. Scher reiterated that USTR will seek retaliatory tariffs as soon as 60 days after May 13, as allowed under WTO rules. And he pointed to the banana case as evidence of the administration's resolve. "This is not about bananas. This is about rules," he said. "... If we're willing to go to that mat on bananas, we're certainly willing to go to the mat on beef." The EU has expressed interest in a compromise that would require U.S. beef to be labeled as originating in the United States. But differences remained over how the labeling was to be done--and the EU asked for more time for additional studies, a request USTR denied. The special negotiator said no fewer than 17 EU studies on hormone-treated beef have already been conducted. "This has been a ban in search of a justification for 10 years now," he said. Biotechnology Key In a related area, a State Department official testified at the hearing that the most pressing agricultural trade concern with the EU may be the broader area of biotechnology, including genetically modified organisms. "Within a few years, virtually 100 percent of U.S. agricultural commodity exports will be genetically modified or mixed with GMO products," he said. "... We of course respect the EU's right to have a system of government oversight for GMOs. No government can abdicate its responsibility to have a system in place to ensure the safety of food, feed, and the environment. But the system must be predictable, transparent, efficient, and scientifically based--and in the case of the EU, it is none of the above." A significant problem is the negative public perception of biotechnology in Europe, due to media misinformation, he said. "This has so slanted the European public's views on the issue that governments are reluctant to undertake perfectly appropriate, but politically difficult, regulatory decisions," Eizenstat said. The State Department and other agencies are developing a public-relations campaign for Europe on hormone-treated beef and biotechnology in general, he said. Sanctions Bill in Works In comments to reporters after the hearing, Eizenstat said the Clinton administration is working with Sens. Richard G. Lugar (R-Ind.), Christopher J. Dodd (D-Conn.), and Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D-Del) on a sanctions-reform bill. "We think it's important to have comprehensive sanctions reform," Eizenstat said. Lugar has introduced bills in the 106th Congress that order the president to review all unilateral economic sanctions (S. 101) and that prohibit agricultural products from being included in future sanctions packages (S. 566). The latter bill mirrors a measure, H.R. 817, introduced by Rep. Thomas W. Ewing (R-Ill.) in the House. Eizenstat said the administration is willing to supplement any bill with executive orders. By Chad Bowman To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Wed Mar 17 02:54:25 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id CAA25716 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 02:54:25 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id CAA12145 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 02:05:22 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id CAA12119 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 02:05:14 -0500 (EST) Received: from alpha.matrixinet.com (alpha.matrixinet.com [205.254.232.10]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id CAA19815 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 02:05:10 -0500 (EST) Received: from [205.254.241.236] (term5-21.vta.west.net [205.254.241.149]) by alpha.matrixinet.com (8.9.1a/8.9.1) with SMTP id XAA01821 for ; Tue, 16 Mar 1999 23:03:27 -0800 (PST) Message-Id: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Date: Tue, 16 Mar 1999 23:04:57 -0700 To: sanet-mg@amani.ces.ncsu.edu From: colibri@west.net (Beth von Gunten) Subject: UK: re: the cost of segregating GMOs Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-MIME-Autoconverted: from quoted-printable to 8bit by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu id CAA12121 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 53 HOW TO PRICE WHAT WE PUT ON OUR PLATE New Scientist 27 February 1999 By Debora MacKenzie FOR MOST PEOPLE, the main question about GM food is: do I have to eat it or not? If we are to have that choice, GM crops will have to be segregated from plough to plate and all products containing GM food labelled as such. The US government claims that this would impose heavy costs on its food suppliers. It threatens a trade war if the European Union responds to public pressure by demanding segregation of GM crops within US exports. But a new analysis suggests that the costs of segregation and labelling are manageable, and could even enhance trade. "This could be the only key to easing public acceptance of biotechnology," says Allan Buckwell, an agricultural economist at Wye College near Ashford, Kent. Buckwell presented his findings in Brussels earlier this month. He says that similarly stringent segregation--although not on the basis of genetic modification--is already widespread. "Different varieties of wheat, for bread or pasta, are already strictly separated from farm gate to production plant," he says. And in the US, soya growers already distinguish beans used in different kinds of tofu for export to Japan. The cost of such segregation is not prohibitive, say Buckwell and his colleague Graham Brookes. For example, soya growers and processors in the US separate and label beans with different protein and oil contents for an extra cost of just 6 to 9 per cent compared with unsegregated beans. Soya growers in Brazil distinguish GM from non-modified soya for a premium of 10 to 15 per cent. European dealers separate maize with a high oil content for 17 per cent extra cost, while US producers do it for 6 per cent. Canadian farmers distinguish GM from normal oilseed rape, or canola, for an 8 per cent premium. And costs will come down, says Buckwell, if segregation becomes widespread. The organisation that commissioned the Wye College study remains sceptical, however. The Food Biotech Communications Initiative, which represents companies such as Monsanto, Coca-Cola and NestlÈ, concludes that segregation will increase food costs by "as much as 150 per cent". But this interpretation assumes that food labelled as non-GM has to be absolutely pure. In practice, regulators are likely to allow food to carry such a label if contamination with GM materials is below a certain level. The EU, which is currently debating its labelling criteria, is considering tolerances for GM contamination for individual ingredients of around 1 per cent. To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Wed Mar 17 10:20:01 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id KAA01792 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 10:20:00 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id JAA08897 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 09:11:29 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id JAA08867 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 09:11:23 -0500 (EST) Received: from envsci.rutgers.edu (envsci.rutgers.edu [165.230.5.130]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id JAA26579 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 09:11:21 -0500 (EST) Received: from LOCALNAME (monk-a-asy-6.rutgers.edu [165.230.176.74]) by envsci.rutgers.edu (8.8.8+Sun/8.8.8) with SMTP id JAA29376; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 09:07:26 -0500 (EST) Message-ID: <36EFE311.6AF1@envsci.rutgers.edu> Date: Wed, 17 Mar 1999 09:14:57 -0800 From: Loren Muldowney Reply-To: loscott@envsci.rutgers.EDU Organization: Individual X-Mailer: Mozilla 3.0 (Win16; I) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: OGL@LSV.UKY.EDU, homestead@listserv.oit.unc.edu CC: sanet-mg@amani.ces.ncsu.edu Subject: Monsanto & GM seeds to be subject of NPR "All Things Considered" Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 54 If you can use the RealAudio software, you can hear the NPR piece on genetically modified seed and the Monsanto company for yourselves at: http://www.npr.org/programs/atc/archives/1999/current.html That's for today, for tomorrow, you'll probably have to hunt through the archives, but it will still be accessible somehow. Transcripts may also be ordered for some cost. LM To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Wed Mar 17 10:52:18 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id KAA02473 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 10:52:18 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id JAA29704 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 09:44:45 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from mailgw.cc.uga.edu (mailgw.cc.uga.edu [128.192.1.101]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id JAA29638 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 09:44:38 -0500 (EST) Received: from agecon.uga.edu (agecon1.agecon.uga.edu) by mailgw.cc.uga.edu (LSMTP for Windows NT v1.1b) with SMTP id <0.009EE4BF@mailgw.cc.uga.edu>; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 9:44:39 -0500 Received: from AGECON/SpoolDir by agecon.uga.edu (Mercury 1.43); 17 Mar 99 09:44:36 EST5EDT Received: from SpoolDir by AGECON (Mercury 1.43); 17 Mar 99 09:44:22 EST5EDT From: "Anita Graf (Staff)" To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Date: Wed, 17 Mar 1999 09:44:19 EST5EDT MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Subject: Monsonto's price In-reply-to: <199903161332.IAA02238@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu> X-mailer: Pegasus Mail for Windows (v2.54) Message-ID: <12B645E001B2@agecon.uga.edu> Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 55 > "The speed at which GM organisms have been developed and introduced by > multinational companies and the scientific community has left many people > completely unaware of and uninvolved in the process," the panel said. I was talking to a friend of mine today who happens to be stock broker and I asked him what's going on with Monsonto stock (wondering to myself how all this bruhaha we've been reading about lately re. the backlash against GMOs is effecting the bottom line over there) and he told me that it had been in a holding pattern for some time, but recently it's gone up (!!). He says that there are rumors of a takeover. Anyway, it would seem that whatever resistence to GE is brewing out there, it isn't giving off any economic signals yet to dampen the GE enthusiasm... Anita To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Wed Mar 17 10:55:31 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id KAA02558 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 10:55:31 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id JAA28067 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 09:43:20 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from imo21.mx.aol.com (imo21.mx.aol.com [198.81.17.65]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id JAA27969 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 09:43:14 -0500 (EST) From: Sprinkraft@aol.com Received: from Sprinkraft@aol.com by imo21.mx.aol.com (IMOv19.3) id 7TJRa08602 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 09:42:24 -0500 (EST) Message-ID: Date: Wed, 17 Mar 1999 09:42:24 EST To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Mime-Version: 1.0 Subject: Agrogastronomia Content-type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 X-Mailer: AOL 4.0 for Windows 95 sub 206 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-MIME-Autoconverted: from quoted-printable to 8bit by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu id JAA27988 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 56 Agrogastronomia 900 miles south to Zapopan, Jalisco from Austin, mostly on Mexico 54, a major portion of the inter-American freight route that doesn’t compare well even with Iowa’s county blacktops. 54 is getting beat up day and night by CFI, Schneider and a lot of trucks with Arkansas plates no doubt hauling for Walmart. Mexico needs Walmart like a another sunny day. I don’t mean to hammer Mexican road-builders, its just that one doesn’t drop NAFTA into a glass of water and expect it to turn into Cabernet Sauvignon. That hollering one hears in Texas about the massively increased north-south truck traffic-and the lack of federal planning to handle it- resonates quite well here in Mexico. The big fellahs are tearing up roadbed and bridges built when Lazaro Cardenas was president, and few of them will bear the increased pounding once a lot more of the smaller light- manufacturing operations go on-line. That eventual burden will be in addition to the increase in local rubber bumping along. The short-haul tankers, belly-dumps, low-boys, buses and farm tractors all tread along, amid fretfully groping Gringos pulling an Izusu Rodeo behind their motels on wheels. Aiy-Chihuahua. I saw one 100 horsepower Deere hauling a 12 foot disc rip up two feet of pavement a hundred meters in front of me as he pulled across the thoroughfare - the pavement frequently drops off 6-8 inches to the "shoulder" ( abyss). Up went the front wheels, down went the discs, traction, and up came the asphalt. He didn’t look back, so it must be a commonplace. Seen often are what everyone in anything less than a Suburban should justly fear rolling aside them on the interstate: the "doble-remolques", twin forty- foot trailers hauled in tandem behind a driver who should have a wide-angle video remote on the tail-end in order to see what is going on behind this chopped-off escapee from a railroad. The iron horse is pulling its weight though: I saw a seemingly endless line-up of empty double-decker cattle cars headed south when I was coming into Laredo. Which sort of brings me around to the food part of my essay. Having learned from my last fast in Oklahoma, I hauled some stuff with me this time: the fruit, trail-mix, Scandicrackers and garlic saw me through the desert between Saltillo and Zacatecas. It was a real desert, not just a metaphor, i.e., where fast-food is the sand and coke is the water. Got lost in Zacatecas at noon- time trying to intuit an eatery, then turned back around south for Guadalajara, and saw El Fuente minding its own business on the side of the road in Cieneguillas across from a fairly new Fanta soda pop plant. Ah: factory, plus restaurant equals lunch. Just in the nick of time, I walked in before the plant personnel poured across the highway. El Fuente means" The Source. It was aptly named and this is what I got for three dollars and seventy cents: a beer, a bowl of soup, a little plate of rice, some homemade pork rinds, 6 homemade corn tortillas and a plateload of pork chile verde and beans. I ignored the pork rinds and analyzed the soup and rice. The soup was approximately 2/3 of a quart in volume with fresh carrots, onions and zucchini surrounding a thick bone to which five good bites of beef were still attached. Like the soup, the rice also had scratch vegetables in it. The main course was unnecessary but I cleared it off like the good gourmand that I am. I just looked it up to be sure that "gourmand" also infers indulgence, but according to Microsoft it doesn’t, therefore they’re wrong and I ate the chile verde because it tasted so good. Between Zacatecas and Zapopan the desert slowly unclenches and fields, watered by aqueducts running down from local impoundments, begin to green. The further south you run, the more irrigated agriculture you encounter, until bananas and guavas and avocados begin to show up. These are watered by the sky. I was absolutely charmed by small patches of alfalfa, some no more than 2000 square feet in area, groomed and cared for like they were filled with snapdragons and delphiniums. I had to pull off to make sure one field was carrots and it was. The corn is laid into upright stacks and then a farmer with a PTO driven grinder cuts the piles into pieces and sacks it up for livestock back at the corral. Tomatoes are still coming on, while spent fields are on the other side of the road. The citrus and guavas were uneven in appearance. Being that they were on hillsides where its hard to bring fertility, it may have been a nitrogen deficiency, but I guessed mites too. Although it might have been last year’s freeze that knocked them back. Outside of Villanueva the eucalyptus trees are growing out from the roots, with tall dead trunks above them. There was wheat about a foot and half high and some nice stands of oats, and women and children were having a lot of fun knocking down nuts from trees with sweat-marked poles I imagined their parents might have used years ago. Heading into Jalisco I began to see roadstand signs that read "coffee" and "mangos". I fear it is too dry though, and has been droughty for awhile. Some of the reservoirs have three-year vegetation growing in their far reaches. Some irrigation authority should suggest that the farmers not water at midday with a twenty knot wind blowing, but for all the know-how we have north of the Rio Grande, that sort of caution goes unheeded as you can readily see throughout the southwestern deserts we have borrowed with all that dammed up water. Hook it up, fire it off and walk away. It is old technology, but I am a real sucker for aqueducts, especially the little ones made of bricks and concrete running alongside a nice patch of black dirt. And the furrow-irrigation, so outmoded and wasteful, is still so satisfying to maintain and coax along all the way to, hopefully, the end of the row. Don Miguel Torres made us water corn like that in California. I wanted to put out drip tape, and he said: " Get out of here with your plastic. The corn wants a lot of water, and when the water goes down to the roots the roots keep following the water and then the corn won’t fall over. Let me water this corn like I want to." Anything you say boss, and he was all that. Production problems associated with shallow watering in concert with synthetic fertilizer at the root zone tend to reinforce the idea that deep watering does make some sense. Short roots from drip irrigation; short roots, greater risk. But in the coming age of water scarcity, I think we’ll see more drip tape in agriculture before we see fewer golf courses in the small ball meccas of Arizona. Six hours out of Zacatecas I cleared the ridge above Guadalajara, having had the good fortune to have passed an achingly slow freighter ominously marked " Materiales Peligrosos" ( Dangerous Materials) on the last brief straight-away before entering twenty five kilometers of hairpins, cliffs, and deep drops into the Achichito and Rio Verde watersheds. Parked "safely" in the confines of Hell-Bat-Town, Jalisco, I had that old mealtime dilemma once again confronting me. At least I found hotel quarters before the sun went down. These drivers seem to speed it up once the delivery vans are parked, and its a regular Daytona in downtown Guadalajara after dark. I wished I could change out of my Red Wings so I could carry myself a little more quickly across the boulevards. " No problem," the hotel desk clerk said, " There is a Burger King around the block on the Avenida Avilla Camacho." When I winced slightly, she pointed out that there was also a typical grill just down the Jorge Alvarez del Castillo. So I showered and walked down to " Ruben’s", and for four dollars and twenty cents I had the following: First, I got a basket of small, fried corn tortillas, four big containers filled with salsas and pico de gallo, and a bowl of guacamole that you would pay four bucks American for in Austin. The waiter alerted me to the fact that with my order of cerdo adobado I got a free trip to the salad bar. I nixed the iceberg and loaded up on beets, garbanzos, onions and cucumbers. No dressing. The beets were scratch, and I could tell because there was a small, knobby, double-rooted beet cut up in the server, and they were earthy and crunchy- fresh. My, what big garbanzos you have, Guadalajara! I destroyed the guacamole. Then, superfluously, came the meal: Way too much grilled pork loin in adobado sauce, fried scratch potatoes that tasted like potatoes, a bowl of charro beans, a pile of sliced tomatoes, a soup bowl filled with fresh, sautéed onions and jalapenos, the corn tortillas that I watched the woman make from behind her glassed-in theater, and two beers. I made up my mind to take a long walk after dinner and skip breakfast. The perfumed streets were lined with flowering trees, and I noted that one distinct proof against graffitti is to cover the wall with a living thing like Bougainvilla or ivy. Ruben’s throws you a real curve-ball. You walk in thinking: this is going to be too Gringofied, since its pretty close to the University and is across the street from an English language school. Just a hunch. And its sharp, and gleaming and had two TV sets tuned to dueling, different soccer games, one in Germany, the other in Peru. The waiters walk by with their arms loaded with food, watch one play for half the trip across the room, and then focus on the other game as they reach their destination. When the announcer yells: GOAL! in there, I’ll bet it gets interesting. Do not succumb to the Romanticized observations of one lucky traveler, because we all rhapsodize about these fundamental, probably fleeting, food truths of Mexico. Though scratch cooking is definitely more available, particularly where a novice is least inclined to experiment, like the public market, Mexico is hurtling toward processed convenience with a Keep Up With the Joneses vengeance. The big supers are wall to wall with the name brands most good Greens have learned to avoid like the plague they are. I remember how disappointed I felt when my friend Angel Perea told me that his wife, an ace scratch cook, was "enchanted" by McD’s French fries. And Ralph Nader owns stock in DuPont. Now that I am once again in a place where they give away avocados, I want to know what happened to the US avocado market. Something doesn’t seem to fit, and its not because I have been eating too many. After all the hard work that Angie Dickinson and Calavo did getting people to eat them, the large, quality avocado is mysteriously missing. And the resulting guacamole is like green caviar: dearly priced. Even in California all one sees at retail are small sizes, and when encountered in Minneapolis or Iowa City at $1.39 each for around four bites of overripe mush, I have to figure either the avo-deal has a life of its own or has evolved into retail loss-leader diversification without rationale, like hustling star fruit and plantains makes sense because Frieda Kaplan has written it on her stone tablets. Not to be unnecessarily tough on Frieda’s Finest; man what a sticker program, which may yet prod a doubting public to eat more winter squash. Not organic though. I took a nice meeting with them ten years ago on that subject: not enough margin to share in the pipeline. In a word, savvy. Frieda’s already walks and talks like uncommon product, somehow making production practices immaterial because of all that purple hype: a strange halo of wholesomeness graces these exotic experiments on behalf of the global palate. Avocado production is a big NAFTA battle ground. Being fairly freeze intolerant, they won’t thrive much above San Luis Obispo on the California coast, and their prime growing areas, particularly the flat ground around Escondido and Ventura, has gone under the blade, leaving production to the tender hillsides, which are more susceptible to a host of management problems, including harvesting and erosion of the already thin and unstable soils. They also don’t like smog. Stateside scarcity leads at least to dependably steady prices. I remember the avo-rollercoaster years when growers just let them drop. And then, there was Angie. Meanwhile, today in Mexico, where they are native, avo export is a built machine stymied by protectionism masked by phytosanitary fears. I am completely in conformance with the idea of not importing another exotic baddie where they aren’t already, but the idea of bringing a disease into the US on the fruit begs one to imagine how a spent avocado shell will get pitched into a disease-free orchard and engender the calamity. Stranger disasters have happened, and some of them were unintended reversals of theory. Instead of shipping them whole, the going industry here is sending frozen avo- puree, either because of the fresh export restrictions or because trucking a highly perishable product of which a significant portion is not utilized, except as compost, ends up being too great a percentage of the actual value. Fifteen dollars a box, FOB Uruapan sounds like a money maker to me though. Five or six bucks per to get it up to Nogales or Laredo and to cross it, five per to shove them around some more, and that’s guacamole. If that sounds too simple, it probably is. Two years ago when I was rambling around in Michuoacan I saw whole mountains planted to three to five year old Hass orchards, and observed quite a few commercial nurseries filled with trees close to planting age. I readily own up to my schizophrenia over globalization. Is the export market supposed to make sense, is the most cogent question. Will the Free-For-All to come be self-equalized by the market valves, self-activating with textbook facility instead of historical upheaval? Consumers can generally take or leave the avocado, but people who have planted them and waited five years to market them are less likely to shrug it off if corporate fields in Chinzamvia throw the fruit at the consumer’s basket for momentary pennies, waiting for market monopoly to kick in. Round and Round it goes, and where it stops, nobody knows. But those who pretend are better paid than popular journalists. How the Hass outclassed the rest of the field is intriguing as well. Ever eaten, or for that matter seen a Bacon, a Rincon or a Fuerte? None of them have bumpy black skins. The bumpy helps the shelf-life, the black tells you they are ripe without having to mash them into guac at point of purchase. I think they tend to have if not a superior flavor one that isn’t inferior to any other, and the Hass tend to be not as watery as Bacons and Rincons. My grandparents had a massive Fuerte in the backyard which we ate from and made dubious charity from among the passive neighbors in the middle-class southern California town where they lived for decades. " Uh, yeah sure, Morris. Thanks, and say hi to Edna for us," Mr. Blankenship might mumble, semi-startled to suddenly have a 15 pound bag of them thrust upon him. " Are you sure he likes them, grandad? " I cautiously inquired as we returned to the Pontiac. " Seems to!" He said, hopefully defiant. In 1972 I odd-jobbed for a millionaire coot in Escondido, hauling empty picking bins into and full ones back from his avocado orchards. He had carefully pinned a recording plate on every tree and measured each year’s yields, hand-punching the year and yield in each patinaed plate. Some of his Hass trees each gave over a ton of fruit in their prime. But he had made his fortune in salvage when storm water flushed a 40’s-era army base full of first cut redwood planks onto his riparian ground. I think he was prouder of that than of the trees, but he was already sideways with reality. Years later, Steve and Ben Moore let me live in their avocado orchard, where I gained much admiration for this exceptionally sustaining food. Seven years among the Hass, and the only thing I’m spoiled over was the price. If they hit the ground, they were either mine, Miguel’s , the Moores, or a lucky find for a coyote. A key market rule is that grounders don’t get shipped. To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Wed Mar 17 13:06:08 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id NAA07076 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 13:06:08 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id LAA11219 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 11:52:27 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id LAA11117 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 11:52:21 -0500 (EST) Received: from enaila.nidlink.com (root@enaila.nidlink.com [216.18.128.8]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id LAA00117 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 11:52:18 -0500 (EST) Received: from benbrook.nidlink.com (pm5-44.nidlink.com [216.18.141.51]) by enaila.nidlink.com (8.9.0/8.9.0) with SMTP id IAA18279; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 08:52:16 -0800 (PST) Message-Id: <2.2.32.19990317171519.00943ef8@mail.nidlink.com> X-Sender: benbrook@mail.nidlink.com X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Pro Version 2.2 (32) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Wed, 17 Mar 1999 09:15:19 -0800 To: sanet-mg@amani.ces.ncsu.edu From: Charles Benbrook Subject: NPR Piece on Monsanto,Etc Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 57 Much could and needs to be said about the NPR piece on Monsanto (part I), the Dupont-Pioneer deal, Monsanto's stock price, and the prospects for farmers to make a living growing soybeans in the U.S. But for now just a few points. The NPR piece shows what good PR can do and get for a company that knows how to "work with" the media. Not a bright day for NPR. What amazes me is that senior Monsanto officials can get away, unchallenged, with saying things like "RR beans lowered their (farmers') costs and raised their yields." The evidence is now overwhelming and indisputable that average yields of RR varieties are about 4-6% less than conventional varieties. The definitive and most recent comparative analysis was carried out by Dr. E.S. Oplinger of the Univ. of Wisconsin, Madison, who has managed a North Central regional project assessing soybean varietal performance for years. Dr. Oplinger compared yields of 5,172 conv. varieties paired with 3,067 RR varieties in 8 states in 1998. The RR varieties yielded between 86% and 113% of the conv., and average yields were 96% of conventional. There were just two areas where RR did better -- Illinois and southern Michigan. Outside these areas the average yield drag was greater, on the order of 6% to 8% (data from "Performance of Transgenetic Soybeans -- Northern US," Dr. E.S. Oplinger, M.J. Martinka, and K.A. Schmitz, Dept. of Agronomy, UW-Madison). This places the minimal average yield drag at about 2 bushels per acre, or $10.00 (and it was much more on many farmers). That $10.00 plus the technology charge, plus the 2-3 applications of Roundup (not the one alleged in the piece), plus the 2 or 3 other herbicide a.i.s that must be applied make for the most expensive soybean seed+weed management system in modern history -- between $40.00 and $60.00 per acre depending on rates, weed pressure, etc. Not long ago, in 1985, the average seed plus weed costs on farms in Illinois was $26.72 per acre (USDA cost of production data), and represented 23% of total variable costs; now, they represent 35-40%. (For details and data sources, see the paper I did for the Univ. of Illinois symposium at ). No wonder Monsanto is throwing in free resprays and replanting, and other crop insurance-like benefits as an added bonus. Every independent set of data, recent analysis of RR beans I have seen reaches the same conclusion; the technology increases costs somewhat, but imposes a "price" farmers are willing to pay for the simplicity/robustness of the weed management system. Oplinger et al. end their paper saying: "It is anticipated that soybean growers will continue to increase acres planted to RR varieties and will sacrifice yield for ease of weed control." They will also sacrifice some net income per acre. This is a perfectly rational reason for farmers to adopt the technology; weed management is probably the number one management challenge all soybean farmers face. Monsanto should not be ashamed to cite these reasons in explaining why the technology is being adopted. But Monsanto needs to drop the "feeding the world", "lowering costs", "lowering pesticide use" claims because they do not hold water and will undermine, further, the reputation of the corporation, and in so doing feed the already considerable cynicism abroad about the trustworthiness of this company. While Monsanto does not seem to worry much about losing consumer trust in Europe and Japan, U.S. farmers (and the U.S. government) should be concerned and will, in the end, pay the price if the effort to drive RR beans down the throats of Europeans backfires into a search for non-GMO soybeans from other countries. Plus, things are not getting any better down on the farm. Soybean prices are way down, export markets are soft. As weed shifts continue in areas planted heavily to RR beans, and as resistance spreads to additional weed species (the first signs of tolerant weeds are appearing in several states), farmers will have to increase rates of Roundup applications and intensify use of other active ingredients, to fill gaps in control. Costs will rise, the income squeeze will get even worse. Contrary to a Monsanto scientist's claim on the NPR piece, Roundup does not kill everything green except for transgenic crop varieties. If that were the case, most farmers using RR systems would not be applying at least 2, and on many farms, three additional active ingredients. Someone posted that Monsanto's stock price is holding. Keep watching that space. The Dupont-Pioneer deal seals off the most likely route to salvation for Monsanto -- Dupont's deep pockets. Monsanto is desperate for a new partner to help cover its $700 million plus cost of capital, etc from the seed mergers of the past few years. Not too many companies around that can float that sort of cost. There remain a couple of major deals to go in the pesticide and seed industries, and then it will be, for all intents and purposes, over. Expect Monsanto, Zeneca, American Home Products, Novartis, and Bayer to be involved in a few additional mega-deals in the next 12-24 months. We will have one industry where we used to have two, and 4-6 major players where there used to be a couple of dozen, and many dozen regionally significant players. No one has much of an idea, nor any credible way to project the consequences of these changes. Its unchartered water in turbulent times. We are all invited along for the ride, which will be exciting and at times divisive, as the economic interests of one part of the agricultural system (probably farmers) suffer at the expense of other players. There will be many surprises, positive and negative. What seems clear to me, in any event, is that public institutions and policies, like those governing research, technology returns, intellectual property, markets, information, are not keeping up and that new forces shaping the performance of the new seed+pesticide industry will largely emerge within the private sector, from the demand side, both farmers for inputs and consumers for food. chuck benbrook Charles Benbrook 208-263-5236 (voice) Benbrook Consulting Services 208-263-7342 (fax) 5085 Upper Pack River Road benbrook@hillnet.com [e-mail] Sandpoint, Idaho 83864 http://www.pmac.net To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Wed Mar 17 13:13:12 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id NAA07304 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 13:13:11 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id MAA27559 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 12:16:57 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id MAA27549 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 12:16:52 -0500 (EST) Received: from mail.iatp.org (iatp-2.InnovSoftD.com [208.141.36.66]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id MAA00554 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 12:16:49 -0500 (EST) Received: from markbert ([208.141.36.107]) by mail.iatp.org (Netscape Messaging Server 3.56) with SMTP id 494; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 11:21:56 -0600 Message-Id: <3.0.5.32.19990317075222.00b87200@iatp.org> X-Sender: mritchie@iatp.org X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Pro Version 3.0.5 (32) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 1999 07:52:22 -0600 To: "Ed and Sue Sparling" , From: "Mark Ritchie" Subject: Re: NPR Report on Monsanto Cc: In-Reply-To: <002e01be7001$587e4120$68365281@edandsue.colostate.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 58 I was on an previous NPR show about biosafety/biotech in which my impression from the NPR producer was that they she and NPR were pro-biotech and pro-monsanto. On the show that was aired I had one sentence and then there were 4 strong proponents of biotech. How about some calls to NPR to complain?? At 04:04 PM 3/16/99 -0700, Ed and Sue Sparling wrote: >>>> Dear Sustainable Ag Network Subscribers: How did you all react to the "All Things Considered piece on Monsanto?" My reaction was that the Monsanto PR dept had a big hand in it. Interesting that Clinton is going to give Fraley (former PR man for Monsanto) a medal. Ouch! I have to wonder if tommorow's part 2 will incorporate a serious consideration of concerns about the effects of bt GM plants on the organic farming sector. It seems pretty irresponsible reporting if Dan Charles (NPR reporter) hasn't talked to Charles Benbrook (for example). Ed Sparling Professor Emeritus Dept Agric Economics Colorado State University <<<< Mark Ritchie, President Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy 2105 First Ave. South Minneapolis, Minnesota 55404 USA 612-870-3400 (phone) 612-870-4846 (fax) mritchie@iatp.org www.iatp.org/iatp To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Wed Mar 17 15:04:15 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id PAA09619 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 15:04:14 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id OAA02398 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 14:11:50 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from imo14.mx.aol.com (imo14.mx.aol.com [198.81.17.4]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id OAA02379 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 14:11:46 -0500 (EST) From: PetersFarm@aol.com Received: from PetersFarm@aol.com by imo14.mx.aol.com (IMOv19.3) id fSCAa14285; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 14:06:50 -0500 (EST) Message-ID: <1cb2d19a.36effd4a@aol.com> Date: Wed, 17 Mar 1999 14:06:50 EST To: rdhc@earthlink.net, sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Mime-Version: 1.0 Subject: Re: Re: npr story on monsanto GE Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit X-Mailer: AOL 2.7 for Mac sub 3 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 59 Well, you know, we SANeters are bound to be disappointed (as I was) by any program about biotech, just because we've already been so well informed, thanks to SANet. Frankly, I'm glad to see/hear ANYthing on the subject from ANY of the media (as long as it's not a Monsanto commercial). If that program gets 10 people thinking about an issue they were not even aware of, I call that a Good Thing. (Betty) Ann Gras To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Wed Mar 17 16:00:54 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id QAA11098 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 16:00:54 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id OAA17696 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 14:44:11 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id OAA17640 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 14:44:06 -0500 (EST) Received: from aae.wisc.edu (aae.wisc.edu [144.92.122.133]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id OAA03833 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 14:44:03 -0500 (EST) Received: from mojo.aae.wisc.edu ([144.92.244.223]) by aae.wisc.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.0) with SMTP id NAA22640; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 13:44:06 -0600 Message-Id: <199903171944.NAA22640@aae.wisc.edu> Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "Michele Gale-Sinex/CIAS, UW-Madison" To: sanet-mg@amani.ces.ncsu.edu, CIAS.staff@aae.wisc.edu Date: Wed, 17 Mar 1999 13:43:58 -0500 Subject: (Fwd) Greenspan Says World Troubles Hurt U.S. Farmers CC: fhbuttel@facstaff.wisc.edu X-mailer: Pegasus Mail for Windows (v2.53/R1) Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 60 Howdy, all-- So, since when has Alan Greenspan set himself up as spokesdude for the J. Random Powerful Pinstriped Guy Ministry of Agricultural Production System Expertise? This appeared in today's /SF Chronicle/. Notice that his touted "characteristic ambiguity" doesn't include his advice to farmers. Efficiency...productivity...latest technology. Keep saying it. Sooner or later my eyes are bound to glaze over. pax misha ------- Forwarded Message Follows ------- Greenspan Says World Troubles Hurt U.S. Farmers Fed chairman sees technology as means to increase efficiency Sam Zuckerman, Chronicle Staff Writer Wednesday, March 17, 1999 Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan came to San Francisco yesterday to speak just hours after the Dow Jones industrial average briefly crashed through the 10,000 barrier for the first time ever. But the Fed chairman didn't utter a word about the market because high finance wasn't on his mind. Greenspan, who has frequently voiced his worries about speculation in stocks and coined the phrase ``irrational exuberance'' several thousand Dow points back, chose the occasion to speak about the U.S. farm economy. While the overall U.S. economy experiences a remarkable mix of robust growth, low unemployment and low inflation, ``agriculture has been one of the more notable soft spots,'' Greenspan noted, hurt by worldwide weakness in commodity prices. Greenspan's choice of San Francisco as a venue to speak about farming wasn't as odd as it seemed at first glance. His audience at the Moscone Center consisted of more than 2,000 community bankers in town for a convention of the Independent Bankers Association of America, many from small-town banks that specialize in loans to farmers. The Fed chief's outlook for the broader economy was, as usual, ambiguous and delivered in his characteristic on-the-one-hand, on-the- other-hand style. The healthy U.S. economy ``is partly the result of influences that may prove transitory, but a number of fundamental strengths imply more lasting benefits,'' he said. Greenspan noted that, after eight years of economic growth, ``the economy appears stretched in a number of dimensions, implying considerable upside and downside risks to the economic outlook.'' Weakness in farm prices reflects the sick economies of key trading partners such as Japan and Russia, which have cut back their imports of U.S. agricultural products. Farmers won't see better times until troubled economies overseas recover, he warned. To survive under these conditions, farmers must keep on making themselves more efficient and more productive by using the latest technology, Greenspan said. c1999 San Francisco Chronicle Page B1 To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Wed Mar 17 21:59:51 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id VAA19310 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 21:59:51 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id VAA00776 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 21:08:20 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from mail.inreach.com (mail.inreach.com [209.142.0.3]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id VAA00761 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 21:08:16 -0500 (EST) Received: from walacres.ptdprolog.net (209-142-19-236.oak.inreach.net [209.142.19.236]) by mail.inreach.com (8.8.8/8.8.6/(InReach)) with SMTP id RAA26305 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 17:56:20 -0800 (PST) Message-Id: <3.0.5.32.19990317181131.007d16d0@mail.inreach.com> X-Sender: farmbox@mail.inreach.com X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Pro Version 3.0.5 (32) Date: Wed, 17 Mar 1999 18:11:31 -0500 To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu From: Diane Joy Goodman Subject: NPR Piece on Monsanto Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 61 I did not listen to the broadcast but know that NPR does listen to response and frequently will air program segments that have valid opposing information. I don't believe individual comments to NPR would be very effective against Monsanto's PR savvy, but a letter noting Chuck Benbrook's RR soybean yield statistics, references to the European movement refusing gmo soybeans, and substantial additional scientific data from credible authorities, organized in a timely way and signed by nationally visible organizations may lead to equal air time. NPR needs only to be convinced (which would not be difficult to do) that there is as much unavailable information about the negative impact of Monsanto's promotion of its gmo products as there is of the perceived benefits. Anyone care to jump in on this ? Chuck? Diane Joy Goodman farmbox@inreach.com To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Wed Mar 17 22:26:36 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id WAA19904 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 22:26:36 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id VAA17722 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 21:32:18 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from mailhub.cns.ksu.edu (grunt.ksu.ksu.edu [129.130.12.17]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id VAA17710 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 21:32:14 -0500 (EST) Received: from facts.ksu.edu (mailhost.facts.ksu.edu [129.130.156.200]) by mailhub.cns.ksu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1/mailhub+tar) with ESMTP id UAA13226 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 20:32:15 -0600 (CST) Received: from FACTS/MERCURY by facts.ksu.edu (Mercury 1.21); 17 Mar 99 20:32:14 CST6CDT Received: from MERCURY by FACTS (Mercury 1.21); 17 Mar 99 20:30:45 CST6CDT Received: from FACTS by facts.ksu.edu (Mercury 1.21); 17 Mar 99 20:30:39 CST6CDT From: "Charlie Griffin" To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Date: Wed, 17 Mar 1999 20:29:54 -600 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Subject: Re: NPR Piece on Monsanto In-reply-to: <3.0.5.32.19990317181131.007d16d0@mail.inreach.com> X-mailer: Pegasus Mail for Win32 (v3.01d) Message-ID: <13B8B9E13743@facts.ksu.edu> Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 62 I heard the piece tonight on the evening NPR while on the road. Help me understand if I heard one part correctly. I believe it was said that Monsanto "agents" go around to fields suspected of having planted illicit seeds and go onto the property and spray a few selected soybean plants with Roundup, then come back the next day and see if the plants died. If not, they consider it evidence of having RR beans and pursue legal recourse. Is this really the way it happens? And if they go onto private land of a producer not dealing with RR beans, spray Roundup and kill some plants, have they not damaged someone's crop, even if it is just a few plants? And if it were an organic operation, would they not have just ruined someone's certification by introducing spray? Please tell me this isn't the way it's really happening? Perhaps I've missed some vital details along the way. Charlie Griffin To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Wed Mar 17 22:28:53 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id WAA19924 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 22:28:53 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id VAA21547 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 21:42:36 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from cornell.edu (cornell.edu [132.236.56.6]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id VAA21507 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 21:42:32 -0500 (EST) Received: from cu-dialup (D1824.DIALUP.CORNELL.EDU [132.236.236.108]) by cornell.edu (8.8.5/8.8.5) with SMTP id VAA06446 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 21:42:29 -0500 (EST) Message-Id: <3.0.3.32.19990317214147.00e2a7c4@postoffice.mail.cornell.edu> X-Sender: gwg2@postoffice.mail.cornell.edu X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Pro Version 3.0.3 (32) -- [Cornell Modified] Date: Wed, 17 Mar 1999 21:41:47 -0500 To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu From: "Gilbert W. Gillespie Jr." Subject: Articles in The Futurist Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-MIME-Autoconverted: from quoted-printable to 8bit by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu id VAA21509 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 63 Those SANETters suffering from low blood pressure may find relief in the latest issue of The Futurist (April 1999, volume 33, No. 4). (Warning: this is merely a testimonial, the safety and efficacy of this treatment have been neither established scientifically nor approved by the FDA.) Steven C. Blank, an extension economist from UC-Davis and author of "The End of the American Farm?" (pp. 22-27), draws from his 1998 book–The End of Agriculture in the American Portfolio–to argue that agriculture is becoming uncompetitive in the US and that we ought to give up the outdated notion of producing food in the U.S. and import it from places that can produce it more cheaply. If I were to criticize Blank, I would do so for not mentioning the promise of biotech for eliminating agriculture all together (a prospect that should prevent rational land grant administrators from hiring any new production scientist faculty members younger than 50). Some excerpts that I hope fairly capture the main content: "Most Americans could not care less if farming and ranching disappear, as long as they get their burgers and fries. Americans will waddle on. The U.S. economy no longer needs agriculture and is rapidly outgrowing it...family farms have become an expensive lifestyle that America cannot afford; it is an inefficient use of resources that is becoming a hobby that leads to bankruptcy...The high costs of producing food in America, compared with the costs in poorer countries are pushing American producers out of business as foreign competitors develop enough to serve the same markets" (p. 22). "Some people may worry that leaving agriculture behind and shifting to imported commodities may cause Americans to miss a meal or two. But the United States has been importing an increasing amount of food for years, and American's waistlines are growing not shrinking" (p. 23). "Is this decline in farm numbers [about 33,000 farms per year since 1969] something to fear? No, it is an improvement in the efficience of American's economy" (pp. 24-25). [On two unnamed rural sociologists, one from Missouri and one from Iowa] "The sociologists are so busy worrying about the institution of family farming that they ignore the bottom line: There is no ‘rural America' anymore, and the people trying to hang on to the outdated version of farming are simply holding on to a bad investment...American agriculture is heading for the last roundup...Especially at this point in history, when American agriculture leads the world in almost every way, it is startling to think that the country will not need farmers or ranchers for much longer. But it is true...We need to strip away the romance and nostalgia surrounding agriculture and see it for what it is: a business. It is a type of business that has limited potential for long-run profits because of its competitive nature. The whole world can do it" (p. 25) [On demand for farmland from urban people seeking rural amenities] "It is ironic that many farmers and ranchers retiring in the future will be thankful for the flood of city folks into rural America...That irony is lost on many Defenders of the Farm. Several groups, such as the American Farmland Trust (AFT), still strive to preserve the nation's farmland" (p. 26). "...AFT has created a ‘Purchase of Development Rights' program...In other words, when the value of land is too high to justify farming it, AFT will buy it at market prices so that land can sit idle instead of being developed into something useful. This is an example of shooting yourself in the foot...Clearly the end of Agriculture in America is near, but some people refuse to see the signs and are hurting themselves in an effort to resist the inevitable. A classic example of this comes from reports that retiring farmers are passing their livelihoods on to young enthusiasts through a growing number of programs that match retiring farmers with younger ones in order to keep alive a family farm and a way of life...The idea...was developed in 1990 by a think tank in Nebraska...Yet, all the analysts agree that these programs are not going to change the faces of agriculture...Americans...must learn to let go of farming and ranching...In the long run, this means becoming citizens of the world, dependent on others for food commodities while Americans produce the marvels and the know-how for the future...accept that farming, although it enabled America to move into its dynamic future, is part of a proud past. Job well done" (p. 27). Robert B. Shapiro (who, perhaps some will recognize as the CEO of a firm headquartered in Missouri and mentioned lately in posts to SANET) authored "How Genetic Engineering Will Save Our Planet" (pp. 28-29). This is drawn from a speech published by the Center for the Study of American Business, Washington University, St. Louis. What he writes may not surprise you; my reading of his argument is as follows: The prospects for massive population increases require us to rethink how to feed the world. On top of that, people are demanding higher quality diets that include more animal products and oils. Therefore, we need to double or triple food output in the next few decades. Given the prospects for greatly increased demand for food, what we have done in the past is not sustainable. We have come to the limits of increasing land under cultivation and wildlife habitats are threatened. Biotechnology and information technologies are the only viable alternatives to accomplish this AND make sustainability and development compatible. Plants bioengineered to repel or kill pests are important examples of this. Note for purposes of perspective on the above: If you are not familiar with The Futurist, it is a publication of the World Future Society. The society is not particularly exclusive (I believe the main requirement for membership is $35 for dues). I suspect (but don't know) that its membership is mainly relatively politically-conservative and technologically-optimistic types. I find The Futurist interesting and stimulating because publishes all sorts articles and news notes on interesting ideas, projections, and cutting-edge technologies (e.g., using explosives to tenderize meat--p. 8 of the April issue). Like with National Public Radio, one needs to be able to read between the lines to gauge the perspectives and commitments of the authors. I would judge that most articles (like the two I described above) are consistent with the perspective of its main membership group. The general thrust of most articles is projecting current trends into the future with a new wrinkle or maybe two and conjecturing about some of the implications. Other articles, those more consistent with my tastes, identify novel and unexpected possibilities. Finally, some of the technologically-optimistic authors propose some downright whacky schemes with an unself-conconscious seriousness that I find, at the same time, very entertaining and very scary. Gil Gillespie To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Wed Mar 17 22:50:21 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id WAA20277 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 22:50:21 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id WAA06484 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 22:05:43 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id WAA06388 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 22:05:37 -0500 (EST) Received: from m18.boston.juno.com (m18.boston.juno.com [205.231.101.191]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id WAA12094 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 22:05:34 -0500 (EST) Received: (from eweigel@juno.com) by m18.boston.juno.com (queuemail) id D5X9R4AK; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 22:05:11 EST To: sanet-mg@amani.ces.ncsu.edu Date: Wed, 17 Mar 1999 19:53:41 -0700 Subject: re: N scavenging plants Message-ID: <19990317.195410.3542.2.eweigel@juno.com> X-Mailer: Juno 1.49 X-Juno-Line-Breaks: 0,7-16,18-26,28,30-33,35-36,38-41,43-46,48-49,51, 53-54,56,58-61,63-64,66,68-79,81,83-86 From: Edna M Weigel Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 64 SANETers: The following is an informative Email I received about N scavenging plants. This is only an academic interest for me since I live in a desert with low/moderate available nitrogen (my county agent thinks I need to add lots more nitrogen, but I grow vegetables just fine with a little added compost, mulch, and water). However, I thought it might be of more interest to some of you who live in areas plagued by nitrate groundwater pollution. regards, Edna --------- Begin forwarded message ---------- From: Michael Russelle To: eweigel@juno.com Subject: N scavenging plants Date: Wed, 17 Mar 1999 13:51:58 -0600 Message-ID: <3.0.5.32.19990317135158.0084dcd0@soils.umn.edu> A colleague of mine sent me a copy of the note you had submitted on SANET. You may wish to share this with others in the discussion group. The USDA-ARS Plant Science Research Unit in St. Paul, MN, has developed a couple of alfalfa types that form ineffective nodules with rhizobia and cannot fix N symbiotically. They were developed for research on N2 fixation, but a few years ago, we found that they are 30-40% better in absorbing nitrate from the soil than regular alfalfa. We are using these in field trials to clean up excess nitrate. In one trial in North Dakota, Ineffective Agate removed twice as much N as corn silage, even though above ground dry matter yields were the same. There is very little seed available for these two alfalfas. Even if seed were readily available, however, we would not recommend that farmers plant them, since they either have to be fertilized or seeded in soil with very high inorganic N supply. It turns out that even regular, N2-fixing alfalfas do a pretty good job at removing inorganic N from the soil. Incidentally, planting a crop that has 'an aggressive root system' is no guarantee that it will remove N efficiently. Nitrogen removal is a function of dry matter (yield) and N concentration. If the crop will not yield particularly well at the location, it will not be especially effective in removing N. Those crops with higher N (or protein) concentration will remove more N than crops with lower N concentration, given the same yield. Of course, the crop needs to be able to produce roots at the depths where the nitrate is found in the soil -- one advantage of alfalfa is that it can be very deeply rooted (roughly 4-6 feet per year) and can get to nitrate in the deep subsoil that other crops cannot reach. Perennial crops are generally better than annuals, in that they use water over a longer part of the growing season and have higher yield potential. The water use question is important, because nitrate moves through the soil with excess water. One concern in using crops to remove excess nitrate is that herbage can develop high concentrations of nitrate-N, too. If the forage is to be used for livestock feeding, it should be ensiled to reduce nitrate concentrations, or the hay or green material should be tested for nitrate. Concentrations above 2000 to 3000 mg nitrate-N/kg dry matter may be toxic. Such feed can be used if mixed with other materials to effect dilution of the nitrate. Hope this is of some help. Michael Russelle - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Michael P. Russelle voice: 612-625-8145 USDA-Agricultural Research Service FAX: 651-649-5058 439 Borlaug Hall e-mail: russelle@soils.umn.edu University of Minnesota http://www.umn.edu/arspsru/plantsci.html St. Paul, MN 55108-6028 http://www.dfrc.wisc.edu/profiles/mpr.html USA --------- End forwarded message ---------- ___________________________________________________________________ You don't need to buy Internet access to use free Internet e-mail. 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All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Thu Mar 18 01:20:43 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id BAA22638 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 01:20:43 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id AAA25386 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 00:20:45 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from mailhub.iastate.edu (mailhub.iastate.edu [129.186.1.102]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id AAA25323 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 00:20:40 -0500 (EST) Received: from oemcomputer (dial54.ppp.iastate.edu [129.186.97.54]) by mailhub.iastate.edu (8.8.5/8.8.5) with SMTP id XAA07358 for ; Wed, 17 Mar 1999 23:20:38 -0600 (CST) Message-Id: <4.1.19990317231522.00bc4a10@pop-1.iastate.edu> X-Sender: ehurley@pop-1.iastate.edu (Unverified) X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Pro Version 4.1 Date: Wed, 17 Mar 1999 23:20:26 -0600 To: sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu From: Eric G Hurley Subject: Re: NPR Piece on Monsanto Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 65 For those of you who missed it, the NPR Monsanto piece can be heard on NPR's website at: http://www.npr.org/programs/atc/archives/1999/990316.atc.html You need to download RealAudio and have a soundcard to make it work. Eric G. Hurley ************************************************************* "Since the achievement of our independence, he is the greatest patriot who stops the most gullies." --Patrick Henry Eric G. Hurley 829 Douglas Ave #3 Ames IA 50010-6221 515/232-2568 ehurley@iastate.edu To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Thu Mar 18 09:43:35 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id JAA28606 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 09:43:34 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id IAA00395 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 08:05:48 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from mail.caribe.net (root@mail.caribe.net [209.91.196.5]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id IAA00328 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 08:05:40 -0500 (EST) Received: from ddworley (ppp237.203dip.netdial.caribe.net [209.91.203.237]) by mail.caribe.net (8.9.0/8.9.0) with SMTP id JAA23275 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 09:08:30 -0400 (AST) Message-Id: X-Sender: ddworley@mail.caribe.net X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Pro Version 4.0 Date: Thu, 18 Mar 1999 09:03:40 -0400 To: sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu From: Richard Wolfson (by way of Daniel Worley ) Subject: GEN3-16; Fwd, Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 66 [Reposted with permission] The Observer (UK) Sunday March 14, 1999 Outrage over Monsanto's underhand tactics in EU By Gregory Palast An international consumer group is calling for world trade authorities to withdraw a key endorsement of Monsanto's controversial growth hormone for cows in the wake of Observer revelations that the company had obtained access to confidential EU documents. In a letter to the Joint Expert Committee on Food Additives (Jecfa), London-based Consumers' International demanded the agency void its approval of the bovine growth hormone BST. The consumer watchdog, which participates on the scientific committee, charges that Monsanto's privileged access to restricted documents 'damaged the objectivity and credibility' of the investigation of the hormone. Jecfa reports to the Codex Commission, the world's food safety arbitrator. In June this commission will vote on approving Monsanto's drug for international trade. Last week CI's director, Julian Edward, accused a US Food and Drug Administration official on the panel, Dr Nick Weber, of professional misconduct and 'breach of trust' in passing copies of sensitive papers to Monsanto. The Observer identified Dr Weber as the source of the leak to Monsanto. Weber has not responded to phone calls to his office, but the Jecfa panel's chairman, Dr John Hermann, stated that, following the Observer story, Weber had admitted passing the confidential documents to Monsanto prior to a crucial meeting last February in Paris. Herrman defended Weber, as he did another US Food and Drug Administration official in the controversy, Dr Margaret Miller. The Observer reported that Miller, a former Monsanto BST analyst, took part in the Jecfa review of the hormone.Herrman concedes that Miller participated in the talks and drafted the committee's report, but she excused herself from the actual vote approving the hormone as safe. Before heading Jecfa, Herrman, too, worked for the FDA. A spokesman for the Consumer Policy Institute of New York decried 'the disturbingly close relationship between FDA and Monsanto'. The Institute's BST expert, Dr Michael Hansen, a Jecfa adviser, said there were indications from test data that milk from cows injected with the hormone may promote cancers in humans. In Canada, the Senate Agriculture Committee last week demanded that Ottawa withdraw its seal of approval for BST following the Observer' disclosure that a scientist representing Canada on the Jecfa panel had been suggested by Monsanto. Senator Mira Spivak of Manitoba said senators were stunned to find in their own investigation that 'a registered Monsanto lobbyist was part of Canada's delegation to Codex'. The committee's report recommended conducting new studies of BST. The senator said her committee'learned that BST files were stolen at Health Canada' and that government scientists who expressed doubts about Monsanto's safety tests had been 'muzzled after they began to talk publicly about the drug review'. The Observer also reported that Monsanto had sued several hundred US farmers for 'seed piracy' - planting seeds taken from crops originally grown from Monsanto's copyrighted genetically modified seeds. Now a rival seed company has accused Monsanto of the same offence. Iowa-based Pioneer Hi-Bred International has just filed a suit in the US Federal Court accusing Monsanto of 'genetic misappropriation'. A Hi-Bred spokesman told The Observer that Monsanto 'buys our seeds' and hunt for rare copies of proprietary genetic codes. Monsanto denies that it has done anything illegal. Analysts say the suit by Hi-Bred, the leading US supplier of farm genetics, has major implications for Monsanto. In India, meanwhile, Monsanto lost a key legal battle in its ongoing conflict with the subcontinent's cotton farmers when India's Supreme Court barred Monsanto from new test plantings until it completes a judicial review of human rights claims against Monsanto. Farmers fear that the GM cotton, which incorporates an insecticide within its genetic code, could lead to the evolution of insects resistant to natural insecticides. ........ posted by: jim@niall7.demon.co.uk (jim mcnulty) Daily Express 12 March 99 Why soya is a hidden destroyer Exclusive by Mark Townsend Fresh fears over the safety of genetically modified foods surfaced faced yesterday after new research revealed that food allergies relating to soya Increased by 50 per cent last year A study by Europe's leading specialists on food sensitivity found health complaints caused by soya - the ingredient most associated with GM foods - have increased from 10 in 100 patients to 15 in 100 over the past year. Researchers at the York Nutritional Laboratory said their findings provide real evidence that GM food could have a tangible, harmful impact on the human body The findings were sent to Health Secretary Frank Dobson last night as scientists urged the Government to act on the information and impose an instant ban on GM food, while further safety tests are carried out. Dr Michael Antoniou, senior lecturer in molecular pathology at Guy's Hospital, Central London,, said: "This is a very interesting if slightly worrying, development. "It points to the fact that far more work is needed to assess their safety. At the moment no allergy tests are carried out before GM foods are marketed and that also needs to be looked at." John Graham, spokesman for the York laboratory, said: "We believe this raises serious new questions about the safety of GM foods because it is impossible to guarantee that the soya used in the tests was GM-free." It is the first time in 17 years of testing that soya has crept into the laboratory's top 10 foods to cause an allergic reaction in consumers. The vegetable has moved up four places to ninth end now sits alongside foodstuffs with a long history of causing allergies, such as yeast, sunflower seeds and nuts ......... CBC Internet news Mar 16, 1999 Fear grows over 'Frankenstein foods' LONDON - There's a new type of food that people around the world are having a hard time swallowing -- genetically modified products. Such food is becoming more and more common around the world. In Britain, so is the public outcry. There, memories of mad cow disease are still fresh on people's minds, and the issue is being described as another food crisis. To bio-technology companies, their ability to genetically alter fruits and vegetables is the dawn of a brave new world. It provides agriculture with the means to grow cheaper, healthier foods. Tomato plants, for instance, have been modified to produce fruit that doesn't ripen too quickly. By inserting genes from one plant into another, scientists can also improve a crop's resistance to insects or weeds. "We believe that bio-technology and genetically modified foods is an important component and an important future," says Nigel Poole of Zeneca Food Sciences. "This is only just the first 10 metres in a marathon race." Zeneca sell more than a half-million tins of their genetically modified tomato paste every year -- and they're not alone. Nearly 60 per cent of Britain's processed foods contain some genetically modified ingredients. But environmental and consumer groups are trying to turn back the tide of so-called GM foods. Their message is blunt -- altering the genetic code of grains and vegetables is creating "Frankenstein foods" that threaten human health and the environment. The groups are demanding more research and a moratorium on growing modified crops. "We've asked (British Prime Minister) Tony Blair to conduct a root-and-branch reform of the regulatory system immediately," says Julie Sheperd of Britain's consumers association, "and until that's done, not to allow new GM food products onto the market." Environmental activists recently ripped up a field of genetically modified canola in the British countryside, saying that even growing such plants for research could lead to contamination of other farmers fields. The refrain of worry is being picked up by retailers across the United Kingdom. A growing number of fast food outlets and major supermarkets say they don't want genetically modified ingredients in their products. Burger King and Domino's Pizza are the latest to join the movement. And Iceland Frozen Foods is producing its own line of products using unmodified Canadian soya flour. Iceland Foods' Bill Wadsworth says genetic modification provides a scientific shortcut to food production, but the alteration may be toxic -- now or in the future. "What we're concerned about is the fact that ... nobody can tell us what the risk is," Wadsworth tells CBC News. But some scientists say public fear over genetically modified foods is getting way out of hand. "People seem to be ignoring the real scientific basis of what is being done in respect of genetic modification. And I think there's very little understanding of the true issues," plant physiologist Mike Black tells CBC News. Ultimately, the battle over genetically modified ingredients will be won or lost in supermarkets, with consumer's choices on the store shelves. The British government is about to bring in new regulations for labelling, requiring anyone who sells food, whether in a restaurant or in a supermarket, to warn customers if it contains genetically modified ingredients. That way, it would be consumers who cast the final vote on the future of GM food. _________________________________________________________ Richard Wolfson, PhD Consumer Right to Know Campaign, for Mandatory Labelling and Long-term Testing of all Genetically Engineered Foods, 500 Wilbrod Street Ottawa, ON Canada K1N 6N2 tel. 613-565-8517 fax. 613-565-1596 email: rwolfson@concentric.net Our website, http://www.natural-law.ca/genetic/geindex.html contains more information on genetic engineering as well as previous genetic engineering news items. Subscription fee to genetic engineering news is $35 for 12 months, payable to "BanGEF" and mailed to the above address. Or see website for details. __________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________ To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Thu Mar 18 09:47:09 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id JAA28691 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 09:47:09 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id IAA12035 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 08:25:01 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from dfw-ix4.ix.netcom.com (dfw-ix4.ix.netcom.com [206.214.98.4]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id IAA11960 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 08:24:51 -0500 (EST) Received: (from smap@localhost) by dfw-ix4.ix.netcom.com (8.8.4/8.8.4) id HAA28820; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 07:24:13 -0600 (CST) Received: from wor-ma1-16.ix.netcom.com(205.184.168.48) by dfw-ix4.ix.netcom.com via smap (V1.3) id rma028787; Thu Mar 18 07:23:51 1999 Message-ID: <020401be7142$69b67ce0$55a8b8cd@guldann.ix.netcom.com> Reply-To: "Dan Hook" From: "Dan Hook" To: , "Gilbert W. Gillespie Jr." Subject: Re: Articles in The Futurist Date: Thu, 18 Mar 1999 08:22:41 -0500 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.72.3115.0 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.3110.3 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 67 Gil sent: > >Steven C. Blank, an extension economist from UC-Davis and author of "The >End of the American Farm?" (pp. 22-27), draws from his 1998 book–The End of >Agriculture in the American Portfolio–to argue that agriculture is becoming >uncompetitive in the US and that we ought to give up the outdated notion of >producing food in the U.S. and import it from places that can produce it >more cheaply. If I were to criticize Blank, I would do so for not >mentioning the promise of biotech for eliminating agriculture all together >(a prospect that should prevent rational land grant administrators from >hiring any new production scientist faculty members younger than 50). Some >excerpts that I hope fairly capture the main content: > >"Most Americans could not care less if farming and ranching disappear, as >long as they get their burgers and fries. Americans will waddle on. The > Yikes this is a scary one, but I really don't see this as true. While many Americans are happy when things they want to buy just appear on the shelves, they can be awakened (albeit usually temporarily) when something endangers or appears to endanger their American comfort ie: attention to mad cow, e-coli, etc. I think if Americans were asked they would say they would prefere that most of our food was grown here, they're aware that having your "pantry" behind another countries borders could prove dangerous, war, export difficulties etc. I don't even think rural american is "disappearing" being chipped away at but not disappearing (fingers crossed). And while many Americans put their interest in things natural or agricultural on the back burner something I read in "Farms of the Future Revisited" struck me as meaningful I paraphrase and include my own opinions, people crave a connection with farms hence the sucess of petting zoos, farm stands, and probably pony rides. If you can get John and Jane Q Public on a farm they usually "see" how beautiful it is. Getting them there another story. Another quote I read and I appologize I do not remember the author if I find it I will post it: "You can not love what you don't know" Wow that about says it. Beth To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Thu Mar 18 10:26:45 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id KAA29667 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 10:26:45 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id JAA03688 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 09:03:23 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id JAA03644 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 09:03:17 -0500 (EST) Received: from dfw-ix4.ix.netcom.com (dfw-ix4.ix.netcom.com [206.214.98.4]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id JAA04741 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 09:03:15 -0500 (EST) Received: (from smap@localhost) by dfw-ix4.ix.netcom.com (8.8.4/8.8.4) id IAA02980; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 08:02:06 -0600 (CST) Received: from wor-ma1-16.ix.netcom.com(205.184.168.48) by dfw-ix4.ix.netcom.com via smap (V1.3) id rma002893; Thu Mar 18 08:01:34 1999 Message-ID: <024001be7147$aea024a0$55a8b8cd@guldann.ix.netcom.com> Reply-To: "Dan Hook" From: "Dan Hook" To: "Michele Gale-Sinex/CIAS, UW-Madison" , , Cc: Subject: Re: (Fwd) Greenspan Says World Troubles Hurt U.S. Farmers Date: Thu, 18 Mar 1999 09:00:23 -0500 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.72.3115.0 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.3110.3 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 68 >Weakness in farm prices reflects the sick economies of key trading >partners such as Japan and Russia, which have cut back their imports >of U.S. agricultural products. Farmers won't see better times until >troubled economies overseas recover, he warned. > >To survive under these conditions, farmers must keep on making >themselves more efficient and more productive by using the latest >technology, Greenspan said. > >c1999 San Francisco Chronicle Page B1 You survive a lessened market by making yourself more efficient and productive (with the lastest bell and whistles of course) so that you have lots of stuff to not sell? He's an ecomomist? Beth To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Thu Mar 18 13:37:18 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id NAA04752 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 13:37:18 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id MAA19248 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 12:12:36 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from garnet.sover.net (garnet.sover.net [209.198.87.53]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id MAA19157; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 12:12:29 -0500 (EST) Received: from oemcomputer (arc0a346.bf.sover.net [209.198.83.254]) by garnet.sover.net (8.9.3/8.9.3) with SMTP id MAA22530; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 12:12:27 -0500 (EST) Comments: SoVerNet Verification (on garnet.sover.net) oemcomputer from arc0a346.bf.sover.net [209.198.83.254] 209.198.83.254 Thu, 18 Mar 1999 12:12:27 -0500 (EST) Message-ID: <001f01be7162$cf66b120$fe53c6d1@oemcomputer> Reply-To: "farm connection" From: "farm connection" To: , Subject: Re: sanet-mg-digest V1 #905 Date: Thu, 18 Mar 1999 11:57:31 -0500 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.72.3110.1 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.3110.3 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 69 why are so many of you surprised at the pro monsanto leanings at npr - this is the same "public" radio that gets major support from archer daniels midland, mobil corp et al. do you really suppose that the grumbling of lowly listeners who contribute maybe $50 will matter to them? -----Original Message----- From: sanet-mg-digest To: sanet-mg-digest@ces.ncsu.edu Date: Wednesday, March 17, 1999 6:56 PM Subject: sanet-mg-digest V1 #905 > >sanet-mg-digest Wednesday, March 17 1999 Volume 01 : Number 905 > > > >In this issue: > > Monsonto's price > NPR Piece on Monsanto,Etc > Re: NPR Report on Monsanto > Re: Re: npr story on monsanto GE > (Fwd) Greenspan Says World Troubles Hurt U.S. Farmers > >See the end of the digest for information about sanet-mg-digest. > >---------------------------------------------------------------------- > >Date: Wed, 17 Mar 1999 09:44:19 EST5EDT >From: "Anita Graf (Staff)" >Subject: Monsonto's price > >> "The speed at which GM organisms have been developed and introduced by >> multinational companies and the scientific community has left many people >> completely unaware of and uninvolved in the process," the panel said. > >I was talking to a friend of mine today who happens to be stock >broker and I asked him what's going on with Monsonto stock (wondering >to myself how all this bruhaha we've been reading about lately re. >the backlash against GMOs is effecting the bottom line over there) >and he told me that it had been in a holding pattern for some time, >but recently it's gone up (!!). He says that there are rumors of a >takeover. Anyway, it would seem that whatever resistence to GE is >brewing out there, it isn't giving off any economic signals yet to >dampen the GE enthusiasm... Anita > >To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command >"unsubscribe sanet-mg". >To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command >"subscribe sanet-mg-digest". > >All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: >http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail > >------------------------------ > >Date: Wed, 17 Mar 1999 09:15:19 -0800 >From: Charles Benbrook >Subject: NPR Piece on Monsanto,Etc > > Much could and needs to be said about the NPR piece on Monsanto >(part I), the Dupont-Pioneer deal, Monsanto's stock price, and the prospects >for farmers to make a living growing soybeans in the U.S. But for now just >a few points. > > The NPR piece shows what good PR can do and get for a company that >knows how to "work with" the media. Not a bright day for NPR. What amazes >me is that senior Monsanto officials can get away, unchallenged, with saying >things like "RR beans lowered their (farmers') costs and raised their >yields." The evidence is now overwhelming and indisputable that average >yields of RR varieties are about 4-6% less than conventional varieties. The >definitive and most recent comparative analysis was carried out by Dr. E.S. >Oplinger of the Univ. of Wisconsin, Madison, who has managed a North Central >regional project assessing soybean varietal performance for years. Dr. >Oplinger compared yields of 5,172 conv. varieties paired with 3,067 RR >varieties in 8 states in 1998. The RR varieties yielded between 86% and >113% of the conv., and average yields were 96% of conventional. There were >just two areas where RR did better -- Illinois and southern Michigan. >Outside these areas the average yield drag was greater, on the order of 6% >to 8% (data from "Performance of Transgenetic Soybeans -- Northern US," Dr. >E.S. Oplinger, M.J. Martinka, and K.A. Schmitz, Dept. of Agronomy, UW-Madison). > > This places the minimal average yield drag at about 2 bushels per >acre, or $10.00 (and it was much more on many farmers). That $10.00 plus >the technology charge, plus the 2-3 applications of Roundup (not the one >alleged in the piece), plus the 2 or 3 other herbicide a.i.s that must be >applied make for the most expensive soybean seed+weed management system in >modern history -- between $40.00 and $60.00 per acre depending on rates, >weed pressure, etc. Not long ago, in 1985, the average seed plus weed costs >on farms in Illinois was $26.72 per acre (USDA cost of production data), and >represented 23% of total variable costs; now, they represent 35-40%. (For >details and data sources, see the paper I did for the Univ. of Illinois >symposium at ). No wonder Monsanto is throwing in >free resprays and replanting, and other crop insurance-like benefits as an >added bonus. > > Every independent set of data, recent analysis of RR beans I have >seen reaches the same conclusion; the technology increases costs somewhat, >but imposes a "price" farmers are willing to pay for the >simplicity/robustness of the weed management system. Oplinger et al. end >their paper saying: "It is anticipated that soybean growers will continue to >increase acres planted to RR varieties and will sacrifice yield for ease of >weed control." They will also sacrifice some net income per acre. This is >a perfectly rational reason for farmers to adopt the technology; weed >management is probably the number one management challenge all soybean >farmers face. Monsanto should not be ashamed to cite these reasons in >explaining why the technology is being adopted. But Monsanto needs to drop >the "feeding the world", "lowering costs", "lowering pesticide use" claims >because they do not hold water and will undermine, further, the reputation >of the corporation, and in so doing feed the already considerable cynicism >abroad about the trustworthiness of this company. > > While Monsanto does not seem to worry much about losing consumer >trust in Europe and Japan, U.S. farmers (and the U.S. government) should be >concerned and will, in the end, pay the price if the effort to drive RR >beans down the throats of Europeans backfires into a search for non-GMO >soybeans from other countries. > > Plus, things are not getting any better down on the farm. Soybean >prices are way down, export markets are soft. As weed shifts continue in >areas planted heavily to RR beans, and as resistance spreads to additional >weed species (the first signs of tolerant weeds are appearing in several >states), farmers will have to increase rates of Roundup applications and >intensify use of other active ingredients, to fill gaps in control. Costs >will rise, the income squeeze will get even worse. > > Contrary to a Monsanto scientist's claim on the NPR piece, Roundup >does not kill everything green except for transgenic crop varieties. If >that were the case, most farmers using RR systems would not be applying at >least 2, and on many farms, three additional active ingredients. > > Someone posted that Monsanto's stock price is holding. Keep >watching that space. The Dupont-Pioneer deal seals off the most likely >route to salvation for Monsanto -- Dupont's deep pockets. Monsanto is >desperate for a new partner to help cover its $700 million plus cost of >capital, etc from the seed mergers of the past few years. Not too many >companies around that can float that sort of cost. There remain a couple of >major deals to go in the pesticide and seed industries, and then it will be, >for all intents and purposes, over. Expect Monsanto, Zeneca, American Home >Products, Novartis, and Bayer to be involved in a few additional mega-deals >in the next 12-24 months. > > We will have one industry where we used to have two, and 4-6 major >players where there used to be a couple of dozen, and many dozen regionally >significant players. No one has much of an idea, nor any credible way to >project the consequences of these changes. Its unchartered water in >turbulent times. We are all invited along for the ride, which will be >exciting and at times divisive, as the economic interests of one part of the >agricultural system (probably farmers) suffer at the expense of other >players. There will be many surprises, positive and negative. What seems >clear to me, in any event, is that public institutions and policies, like >those governing research, technology returns, intellectual property, >markets, information, are not keeping up and that new forces shaping the >performance of the new seed+pesticide industry will largely emerge within >the private sector, from the demand side, both farmers for inputs and >consumers for food. > > chuck benbrook > > > > > > >Charles Benbrook 208-263-5236 (voice) >Benbrook Consulting Services 208-263-7342 (fax) >5085 Upper Pack River Road benbrook@hillnet.com [e-mail] >Sandpoint, Idaho 83864 http://www.pmac.net > > >To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command >"unsubscribe sanet-mg". >To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command >"subscribe sanet-mg-digest". > >All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: >http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail > >------------------------------ > >Date: Wed, 17 Mar 1999 07:52:22 -0600 >From: "Mark Ritchie" >Subject: Re: NPR Report on Monsanto > >I was on an previous NPR show about biosafety/biotech in which my >impression from the NPR producer was that they she and NPR were pro-biotech >and pro-monsanto. On the show that was aired I had one sentence and then >there were 4 strong proponents of biotech. >How about some calls to NPR to complain?? > >At 04:04 PM 3/16/99 -0700, Ed and Sue Sparling wrote: >>>>> >Dear Sustainable Ag Network Subscribers: > >How did you all react to the "All Things Considered piece on Monsanto?" > >My reaction was that the Monsanto PR dept had a big hand in it. >Interesting that Clinton is going to give Fraley (former PR man for >Monsanto) a medal. Ouch! > >I have to wonder if tommorow's part 2 will incorporate a serious >consideration of concerns about the effects of bt GM plants on the organic >farming sector. It seems pretty irresponsible reporting if Dan Charles >(NPR reporter) hasn't talked to Charles Benbrook (for example). > >Ed Sparling >Professor Emeritus >Dept Agric Economics >Colorado State University > ><<<< > > >Mark Ritchie, President >Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy >2105 First Ave. South >Minneapolis, Minnesota 55404 USA >612-870-3400 (phone) 612-870-4846 (fax) >mritchie@iatp.org www.iatp.org/iatp > >To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command >"unsubscribe sanet-mg". >To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command >"subscribe sanet-mg-digest". > >All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: >http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail > >------------------------------ > >Date: Wed, 17 Mar 1999 14:06:50 EST >From: PetersFarm@aol.com >Subject: Re: Re: npr story on monsanto GE > >Well, you know, we SANeters are bound to be disappointed (as I was) by any >program about biotech, just because we've already been so well informed, >thanks to SANet. Frankly, I'm glad to see/hear ANYthing on the subject from >ANY of the media (as long as it's not a Monsanto commercial). If that >program gets 10 people thinking about an issue they were not even aware of, I >call that a Good Thing. > >(Betty) Ann Gras > >To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command >"unsubscribe sanet-mg". >To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command >"subscribe sanet-mg-digest". > >All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: >http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail > >------------------------------ > >Date: Wed, 17 Mar 1999 13:43:58 -0500 >From: "Michele Gale-Sinex/CIAS, UW-Madison" >Subject: (Fwd) Greenspan Says World Troubles Hurt U.S. Farmers > >Howdy, all-- > >So, since when has Alan Greenspan set himself up as spokesdude for >the J. Random Powerful Pinstriped Guy Ministry of Agricultural >Production System Expertise? > >This appeared in today's /SF Chronicle/. Notice that his touted >"characteristic ambiguity" doesn't include his advice to farmers. > >Efficiency...productivity...latest technology. Keep saying it. Sooner >or later my eyes are bound to glaze over. > >pax >misha > >- ------- Forwarded Message Follows ------- > >Greenspan Says World Troubles Hurt U.S. Farmers >Fed chairman sees technology as means to increase >efficiency > >Sam Zuckerman, Chronicle Staff Writer >Wednesday, March 17, 1999 > > >Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan came to San Francisco >yesterday to speak just hours after the Dow Jones industrial average >briefly crashed through the 10,000 barrier for the first time ever. > >But the Fed chairman didn't utter a word about the market because >high finance wasn't on his mind. > >Greenspan, who has frequently voiced his worries about speculation in >stocks and coined the phrase ``irrational exuberance'' several >thousand Dow points back, chose the occasion to speak about the U.S. >farm economy. > >While the overall U.S. economy experiences a remarkable mix of robust >growth, low unemployment and low inflation, ``agriculture has been one >of the more notable soft spots,'' Greenspan noted, hurt by worldwide >weakness in commodity prices. > >Greenspan's choice of San Francisco as a venue to speak about farming >wasn't as odd as it seemed at first glance. His audience at the >Moscone Center consisted of more than 2,000 community bankers in town >for a convention of the Independent Bankers Association of America, >many from small-town banks that specialize in loans to farmers. > >The Fed chief's outlook for the broader economy was, as usual, >ambiguous and delivered in his characteristic on-the-one-hand, >on-the- other-hand style. > >The healthy U.S. economy ``is partly the result of influences that >may prove transitory, but a number of fundamental strengths imply >more lasting benefits,'' he said. > >Greenspan noted that, after eight years of economic growth, ``the >economy appears stretched in a number of dimensions, implying >considerable upside and downside risks to the economic outlook.'' > >Weakness in farm prices reflects the sick economies of key trading >partners such as Japan and Russia, which have cut back their imports >of U.S. agricultural products. Farmers won't see better times until >troubled economies overseas recover, he warned. > >To survive under these conditions, farmers must keep on making >themselves more efficient and more productive by using the latest >technology, Greenspan said. > >c1999 San Francisco Chronicle Page B1 > >To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command >"unsubscribe sanet-mg". >To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command >"subscribe sanet-mg-digest". > >All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: >http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail > >------------------------------ > >End of sanet-mg-digest V1 #905 >****************************** > > >To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the comannd >"unsubscribe sanet-mg-digest". To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Thu Mar 18 15:41:50 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id PAA10289 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 15:41:49 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id OAA10399 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 14:33:05 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from eagle.ACNS.ColoState.EDU (root@eagle.ACNS.ColoState.EDU [129.82.100.90]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id OAA10383 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 14:33:00 -0500 (EST) Received: from lamar.ColoState.EDU (lamar.ACNS.ColoState.EDU [129.82.100.75]) by eagle.ACNS.ColoState.EDU (AIX4.3/UCB 8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id MAA39448; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 12:32:57 -0700 Received: from edandsue (dialup0128.PPP.ColoState.EDU [129.82.52.227]) by lamar.ColoState.EDU (AIX4.3/UCB 8.8.8/8.8.8) with SMTP id MAA180138; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 12:32:51 -0700 Message-ID: <007d01be7175$53268be0$e3345281@edandsue.colostate.edu> From: "Ed and Sue Sparling" To: Cc: Subject: ATC Piece on Monsanto and Genetic Engineered Crops Date: Thu, 18 Mar 1999 12:27:09 -0700 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary="----=_NextPart_000_007A_01BE713A.A4749C20" X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.72.3110.5 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.3110.3 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 70 This is a multi-part message in MIME format. ------=_NextPart_000_007A_01BE713A.A4749C20 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable To Whom it May Concern: =20 Please find below a post from Dr Charles Benbrook, author of the book, = "Pest Management at the Crossroads," 1996, Consumers Union, Yonkers, = NY.,=20 and formerly Executive Director of the Board on Agriculture for the = National Academy of Sciences. =20 Dr. Benbrook is addressing one inaccuracy (misrepresentation by = Monsanto) of Part I of the ATC piece of this week. Benbrook's points = are well substantiated. In particular, he gives several references which = can be checked with a web crawler. In addition to checking these leads, ATC needs to follow up by delving = more deeply into the reasons responsible scientists and organic farmers = are so concerned about Monsanto's approach to marketing genetically = engineered crop seed. Dr Benbrook would be an excellent resource for = your reporters. Please find his post below my signature line. Yours Truly, =20 Ed Sparling Subscriber, KUNC Professor Emeritus, Agricultural Economics Colorado State University =20 =20 =20 NPR Piece on Monsanto,Etc =20 Charles Benbrook (benbrook@hillnet.com) Wed, 17 Mar 1999 09:15:19 -0800=20 =20 Messages sorted by: [ date ][ thread ][ subject ][ author ]=20 Previous message: Anita Graf: "Monsonto's price"=20 =20 Much could and needs to be said about the NPR piece on Monsanto (part I), the Dupont-Pioneer deal, Monsanto's stock price, and the = prospects for farmers to make a living growing soybeans in the U.S. But for now = just a few points. =20 The NPR piece shows what good PR can do and get for a company that knows how to "work with" the media. Not a bright day for NPR. What = amazes me is that senior Monsanto officials can get away, unchallenged, with = saying things like "RR beans lowered their (farmers') costs and raised their yields." The evidence is now overwhelming and indisputable that average yields of RR varieties are about 4-6% less than conventional varieties. = The definitive and most recent comparative analysis was carried out by Dr. = E.S. Oplinger of the Univ. of Wisconsin, Madison, who has managed a North = Central regional project assessing soybean varietal performance for years. Dr. Oplinger compared yields of 5,172 conv. varieties paired with 3,067 RR varieties in 8 states in 1998. The RR varieties yielded between 86% and 113% of the conv., and average yields were 96% of conventional. There = were just two areas where RR did better -- Illinois and southern Michigan. Outside these areas the average yield drag was greater, on the order of = 6% to 8% (data from "Performance of Transgenetic Soybeans -- Northern US," = Dr. E.S. Oplinger, M.J. Martinka, and K.A. Schmitz, Dept. of Agronomy, = UW-Madison). =20 This places the minimal average yield drag at about 2 bushels per acre, or $10.00 (and it was much more on many farmers). That $10.00 plus the technology charge, plus the 2-3 applications of Roundup (not the one alleged in the piece), plus the 2 or 3 other herbicide a.i.s that must = be applied make for the most expensive soybean seed+weed management system = in modern history -- between $40.00 and $60.00 per acre depending on rates, weed pressure, etc. Not long ago, in 1985, the average seed plus weed = costs on farms in Illinois was $26.72 per acre (USDA cost of production data), = and represented 23% of total variable costs; now, they represent 35-40%. = (For details and data sources, see the paper I did for the Univ. of Illinois symposium at ). No wonder Monsanto is throwing in free resprays and replanting, and other crop insurance-like benefits as = an added bonus.=20 =20 Every independent set of data, recent analysis of RR beans I have seen reaches the same conclusion; the technology increases costs = somewhat, but imposes a "price" farmers are willing to pay for the simplicity/robustness of the weed management system. Oplinger et al. end their paper saying: "It is anticipated that soybean growers will = continue to increase acres planted to RR varieties and will sacrifice yield for ease = of weed control." They will also sacrifice some net income per acre. This = is a perfectly rational reason for farmers to adopt the technology; weed management is probably the number one management challenge all soybean farmers face. Monsanto should not be ashamed to cite these reasons in explaining why the technology is being adopted. But Monsanto needs to = drop the "feeding the world", "lowering costs", "lowering pesticide use" = claims because they do not hold water and will undermine, further, the = reputation of the corporation, and in so doing feed the already considerable = cynicism abroad about the trustworthiness of this company.=20 =20 While Monsanto does not seem to worry much about losing consumer trust in Europe and Japan, U.S. farmers (and the U.S. government) should = be concerned and will, in the end, pay the price if the effort to drive RR beans down the throats of Europeans backfires into a search for non-GMO soybeans from other countries. =20 Plus, things are not getting any better down on the farm. Soybean prices are way down, export markets are soft. As weed shifts continue in areas planted heavily to RR beans, and as resistance spreads to = additional weed species (the first signs of tolerant weeds are appearing in several states), farmers will have to increase rates of Roundup applications and intensify use of other active ingredients, to fill gaps in control. = Costs will rise, the income squeeze will get even worse.=20 =20 Contrary to a Monsanto scientist's claim on the NPR piece, Roundup does not kill everything green except for transgenic crop varieties. If that were the case, most farmers using RR systems would not be applying = at least 2, and on many farms, three additional active ingredients. =20 Someone posted that Monsanto's stock price is holding. Keep watching that space. The Dupont-Pioneer deal seals off the most likely route to salvation for Monsanto -- Dupont's deep pockets. Monsanto is desperate for a new partner to help cover its $700 million plus cost of capital, etc from the seed mergers of the past few years. Not too many companies around that can float that sort of cost. There remain a couple = of major deals to go in the pesticide and seed industries, and then it will = be, for all intents and purposes, over. Expect Monsanto, Zeneca, American = Home Products, Novartis, and Bayer to be involved in a few additional = mega-deals in the next 12-24 months. =20 We will have one industry where we used to have two, and 4-6 major players where there used to be a couple of dozen, and many dozen = regionally significant players. No one has much of an idea, nor any credible way to project the consequences of these changes. Its unchartered water in turbulent times. We are all invited along for the ride, which will be exciting and at times divisive, as the economic interests of one part of = the agricultural system (probably farmers) suffer at the expense of other players. There will be many surprises, positive and negative. What seems clear to me, in any event, is that public institutions and policies, = like those governing research, technology returns, intellectual property, markets, information, are not keeping up and that new forces shaping the performance of the new seed+pesticide industry will largely emerge = within the private sector, from the demand side, both farmers for inputs and consumers for food. =20 chuck benbrook =20 Charles Benbrook 208-263-5236 (voice) Benbrook Consulting Services 208-263-7342 (fax) 5085 Upper Pack River Road benbrook@hillnet.com [e-mail] Sandpoint, Idaho 83864 http://www.pmac.net =20 To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". =20 All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail =20 Previous message: Anita Graf: "Monsonto's price"=20 =20 =20 ------=_NextPart_000_007A_01BE713A.A4749C20 Content-Type: text/html; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable
To Whom it May Concern:
 
Please find below a post from Dr Charles Benbrook, = author of=20 the book, "Pest Management at the Crossroads,"  1996, = Consumers=20 Union, Yonkers, NY.,
and formerly Executive Director of the Board on = Agriculture=20 for the National Academy of Sciences.
 
Dr. Benbrook is addressing one = inaccuracy=20 (misrepresentation by Monsanto) of Part I of the ATC piece of this = week. =20 Benbrook's points are well = substantiated. In=20 particular, he gives several references which can be checked with a web=20 crawler.
 
In addition to checking these = leads,  ATC=20 needs to follow up by delving more deeply into the reasons responsible=20 scientists and organic farmers are so concerned about Monsanto's = approach to=20 marketing genetically engineered crop seed.  Dr Benbrook would be = an=20 excellent resource for your reporters. Please find his post below my = signature=20 line.

Yours Truly,
 
Ed Sparling
Subscriber,=20 KUNC
Professor Emeritus, Agricultural = Economics
Colorado State = University
 
 
 
NPR Piece on = Monsanto,Etc
 
Charles Benbrook (benbrook@hillnet.com)
Wed, = 17 Mar 1999=20 09:15:19 -0800
 
    Messages sorted = by: [ date ][=20 thread ][ subject ][ author ]
    Previous message: = Anita=20 Graf: "Monsonto's price"
 
Much could and needs to be said = about the NPR=20 piece on Monsanto
(part I), the Dupont-Pioneer deal, Monsanto's stock = price,=20 and the prospects
for farmers to make a living growing soybeans in = the U.S.=20 But for now just
a few points.
 
The NPR piece shows what good PR can = do and get=20 for a company that
knows how to "work with" the media. Not = a bright=20 day for NPR. What amazes
me is that senior Monsanto officials can get = away,=20 unchallenged, with saying
things like "RR beans lowered their = (farmers')=20 costs and raised their
yields." The evidence is now overwhelming = and=20 indisputable that average
yields of RR varieties are about 4-6% less = than=20 conventional varieties. The
definitive and most recent comparative = analysis=20 was carried out by Dr. E.S.
Oplinger of the Univ. of Wisconsin, = Madison, who=20 has managed a North Central
regional project assessing soybean = varietal=20 performance for years. Dr.
Oplinger compared yields of 5,172 conv. = varieties=20 paired with 3,067 RR
varieties in 8 states in 1998. The RR varieties = yielded=20 between 86% and
113% of the conv., and average yields were 96% of=20 conventional. There were
just two areas where RR did better -- = Illinois and=20 southern Michigan.
Outside these areas the average yield drag was = greater, on=20 the order of 6%
to 8% (data from "Performance of Transgenetic = Soybeans=20 -- Northern US," Dr.
E.S. Oplinger, M.J. Martinka, and K.A. = Schmitz,=20 Dept. of Agronomy, UW-Madison).
 
This places the minimal average = yield drag at=20 about 2 bushels per
acre, or $10.00 (and it was much more on many = farmers).=20 That $10.00 plus
the technology charge, plus the 2-3 applications of = Roundup=20 (not the one
alleged in the piece), plus the 2 or 3 other herbicide = a.i.s=20 that must be
applied make for the most expensive soybean seed+weed = management=20 system in
modern history -- between $40.00 and $60.00 per acre = depending on=20 rates,
weed pressure, etc. Not long ago, in 1985, the average seed = plus weed=20 costs
on farms in Illinois was $26.72 per acre (USDA cost of = production=20 data), and
represented 23% of total variable costs; now, they = represent=20 35-40%. (For
details and data sources, see the paper I did for the = Univ. of=20 Illinois
symposium at <www.pmac.net/IWFS.pdf>). No = wonder=20 Monsanto is throwing in
free resprays and replanting, and other crop=20 insurance-like benefits as an
added bonus.
 
Every independent set of data, = recent analysis=20 of RR beans I have
seen reaches the same conclusion; the technology = increases=20 costs somewhat,
but imposes a "price" farmers are willing = to pay=20 for the
simplicity/robustness of the weed management system. Oplinger = et al.=20 end
their paper saying: "It is anticipated that soybean growers = will=20 continue to
increase acres planted to RR varieties and will sacrifice = yield=20 for ease of
weed control." They will also sacrifice some net = income per=20 acre. This is
a perfectly rational reason for farmers to adopt the=20 technology; weed
management is probably the number one management = challenge=20 all soybean
farmers face. Monsanto should not be ashamed to cite = these=20 reasons in
explaining why the technology is being adopted. But = Monsanto needs=20 to drop
the "feeding the world", "lowering = costs",=20 "lowering pesticide use" claims
because they do not hold = water and=20 will undermine, further, the reputation
of the corporation, and in so = doing=20 feed the already considerable cynicism
abroad about the = trustworthiness of=20 this company.
 
While Monsanto does not seem to = worry much about=20 losing consumer
trust in Europe and Japan, U.S. farmers (and the U.S. = government) should be
concerned and will, in the end, pay the price = if the=20 effort to drive RR
beans down the throats of Europeans backfires into = a=20 search for non-GMO
soybeans from other countries.
 
Plus, things are not getting any = better down on=20 the farm. Soybean
prices are way down, export markets are soft. As = weed=20 shifts continue in
areas planted heavily to RR beans, and as = resistance=20 spreads to additional
weed species (the first signs of tolerant weeds = are=20 appearing in several
states), farmers will have to increase rates of = Roundup=20 applications and
intensify use of other active ingredients, to fill = gaps in=20 control. Costs
will rise, the income squeeze will get even worse.=20
 
Contrary to a Monsanto scientist's = claim on the=20 NPR piece, Roundup
does not kill everything green except for = transgenic crop=20 varieties. If
that were the case, most farmers using RR systems would = not be=20 applying at
least 2, and on many farms, three additional active=20 ingredients.
 
Someone posted that Monsanto's stock = price is=20 holding. Keep
watching that space. The Dupont-Pioneer deal seals off = the most=20 likely
route to salvation for Monsanto -- Dupont's deep pockets. = Monsanto=20 is
desperate for a new partner to help cover its $700 million plus = cost=20 of
capital, etc from the seed mergers of the past few years. Not too=20 many
companies around that can float that sort of cost. There remain = a couple=20 of
major deals to go in the pesticide and seed industries, and then = it will=20 be,
for all intents and purposes, over. Expect Monsanto, Zeneca, = American=20 Home
Products, Novartis, and Bayer to be involved in a few additional = mega-deals
in the next 12-24 months.
 
We will have one industry where we = used to have=20 two, and 4-6 major
players where there used to be a couple of dozen, = and many=20 dozen regionally
significant players. No one has much of an idea, nor = any=20 credible way to
project the consequences of these changes. Its = unchartered=20 water in
turbulent times. We are all invited along for the ride, = which will=20 be
exciting and at times divisive, as the economic interests of one = part of=20 the
agricultural system (probably farmers) suffer at the expense of=20 other
players. There will be many surprises, positive and negative. = What=20 seems
clear to me, in any event, is that public institutions and = policies,=20 like
those governing research, technology returns, intellectual=20 property,
markets, information, are not keeping up and that new = forces=20 shaping the
performance of the new seed+pesticide industry will = largely=20 emerge within
the private sector, from the demand side, both farmers = for=20 inputs and
consumers for food.
 
chuck benbrook
 

Charles Benbrook 208-263-5236=20 (voice)
Benbrook Consulting Services 208-263-7342 (fax)
5085 Upper = Pack=20 River Road benbrook@hillnet.com=20 [e-mail]
Sandpoint, Idaho 83864 http://www.pmac.net
 
To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with = the=20 command
"unsubscribe sanet-mg".
To Subscribe to Digest: = Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with = the=20 command
"subscribe sanet-mg-digest".
 
All messages to sanet-mg are = archived at:
http://www.sare.org/san= /htdocs/hypermail
 
    Previous message: = Anita Graf:=20 "Monsonto's price"
 
 
------=_NextPart_000_007A_01BE713A.A4749C20-- To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Thu Mar 18 16:55:53 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id QAA11863 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 16:55:53 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id PAA01670 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 15:58:15 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from mail.iatp.org (iatp-2.InnovSoftD.com [208.141.36.66]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id PAA01597 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 15:58:08 -0500 (EST) Received: from renskebert.iatp.org ([208.141.36.78]) by mail.iatp.org (Netscape Messaging Server 3.56) with SMTP id 522; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 15:03:25 -0600 Message-Id: <3.0.5.32.19990318151447.007c6870@iatp.org> X-Sender: rvanstaveren@iatp.org X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Pro Version 3.0.5 (32) Date: Thu, 18 Mar 1999 15:14:47 -0600 To: sanet-mg-digest@ces.ncsu.edu From: "Renske van Staveren" Subject: Antitrust chief to meet with producers about mergers Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 71 Mpls/St. Paul Star Tribune, 17 March 1999 WASHINGTON, D.C. -- The Justice Department's chief enforcer of antitrust laws will be in Minnesota next month to meet with producers about their concerns with agribusiness mergers. Joel Klein will be accompanied by Michael Dunn, the Agriculture Department's undersecretary for marketing and regulatory programs. Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle, D-S.D., also may attend. The meeting will be April 18, but no location has been set. "This is going to give [Klein] an opportunity to hear first-hand the concerns of . . . producers all over the Upper Midwest," said Andy McDonald, a spokesman for Sen. Paul Wellstone, D-Minn. Klein's office is reviewing plans by Cargill Inc. of Minnetonka, the nation's No. 1 grain company, to buy the worldwide operations of second-ranked Continental Grain Co. Livestock producers long have been complaining about declining competition among meatpackers. -- Associated Press __________________________________________ Ms. Renske van Staveren, Coordinator International Forum on Food & Agriculture (IFA) c/o Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy (IATP) 2105 First Avenue South Minneapolis, MN, USA 55404-2505 ph: 612-870-3423 fax: 612-870-4846 rvanstaveren@iatp.org> http://www.iffah.org __________________________________________ "When I give food to the poor, they call me a saint. When I ask why the poor have no food, they call me a communist." - Dom Helder Camara To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Thu Mar 18 17:00:56 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id RAA12022 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 17:00:55 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id QAA04095 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 16:00:51 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from mail.iatp.org (iatp-2.InnovSoftD.com [208.141.36.66]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id QAA04078 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 16:00:45 -0500 (EST) Received: from renskebert.iatp.org ([208.141.36.78]) by mail.iatp.org (Netscape Messaging Server 3.56) with SMTP id 125 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 15:06:04 -0600 Message-Id: <3.0.5.32.19990318151726.00851100@iatp.org> X-Sender: rvanstaveren@iatp.org X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Pro Version 3.0.5 (32) Date: Thu, 18 Mar 1999 15:17:26 -0600 To: sanet-mg-digest@ces.ncsu.edu From: "Renske van Staveren" Subject: The first line says it all... Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 72 >From Mpls/St. Paul Star Tribune, 16 March 1999 A special pledge to MPR: Two more radio stations Noel Holston and Ann Merrill / Star Tribune If a $66 donation to Minnesota Public Radio is good for a souvenir tote bag or a "Morning Edition" mug, what do you get if you give MPR a pair of million-dollar-plus radio stations? The gratitude of public-radio listeners statewide and a tax deduction to boot. Jim Cargill and his wife, Susan, called their gift of two commercial radio stations -- KLBB (1400 AM) and WLOL (1470 AM) -- a gesture of support for public broadcasting at a time when state policymakers are debating whether to wean such broadcasters off public funding.... http://www.startribune.com/stOnLine/cgi-bin/article?thisSlug=MPR16&date=16-M ar-99&word=cargills&word=cargill __________________________________________ Ms. Renske van Staveren, Coordinator International Forum on Food & Agriculture (IFA) c/o Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy (IATP) 2105 First Avenue South Minneapolis, MN, USA 55404-2505 ph: 612-870-3423 fax: 612-870-4846 rvanstaveren@iatp.org> http://www.iffah.org __________________________________________ "When I give food to the poor, they call me a saint. When I ask why the poor have no food, they call me a communist." - Dom Helder Camara To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Thu Mar 18 17:21:40 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id RAA12520 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 17:21:40 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id QAA16467 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 16:22:57 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from VM1.MCGILL.CA (VM1.McGill.CA [132.206.27.2]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with SMTP id QAA16451 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 16:22:50 -0500 (EST) Received: by VM1.MCGILL.CA (IBM VM SMTP V2R4a) via spool with SMTP id 6505 ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 16:24:36 EST Received: from MUSICB.MCGILL.CA (NJE origin MUSICB@MCGILL1) by VM1.MCGILL.CA (LMail V1.1d/1.7f) with BSMTP id 3855; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 16:24:36 -0500 Message-Id: <18MAR99.17722748.0308.MUSIC@MUSICB.MCGILL.CA> Date: Thu, 18 Mar 1999 16:24:35 EST From: "John Henning, Eco-Echo, McGill U., Montreal, Ca" To: Cc: Debra Viskelis , Subject: Co-op-ting Organic/Le Monde X-Mailer: MUSIC/SP V5.1.0 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 73 I just got round to reading the article referenced in a recent post by Donald E Davison. It contained a short abstract of an article that appeared recently in Le Monde. For those of you who may have not had a look, at the full article, you should. It is in English by the way. It is quite well done and takes dead aim at the issue of the growing interest and influence of large enterprise (aka agro-industrial complex) in the organic sector. From: donald@mich.com (Donald E Davison) Subject: Big Business into Organic Farming ORGANIC FOOD: LIES AND PROFITS Bio business is big business * by Chantal Le Noallec http://www.monde-diplomatique.fr/en/1999/03/16bio.html On a related note, there will be an organic conference in Lyon France this December which will touch on these and related issues. More on the conference later. To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Thu Mar 18 19:15:22 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id TAA15105 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 19:15:21 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id SAA09235 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 18:32:09 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from big.seorf.ohiou.edu (ab210@big.seorf.ohiou.edu [132.235.1.252]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id SAA09213 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 18:32:04 -0500 (EST) Received: (from ab210@localhost) by big.seorf.ohiou.edu (8.8.5/8.8.5) id SAA25185 for sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 18:32:04 -0500 (EST) From: Kevin Smyth Message-Id: <199903182332.SAA25185@big.seorf.ohiou.edu> Subject: 17 year locusts To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Date: Thu, 18 Mar 1999 18:32:04 -0500 (EST) X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4 PL25] Content-Type: text Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 74 Friends - This is the year for the 17 year locusts (I heard they were actually cicadas), and I am wondering what effect they might have on our vegetable crops here in SE Ohio. We grow 2.5 acres organic vegetables for a CSA here. Anybody know? Kevin Smyth ab210@seorf.ohiou.edu To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Thu Mar 18 19:43:11 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id TAA15514 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 19:43:10 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id SAA15085 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 18:43:25 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from eclogite.geo.umass.edu (eclogite.geo.umass.edu [128.119.45.20]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id SAA14960; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 18:43:19 -0500 (EST) Received: from localhost by eclogite.geo.umass.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with SMTP id SAA03517; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 18:43:20 -0500 (EST) Date: Thu, 18 Mar 1999 18:43:19 -0500 (EST) From: Beth Rennekamp X-Sender: bethr@eclogite To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu cc: sanet-mg-digest@ces.ncsu.edu Subject: Respons to Charlie Griffin's post In-Reply-To: <199903181308.IAA01281@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 75 -When a farm purchases RR soybeans they have to sign a contract allowing monsanto to come onto their farm and inspect it for up to five years. So, as long as the fields being tested are those of farmers who have signed this contract (which is ALL farmers who use RR soybeans), then (unfortunatly) this is legal. As for other fields-- I'm unsure. (I would hope that these agents would know better thatn to test on the fields of an organic farmer-as RR resistence would be of no use). Beth Charlie Griggin's questions are below. I heard the piece tonight on the evening NPR while on the road. Help me understand if I heard one part correctly. I believe it was said that Monsanto "agents" go around to fields suspected of having planted illicit seeds and go onto the property and spray a few selected soybean plants with Roundup, then come back the next day and see if the plants died. If not, they consider it evidence of having RR beans and pursue legal recourse. Is this really the way it happens? And if they go onto private land of a producer not dealing with RR beans, spray Roundup and kill some plants, have they not damaged someone's crop, even if it is just a few plants? And if it were an organic operation, would they not have just ruined someone's certification by introducing spray? Please tell me this isn't the way it's really happening? Perhaps I've missed some vital details along the way. To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Thu Mar 18 19:49:34 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id TAA15601 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 19:49:34 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id TAA00732 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 19:07:58 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id TAA00662 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 19:07:53 -0500 (EST) Received: from acme.sb.west.net (acme.sb.west.net [205.254.224.2]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id TAA20655 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 19:07:48 -0500 (EST) Received: from [205.254.241.210] (term6-18.vta.west.net [205.254.241.210]) by acme.sb.west.net (Postfix) with SMTP id A26F2249CA for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 16:07:43 -0800 (PST) Message-Id: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Thu, 18 Mar 1999 16:07:25 -0700 To: sanet-mg@amani.ces.ncsu.edu From: colibri@west.net (Beth von Gunten) Subject: UK: New research reveals [GE?] soya food allergies increased 50% last year Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 76 Why soya is a hidden destroyer Daily Express 12 March 99 Exclusive by Mark Townsend Fresh fears over the safety of genetically modified foods surfaced faced yesterday after new research revealed that food allergies relating to soya increased by 50 per cent last year. A study by Europe's leading specialists on food sensitivity found health complaints caused by soya - the ingredient most associated with GM foods - have increased from 10 in 100 patients to 15 in 100 over the past year. Researchers at the York Nutritional Laboratory said their findings provide real evidence that GM food could have a tangible, harmful impact on the human body. The findings were sent to Health Secretary Frank Dobson last night as scientists urged the Government to act on the information and impose an instant ban on GM food, while further safety tests are carried out. Dr Michael Antoniou, senior lecturer in molecular pathology at Guy's Hospital, Central London, said: "This is a very interesting if slightly worrying development. It points to the fact that far more work is needed to assess their safety. At the moment no allergy tests are carried out before GM foods are marketed and that also needs to be looked at." John Graham, spokesman for the York laboratory, said: "We believe this raises serious new questions about the safety of GM foods because it is impossible to guarantee that the soya used in the tests was GM-free." It is the first time in 17 years of testing that soya has crept into the laboratory's top 10 foods to cause an allergic reaction in consumers. The vegetable has moved up four places to ninth end now sits alongside foodstuffs with a long history of causing allergies, such as yeast, sunflower seeds and nuts. Mr. Graham said researchers tested 4,500 people for allergic reactions to vegetables including soya. Among the range of chronic illnesses it caused were irritable bowel syndrome, digestion problems and skin complaints including acne and eczema. "People also suffered neurological problems with chronic fatigue syndrome, headaches and lethargy. It is worrying," Mr Graham added. Researchers measured the levels of antibodies in a person's blood. If increased levels were detected it showed the person suffered an adverse reaction to a particular food. Soya, the wonder crop of the 20th century is found in 60 per cent of all processed foods sold in the UK - from bread to baby food, ready-to-eat curries to vegetarian lasagne. But because GM and natural soya are mixed at source in America - the world's biggest supplier - it has become increasingly difficult for retailers to guarantee the purity of any products. Last month campaigners from Greenpeace dumped four tons of GM soya beans from America at the gates of Downing Street in protest. The Consumers' Association yesterday renewed its demand for the Government to investigate the safety of GM foods. A spokesman said: "We just don't know what health problems could arise in the future. " Waitrose yesterday announced that it would be stocking its own-label GM-free foods by the end of the month. Managing director David Felwick said: "We believe customers should be able to make an informed choice about the products they are buying." To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Thu Mar 18 19:51:48 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id TAA15668 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 19:51:47 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id TAA00839 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 19:08:06 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id TAA00745 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 19:07:59 -0500 (EST) Received: from acme.sb.west.net (acme.sb.west.net [205.254.224.2]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id TAA20657 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 19:07:51 -0500 (EST) Received: from [205.254.241.210] (term6-18.vta.west.net [205.254.241.210]) by acme.sb.west.net (Postfix) with SMTP id A4C6A249CB for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 16:07:43 -0800 (PST) Message-Id: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Thu, 18 Mar 1999 16:07:27 -0700 To: sanet-mg@amani.ces.ncsu.edu From: colibri@west.net (Beth von Gunten) Subject: LA Times: Pesticides May Harm Brain, Study Says Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 77 Pesticides May Harm Brain, Study Says Health: Fetuses and young children in farm areas are at highest risk, research suggests, with intelligence, motor skills and personalities affected. By MARLA CONE Los Angeles Times Environmental Writer Monday, March 15, 1999 Children exposed to pesticides in the womb or at an early age may suffer permanent brain defects that could change their lives by altering their behavior and their ability to do everything from drawing a picture to catching a ball, according to new scientific research. Widely used pest-killing chemicals, in amounts routinely found in the environment in farm areas, seem to be capable of skewing thyroid hormones, which control how the brain of a fetus or young child develops, according to a study published today. Scientists say the study and other recent research support an emerging theory that pesticides may exact a toll on the intelligence, motor skills and personalities of infants, toddlers and preschoolers. "Data suggest that we may be raising a generation of children with learning disabilities and hyper-aggression," said Warren Porter, a University of Wisconsin professor of zoology and environmental toxicology. Porter's study, published today in the journal Toxicology and Industrial Health, shows that a common mix of insecticide, herbicide and fertilizer found in drinking water altered the thyroid hormones of young mice. It also changed their aggressiveness--measured by attacks on other mice--and suppressed their immune systems. Although a study of mice alone is not overly compelling, the theory is bolstered by recent research on human beings. In tests in the state of Sonora, Mexico, scientists found striking differences in hand-eye coordination and other mental and physical skills when comparing Yaqui Indian preschoolers in an agrarian region with those in adjacent foothills where no pesticides are used. Four- and 5-year-olds living in the farm valley had trouble performing a variety of simple motor skills--drawing stick figures, catching a 12-inch ball from almost four yards away and a tennis ball from more than a yard away, and dropping raisins into a bottle cap from a distance of six inches. They also had poorer memory skills and stamina, were more prone to physical aggression and angry outbursts, and were less sociable and creative while playing. Farm and household pest-killers are widely used there, and high levels of multiple pesticides have been found in the cord blood of newborns and the breast milk of mothers in the area. Another study, in rural western Minnesota, found increased birth defects in children conceived during the spring growing season. Most of the new research detects problems in agricultural communities--places found not just in rural regions but also in more urbanized areas, including Southern California. No one knows yet what it might mean for people who consume small traces of the chemicals in their food. Earlier this month, Consumers Union reported that many fruits and vegetables contain concentrations of pesticides that may be unhealthful for children. The new hormone studies add to a growing body of research from around the world suggesting that dozens of commonly used pesticides and other chemicals mimic the hormones that control sexual and neurological development. Called endocrine disruption, this is arguably the most controversial environmental issue of the past decade. >From alligators in Florida to polar bears in the Arctic, wild animals in pollution hot spots have been feminized by hormone-disrupting chemicals that imitate estrogen or block testosterone, scientists say. But the impact on human beings--who generally are exposed to much lower levels of pollution--is more controversial and uncertain. In addition to the possible neurological effects, some researchers theorize that the hormone disrupters could be reducing men's sperm counts or increasing diseases of the reproductive system. Pesticide company representatives--and some toxicologists and other scientists -- remain skeptical that commonly found levels of pesticides can alter human thyroid and sex hormones. "I'm kind of dubious that low-level exposures to chemicals are raising all kinds of havoc with the endocrine system," said John McCarthy, vice president of a group representing pesticide manufacturers, the American Crop Protection Assn. "The human system has so many protective mechanisms, and our bodies are bombarded with all kinds of things." Still, he said, the industry is highly concerned about the findings suggesting neurological damage, and would like to see a comprehensive review to evaluate all existing studies and figure out what they collectively show. "We ought to be taking a very hard look at it," McCarthy said. "There's almost a study a week of one type or another, and it's hard to see how it all fits together. We have to take some time to say, 'OK, what does this all mean? Is this something that should require some abrupt change [in pesticides] or fine-tuning or more research?'" No one knows how many pesticides out of 77,000 used in the United States might alter sex or thyroid hormones. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency requires tests that screen pesticides for cancer and birth defects--but not for hormone effects. A committee last year devised new testing requirements--supported by the pesticide industry--that are expected to take effect in 2001. It has long been suspected that various environmental pollutants can damage brain development. Industrial compounds called PCBs have been linked to learning disabilities in children of women who ate contaminated Great Lakes fish. The link to pesticides is far from definitive, however, and big gaps in knowledge remain. Questions abound: How do the contaminants disrupt thyroid levels? What does that physically do to the brain? What dose of exposure does it take? Does the human body have some defense mechanism to fend off low levels of hormones? What do mixes of various man-made and natural hormones do to people? Some scientists suspect that the damage is passed from a mother to her unborn child early in the first trimester, before most women even know they are pregnant. Thyroid hormones guide the nerve cells that dictate how the brain of a fetus develops and the number of brain cells created. One theory is that if a mother receives a dose of pesticides during this critical phase, it can interfere with her thyroid levels -- sometimes raising them, sometimes lowering them--irreversibly altering the child's nervous system. How the child's brain circuitry develops determines his or her hand-eye coordination, motor skills and learning ability. Thyroid hormones also can change behavior--an excess can make people quick to anger, while a low count could have the opposite effect. The hormones also can alter steroids that control aggression and immune systems. "Thyroid hormones are important to brain development, and that's been known for a long time," said Dr. Harley Kornblum, a pediatric neurologist at the UCLA Medical Center. But, he and other neurologists say, it's debatable how important the mother's thyroid level is to the fetus, and it's even more uncertain what role environmental contaminants may play. Porter said children up to age 8 who have developing brains and immune systems are "especially vulnerable" to changes in thyroid hormones. Some symptoms of children exposed to pesticides are similar to attention deficit hyperactivity disorders, which have been increasingly diagnosed in American children. Some medical research supports a link between thyroid hormones and those disorders, but the connection, especially with pesticides, remains unclear. The implication for adults, and whether pesticides might cause thyroid disorders, also is unknown. In the study of 50 Mexican children, the scientists, led by anthropologist Elizabeth Guillette of the University of Arizona, said genetic and social factors--including income, education and health services--are so similar between the farm valley and the foothills that they cannot explain the differences in the youngsters' cognitive ability. "These children share similar genetic background, diets, water mineral contents, cultural patterns and social behaviors. The major difference was their exposure to pesticides," Guillette and Mexican researchers said in a report published in June in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives. Most of the stick-figure drawings by the 4- and 5-year-olds in the farm valley were unrecognizable as human beings--they look like the scribbles of a 2-year-old. In contrast, drawings by the foothill children had heads, eyes, torsos, arms and legs. Experts say that the inability to draw a person indicates a breakdown between the brain's ability to process visual information and its ability to control fine muscles. "Some valley mothers stressed their own frustration in trying to teach their child how to draw. In addition, two valley children drew pictures composed of boxes, arches and lines, claiming these pictures were people," the researchers reported. Other tests pointed to recollection and stamina problems. One foothill child could jump for 336 seconds--over three times longer than the best-performing valley child. Some scientists remain dubious of the results because the tests on the children were unusual, and are intrinsically subjective and difficult to interpret. Dr. Richard Jackson, director of the National Center for Environmental Health at the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said his staff was "unimpressed by the scientific rigor" of the work in the report. McCarthy said that although the differences between the two populations of children seem striking, other hidden factors, rather than pesticide exposure, cannot be ruled out. Other studies, meanwhile, show that pesticide exposure during the first trimester of pregnancy increases birth defects. The University of Minnesota and the federal EPA in a 1996 study found a high rate of birth defects in the children of Minnesotans who work as pesticide appliers as well as the general population of western Minnesota, a major farm region with heavy pesticide use. The defect rate was the highest among babies born nine months after the spring season, indicating that the risk rises for children conceived during the time when pesticide use increases. In Porter's 5-year study of mice, the animals drank water containing a mixture of two pesticides--aldicarb and atrazine--and nitrates from fertilizer. The concentrations ingested by the mice were similar to those found in ground water in many agricultural areas, Porter said. Aldicarb, atrazine and nitrates are the three most abundant agricultural contaminants in the United States, although they do not rank high in use in California. While the mix of the three chemicals altered the mice hormones, each one alone did not. That points out a gaping hole in the federal effort to protect consumers--the EPA only tests for effects of pesticides individually, not cumulatively. The EPA tests, Porter said, "generate a great deal of false confidence in the safety" of pesticides. Source: Environmental Health Perspectives, June 1998. Copyright 1999 Los Angeles Times. All Rights Reserved To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". 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All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Thu Mar 18 20:34:59 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id UAA16471 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 20:34:59 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id TAA00783 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 19:52:00 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from uranium.nb.net (uranium.nb.net [209.161.64.33]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with SMTP id TAA00764 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 19:51:53 -0500 (EST) Received: (qmail 1578 invoked from network); 19 Mar 1999 00:51:51 -0000 Received: from squash-39.breezewood.nb.net (HELO cass) (209.161.71.139) by uranium.nb.net with SMTP; 19 Mar 1999 00:51:51 -0000 Message-Id: <4.1.19990318193337.00953e40@nb.net> X-Sender: cpete@nb.net X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Pro Version 4.1 Date: Thu, 18 Mar 1999 19:49:13 -0500 To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu From: Cass Peterson Subject: Re: 17 year locusts In-Reply-To: <199903182332.SAA25185@big.seorf.ohiou.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 78 At 06:32 PM 3/18/1999 -0500, Kevin Smyth wrote: >Friends - This is the year for the 17 year locusts (I heard they were >actually cicadas), and I am wondering what effect they might have on our >vegetable crops here in SE Ohio. We grow 2.5 acres organic vegetables for >a CSA here. Anybody know? Kevin-- Remembering all this from 1986, when the 17-year cicadas hatched hereabouts. No prob with the veggies. If you have young trees, you may want to protect them with netting for six weeks or so after the cicadas emerge. After emerging, the cicadas basically just want to mate and lay eggs, which they prefer to do in twigs. If the trees are young and small, the egg-laying from so many cicadas could do enough damage to admit secondary fungal infections. When the eggs hatch, the larvae drop to the ground and burrow in, and they feed on the roots of the tree/shrub for the next 16 years. Again, a young tree probably can't handle that much blood-sucking. Mature trees won't be damaged. Cicadas don't lay their eggs on annual veggies. The only damage we observed was in areas that were cleared when we bought the farm but apparently were tree-covered at the time of the last cicada hatching. The cicadas came up so hot and heavy that they actually uprooted newly transplanted seedlings. (In Washington, DC, they came up through asphalt laid down where trees had stood 17 years earlier.) If your land has been cleared for at least 17 years, you may have no problem at all. If it was forested back then, get yourself some ear plugs. Like annual cicadas, the 17-year guys are music-makers. And there are a lot more of them. Cass Peterson www.flickerville.com To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Thu Mar 18 20:56:31 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id UAA16752 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 20:56:30 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id UAA11298 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 20:09:58 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from westbyserver.mwt.net (westbyserver.westby.mwt.net [156.46.73.3]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id UAA11279 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 20:09:53 -0500 (EST) Received: from oemcomputer (ppp9.sabin.mwt.net [156.46.75.109]) by westbyserver.mwt.net (8.8.7/8.8.6) with SMTP id TAA07190 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 19:07:33 -0600 (CST) Message-ID: <000f01be71a4$bdd23dc0$6d4b2e9c@oemcomputer> From: "Julie M." To: Subject: Study of Farm Women Date: Thu, 18 Mar 1999 19:06:37 -0600 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.72.3155.0 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.3155.0 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 79 Forwarded from the Farmbiz-L list: For Immediate Release For More Information: Lydia Zepeda (608) 262-9487 zepeda@calshp.cals.wisc.edu STUDY DOCUMENTS WOMEN'S IMPORTANCE IN MAKING DECISIONS ON FARMS Auntie Em did the laundry and the cooking, and was referred to as a "farm wife." But farm women today bristle at that term. Now farm women consider themselves farmers, too. And well they should: They manage and care for calves, milk and feed the cows, take charge of farm finances, and do artificial insemination. They also have a much larger role in decision-making than economists give them credit for. Until agricultural economist Lydia Zepeda did her research, all the economic models of technology adoption assumed that farms had one decision-maker, typically the male head of the household. "What I found was women involved in every task on the farm except crops and machinery," said Zepeda, professor in the University of Wisconsin-Madison's School of Human Ecology. Zepeda's observations were drawn from two studies of Wisconsin dairy farmers. In the first, she surveyed 600 couples to determine how men and women spent their time and made decisions. In the second, she interviewed 19 couples from the survey in four focus groups, separating men and women. She asked all participants to describe a long-term decision they had made about the farm, and to imagine what they'd do if they had an extra $500 per month. Zepeda's survey, which was supported by the College of Agricultural and Life Sciences and the Center for Integrated Agricultural Systems, revealed not only that women have undertaken a diversity of tasks, but also that they spend longer hours at work than men do. Women spent 61 percent of the day doing the combination of farm work, housework and off-farm work, while men spent 55 percent of the day in those jobs. For both men and women, the rest of their day was devoted to sleep, personal care and leisure activities. Men said they spent 45 percent of their day on farm work, two percent on off-farm work and eight percent on housework. Women spent 21 percent of the day on farm work, 11 percent on off-farm work and 29 percent on housework. Some of the women worked 40 hours a week off the farm. Women's off-farm work not only helped provide benefits, but also gave the women a sense of pride. "It gives them a better bargaining chip," Zepeda said. "Naturally they have more clout with money." What do they do with that bargaining chip? They use it to expand their role in making decisions. Some women said that when they were children, there might have been only one decision-maker on the farm, typically the father or grandfather. Now, couples tend to make long-term decisions together, while the spouse who performs a daily activity makesthe decisions about that activity on a day-to-day basis. One man said, "On a major decision, we both make the decision. But I don't consult her on what bulls I'm going to use, and she doesn't consult me when it comes to raising the calves. If she sees a sick calf, she doesn't have to check it out with me before she takes care of it, you know." Similarly, a woman said, "I do most of the stuff with the cows, and I basically make our decisions there. The crop stuff, he basically takes care of that." On the other hand, a man recalled a major mistake he'd made early in his marriage. He and his wife had been discussing another site for their double-wide mobile home, but hadn't come to a decision yet. One day when she was at work, he just decided to move it. The other farm men in the focus group shook their heads and asked him, "How could you have done that?" And that, in stronger terms, was exactly what his wife asked once she found the home. Both men and women in the focus groups stressed the need to have common goals and share decision-making. Men, however, thought their wives had equal roles in making decisions. Women weren't as convinced. Some women thought their role was to approve decisions their husbands had made. Others laughed as they mentioned manipulating their husbands into making decisions. One woman said, "I think sometimes you have to push a little here and there, let them think it's their decision." Zepeda's focus groups showed that women make decisions about milking and caring for calves, while men made decisions about feed. The survey found the men responsible for most of the decisions about crops, pastures and feeding. On the other hand, the survey found that women made most of the decisions about child care, their own off-farm work and family leisure time. As for the budget, most people said it was either a joint decision or a woman's decision. Most farmers now own computers for financial records. "The women knew more than their husbands did about computers," Zepeda said. The men knew how much debt they carried, but because women did most of the bill-paying and shopping, they knew how it affected purchasing decisions on a day-to-day basis, Zepeda said. While farm women may not be recognized off the farm as farmers yet, at least their husbands express appreciation for them. Zepeda said she was moved by the way farm men talked about how much their wives meant to them. One man said, "When I got out of the service in '58 the first thing I did was find a wife. It didn't take long. That was the best decision I ever made." ### farm women 3/99 writer: Mary Conroy (608) 262-0111 mjconroy@students.wisc.edu ******************************************************************** Bob Cooney, press service editor College of Agricultural and Life Sciences University of Wisconsin-Madison 440 Henry Mall Madison WI 53706 phone (608) 262-2679 FAX (608) 265-3042 rjcooney@facstaff.wisc.edu To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Thu Mar 18 23:31:08 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id XAA18992 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 23:31:07 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id WAA15458 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 22:33:25 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id WAA15440 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 22:33:20 -0500 (EST) Received: from sp2n17.missouri.edu (sp2n17-t.missouri.edu [128.206.2.27]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id WAA23689 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 22:33:17 -0500 (EST) Received: from mail.coin.missouri.edu (Mizzou-AS8-43.missouri.edu [128.206.209.139]) by sp2n17.missouri.edu (8.9.0/8.9.0) with ESMTP id VAA701002 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 21:32:54 -0600 Message-ID: <36F1C6AB.85FB6D5C@mail.coin.missouri.edu> Date: Thu, 18 Mar 1999 21:38:21 -0600 From: Kevin Webb Reply-To: kwebb01@mail.coin.missouri.edu Organization: b01 X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.5 (Macintosh; I; PPC) X-Accept-Language: en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: sanet-mg@amani.ces.ncsu.edu Subject: Re: LA Times: Pesticides May Harm Brain, Study Says References: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; x-mac-type="54455854"; x-mac-creator="4D4F5353" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 80 Much of this article seems to have been based on the book "Our Stolen Future : Are We Threatening Our Fertility, Intelligence, and Survival?-A Scientific Detective Story" by Theo Colburn, et al (ISBN: 0452274141). The book is a must read for anyone seeking an articulate and definitively damning critique of our societys use of chemicals. Theo Colburn is an experienced and respected scientist with a gift for writing clearly and concisely (a rare feat for most scientists). I highly reccomend it. Kevin Webb To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Thu Mar 18 23:31:08 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id XAA18993 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 23:31:07 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id WAA17760 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 22:36:47 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from ram.wlink.com.np (IDENT:qmailr@ram.wlink.com.np [206.82.134.33]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with SMTP id WAA17677 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 22:36:37 -0500 (EST) Received: (qmail 17900 invoked from network); 19 Mar 1999 03:36:32 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO mail) (206.82.134.50) by ram.wlink.com.np with SMTP; 19 Mar 1999 03:36:31 -0000 Message-Id: From: Yamuna Ghale Date: Fri, 19 Mar 1999 9:07:48 +0545 To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Subject: sanet-mg-digest MIME-version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 X-Mailer: TFS Gateway /310000000/310104525/310104495/310400190/ X-Engine: "TFS Engine Release 3.12 Build 132e" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-MIME-Autoconverted: from quoted-printable to 8bit by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu id WAA17726 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 81 Date: 03/19/1999 10:07 am (Friday) : Yamuna Ghale To: tfs:"sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu" Subject: sanet-mg-digest sanet-mg-digest -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Yamuna Ghale ACTIONAID Nepal Lazimpat GPO Box no. 6257 Kathmandu Nepal My E-mail address is: yamunag@actionaidnepal.org Tel: 419115, 421232, 410929, 436477 Fax: 977 (01) 419718 Visit our web site at: http://www.actionaidnepal.org -------------------------------------------------------------------------- To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Thu Mar 18 23:33:44 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id XAA19026 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 23:33:44 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id WAA23223 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 22:41:20 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from sp2n17.missouri.edu (sp2n17-t.missouri.edu [128.206.2.27]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id WAA23206 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 22:41:15 -0500 (EST) Received: from mail.coin.missouri.edu (Mizzou-AS8-43.missouri.edu [128.206.209.139]) by sp2n17.missouri.edu (8.9.0/8.9.0) with ESMTP id VAA725298 for ; Thu, 18 Mar 1999 21:40:49 -0600 Message-ID: <36F1C887.EF72D06B@mail.coin.missouri.edu> Date: Thu, 18 Mar 1999 21:46:17 -0600 From: Kevin Webb Reply-To: kwebb01@mail.coin.missouri.edu Organization: b01 X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.5 (Macintosh; I; PPC) X-Accept-Language: en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Subject: Re: 17 year locusts References: <199903182332.SAA25185@big.seorf.ohiou.edu> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; x-mac-type="54455854"; x-mac-creator="4D4F5353" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 82 I've never heard of cicadas harming vegetables. I know that they can hurt trees (they deposit their eggs typically between a limb and the trunk). I'm not sure what they eat in the interim, I've never seen them in our fields, though. Kevin Smyth wrote: > Friends - This is the year for the 17 year locusts (I heard they were > actually cicadas), and I am wondering what effect they might have on our > vegetable crops here in SE Ohio. We grow 2.5 acres organic vegetables for > a CSA here. Anybody know? > Kevin Smyth > ab210@seorf.ohiou.edu > > To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command > "unsubscribe sanet-mg". > To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command > "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". > > All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: > http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Fri Mar 19 04:45:48 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id EAA21720 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 04:45:47 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id EAA14685 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 04:02:12 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from imo21.mx.aol.com (imo21.mx.aol.com [198.81.17.65]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id EAA14628 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 04:02:06 -0500 (EST) From: DGreen47@aol.com Received: from DGreen47@aol.com by imo21.mx.aol.com (IMOv19.3) id 7RLOa24548 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 04:01:22 -0500 (EST) Message-ID: Date: Fri, 19 Mar 1999 04:01:22 EST To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Mime-Version: 1.0 Subject: Re: LA Times: Pesticides May Harm Brain, Study Says Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit X-Mailer: AOL 4.0 for Windows 95 sub 4 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 83 So _that's_ why it's so difficult for the masses to see what's so obvious to the rest of us? Dori Green Ash Grove Community Farm & Center for Sustainable Living Corning, NY http://www.agrove.com To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Fri Mar 19 06:53:09 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id GAA22563 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 06:53:09 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id FAA27563 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 05:51:50 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from mail.caribe.net (root@mail.caribe.net [209.91.196.5]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id FAA27540 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 05:51:43 -0500 (EST) Received: from ddworley (ppp222.203dip.netdial.caribe.net [209.91.203.222]) by mail.caribe.net (8.9.0/8.9.0) with SMTP id GAA03156 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 06:54:25 -0400 (AST) Message-Id: X-Sender: ddworley@mail.caribe.net X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Pro Version 4.0 Date: Fri, 19 Mar 1999 06:53:10 -0400 To: sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu From: Richard Wolfson (by way of Daniel Worley ) Subject: GEN3-17; Fwd, Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 84 [Reposted with permission] French environmentalists want longer gene crop ban March 16, 1999 PARIS, Reuters [WS] via NewsEdge Corporation : French environmental groups, spurred on by talk of a possible freeze on gene-crops in Britain, on Monday called for a longer, broader moratorium in France so wider tests could be carried out. ``This is a sign of encouragement which should push the French government to reconsider the risks from gene modified foods,'' said campaigner Etienne Vernet at Ecoropa. ``We want a moratorium on all types of GM food for three to five years so we can do more tests. If Britain did impose a three year freeze, France should do the same thing.'' Greenpeace France Director Bruno Rebelle also backed a freeze on GM crops until at least 2002 and more rigorous tests. France imposed a two-year freeze on genetically engineered oilseed varieties last July after concerns the modifications could be transmitted to other crops. ........ Here are the Conclusions and Recommendations of the Scientific Committee on Animal Health and Animal Welfare on the Animal Welfare Aspects of the Use of Bovine Somatotrophin (Adopted 10 March 1999). Full text is on website http://europa. eu.int/comm/dg24/health/sc/scah/out21_en.html General conclusion BST is used to increase milk yield, often in already high-producing cows. BST administration causes substantially and very significantly poorer welfare because of increased foot disorders, mastitis, reproductive disorders and other production related diseases. These are problems which would not occur if BST were not used and often results in unnecessary pain, suffering and distress. If milk yields were achieved by other means which resulted in the health disorders and other welfare problems described above, these means would not be acceptable. The injection of BST and its repetition every 14 days also causes localised swellings which are likely to result in discomfort and hence some poor welfare. Recommendation BST use causes a substantial increase in levels of foot problems and mastitis and leads to injection site reactions in dairy cows. These conditions, especially the first two, are painful and debilitating, leading to significantly poorer welfare in the treated animals. Therefore from the point of view of animal welfare, including health, the Scientific Committee on Animal Health and Animal Welfare is of the opinion that BST should not be used in dairy cows. ......... March 17, 1999 Canada Approved Genetically Modified Canola Tolerant to an Herbicide Causing Birth Defects by Joe Cummins, PhD, Professor Emeritus of Genetics, University of Western Ontario e-mail: jcummins@julian.uwo.ca Canada has approved genetically engineered canola patented by the multinational chemical company Rhone Poulenc for their herbicides Bromoxynl and Ioxynil. The herbicide Bromoxynil has a history of controversy in its use after it was found that it caused birth defects in rats and mice. In the United States, the use of Bromoxynl on cotton was a source of controversy. However, in Canada (where government departments of Agriculture and Health take multimillion dollar payments from chemical companies) the herbicide was quietly approved and used extensively to control weeds in grain crops that are innately tolerant to the herbicide. The herbicide Bromoxynl is sprayed on the Bromoxynl-resistant canola. As the herbicide is very persistent in treated soil, when farmers rotate crops, Bromoxynl residues can accumulate in grains rotated on the same land. Residues of the teratogenic herbicide are likely to accumulate in the harvested canola oil and in the cattle and pig food from the residues recovered from pressing canola seed to recover oil. Such pressing residues have also been used as fertilizer on organic farms, a procedure that should be reviewed on the basis of transferring genetic modifications and teratogenic herbicides. The journal Biotechnology noted that there was a very high likelihood that the herbicide tolerant gene would be transferred to unpatented canola and to at least seven wild plant species but the transfer to wild plant was a minimal threat as the resistant species could be controlled by other herbicides as they became weeds. The impact of use of the genetically modified crop on biodiversity was given brief discussion with no data and no fundamental knowledge of biodiversity. Another genetically modified canola, Liberty Ready canola, also employs a highly teratogenic herbicide glufosinate. Importers of canola oil or animal feed from pressed seed should be made aware of these developments and that the products are not labeled. Clearly the Canadian approval process bears the stamp of the millions of dollars from chemical companies. The information on approval of Bromoxynil resistant canola was taken from Plant Biotechnology Canada August 19,1998 .......... ASHDOWN URGES SPECIAL WTO GROUP ON GENETIC FOODS GENEVA, March 11 (Reuters) - Britain's outgoing Liberal Democratic leader Paddy Ashdown said on Thursday the controversial issue of genetically-modified crops should be part of the next global round of trade liberalisation talks. Speaking after talks at the World Trade Organisation (WTO) and with trade ambassadors of the European Union and the United States, he warned tha t the issue could become a "huge problem" that could poison relations between the two powers. "The WTO regulations were not set up to handle GMOs," he told a news conference, using the acronym for genetically-modified organisms which are rapidly emerging as a potentially explosive topic in international trade. ........ From: genetics Subject: GE - news 17th March Greenpeace welcomes major global steps to get out of genetically modified food AMSTERDAM, March 17, 1999 - Greenpeace International today welcomed two major steps towards a genetically modified (GM) free food supply at two different ends of the world. Monsanto, the world's most aggressive seller of genetically engineered seeds yesterday announced that it had withdrawn applications for approval of their herbicide resistant (Roundup Ready) soyabeans in Brazil. The step comes after massive protests by environmental and consumers organisations as well as scientists and lawmakers in Brazil. Brazil is the worlds second biggest exporter of soyabeans. Soyabeans are used in 60 per cent of processed supermarket food products including bread, pasta, yoghurt, chocolate and ice-cream. At the same time the UK retailer J. Sainsbury's announced that it will not sell any genetically engineered products under it's own label. Sainsbury's also revealed that it had formed a consortium of major European retailers, including Marks & Spencer (UK), Carrefour (France), Superquinn (Ireland), Migros (Switzerland), Delhaiz (Belgium) and Effelunga (Italy), who will jointly source GM-free products. "This is the beginning of the end of trying to forcefeed consumers unwanted and unneeded genetically manipulated food", commented Greenpeace International's campaigner Benedikt Haerlin. "We hope to see more supermarket chains and food producers join the GM-free consortium in the next few days." Haerlin added that other major food producers and retailers, such as Unilever in Germany and Austria, and 90 percent of all supermarkets in Austria and countless small producers have already declared that they are GM free. "No supermarket or food producer can claim that it was not possible to avoid GM ingredients in their products." _________________________________________________________ Richard Wolfson, PhD Consumer Right to Know Campaign, for Mandatory Labelling and Long-term Testing of all Genetically Engineered Foods, 500 Wilbrod Street Ottawa, ON Canada K1N 6N2 tel. 613-565-8517 fax. 613-565-1596 email: rwolfson@concentric.net Our website, http://www.natural-law.ca/genetic/geindex.html contains more information on genetic engineering as well as previous genetic engineering news items. Subscription fee to genetic engineering news is $35 for 12 months, payable to "BanGEF" and mailed to the above address. Or see website for details. __________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________ To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Fri Mar 19 09:24:00 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id JAA24698 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 09:23:59 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id IAA11478 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 08:30:43 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from aurora.nal.usda.gov (aurora.nal.usda.gov [192.54.138.38]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id IAA11468 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 08:30:38 -0500 (EST) Received: by aurora.nal.usda.gov with Internet Mail Service (5.5.2448.0) id ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 08:33:45 -0500 Message-ID: From: Andy Clark To: "'sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu'" Cc: "'voces@igc.org'" Subject: FW: Position announcement, Rural Development Center Date: Fri, 19 Mar 1999 08:33:39 -0500 MIME-Version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2448.0) Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-MIME-Autoconverted: from quoted-printable to 8bit by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu id IAA11469 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 85 Applications will be accepted until the position is filled, in March or April, 1999. A detailed resume and related information and material should be sent to the Rural Development Center, P. O. Box 5415, Salinas, CA 93915 Contact RDC for more information (831)758-1469 -----Original Message----- From: Selene Jaramillo [mailto:voces@igc.org] Sent: Thursday, March 18, 1999 6:53 PM Subject: Position announcement-please post and distribute Program Representative Rural Development Center: Farmer Training and Technical Assistance Program The Rural Development Center (RDC) seeks a self-motivated, innovative individual to help promote the development of a new Farmer Training Center and Technical Assistance Program. Over the past 13 years, the RDC has built a solid record of training family farmers in sustainable farming systems, and has provided limited technical assistance and outreach to Latino farmers throughout the Monterey Bay Area. The goal of the new program is to expand and adapt RDC's training program to the specific needs of hillside farmers in and around the Elkhorn Slough Watershed, to coordinate outreach activities with other technical assistance partners and collaborators, and to secure adequate support for the development and staffing of a training facility in the area. The proposed Farmer Training Center is part of a collaborative project to promote appropriate land management, natural resource conservation, and sustainable farming practices among farmers and rural residents around the Central Monterey Bay Wetlands. The project targets three types of actions to achieve this goal: Watershed Communication and Education, Farmer Training and Technical Assistance, and Land Management Incentives. These activities will be achieved through the combined efforts of public and private organizations including the USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service, local Resource Conservation Districts, UC Cooperative Extension, and the Community Alliance with Family Farmers. The RDC is the lead partner in the Farmer Training and Technical Assistance component of this collaborative effort. The Program Representative will initially be based at the RDC (south of Salinas) to benefit from the resources and experience of the RDC and to learn the training approach used there. The focus of the work, however, will be on establishing a comprehensive research, demonstration and training program on alternative crops, production methods, and marketing appropriate to hillside farmers who tend to be of Mexican ancestry with limited financial resources. The program goal is to establish permanent systems of support, reduce the personal risk to farmers who agree to try alternative production systems, and encourage collaboration within the farming community to reduce environmental impacts of current farming practices. The primary tasks for the first year are to: · Conduct a survey of farmers and landowners that will participate in and benefit from the project; · Coordinate discussions and organize meetings among the various partners to explore and delineate expectations, issues and concerns related to the project, define and specify partner roles and responsibilities, secure commitments, and formalize agreements; · Develop specific implementation plans and projected budget; · Secure adequate multi-year support for full project implementation; · Survey potential sites for the demonstration farm and work with funders to secure land; · Explore the range of possible practical incentives for farmer and landowner participation in training and technical assistance programs. In the second year of the project, assuming that the project will by then be fully funded, the tasks may be expanded to fully implement the training program including: · Establish a demonstration farm (50-100 acres) on representative farmland within the Watershed. A range of crop experiments and conservation farming practices will be demonstrated. Local farmers will be invited to try new farming systems on 5 acre parcels, and will be provided incentives to participate, such as reduced rent, on-site consultations and access to equipment. · Organize regular meetings for participating farmers to compare results and discuss applicability to other farms. · Sponsor field days, farmer meetings, farm visits, and provide on site technical assistance to disseminate and promote the adoption of best management practices developed on the demonstration farm. · Coordinate technical assistance from participating agricultural advisors. · Offer a training program for outside farmers to teach about new crops, technologies and conservation practices. Depending on performance and the availability of resources, this will be a two-year position with an excellent benefits package. Salary is commensurate with experience and qualifications within the range of comparable positions in community-based organizations. Applications will be accepted until the position is filled, in March or April, 1999. A detailed resume and related information and material should be sent to the Rural Development Center, P. O. Box 5415, Salinas, CA 93915 Contact RDC for more information (831)758-1469 To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Fri Mar 19 10:43:37 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id KAA26520 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 10:43:37 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id JAA23905 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 09:36:34 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from supermail.globaldialog.com (root@pop.globaldialog.com [156.46.122.14]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id JAA23859 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 09:36:29 -0500 (EST) Received: from LOCALNAME (wtn09tc5.gdinet.com [156.46.27.10]) by supermail.globaldialog.com (8.9.1/8.9.1) with SMTP id IAA24286 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 08:36:52 -0600 (CST) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 1999 08:36:52 -0600 (CST) Message-Id: <199903191436.IAA24286@supermail.globaldialog.com> X-Sender: prairiedf@pop.globaldialog.com X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Version 1.4.5 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" To: sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu From: prairiedf@globaldialog.com (Greg David) Subject: Re: 17 year locusts Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 86 Kevin, I haven't experienced the music of 17 year locusts for a long time. I was fortunate enough to be camping on the current river in Mossouri the year that group(they do this 17 year thing in regional bands)came out to sing. It was beautiful! They started singing in the afternoon and carried on well into the night. Their song changes as the night progresses, becoming more melodious, serenading you to sleep. In the morning all is quiet. My friend didn't like them. He said If those damn bugs don't shut-up I'm going to spray this whole state with DDT. But he doen't like jazz or appreciate the finer things in life. My advice is to enjoy the upcoming show! I really don't know a thing about there life cycle, but I'd bet they are more interested in sex than food...that's why they sing so nice. Greg Prarie Dock Farm >Friends - This is the year for the 17 year locusts (I heard they were >actually cicadas), and I am wondering what effect they might have on our >vegetable crops here in SE Ohio. We grow 2.5 acres organic vegetables for >a CSA here. Anybody know? >Kevin Smyth >ab210@seorf.ohiou.edu > >To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command >"unsubscribe sanet-mg". >To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command >"subscribe sanet-mg-digest". > >All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: >http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail > To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Fri Mar 19 12:44:42 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id MAA29303 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 12:44:41 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id KAA00933 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 10:42:04 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id KAA00893 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 10:41:59 -0500 (EST) Received: from mhub2.tc.umn.edu (mhub2.tc.umn.edu [128.101.131.42]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with SMTP id KAA05743 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 10:41:58 -0500 (EST) Received: from gold.tc.umn.edu by mhub2.tc.umn.edu with ESMTP for sanet-mg@amani.ces.ncsu.edu; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 09:41:59 -0600 Received: from [160.94.23.50] by gold.tc.umn.edu for sanet-mg@amani.ces.ncsu.edu; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 09:41:51 -0600 From: "Brian A DeVore" Reply-To: "Brian A DeVore" To: sanet-mg@amani.ces.ncsu.edu Subject: LA Times: Pesticides May Harm Brain, Study Says (fwd) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" X-Mailer: POPmail 2.3b4 Message-Id: Date: Fri, 19 Mar 1999 09:41:59 -0600 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 87 If you want to read more about this subject check out the following page: http://www.misa.umn.edu/lspv16n3.html It features a story that quotes Warren Porter extensively. It also examines the Minnesota study done by Vincent Garry on relationships between birth defects and the seasons. - Brian DeVore, Land Stewardship Project Pesticides May Harm Brain, Study Says Health: Fetuses and young children in farm areas are at highest risk, research suggests, with intelligence, motor skills and personalities affected. By MARLA CONE Los Angeles Times Environmental Writer Monday, March 15, 1999 Children exposed to pesticides in the womb or at an early age may suffer permanent brain defects that could change their lives by altering their behavior and their ability to do everything from drawing a picture to catching a ball, according to new scientific research. Widely used pest-killing chemicals, in amounts routinely found in the environment in farm areas, seem to be capable of skewing thyroid hormones, which control how the brain of a fetus or young child develops, according to a study published today. Scientists say the study and other recent research support an emerging theory that pesticides may exact a toll on the intelligence, motor skills and personalities of infants, toddlers and preschoolers. "Data suggest that we may be raising a generation of children with learning disabilities and hyper-aggression," said Warren Porter, a University of Wisconsin professor of zoology and environmental toxicology. Porter's study, published today in the journal Toxicology and Industrial Health, shows that a common mix of insecticide, herbicide and fertilizer found in drinking water altered the thyroid hormones of young mice. It also changed their aggressiveness--measured by attacks on other mice--and suppressed their immune systems. Although a study of mice alone is not overly compelling, the theory is bolstered by recent research on human beings. In tests in the state of Sonora, Mexico, scientists found striking differences in hand-eye coordination and other mental and physical skills when comparing Yaqui Indian preschoolers in an agrarian region with those in adjacent foothills where no pesticides are used. Four- and 5-year-olds living in the farm valley had trouble performing a variety of simple motor skills--drawing stick figures, catching a 12-inch ball from almost four yards away and a tennis ball from more than a yard away, and dropping raisins into a bottle cap from a distance of six inches. They also had poorer memory skills and stamina, were more prone to physical aggression and angry outbursts, and were less sociable and creative while playing. Farm and household pest-killers are widely used there, and high levels of multiple pesticides have been found in the cord blood of newborns and the breast milk of mothers in the area. Another study, in rural western Minnesota, found increased birth defects in children conceived during the spring growing season. Most of the new research detects problems in agricultural communities--places found not just in rural regions but also in more urbanized areas, including Southern California. No one knows yet what it might mean for people who consume small traces of the chemicals in their food. Earlier this month, Consumers Union reported that many fruits and vegetables contain concentrations of pesticides that may be unhealthful for children. The new hormone studies add to a growing body of research from around the world suggesting that dozens of commonly used pesticides and other chemicals mimic the hormones that control sexual and neurological development. Called endocrine disruption, this is arguably the most controversial environmental issue of the past decade. >From alligators in Florida to polar bears in the Arctic, wild animals in pollution hot spots have been feminized by hormone-disrupting chemicals that imitate estrogen or block testosterone, scientists say. But the impact on human beings--who generally are exposed to much lower levels of pollution--is more controversial and uncertain. In addition to the possible neurological effects, some researchers theorize that the hormone disrupters could be reducing men's sperm counts or increasing diseases of the reproductive system. Pesticide company representatives--and some toxicologists and other scientists -- remain skeptical that commonly found levels of pesticides can alter human thyroid and sex hormones. "I'm kind of dubious that low-level exposures to chemicals are raising all kinds of havoc with the endocrine system," said John McCarthy, vice president of a group representing pesticide manufacturers, the American Crop Protection Assn. "The human system has so many protective mechanisms, and our bodies are bombarded with all kinds of things." Still, he said, the industry is highly concerned about the findings suggesting neurological damage, and would like to see a comprehensive review to evaluate all existing studies and figure out what they collectively show. "We ought to be taking a very hard look at it," McCarthy said. "There's almost a study a week of one type or another, and it's hard to see how it all fits together. We have to take some time to say, 'OK, what does this all mean? Is this something that should require some abrupt change [in pesticides] or fine-tuning or more research?'" No one knows how many pesticides out of 77,000 used in the United States might alter sex or thyroid hormones. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency requires tests that screen pesticides for cancer and birth defects--but not for hormone effects. A committee last year devised new testing requirements--supported by the pesticide industry--that are expected to take effect in 2001. It has long been suspected that various environmental pollutants can damage brain development. Industrial compounds called PCBs have been linked to learning disabilities in children of women who ate contaminated Great Lakes fish. The link to pesticides is far from definitive, however, and big gaps in knowledge remain. Questions abound: How do the contaminants disrupt thyroid levels? What does that physically do to the brain? What dose of exposure does it take? Does the human body have some defense mechanism to fend off low levels of hormones? What do mixes of various man-made and natural hormones do to people? Some scientists suspect that the damage is passed from a mother to her unborn child early in the first trimester, before most women even know they are pregnant. Thyroid hormones guide the nerve cells that dictate how the brain of a fetus develops and the number of brain cells created. One theory is that if a mother receives a dose of pesticides during this critical phase, it can interfere with her thyroid levels -- sometimes raising them, sometimes lowering them--irreversibly altering the child's nervous system. How the child's brain circuitry develops determines his or her hand-eye coordination, motor skills and learning ability. Thyroid hormones also can change behavior--an excess can make people quick to anger, while a low count could have the opposite effect. The hormones also can alter steroids that control aggression and immune systems. "Thyroid hormones are important to brain development, and that's been known for a long time," said Dr. Harley Kornblum, a pediatric neurologist at the UCLA Medical Center. But, he and other neurologists say, it's debatable how important the mother's thyroid level is to the fetus, and it's even more uncertain what role environmental contaminants may play. Porter said children up to age 8 who have developing brains and immune systems are "especially vulnerable" to changes in thyroid hormones. Some symptoms of children exposed to pesticides are similar to attention deficit hyperactivity disorders, which have been increasingly diagnosed in American children. Some medical research supports a link between thyroid hormones and those disorders, but the connection, especially with pesticides, remains unclear. The implication for adults, and whether pesticides might cause thyroid disorders, also is unknown. In the study of 50 Mexican children, the scientists, led by anthropologist Elizabeth Guillette of the University of Arizona, said genetic and social factors--including income, education and health services--are so similar between the farm valley and the foothills that they cannot explain the differences in the youngsters' cognitive ability. "These children share similar genetic background, diets, water mineral contents, cultural patterns and social behaviors. The major difference was their exposure to pesticides," Guillette and Mexican researchers said in a report published in June in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives. Most of the stick-figure drawings by the 4- and 5-year-olds in the farm valley were unrecognizable as human beings--they look like the scribbles of a 2-year-old. In contrast, drawings by the foothill children had heads, eyes, torsos, arms and legs. Experts say that the inability to draw a person indicates a breakdown between the brain's ability to process visual information and its ability to control fine muscles. "Some valley mothers stressed their own frustration in trying to teach their child how to draw. In addition, two valley children drew pictures composed of boxes, arches and lines, claiming these pictures were people," the researchers reported. Other tests pointed to recollection and stamina problems. One foothill child could jump for 336 seconds--over three times longer than the best-performing valley child. Some scientists remain dubious of the results because the tests on the children were unusual, and are intrinsically subjective and difficult to interpret. Dr. Richard Jackson, director of the National Center for Environmental Health at the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said his staff was "unimpressed by the scientific rigor" of the work in the report. McCarthy said that although the differences between the two populations of children seem striking, other hidden factors, rather than pesticide exposure, cannot be ruled out. Other studies, meanwhile, show that pesticide exposure during the first trimester of pregnancy increases birth defects. The University of Minnesota and the federal EPA in a 1996 study found a high rate of birth defects in the children of Minnesotans who work as pesticide appliers as well as the general population of western Minnesota, a major farm region with heavy pesticide use. The defect rate was the highest among babies born nine months after the spring season, indicating that the risk rises for children conceived during the time when pesticide use increases. In Porter's 5-year study of mice, the animals drank water containing a mixture of two pesticides--aldicarb and atrazine--and nitrates from fertilizer. The concentrations ingested by the mice were similar to those found in ground water in many agricultural areas, Porter said. Aldicarb, atrazine and nitrates are the three most abundant agricultural contaminants in the United States, although they do not rank high in use in California. While the mix of the three chemicals altered the mice hormones, each one alone did not. That points out a gaping hole in the federal effort to protect consumers--the EPA only tests for effects of pesticides individually, not cumulatively. The EPA tests, Porter said, "generate a great deal of false confidence in the safety" of pesticides. Source: Environmental Health Perspectives, June 1998. Copyright 1999 Los Angeles Times. All Rights Reserved To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail . ------------ Forwarded Message ends here ------------ To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Fri Mar 19 14:06:17 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id OAA01039 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 14:06:16 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id NAA07028 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 13:15:03 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id NAA06975 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 13:14:58 -0500 (EST) Received: from aae.wisc.edu (aae.wisc.edu [144.92.122.133]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id NAA09039 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 13:14:55 -0500 (EST) Received: from mojo.aae.wisc.edu ([144.92.244.223]) by aae.wisc.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.0) with SMTP id MAA32255 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 12:14:57 -0600 Message-Id: <199903191814.MAA32255@aae.wisc.edu> Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "Michele Gale-Sinex/CIAS, UW-Madison" To: sanet-mg@amani.ces.ncsu.edu Date: Fri, 19 Mar 1999 12:14:49 -0500 Subject: > Study of Farm Women X-mailer: Pegasus Mail for Windows (v2.53/R1) Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 88 Howdy, all-- Thanks to Julie M. for posting the UW-Madison press release on Lydia Zepeda's study of women dairy farmers and their time use and farm family decision-making processes. CIAS has a /Research Brief/ on this project, #29, "Women on dairy farms: Juggling diverse roles and responsibilities." Holler if you want a (paper) copy. And then if you'd like to actually receive it, send me your name and mailing address. :^) Also, we're finalizing the first in a new publications series, an /Issue Focus/ entitled "Women as activists in rural communities." Forthcoming. peace misha <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< Michele Gale-Sinex, communications manager Center for Integrated Ag Systems UW-Madison College of Ag and Life Sciences Voice: (608) 262-8018 FAX: (608) 265-3020 http://www.wisc.edu/cias/ >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Dennis: Anarcho-syndicalism is a way of *preserving* freedom! His Wife: Oh, Dennis, *forget* about freedom! We 'aven't got enough mud! To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Fri Mar 19 14:07:23 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id OAA01053 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 14:07:22 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id NAA05263 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 13:10:37 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from um-mail01.umsystem.edu (um-mail01.missouri.edu [128.206.238.168]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id NAA05204 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 13:10:32 -0500 (EST) Received: by um-mail01 with Internet Mail Service (5.5.2232.9) id ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 12:10:33 -0600 Message-ID: From: "Shade, Victoria Tory" To: "'Kevin Smyth'" , sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Subject: RE: 17 year locusts Date: Fri, 19 Mar 1999 12:10:25 -0600 MIME-Version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2232.9) Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 89 We had two populations emerge in Missouri last year and some of the trees got a lot of flagging (especially where there were a lot of oaks). In some areas the population was large enough that more than trees got hit with cosmetic damage. However, they do prefer certain species of trees. I went looking for the list, but can't find it right now. I'll try to dig it up. Look at this site for more cicada info. http://www.ummz.lsa.umich.edu/Magicicada/Periodical/Index.html Tory, Se Missouri shadev@missouri.edu -----Original Message----- From: Kevin Smyth [mailto:ab210@seorf.ohiou.edu] Sent: Thursday, March 18, 1999 5:32 PM To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Subject: 17 year locusts Friends - This is the year for the 17 year locusts (I heard they were actually cicadas), and I am wondering what effect they might have on our vegetable crops here in SE Ohio. We grow 2.5 acres organic vegetables for a CSA here. Anybody know? Kevin Smyth ab210@seorf.ohiou.edu To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Fri Mar 19 14:13:48 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id OAA01197 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 14:13:48 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id NAA08032 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 13:16:41 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from mail.his.com (root@mail.his.com [205.177.25.9]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id NAA07934 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 13:16:31 -0500 (EST) Received: from bridgette (ws1.vancomm.com [209.8.22.66]) by mail.his.com (8.8.5/8.8.5) with SMTP id NAA24346 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 13:16:30 -0500 (EST) Received: by localhost with Microsoft MAPI; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 13:14:50 -0300 Message-ID: <01BE720A.7843C7E0.lwilliams@vancomm.com> From: Lisa Williams Reply-To: "lwilliams@vancomm.com" To: "sanet-mg-digest@ces.ncsu.edu" Subject: Job opening to post, please Date: Fri, 19 Mar 1999 13:14:48 -0300 Organization: Vanguard Communications X-Mailer: Microsoft Internet E-mail/MAPI - 8.0.0.4211 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 90 We would love to have this job opening made available to your members on your list-serv. Could you please contact me if you are interested? Thanks! Lisa M. Williams Vanguard Communications 202-331-4323, ext. 3022 mailto:lwilliams@vancomm.com Campaign Coordinator We are seeking an individual to design and implement multi-faceted campaign that will include public relations, media relations, public service advertising and grassroots outreach to farmers in the Maryland Chesapeake Bay watershed area. Collaboration with a coalition of farmers, environmentalists, consumers and government officials to maximize the effectiveness of the campaign; help conceptualize and produce materials needed to complement the campaign; contribute ideas and contacts to assist in ongoing fund-raising efforts; develop messages and "pitch" strategies for media placement, and identify existing promotional and educational materials that can be used in this campaign at low or no cost. Reqs: a minimum of 3 years experience working in media and public relations; basic knowledge of sustainable agriculture practices; minimum BA/BS degree, preferably in communications or agriculture-related field; excellent writing samples; successful track record in media placement; and experience working with community-based organizations. Send cover letter, resume and three writing samples to: Community Media, Inc.; c/o Vanguard Communications; 1019 19th Street NW; Suite 1200; Washington, DC 20036. Community Media is a equal opportunity employer. To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Fri Mar 19 15:49:56 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id PAA03158 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 15:49:55 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id OAA02562 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 14:44:03 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from hermes.cdpr.ca.gov (hermes.cdpr.ca.gov [134.186.189.1]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id OAA02536 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 14:43:58 -0500 (EST) Received: from empm.cdpr.ca.gov (empm.cdpr.ca.gov [134.186.108.6]) by hermes.cdpr.ca.gov (8.8.3/8.8.3) with SMTP id LAA29935 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 11:32:19 -0800 (PST) Received: from [134.186.108.48] by empm.cdpr.ca.gov (SMI-8.6/SMI-SVR4) id LAA20530; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 11:44:58 -0800 X-Sender: brunetti@134.186.108.6 Message-Id: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/enriched; charset="us-ascii" Date: Fri, 19 Mar 1999 11:45:06 -0800 To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu From: Kathy Brunetti Subject: Calif. Proposes Proposes Reduced-Risk Pesticide Registration Exemptions Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 91 ArialThis is a press release from the California Department of Pesticide Regulaton, concerning a proposal to exempt certain products (mostly food materials) from registration. The name of a contact person is at the end of the text. I have not included the list of products in the interest of not making this message *too* long. You'll find the press release, including the list, at < **************************************** Kathy Brunetti California Department of Pesticide Regulation ***************************************** ArialSACRAMENTO - Cal/EPA's Department of Pesticide Regulation has proposed regulations that would exempt certain kinds of minimum-risk pesticides from registration requirements. DPR's registration process requires payment of fees and submission of specific studies before products can be advertised and sold for pest control in California. Among the substances proposed for exemption are many common household and food products that currently must be registered in California as pesticides when labeled and sold for pest-controlling purposes. They include substances such as garlic, peppermint, rosemary, corn oil, cedar chips, and castor oil. The proposed regulations were authorized by 1997 legislation (SB 445, Monteith). This bill allowed DPR to exempt certain chemicals from registration after the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency had done so. The major category of exempt chemicals are low-risk substances that have a wide range of other, nonpesticidal uses as foods, medicines, or household items. All are on U.S. EPA's exempt list and were evaluated by DPR scientific staff for potential hazards. The Department is proposing to divide 40 federally exempted, minimum-risk substances into two lists. The first includes several spices and herbs (such as cinnamon, cloves, garlic, mint, and rosemary), sodium chloride (common table salt), several oils (including corn oil, cottonseed oil, and linseed oil), and zinc metal strips. Because of their widespread and long-standing use, and the fact they pose minimum risk to users, products containing these 22 substances will be exempted without further restrictions. The 18 chemicals that DPR proposes to place on the second list have the potential to cause eye or skin irritation, although they also include many food or household substances, such as citric acid, clove oil, mint oil, white pepper, and corn gluten meal. Pesticide products that contain more than 8.5 percent of a chemical on this list must have label language requiring use of eyewear and gloves. For substances on both lists, the label will have to identify the name and percentage of each active ingredient and the name of each inert ingredient. Moreover, all ingredients in a formulation must qualify for exemption. Only inert ingredients that U.S. EPA has classified as minimum-risk would be allowed. Among these approximately 160 inerts are beeswax, dextrose, eggs, gelatin, honey, lanolin, milk, sawdust, and yeast. To qualify for exemption, products containing these 40 chemicals cannot make claims to control or mitigate microorganisms that pose a threat to human health, including but not limited to disease-transmitting bacteria or viruses. Claims that specify possible control for disease carried by insects or rodents would also be prohibited. In addition, the product must not include any false or misleading statements. Besides the low-risk compounds on the two lists, DPR also proposes to exempt from registration four other categories of substances: certain natural cedar products; pheromones labeled for use in traps or the pheromone traps themselves (as defined in the regulation); certain preservatives (including embalming fluids and products used to preserve laboratory animal specimens); and foods used as pest attractants that contain no chemical or biological toxicants. Products exempted from registration will remain under DPR oversight. The Department will require manufacturers to submit reports of any adverse effects from the use of the exempted products so that DPR can reassess exemptions if necessary. Copies of the proposed regulations are available on DPR's Web site <, or by calling Ann Prichard at (916) 324-3931. Comments may be submitted until 5:00 p.m. on May 12, 1999. E-mail comments may be sent to <. Address written comments to: Ann Prichard, Department of Pesticide Regulation, 830 K Street, Sacramento 95814. To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Fri Mar 19 18:44:11 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id SAA07310 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 18:44:10 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id RAA02021 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 17:52:20 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id RAA01897 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 17:52:09 -0500 (EST) Received: from mail.alphalink.com.au (mail.alphalink.com.au [203.24.205.7]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id RAA15016 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 17:51:58 -0500 (EST) Received: from p2 (ppp60-0-Canberra.alphalink.com.au [203.37.51.60]) by mail.alphalink.com.au (8.9.3/8.6.9) with SMTP id JAA10350 for ; Sat, 20 Mar 1999 09:50:59 +1100 From: "Argall Family" To: Subject: RE: N scavenging plants Date: Sat, 20 Mar 1999 10:01:14 +1100 Message-ID: <001e01be725c$63bde6a0$3c3325cb@p2> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 (Normal) X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook 8.5, Build 4.71.2173.0 In-reply-to: <19990317.195410.3542.2.eweigel@juno.com> X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.2106.4 Importance: Normal Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 92 It may not suit all circumstances but I understand Paulownia trees are being used in some pig waste problem areas. The rate of growth is sufficient to allow return of grazing in three years; they are real climate moderators in my experience in hot summers, they lose leaf early; fallen leaf breaks down readily, timber value begins at 8 years and tress coppice with growth back to 5 metres or more in a summer possible after coppicing. Dennis Argall To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Fri Mar 19 19:24:38 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id TAA08023 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 19:24:38 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id SAA20262 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 18:20:02 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from mail.internet.com.mx (mail.internet.com.mx [200.10.239.229]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id SAA20239 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 18:19:53 -0500 (EST) Received: from ssc053.sancristobal.com.mx ([167.114.50.136]) by mail.internet.com.mx (8.9.1/8.9.1) with SMTP id RAA04929 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 17:17:01 -0600 (CST) Message-Id: <3.0.1.32.19990319171910.006c136c@mail.internet.com.mx> X-Sender: danamex@mail.internet.com.mx (Unverified) X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Light Version 3.0.1 (32) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 1999 17:19:10 -0600 To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu From: Ronald Nigh Subject: End of Steven Blank's nonesense Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-MIME-Autoconverted: from quoted-printable to 8bit by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu id SAA20246 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 93 In a posting called "Articles in The Futurist" we learn that Steven Blank, an extension economist from UC Davis (earning your tax dollars to help farmers!) informs that American agriculture is no longer profitable and so should be abanoned. Although one gets used to such neoconservative dreamy twaddle, from The Futurist, this one really takes the cake. I couldn't help but think of Dr. Blank when I read the following article today in the NY Times: March 19, 1999 >U.S. Trade Deficit Soars as Imports Increase Sharply WASHINGTON -- As American exports continued to fall, the United States trade deficit jumped to a monthly record of nearly $17 billion in January, fueled by a flood of imports from China that could stir further protectionist sentiments in Congress. Among the imports flowing into the United States, Chinese-made steel surged 65 percent from December. On Wednesday, the House of Representatives overwhelmingly passed a bill that would sharply limit steel imports, a movement that may gain momentum now that China is joining Japan, Brazil and Russia on the list of nations pouring inexpensive steel into the American market.... > It would seem that farming isn't the only business having trouble with foreign competition these days. I guess we better stop making steel too, right Dr. Blank? I suppose it would be foolish to propose an alternative: policies that favor our domestic economy rather than multinational capital flying around the world looking for the most downtrodden, cheap labor force. Where I think Dr. Blank blanks out is, not in saying that farming is a business and must make a profit--it has always been thus since the earliest times. Rather it is to purvey the logic that the only function of business is to maximize profit, even if it is at the expense of the welfare of our society. I know some organic farmers that aren't doing to badly as businesses--maybe its time to ask them to help reduce the US trade budget and bail out the steel industry. End of agriculture , huh? Ronald Nigh Dana, A.C. Mexico, D.F. & San Cristóbal de Las Casas, Chiapas Tel. y FAX 525-666-73-66 (DF) 529-678-72-15 (Chiapas) danamex@mail.internet.com.mx To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Fri Mar 19 21:03:46 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id VAA09151 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 21:03:46 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id TAA27559 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 19:59:04 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from imo19.mx.aol.com (imo19.mx.aol.com [198.81.17.9]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id TAA27494 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 19:58:59 -0500 (EST) From: PetersFarm@aol.com Received: from PetersFarm@aol.com by imo19.mx.aol.com (IMOv19.3) id 7ORPa05013 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 19:58:17 +1900 (EST) Message-ID: <2ae190a8.36f2f2a9@aol.com> Date: Fri, 19 Mar 1999 19:58:17 EST To: sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Mime-Version: 1.0 Subject: Question regarding petitions, old and new. Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit X-Mailer: AOL 2.7 for Mac sub 3 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 94 Dear friends - A long time ago, seems like, I signed on to petitions and protests regarding the proposed Fed Organic (Sub)Standards, the acceptance of GE and GM in any way, and other such matters worthy of protest. Does anyone know the results? Are there any petitions circulating now? Any specific person/group I can ask new converts to contact? Thanks in advance for any and all replies. Betty Ann Gras (gradually changing my name back to Ann, the name my husband gave me in preference to Betty which was the name my parents gave me, only my official name is actually Annette E., but what's in a name?) To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Sat Mar 20 01:36:20 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id BAA12605 for ; Sat, 20 Mar 1999 01:36:20 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id AAA22085 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Sat, 20 Mar 1999 00:23:49 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from email.kdsi.net (IDENT:root@email.kdsi.net [206.103.112.4]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id AAA22007 for ; Sat, 20 Mar 1999 00:23:40 -0500 (EST) Received: from 208.136.226.110 ([208.136.226.178]) by email.kdsi.net (8.8.7/8.8.7) with SMTP id XAA31705 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 23:23:38 -0600 Message-ID: <36F34727.3A41@kdsi.net> Date: Fri, 19 Mar 1999 22:58:43 -0800 From: Jacklyn Smith Reply-To: jjerseys@kdsi.net X-Mailer: Mozilla 3.01 (Macintosh; I; 68K) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: "sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu" Subject: Bumper sticker Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 95 Can anyone tell me where I can purchase the bumper sticker "Don't treat your soil like dirt"? Thank you Jacklyn Smith jjerseys@kdsi.net To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Sat Mar 20 07:33:03 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id HAA14920 for ; Sat, 20 Mar 1999 07:33:03 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id GAA28211 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Sat, 20 Mar 1999 06:25:59 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from mail.caribe.net (root@mail.caribe.net [209.91.196.5]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id GAA28201 for ; Sat, 20 Mar 1999 06:25:51 -0500 (EST) Received: from ddworley (ppp226.203dip.netdial.caribe.net [209.91.203.226]) by mail.caribe.net (8.9.0/8.9.0) with SMTP id HAA06962 for ; Sat, 20 Mar 1999 07:28:47 -0400 (AST) Message-Id: X-Sender: ddworley@mail.caribe.net X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Pro Version 4.0 Date: Sat, 20 Mar 1999 07:28:12 -0400 To: sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu From: Richard Wolfson (by way of Daniel Worley ) Subject: GEN3-18; Fwd, Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-MIME-Autoconverted: from quoted-printable to 8bit by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu id GAA28208 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 96 [Reposted with permission] Thanks to Bradford Duplisea for posting the next two articles LA Times Staff Writer Sunday, March 14, 1999 (Full Page Feature Story) In the Land of Sushi, Lab Tomato Strikes Out Biotechnology: The Japanese government and companies face a major hurdle in winning public acceptance of genetically engineered foods. By SONNI EFRON, LA Times Staff Writer TOKYO--Pity the "transgenic" tomato. It has become a marketing disaster on both sides of the Pacific, and a cautionary tale for Japanese biotechnology. It began life in a California laboratory as a miracle product, a tomato bioengineered to be tasty but slow to spoil. It was the first gene-spliced food to win approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. And in 1994, when Kirin Brewery Co., Japan's top beer maker, acquired the Japanese rights to the Flavr-Savr tomato from Calgene Inc. of Davis, Calif., it seemed like a sure-fire winner. Kirin quickly won approval from Japan's Health and Welfare Ministry to market the tomato here, and set to work crossbreeding it with Japanese species to produce the pink color, particular taste and compact growth characteristics that consumers and farmers here prefer. But before the tomato got near the supermarket shelves, a Japanese consumer group that opposes genetically engineered food threatened to boycott every Kirin product--including its beer--if the company dared to put its brave new product on the market. Kirin pulled the offending vegetable. In a recent interview, company spokesmen politely avoided comment on the boycott threat, but said Kirin will not try to market its tomato--or any other genetically modified food--until and unless the Japanese public is prepared to accept it. "Until we resolve the taste, color and growth issues, we can't sell it," explained spokesman Hirotaka Ishikawa. "In addition, we need to have the public's understanding. Right now, people feel resistance even when they hear the words 'genetic engineering.' " But Kirin has by no means abandoned bioengineering. It is quietly continuing efforts to produce a genetically superior tomato--even though Calgene's Flavr-Savr has been a dud with U.S. shoppers. ... Now the government is mounting a public education campaign to persuade the Japanese public that gene-spliced foods also are unobjectionable. Powerful anti-GMO farm lobbies, along with consumer and environmental groups, are pitted against some of Japan's largest agribusinesses, which are developing such genetically modified products as rice, melons, tomatoes, strawberries and cucumbers and would like to bring them to market. A Lack of Incentive? Government officials are worried that unless the prevailing negative attitude toward GMOs can be changed, the biotech industry will have little incentive to pursue research and development and Japan will fall even further behind in the vital technology. "If private companies find that, like Kirin, they can develop a product and pass all the legally required safety checks but then can't sell it, we're in trouble," said Makoto Tabata, who works on promoting biotech research in the Innovative Technology Division of the agriculture ministry. "They will lose the motivation to invest." ........ PUBLICATION Agence France Presse English DATE Thu 18 Mar 1999 SECTION/CATEGORY International News BYLINE by Philip Pank Consumer power rears its head to drive GM food off supermarket shelves LONDON, March 18 (AFP) - Hostility to genetically engineered food reached a highpoint across Europe Wednesday when leading supermarket chains bowed to consumer pressure and decided to chase "Frankenstein food" from their shelves. In Britain, Sainsbury's and Marks and Spencer supermarkets announced that they would remove all genetically-modified (GM) ingredients from their own-brand range. The high street giants launched a Europe-wide consortium which also grouped the French hypermarket retailer Carrefour, Delhaize of Belgium, Migros in Switzerland, Effelunga in Italy and the Irish group Superquinn. The group pledged to eek out non-GM sources in farmers' fields and not to mix these with known GM crops. At present, genetically engineered produce is found in an estimated 60 percent of processed food. The British government is due to clarify its policy on GM crops soon, amid calls for a three-year moratorium on planting GM crops here. London has recently tempered its wholehearted support for the produce. Consumers in Britain and elsewhere have become alarmed at the potential health hazards of eating food that has been concocted using genes from other species. Environmentalists fear that crops implanted with herbicide-resistant genes will be sprayed with powerful chemicals that will decimate surrounding plant and animal life. They are also concerned that nature's ingenuity will create bionic bugs capable of withstanding the chemicals used on new super crops. "Our customers have indicated to us very clearly that they do not want genetically-modified ingredients in their food and we are taking steps to offer that guarantee," said a spokeswoman for Sainsbury's, Britain's second biggest supermarket chain. Britons are slowly waking to the benefits of eating healthy food. The change follows a string of food scares here, including the "madcow" panic sparked after the government admitted that consumers who ate infected beef could contract a fatal brain-wasting disease, a deadly outbreak of e-coli food poisoning and a spate of salmonella in eggs. Sainsbury's environmental manager Alison Austin said that "by establishing verified non-GM sources in the farmer's field and ensuring segregation through the supply chain we will be GM free. "We always wanted GM and standard crops to be separated and were extremely disappointed when this did not happen with the US soya crop." The supermarkets said that they would look towards Canada and Brazil for supplies of natural soya. Retailers complain that the giant US producers cannot guarantee that their shipments are free of genetic engineering, because they mix beans at source. Imports of soya beans from the United States into Europe has emerged as a political hot-potato amid a wider dispute between the two trading blocks over import policy. Three European countries, Italy, Austria and Luxembourg, have imposed unilateral bans on US soya imports, despite European Union clearance. ...... next article posted by Paul Davis UK Daily Mail 18 March 99 GM giant's milk hormone "is cancer risk" By SEAN POULTER Consumer Affairs Correspondent A HORMONE designed by "Frankenstein Food" giant Monsanto to make cows produce more milk could put the health of the animals and humans at risk. A damning report compiled by scientists for the European Commission reveals that the genectically-engineered drug BST is deeply flawed. The chemical, which is injected into the animal, is said to increase yields by 10-15 per cent, so increasing profits for farmers. But research suggests the milk may contain higher levels of a hormone which has been linked to increased incidence of certain cancers. The damning report is set to start an international trade war between Europe and the United States, where the drug is already in use. The U.S. government is demanding that a two-year moratorium on the use of BST in Europe must be lifted by the end of the year - opening up a lucrative new market for Monsanto. However the evidence of the study can only lead European governments, including Britain, to oppose any attempt to legalise BST. The push by Monsanto and the Clinton administration to bully Britain and the rest of Europe to take BST has echoes of the controversy involving genetically-modified crops. Monsanto effectively forced Europe to take its Roundup Ready GM soya by mixing it with natural crops shipped across the Atlantic. As many as 30 per cent of American cows are injected with BST and U.S. campaigners complain that most of the milk stream is adulterated because milk from different dairies is mixed before it reaches consumers. The EU investigation suggests the extra milk production promised by BST treatment puts enormous strain on animals which are already struggling to cope with creating unnatural amounts of milk. Specialist breeding techniques already mean cows are 20 per cent bigger than 20 years ago, while the yield has soared by 50 per cent. Cows have become no more than an udder and stomach on thin legs-producing 80 pints of milk a day, eight times more than any calf can drink. Professor Donald Broom, who carried out the EU study says the animals cannot tolerate the even greater strain produced by BST, with particular problems of udder infections, or mastitis. "There's too much mastitis, leg disorders, reproductive disorders and injection site problems - and this is not a medicine, this is a substance that doesn't have to be used, and we think it shouldn't be used," he said. His views will carry enormous weight for he is world renowned in the field. He is both Professor of Animal Welfare at Cambridge University and Chairman of the European Union's Scientific Veterinary Committee. His committee has concluded that claims by Monsanto that it is has carried out research proving the safety of BST - Bovine Somatotropin - are deeply flawed. Details were revealed on Channel 4 News last night, which has also seen parallel research on the potential impact on human health. This separate study will warn of a small but significant increase in the risk of cancer from BST milk. It suggests that a hormone - IGF-1 - is increased in milk by the use of BST This same hormone has been linked to some cancers. Monsanto's research found IGF-l was not increased by BST, but Professor Brown argues: "They got it wrong." ....... next article posted by Paul Davis >From the BBC March 18, 1999 Fines back up GM labeling rules Restaurants will be fined if they do not label GM food The UK Government is claiming to lead the way in Europe by bringing in tough new regulations to force all food-sellers to tell customers if items contain genetically-modified ingredients. Local authorities are being given powers to enforce a European Union directive requiring labelling of all products containing GM soya or maize. These will be backed up by £5,000 fines for those who fail to provide full information to consumers. In a written parliamentary answer, Food Safety Minister Jeff Rooker said: "The government is determined that consumers should be able to choose whether or not to eat genetically-modified foods. ........ Restaurants must declare any GM food The Daily Telegraph London March 18, 1999 RESTAURANTS and cafes will be forced to tell their customers about any genetically modified ingredients contained in their food under measures to be announced by the Government today. It is expected that declarations will have to be made on menus. Bakers and delicatessens will also have to comply with the new labelling controls, which will exceed current European Union requirements. At present EU labelling regulations lay down that all foods sold in shops and supermarkets must be clearly marked if they contain more than two per cent of GM ingredients. The move follows an announcement this week that Marks & Spencer is to ban all genetically modified food from its shelves. Sainsbury's said yesterday that it is to ban genetically modified ingredients from its own-brand foods and that it has joined a consortium to ensure supplies of non-GM ingredients in future. _________________________________________________________ Richard Wolfson, PhD Consumer Right to Know Campaign, for Mandatory Labelling and Long-term Testing of all Genetically Engineered Foods, 500 Wilbrod Street Ottawa, ON Canada K1N 6N2 tel. 613-565-8517 fax. 613-565-1596 email: rwolfson@concentric.net Our website, http://www.natural-law.ca/genetic/geindex.html contains more information on genetic engineering as well as previous genetic engineering news items. Subscription fee to genetic engineering news is $35 for 12 months, payable to "BanGEF" and mailed to the above address. Or see website for details. __________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________ To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Sat Mar 20 16:06:27 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id QAA20679 for ; Sat, 20 Mar 1999 16:06:26 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id PAA09388 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Sat, 20 Mar 1999 15:12:53 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id PAA09379 for ; Sat, 20 Mar 1999 15:12:50 -0500 (EST) Received: from sscntex.ssc.msu.edu (ssc.msu.edu [35.8.70.66]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id PAA01123 for ; Sat, 20 Mar 1999 15:12:48 -0500 (EST) Received: by hudzik.ss-dean.msu.edu with Internet Mail Service (5.5.2448.0) id ; Sat, 20 Mar 1999 15:03:25 -0500 Message-ID: From: "Harris, Craig" To: "'sanet-mg@amani.ces.ncsu.edu'" Subject: catfish Date: Sat, 20 Mar 1999 15:03:23 -0500 MIME-Version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2448.0) Content-Type: text/plain Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 97 just to remind us all that gmo's include both animals and plants cheers, craig > {Improved Catfish. On Mar. 11, 1999, officials of the Thad Cochran > National Warmwater Aquaculture Center, Stoneville, MS, announced that a > genetically engineered catfish, designated USDA 103, could be certified > for release and available for distribution to catfish growers as early as > January 2000. USDA 103 is reported to grow about 25% faster than most > catfish strains, using feed more efficiently.}[Assoc Press] > craig k harris department of sociology michigan state university 429b berkey hall east lansing michigan 48824-1111 tel: 517-355-5048 fax: 517-432-2856 To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Sat Mar 20 18:45:37 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id SAA22272 for ; Sat, 20 Mar 1999 18:45:37 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id RAA26400 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Sat, 20 Mar 1999 17:58:09 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from big.seorf.ohiou.edu (ab210@big.seorf.ohiou.edu [132.235.1.252]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id RAA26387 for ; Sat, 20 Mar 1999 17:58:04 -0500 (EST) Received: (from ab210@localhost) by big.seorf.ohiou.edu (8.8.5/8.8.5) id RAA11709 for sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu; Sat, 20 Mar 1999 17:58:04 -0500 (EST) From: Kevin Smyth Message-Id: <199903202258.RAA11709@big.seorf.ohiou.edu> Subject: we're thinking about getting a pig... To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Date: Sat, 20 Mar 1999 17:58:04 -0500 (EST) X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4 PL25] Content-Type: text Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 98 Friends - we run a CSA here in SE Ohio, providing organic produce to 50-70 households. We're considering getting a few pigs so that we can supply our customers with pork. Does anybody have any tips on where to look or who to talk to re. the economics of such an endeavore? I need to know, for example, how much it costs to have a pig butchered, and how much I can expect to make selling the pork from one pig, and so on. Any pertinent info would be greatly appreciated. Thank you, Kevin Smyth ab210@seorf.ohiou.edu To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Sat Mar 20 21:02:13 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id VAA23632 for ; Sat, 20 Mar 1999 21:02:12 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id UAA03683 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Sat, 20 Mar 1999 20:26:54 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from imo18.mx.aol.com (imo18.mx.aol.com [198.81.17.8]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id UAA03669 for ; Sat, 20 Mar 1999 20:26:48 -0500 (EST) From: DGreen47@aol.com Received: from DGreen47@aol.com by imo18.mx.aol.com (IMOv19.3) id 7ZPNa04981 for ; Sat, 20 Mar 1999 20:26:09 +1900 (EST) Message-ID: <8948c2bd.36f44ab1@aol.com> Date: Sat, 20 Mar 1999 20:26:09 EST To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Mime-Version: 1.0 Subject: SUSTAINABLE agriculture Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit X-Mailer: AOL 4.0 for Windows 95 sub 4 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 99 The recent posting about Dr. Blank's research reminded me of the comment from the sweet lady who was "managing" a little farmer's market. I had just told her that I was going to have to stop attending because I wasn't making any money. "But Dori, you have to understand that none of us are there to make money, we're there to have a nice time visiting with each other." Sorry. I'm doing sustainable agriculture, and if it ain't economically sustainable then I can't call it sustainable. I don't for a minute propose that it isn't a challenge to include economic sustainability. Sometimes it requires hard choices. But it absolutely must be included. Dori Green Ash Grove Community Farm & Center for Sustainable Living Corning, NY http://www.agrove.com To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From london@metalab.unc.edu Fri Mar 19 10:29:30 1999 -0500 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id KAA26211 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 10:29:30 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id JAA07086 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 09:12:52 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from hpamgaab.compuserve.com (ah-img-2.compuserve.com [149.174.217.153]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id JAA07037 for ; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 09:12:47 -0500 (EST) Received: (from mailgate@localhost) by hpamgaab.compuserve.com (8.8.8/8.8.8/HP-1.1) id JAA16584; Fri, 19 Mar 1999 09:11:47 -0500 (EST) Date: Fri, 19 Mar 1999 09:08:15 -0500 From: BILL DUESING <71042.2023@compuserve.com> Subject: A Visit to the Heartland To: Blind.Copy.Receiver@compuserve.com Message-ID: <199903190911_MC2-6E98-EEB9@compuserve.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 100 Living on the Earth, March 19, 1999: A Visit to the Heartland About sixty years ago, writer Louis Bromfield, fleeing the oncoming World War in Europe, returned to his native, dustbowl-ravaged Ohio, where he bought three eroded, worn-out farms. Greedy, desperate farmers had allowed their topsoil to be washed down to the Gulf of Mexico, destroying the fertility and water-holding capacity of ecosystems, as well as lives and communities. Bromfield believed that with proper care, using nature's soil-building methods, this land could be restored to prosperity. He used cover crops, pastures with grazing animals, careful crop rotations and trees to stop erosion and create fertile soil. The land was again able to build its soil and water resources as well as its biological diversity. Springs that hadn't run for years began flowing as his farmland held onto more rainwater. Bromfield described his work eloquently in Pleasant Valley and other books. His passionate writings are credited with inspiring the soil conservation movement in the 1940s and 50s. Thirty years ago, when I first lived in the country on an abandoned, 200-year-old Connecticut farm, I read Bromfield's Pleasant Valley. It inspired me and changed my life. I managed to buy a small piece of land and began to care for it- to study and learn from nature. Last weekend, I had the opportunity to visit our country's heartland and as a result, to realize just how important and timeless Bromfield's message is. The Ohio Ecological Food and Farm Association (OEFFA) invited me to address its 20th Annual Conference. OEFFA is one of the many groups of farmers, gardeners and consumers around the country with similar missions. "To work to create and promote a healthful, ecological, accountable and sustainable system of agriculture," is OEFFA's goal. This conference offered a great opportunity to share information, successes, dreams and struggles with others involved in the work of creating a local, ecological food system on a human scale. Food is our most important connection to the Earth. Most of it comes directly or indirectly from the soil. The well-attended, all-day "Organic Soil Fertility Management and Improvement" workshop on the Friday before the official conference demonstrated this topic's importance. The message from seasoned farmers and a pioneering researcher stressed cover crops, the use of animals and plants in rotations, compost and trees. These methods are very similar to Bromfield's message, enhanced by modern research results. Later in the conference, a veteran farmer suggested that Pleasant Valley is still a valuable book for a beginning farmer to read. Other research shows that these organic soil building methods not only heal damaged ecosystems, they also help plants to resist pests and can eliminate the need for pesticides. Of course, whenever 600 thoughtful farmers and gardeners come together, there's bound to be talk of worrisome trends in this country's food and agriculture system. The rampant consolidation and vertical integration of the food system into the hands of a few dominant players results in lower farm prices and closed markets. Corporate giants' demands for low cost commodities to buy, sell, process or feed drive an increasingly disconnected, destructive, industrial-scale agriculture. Its voracious energy and pesticide use, large-scale animal confinement facilities, routine antibiotic feeding and the increasing lack of diversity and use of genetically-engineered seeds and animals worry many of those who actually tend the land. The threatening "Terminator Technology" which may allow corporations to sterilize future generations of seeds in order to achieve greater profits encouraged lots of talk of open-pollinated corn-- a creative defense against corporate biocide. Many of the people I met are using gardens, small farms, local processing and marketing to rebuild ravaged communities and soils in Appalachian hills and urban wastelands as well as on typical Ohio farms, and even on Bromfield's Malabar Farm, now a State Park. The deep pleasure of working with nature to build health, fertility and community, which makes Bromfield's book so inspiring, is shared by many OEFFA members. Tomorrow is the Spring Equinox and the beginning of another growing season. Peas, lettuces and other greens can be planted soon. This spring get your hands into the soil and begin to discover the great joys of working with nature to feed ourselves. This is Bill Duesing, Living on the Earth (C) 1999, Bill Duesing, Solar Farm Education, Box 135, Stevenson, CT 06491 To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Sun Mar 21 09:00:56 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id JAA28446 for ; Sun, 21 Mar 1999 09:00:56 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id IAA16071 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Sun, 21 Mar 1999 08:22:45 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from dfw-ix1.ix.netcom.com (dfw-ix1.ix.netcom.com [206.214.98.1]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id IAA16061 for ; Sun, 21 Mar 1999 08:22:39 -0500 (EST) Received: (from smap@localhost) by dfw-ix1.ix.netcom.com (8.8.4/8.8.4) id HAA28241 for ; Sun, 21 Mar 1999 07:22:07 -0600 (CST) Received: from wor-ma1-07.ix.netcom.com(205.184.168.39) by dfw-ix1.ix.netcom.com via smap (V1.3) id rma028191; Sun Mar 21 07:21:36 1999 Message-ID: <007c01be739d$84619540$27a8b8cd@guldann.ix.netcom.com> Reply-To: "Dan Hook" From: "Dan Hook" To: Subject: Japanese tomato? Date: Sun, 21 Mar 1999 08:19:55 -0500 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.72.3115.0 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.3110.3 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 101 This was included in a previous post, I was wondering if anyone knew the variety of this pink tomato. The un GM one of course. It could be interesting to grow. Beth >Kirin quickly won approval from Japan's Health and Welfare Ministry to >market the tomato here, and set to work crossbreeding it with Japanese >species to produce the pink color, particular taste and compact growth >characteristics that consumers and farmers here prefer. > To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Sun Mar 21 09:35:35 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id JAA28592 for ; Sun, 21 Mar 1999 09:35:35 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id JAA07440 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Sun, 21 Mar 1999 09:00:27 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from uranium.nb.net (uranium.nb.net [209.161.64.33]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with SMTP id JAA07391 for ; Sun, 21 Mar 1999 09:00:22 -0500 (EST) Received: (qmail 25474 invoked from network); 21 Mar 1999 14:00:21 -0000 Received: from cabbage-a-32.warfordsburg.nb.net (HELO cass) (209.161.71.204) by uranium.nb.net with SMTP; 21 Mar 1999 14:00:21 -0000 Message-Id: <4.1.19990321085222.00931e70@nb.net> X-Sender: cpete@nb.net X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Pro Version 4.1 Date: Sun, 21 Mar 1999 08:57:39 -0500 To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu From: Cass Peterson Subject: Re: Japanese tomato? In-Reply-To: <007c01be739d$84619540$27a8b8cd@guldann.ix.netcom.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 102 At 08:19 AM 3/21/1999 -0500, you wrote: > >This was included in a previous post, I was wondering if anyone knew the >variety of this pink tomato. The un GM one of course. It could be >interesting to grow. Beth > >>Kirin quickly won approval from Japan's Health and Welfare Ministry to >>market the tomato here, and set to work crossbreeding it with Japanese >>species to produce the pink color, particular taste and compact growth >>characteristics that consumers and farmers here prefer. My guess would be Odoriko. We grew it several years ago. Good tomato. Seed is available from Shepherd's Garden Seeds. Cass Peterson Flickerville Mountain Farm & Groundhog Ranch www.flickerville.com To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Sun Mar 21 13:27:27 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id NAA00814 for ; Sun, 21 Mar 1999 13:27:26 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id MAA17943 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Sun, 21 Mar 1999 12:40:57 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from supermail.globaldialog.com (root@pop.globaldialog.com [156.46.122.14]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id MAA17906 for ; Sun, 21 Mar 1999 12:40:53 -0500 (EST) Received: from LOCALNAME (wtn09tc4.gdinet.com [156.46.27.138]) by supermail.globaldialog.com (8.9.1/8.9.1) with SMTP id LAA10652 for ; Sun, 21 Mar 1999 11:40:57 -0600 (CST) Date: Sun, 21 Mar 1999 11:40:57 -0600 (CST) Message-Id: <199903211740.LAA10652@supermail.globaldialog.com> X-Sender: prairiedf@pop.globaldialog.com X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Version 1.4.5 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" To: sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu From: prairiedf@globaldialog.com (Greg David) Subject: A New Perspective of Agriculture Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 103 Hi, I thought some of you might be interested... Viewing Farming From a New Perspective What I would like to do today is to create a new frame work from which to review the way we farm. The new frame work, or paradigm, from which to view farming, is not meant to condemn a particular way of farming, or to set one type of farming above another. The paradigm we wish to put forth tonight is one that looks at the consequences of farming. The consequences of today's farming methods are very broad in scope. We must look at the environmental costs, the economic costs, and the social costs. We must consider the benefits too. Surely there are benefits to farming or so many people would not be involved with it. We will explore the sustainability of farming. Will we be able to continue to produce the way we are, without impinging on future generations to produce for themselves? So to begin I shall read a passage from the book 'The Unsettling of America', by Wendell Berry. It will give us two differing paradigms from which to view farming. "We as a society can be either exploiter or nurturers of our environment. The terms exploitation and nurture, describe a division not only between persons, but, also within persons. We are all to some extent the products of an exploitive society, and it would be foolish and self-defeating to pretend we do not bear its stamp. Let me outline as briefly as I can, what seems to me to be these opposite kinds of mind. I conceive a strip miner to be a model exploiter, and as a model nurturer I take the old fashioned idea, or ideal of a farmer. The exploiter is a specialist, and expert; the nurturer is not. The standard of the exploiter is efficiency; the standard of the nurturer is care. The exploiter's goal is money, profit; the nurturer's is health--his land's health, his own, his family's, his community's, his country's. Whereas the exploiter asks of a piece of land only how much and how quickly it can be made to produce; the nurturer asks a question that is much more complex and difficult: What is its carrying capacity? (That is: How much can be taken from it without diminishing it? What can it produce dependably for an indefinite time?) The exploiter wants to earn as much as possible by as little work as possible; the nurturer expects, certainly, to have a decent living from his work, but his characteristic wish is to work as well as possible. The competence of the exploiter is in organization; that of the nurturer in order. The exploiter typically serves a institution of organization; the nurturer serves land, household, community, place. The exploiter thinks in terms of numbers, quantity, "hard facts"; the nurturer in terms of character, condition, quality, kind." Wendell Berry Okay, so what does that mean? ... Externalized Costs One of the major problems with today's methods of farming is it is so exploitive in nature. We can see this demonstrated in the Externalized Costs of operation. By externalized costs, I mean the negative consequences, that are often hidden or difficult to initially detect. Examples include; all types of pollution, impacts to health, flooding and drainage problems, accumulation of animal waste, salinated soils, eroded soils, compacted and hardened soils, drained aquifers, rivers that no longer flow, and loss of ecological diversity. Many of these examples of externalized costs are the result of labor saving devices, technologies, chemicals or drugs. As an example, chemical pesticides do save labor, but they pollute aquifers, and they do cause health problems. However we have reduced our labor need, and that means fewer farmers. We have also set up a condition where-by the farmer has just lost a portion of control of his operation. When he started using chemicals, he bought into the addiction to cheap food ideals, and put in place a broker for part of his livelihood. IMO you won't get any richer producing at the highest capacity, because you will also have the highest overhead. Any excess capital from producing at high capacity goes to pay for the increased overhead. It is like a safety line lent out to farmers, that he becomes entangled in and is slowly strangled. It also acts as a mechanism for someone else to make profit off his work. He has also traded pollution and health costs for labor, but never pay the costs of chemical use. In our present system no cost is accessed for the externalities. They are not paid for by those profiting in the farming industry, but by you and me and all future generations. The way the system is working right now these costs are being born by the environment and in turn, by the public, to whom these shared resources belong. All the pollution and negative consequences of the operation, need to have a price tag attached to them, and recorded on the ledger sheet. That is because these costs are real, and do not just go away. They become liabilities that some one will end up dealing with. Somehow, these costs need to be billed to the transgressor, and only then, will we have True Cost Accounting of the unseen costs of production. We need true cost accounting to avoid the terrible consequences that will eventually beleaguer and our children. Former Senator Gaylord Nelson said it this way, "The economy is a wholly owned subsidiary of the environment. All economic activity is dependent upon that environment with it's underlying resource base. When the environment is finally forced to file under Chapter 11 because it's resource base has been polluted, degraded, dissipated, irretrievably compromised, then, the economy goes down into bankruptcy with it because the economy is just a subset within the ecological system." Professor Donella Meadows said it like this, "Someday we will all come to learn that the environment is not an intermittent news story, not a special event, not a win-lose sports event, not a luxury, not a fad, not a movement, not discredited, not faltering, and not something to pay token attention to one day a year. It is a beat far more important than Wall Street or Washington. It's laws are stronger than Newt's, it's moves are more important than the Federal Reserve's, it's impact overwhelms that of the stock market or the next election. The environment is not one player on the field; it is the field. It holds up, or fails to hold up, the whole economy and all of life, whether the spot light is on it or not". Economics Another problem with farming is in the economics of the situation. The hardest working people I know are farmers. It's been said that if you need an employee who will work hard and give you 110%, hire a farmer. They know the meaning of work and should stand to profit by their hard work. But this is too often not the case. Let's look at what is happening to the farmer. Is he the one prospering from modern agriculture? Most often not. He's caught in the pinch between high production costs and low commodity prices. Take the recent calamity hitting hog farmers. What a disaster this! dollars received per hundred weight + cost of production + financial obligations + vertical integration + over production = loss of family farms Someone's making money during these times of depressed hog prices. Not the farmer certainly. Not our neighbor down the road. But someone is. Who? Who stands to profit from these depressed hog prices? And why are they so low? The price of pork in the grocery store hasn't dropped like the price of pigs has. Why is that? WHO IS PROFITING? The answer is large scale corporate agriculture. The same ones with 100,000 unit, sow operations in unfortunate states like North Carolina and Iowa. In Utah, a consortium of firms led by Smithfield Foods of Virginia is planning a massive factory designed to produce 2.5 million hogs per year! It will produce as much sewage as the city of Los Angeles. Proponents say this scale of production lessens costs, thereby making large operations more efficient. But as we saw in North Carolina, the costs weren't reduced, they were externalized. Externalized costs are those which are not paid for by the producer but shunted on to the public, in hope that no one will notice. These are costs for things like clean up of sewage lagoon ruptures, contaminated streams and rivers, poisoned aquifers, pfiesteria (the cell from hell) epidemics, reduced antibiotic usefulness, air pollution, and decreased property values for anyone unfortunate enough to live down wind from these pigs. These corporate hog factories (not farms) use public dollars to subsidize their bloated growth. (see Time Magazine's recent series on corporate welfare) But there is another reason pig farmers are going out of business. It's called 'vertical integration'. That means that the same corporate giants producing mega hogs and mega pollution also own the processing plants and distribution chains. As the big processing plants were bought out by the corporate pigs, many were also closed down. Enough were closed that there are no longer enough processing plants to handle the supply of hogs. We now have a glut of hogs and no place to process them. The corporate giants are able to sell at the depressed price of $13 per hundredweight, because they don't need to make money at that point of production. They can still make their money on the processing and marketing!!! And as it turns out many of these corporate giants were able to get 30 to 50 dollars per hundredweight for their hogs because they had contracts with the packers for their hogs. These contracts were not available to the family farmer because they weren't big enough. This is just the type of discrimination that was supposed to be illegal under the 'Packers an Stockyards Act (PSA). Unfortunately the current Secretary of Agriculture, Dan Glickman, chose not to enforce it. Why is that? If you look into President Clinton's campaign donations, I think you find good reason for Mr. Glickman ignoring the plight of the family hog producer and enacting the PSA. A note on the bright side, both Senators Kohl and Feingold have asked for investigations into this matter. I see giant, corporate agriculture as the most real threat to our environment and the family farm. They refuse to be responsible for their actions, and only responsible for profit. Peter Montague of the AFL-CIO writers union explains corporate reasoning like this: " For the most part, corporations are staffed by intelligent, well-meaning people. But the personal motivations of those individuals are not what motivate the corporation. A large publicly-traded corporation is driven by its own internal logic. ** A corporation has an internal drive that is comparable to a human's "will to live." Once a corporation is publicly traded, it: ** Must return a profit to investors; ** Must grow; ** Must externalize costs to the extent feasible. These are essential characteristics of the corporate form. If a corporation fails to provide a decent return for investors, those investors can (and do) sue for breach of fiduciary trust. This requirement --to turn a profit --narrowly limits what corporations can do. In general, what is unprofitable cannot be pursued. This means that individuals must sometimes put aside their consciences when they make decisions for a corporation. The most well-meaning people in the world are not free to act on their personal philosophies when they are acting on behalf of a publicly-held corporation. They must do what is profitable, which is not necessarily what is right." Peter Montague >From Mr. Montague's dialogue it becomes obvious that giant scale corporate agriculture is not interested in seeing the family farmers do well, but actually engaged in devising it's end. There will be less competition that way, and then higher profits will be ensured. So again, is the family farmer prospering from the set up of our agricultural system? If he isn't, who is?... Americans pay less for their food than any other country, about 11% of his annual income. So the consumer is benefiting. But who else? Why is food so cheap here? The US has long had a 'cheap food' policy, and I suppose this should be the expected result. But what makes our food so cheap? Why is it that food is so cheap and so many farmers are going out of business? Former Secretary of Agriculture, Earl Butz wrote the family farmers epitaph when he said, "Get big, or get out." Earl Butz is also the one credited with proposing the idea of using food as a weapon. Indeed food can be used as a weapon. It can be use to bring nations to their knees. But should we turn this weapon on our own family farmers? The federal government then went about creating a series of incentives, subsidies and policies to do just that. If you study these policies, you will find they do just as Mr. Butz promised, they reward getting big, externalizing costs, and practicing an eploitative type of agriculture. If a farmer wasn't willing to get big, he was going to get driven out. With true freedom comes responsibility! Our nation operates under a Free Market, capitalist framework. Free Market capitalism guarantee us many rights...but with those rights come equally important responsibilities. George Bernard Shaw said, " Liberty means responsibility, that is why most men dread it." Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said, Free market says if you want to bring a product to market you pay dividends, and that includes cleaning up after yourself. And that is responsibility number 1) clean up after yourself. Another would be to not impinge on the rights of others. A third, is treating the natural capital of the land as an asset to be counted on ledger sheet. Until that is done, capitalism is built on a lie. And now the dairy farmer is under the siege, suffering from a near 40% drop in milk prices he receives for his milk. I hope he is able to weather the storm better than some of the family pork producers recently pushed out of business. But if he is forced off his farm here in Wisconsin, again some will benefit and some will not. It is obvious the family dairy farmer will not benefit, but some do. I do for one. and I'd like to explain why. To do this we need to take a step back from agriculture and examine our economy as a whole. The Dow Jones hit the 10,000 mark the other day. An all time high! The stock market just keeps climbing and climbing, at least here in America. Thank God we aren't in some of those third world countries like Japan and the rest of Asia! So, what is causing this record growth in the financial markets? Much of it is happening as a result of corporate downsizing, mergers, and flight to cheap labor markets. This erodes steadily at our job base. Lose of living wage paying jobs is at an all time high. In return we get low-wage jobs and cheap prices of goods. My point here is part of the Dow-Jones high is fueled by liquidation of jobs and place. This can go on only so long before some other fuel feeds the fire of the sock market. That other fuel is the liquidation of Natural Capital. Natural Capital is the pre-existing, God given resources. Examples include; oil, minerals, soils, water, trees, wetlands, and the land itself. Unpolluted, undiminished resources, should be recognized as having a higher natural capital value. Let's bring it back to land. The farmer who is forced off his land is usually able to still turn one final profit in the sale of his land. Around here a good percentage of those sales of land go into feeding the development engine. It's been estimated that 50% of our economy is being fueled by the development and urban sprawl. As the real production of our economy is downsized and shipped overseas, something has to pick up the slack and that is the liquidation of our land and natural resources through development. Development is a powerful economic engine, employing a whole host of people from manufacturers to carpenters. I know, I profit from development. I've been a builder since I got out of highschool, and still do construction part-time....to pay for one of my habits...Farming. My point here is that by forcing the family farmer off his land, then liquidating it by building upon it, we enable one of the last means to keep our economy growing. This liquidation of the natural capital is also one of the last means by which the lower-class can raise themselves up to the middle-class. So in closing I think it is necessary to step back and rethink what farming is all about. We must have a greater goal than maximum production and profit, and that goal is the common good. We must protect our soil and farm resources, because they are the production base of our economy, and our life support system. We need to look upstream, far enough to recognize hidden costs. Then we will be able to control, in a positive manner, the out come of our actions. Only then... only then, will free-market capitalism become accountable for their responsibilities, and become sustainable. Greg David Prairie Dock Farm (920) 261-4292 You can't escape the responsibility of tomorrow, by evading it today. Abe Lincoln To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Sun Mar 21 21:03:24 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id VAA06074 for ; Sun, 21 Mar 1999 21:03:24 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id UAA13236 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Sun, 21 Mar 1999 20:13:15 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from out2.ibm.net (out2.ibm.net [165.87.194.229]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id UAA13187 for ; Sun, 21 Mar 1999 20:13:10 -0500 (EST) Received: from piper.hamline.edu (slip129-37-114-120.mn.us.ibm.net [129.37.114.120]) by out2.ibm.net (8.8.5/8.6.9) with SMTP id BAA25400; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 01:13:06 GMT Message-ID: <36F59617.7B55@tmn.com> Date: Sun, 21 Mar 1999 19:00:07 -0600 From: tom abeles Reply-To: tabeles@tmn.com Organization: sagacity X-Mailer: Mozilla 3.01 (Win95; I) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Ronald Nigh CC: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Subject: Re: End of Steven Blank's nonesense References: <3.0.1.32.19990319171910.006c136c@mail.internet.com.mx> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 104 There have been several cutting posts regarding Steven Blank's article in the recent issue of "The Futuist". None has contributed a single counterpoint, any rational respnse or constructive alternatives. Blank represents a real position within the larger agricultural community. Yet no peer from The Academy or government has come forward with anything to counter. And the alternative agricultural community, including think tanks have been stragely silent. Sometimes silence serves as a reasoned respnse. Not in this case and not on this list devoted to a partisan vision of agriculture which might be considered antithetical to the positon postulated by Blank thoughts? tom abeles To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Sun Mar 21 22:23:26 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id WAA07138 for ; Sun, 21 Mar 1999 22:23:26 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id VAA27288 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Sun, 21 Mar 1999 21:26:08 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from vesuvius.gr8brdg.net (vesuvius.gr8brdg.net [209.96.136.2]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id VAA27159 for ; Sun, 21 Mar 1999 21:26:00 -0500 (EST) Received: from greatbridge.net (cox139ppp237.gr8brdg.net [209.96.139.237]) by vesuvius.gr8brdg.net (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id VAA19880; Sun, 21 Mar 1999 21:25:51 -0500 Message-ID: <36F5AADB.EFCB97C0@greatbridge.net> Date: Sun, 21 Mar 1999 21:28:44 -0500 From: Ben and Sasha Goldberg Reply-To: goldberg@greatbridge.net X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.05 [en] (Win95; U) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: tabeles@tmn.com CC: Ronald Nigh , sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Subject: Re: End of Steven Blank's nonesense References: <3.0.1.32.19990319171910.006c136c@mail.internet.com.mx> <36F59617.7B55@tmn.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 105 tom abeles wrote: > There have been several cutting posts regarding Steven Blank's article > in the recent issue of "The Futuist". None has contributed a single > counterpoint My immediate thought upon reading Mr. Blank's idea was "we had better maintain a large standing army". Whether one is a proponent of sustainable agriculture or of the system we have now is irrelevant. To be largely dependent on crops grown outside of our borders is to court disaster; remember the oil crisis? Further, his reasoning assumes that there will always be a large pool of underpaid workers. What happens if and when that is no longer the case? It also assumes that petroleum products (or some reasonable facsimile) will always be available in sufficient quantity to allow the shipping of goods. But what if they aren't? This individual is talking about placing total or near total control of our food supply in other people's hands. That's really scary to me. If we don't have enough clothing, we can patch. If we don't have enough gas, there are ways to cut back. But if we don't have enough food, or if the price of that food is beyond what most people can afford, we starve to death .We cannot just dismiss our food as another commodity and farming as another business. Sasha To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Mon Mar 22 10:01:01 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id KAA13838 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 10:01:00 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id IAA15195 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 08:50:48 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from imo12.mx.aol.com (imo12.mx.aol.com [198.81.17.2]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id IAA15188 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 08:50:44 -0500 (EST) From: Sprinkraft@aol.com Received: from Sprinkraft@aol.com by imo12.mx.aol.com (IMOv19.3) id 7NEPa03692 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 08:50:10 -0500 (EST) Message-ID: Date: Mon, 22 Mar 1999 08:50:10 EST To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Mime-Version: 1.0 Subject: Porter's Pinks Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit X-Mailer: AOL 4.0 for Windows 95 sub 206 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 106 In a message dated 3/21/99 5:12:41 PM Central Standard Time, owner-sanet-mg- digest@ces.ncsu.edu writes: ...."....Japanese species to produce the pink color, particular taste and compact growth characteristics that consumers and farmers here prefer." Well, if that don't beat all. Back before they come up with Heat Wave, Hell Beater and Sun Defier, tomato varieties, we used to grow Porter tomatoes down here in the Heat Belt. Problem with those Porters was that they were pink. And they were semi-determinate. But you couldn't sell them, because tomatoes are supposed to be fire-engine red, not pink. I guess they should have just got stuffed in an air-can and flown to Tokyo instead. Steve Sprinkel Laredo, Texas To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Mon Mar 22 10:01:11 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id KAA13843 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 10:01:11 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id IAA12039 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 08:36:49 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from mailgw.cc.uga.edu (mailgw.cc.uga.edu [128.192.1.101]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id IAA12023 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 08:36:44 -0500 (EST) Received: from gaes.griffin.peachnet.edu by mailgw.cc.uga.edu (LSMTP for Windows NT v1.1b) with SMTP id <0.00A25741@mailgw.cc.uga.edu>; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 8:36:46 -0500 Received: from sareace4.griffin.peachnet.edu (sareace4.Griffin.PeachNet.EDU [168.26.248.64]) by gaes.griffin.peachnet.edu (8.8.8/8.8.8) with SMTP id IAA06496 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 08:36:46 -0500 (EST) Message-Id: <199903221336.IAA06496@gaes.griffin.peachnet.edu> From: "John C. Mayne" To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Date: Mon, 22 Mar 1999 08:37:26 -0500 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/enriched; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Subject: NEW Grad Student Awards Reply-to: jmayne@gaes.griffin.peachnet.edu X-mailer: Pegasus Mail for Win32 (v3.01d) Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 107 The Southern Region Sustainable Agriculture Research & Education (SARE) Program announces the GRADUATE STUDENT AWARD IN SUSTAINABLE AGRICULTURE The Southern SARE Program on Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education is requesting proposals for Graduate Student research projects that address issues of sustainable agriculture of current and potential importance to the Southern Region and the nation. The maximum limits for Southern SARE Graduate Student Awards in Sustainable Agriculture are $10,000 and no more than three years duration. A candidate may receive only one Southern SARE Graduate Student Award during her or his graduate student career. The Southern SARE program will only consider proposals submitted, and to be conducted, by graduate students (masters and Ph.D.) enrolled at an accredited college or university in the Southern Region. The deadline for proposals to be received in the Southern Region SARE office is December 8, 1999. Full information can be found in the Call for Proposals. The Southern Region is comprised of Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands. To have a Southern SARE Graduate Student Award in Sustainable Agriculture Call for Proposals sent to you please call: (770) 412-4787. The Southern Region SARE Graduate Student Award in Sustainable Agriculture Call for Proposals can also be downloaded from the web at: http://www.griffin.peachnet.edu/sare If you have any questions about the Southern SARE Graduate Student Award in Sustainable Agriculture please contact: John C. Mayne, Ph.D. Southern SARE Program 1109 Experiment Street Griffin, GA 30223 PH: (770) 229-3350 FX: (770) 412-4789 To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Mon Mar 22 10:38:30 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id KAA14582 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 10:38:30 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id JAA00672 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 09:18:23 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id JAA00593 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 09:18:18 -0500 (EST) Received: from uni02mr.unity.ncsu.edu (uni02mr.unity.ncsu.edu [152.1.1.165]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id JAA05370 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 09:18:17 -0500 (EST) Received: from unity.ncsu.edu (2405p200.ppath.ncsu.edu [152.1.176.53]) by uni02mr.unity.ncsu.edu (8.8.8/8.8.8/UR01Feb99) with ESMTP id JAA09230; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 09:18:19 -0500 (EST) Message-ID: <36F651EF.B69B58C5@unity.ncsu.edu> Date: Mon, 22 Mar 1999 09:21:36 -0500 From: Russ Bulluck X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.5 [en] (Win95; U) X-Accept-Language: en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Kevin Smyth , Sustainable Ag Subject: Re: 17 year locusts References: <199903182332.SAA25185@big.seorf.ohiou.edu> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 108 Actually, the 17 year locust appears each year, just that every 17 years, a bumper crop appears. Cicadas mainly like oak trees (especially Quercus alba, the white oak). I thought that 1995 or 96 was the 17th year. (There is also a three year locust, and several other species, I think.) The main effect of the cicada is tip dieback in oak trees. They seem to like the fresh tips of oak branches. I don't think you have to worry about the veggies. In the summer of 1996, while moving from PA to NC to finish graduate work, _all_ of the oak trees on highway 15 through Virginia had dead tips. It was quite a sight. When I reached NC State, I asked a forest pathologist here, who said it was the 17 year locust. Kevin Smyth wrote: > Friends - This is the year for the 17 year locusts (I heard they were > actually cicadas), and I am wondering what effect they might have on our > vegetable crops here in SE Ohio. We grow 2.5 acres organic vegetables for > a CSA here. Anybody know? > Kevin Smyth > ab210@seorf.ohiou.edu > > To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command > "unsubscribe sanet-mg". > To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command > "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". > > All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: > http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail -- Russ Bulluck Ph.D. Student Department of Plant Pathology North Carolina State University PO Box 7616 Raleigh, NC 27695-7616 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The soil population is so complex that it manifestly cannot be dealt with as a whole with any detail by any one person, and at the same time it plays so important a part in the soil economy that it must be studied. --Sir E. John Russell The Micro-organisms of the Soil, 1923 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Mon Mar 22 11:13:10 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id LAA15392 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 11:13:10 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id KAA00802 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 10:08:51 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from lima.epix.net (lima.epix.net [199.224.64.56]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id KAA00722 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 10:08:46 -0500 (EST) Received: from epix.net (qrvl209-74-60ppp190.epix.net [209.74.60.190]) by lima.epix.net (8.9.3/8.9.0/1998093001/Philippe Levan) with ESMTP id KAA28521 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 10:08:44 -0500 (EST) Message-ID: <36F65D7F.C1E4008@epix.net> Date: Mon, 22 Mar 1999 10:10:55 -0500 From: Steve Groff Reply-To: sgroff@epix.net Organization: Cedar Meadow Farm X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.5 [en] (Win95; I) X-Accept-Language: en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: sanet Subject: Soil Quality Research Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 109 Sanet, I have just put some of the soil quality research data from our farm on my website. Those who are interested in the long term effect of sustainable soil management can click on over to: http://www.cedarmeadowfarm.com Then go to "Research at CMF". Steve Groff -- "New Generation Cropping Systems": the cutting edge of sustainable agriculture http://www.cedarmeadowfarm.com Steve Groff Cedar Meadow Farm 679 Hilldale Rd Holtwood PA 17532 USA Ph. 717-284-5152 To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Mon Mar 22 11:17:01 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id LAA15515 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 11:17:01 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id KAA25905 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 10:02:06 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id KAA25901 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 10:02:01 -0500 (EST) Received: from lima.epix.net (lima.epix.net [199.224.64.56]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id KAA06450 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 10:01:59 -0500 (EST) Received: from epix.net (qrvl209-74-60ppp190.epix.net [209.74.60.190]) by lima.epix.net (8.9.3/8.9.0/1998093001/Philippe Levan) with ESMTP id KAA27638; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 10:01:51 -0500 (EST) Message-ID: <36F65BE2.672713D9@epix.net> Date: Mon, 22 Mar 1999 10:04:03 -0500 From: Steve Groff Reply-To: sgroff@epix.net Organization: Cedar Meadow Farm X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.5 [en] (Win95; I) X-Accept-Language: en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Russ Bulluck CC: Kevin Smyth , Sustainable Ag Subject: Re: 17 year locusts References: <199903182332.SAA25185@big.seorf.ohiou.edu> <36F651EF.B69B58C5@unity.ncsu.edu> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 110 I see some locusts every year, but every so often they really make a grand appearance. I remember a dozen or so years ago the locusts were so loud you could hear them a quarter of a mile from the woods! I don't remember they did much damage though. Steve Groff -- "New Generation Cropping Systems": the cutting edge of sustainable agriculture http://www.cedarmeadowfarm.com Steve Groff Cedar Meadow Farm 679 Hilldale Rd Holtwood PA 17532 USA Ph. 717-284-5152 To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Mon Mar 22 11:18:44 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id LAA15550 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 11:18:43 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id KAA04300 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 10:13:47 -0500 (EST) Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id KAA04270 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 10:13:42 -0500 (EST) Received: from po3.wam.umd.edu (po3.wam.umd.edu [128.8.10.165]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id KAA06628 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 10:13:39 -0500 (EST) Received: from rac7.wam.umd.edu (root@rac7.wam.umd.edu [128.8.10.147]) by po3.wam.umd.edu (8.9.3/8.9.0.Beta6) with ESMTP id KAA10889; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 10:13:41 -0500 (EST) Received: from rac7.wam.umd.edu (sendmail@localhost [127.0.0.1]) by rac7.wam.umd.edu (8.9.3/8.9.0.Beta6) with SMTP id KAA08301; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 10:13:40 -0500 (EST) Received: from localhost by rac7.wam.umd.edu (8.9.3/8.9.0.Beta6) with SMTP id KAA08297; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 10:13:40 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: rac7.wam.umd.edu: jgruv owned process doing -bs Date: Mon, 22 Mar 1999 10:13:40 -0500 (EST) From: joel b gruver To: Sustainable Ag cc: Kevin Smyth Subject: Re: 17 year locusts In-Reply-To: <36F65BE2.672713D9@epix.net> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 111 Hello to all... My dad took some interesting photographs of cicadas laying eggs in blueberry stems during one of the peak cicada years... the damage to the blueberry bushes was fairly severe... Joel To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Mon Mar 22 11:24:42 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id LAA15728 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 11:24:42 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id KAA07875 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 10:22:44 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from dub-img-11.compuserve.com (dub-img-11.compuserve.com [149.174.206.141]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id KAA07854 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 10:22:39 -0500 (EST) Received: (from root@localhost) by dub-img-11.compuserve.com (8.8.6/8.8.6/2.18) id KAA02586 for sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 10:22:10 -0500 (EST) Date: Mon, 22 Mar 1999 10:21:41 -0500 From: Jenny Warden Subject: Slaughterhouse Feassibility? To: SANET digest Message-ID: <199903221021_MC2-6EED-6D91@compuserve.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Disposition: inline Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-MIME-Autoconverted: from quoted-printable to 8bit by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu id KAA07859 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 112 Does anyone know if a feasibility study has been conducted for a slaughterhouse facility either in the DC or NY markets? (apologies to vegans). I've got the SARE projects - but have there been other? Many thanks, Jenny Warden To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Mon Mar 22 12:42:56 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id MAA17721 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 12:42:56 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id LAA23612 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 11:37:13 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id LAA23504 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 11:37:07 -0500 (EST) Received: from aae.wisc.edu (aae.wisc.edu [144.92.122.133]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id LAA08301 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 11:37:06 -0500 (EST) Received: from mojo.aae.wisc.edu ([144.92.244.223]) by aae.wisc.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.0) with SMTP id KAA13305 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 10:37:06 -0600 Message-Id: <199903221637.KAA13305@aae.wisc.edu> Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "Michele Gale-Sinex/CIAS, UW-Madison" To: sanet-mg@amani.ces.ncsu.edu Date: Mon, 22 Mar 1999 10:36:58 -0500 Subject: (Fwd) Farm women in Europe X-mailer: Pegasus Mail for Windows (v2.53/R1) Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 113 Howdy, all-- Greet Overbeek passed this along from the Netherlands. Thanks! I thought it might interest some of you. Fwd'd with permission. peace misha ------- Forwarded Message Follows ------- Divergent labour strategies of farm women in rural areas of Europe > A study carried out by research institutes in Greece > (Agricultural University of Athens), Italy (CRES), the Netherlands > (LEI-DLO) and Norway (Centre for Rural Research), co-ordinated by > LEI-DLO analysed the labour situation of farm women in less and > more diversified rural areas in Europe. The study was co-funded by > the Directorate General VI of the European Commission... > You can find the press release at > http://www.lei.dlo.nl/News/1594.html (without frames) or visit our > site at: > http://www.lei.dlo.nl and use the provided link. > You can find the zipped Html version of the executive summary > at http://www.lei.dlo.nl/download/news1594.zip or read the press > release and download from there. > Greet Overbeek > LEI-DLO > P.O.Box 29703 > 2502 LS The Hague > The Netherlands > tel: +31.70.3308100/070-3308100 > fax:+31.70.3615624/070-3615624 <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< Michele Gale-Sinex, communications manager Center for Integrated Ag Systems UW-Madison College of Ag and Life Sciences Voice: (608) 262-8018 FAX: (608) 265-3020 http://www.wisc.edu/cias/ >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> In the towers of steel, belief goes on and on in this heartland, in this heartland soil. --U2 To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Mon Mar 22 12:54:46 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id MAA17942 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 12:54:35 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id MAA07942 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 12:02:02 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from wheel.dcn.davis.ca.us (root@wheel.dcn.davis.ca.us [168.150.253.1]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id MAA07928 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 12:01:57 -0500 (EST) Received: from eatwell.com (dcn251-15.dcn.davis.ca.us [168.150.251.15]) by wheel.dcn.davis.ca.us (8.8.7/DCN8.8.7) with ESMTP id JAA12235 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 09:01:40 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <36F68D49.F29445A3@eatwell.com> Date: Mon, 22 Mar 1999 10:34:49 -0800 From: Nigel Walker X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.5 [en] (WinNT; I) X-Accept-Language: en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Sus Ag Network Subject: Gopher Control Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 114 Dear Gopher lovers, Last year our neighbors barn burned down and with it the home of the local owl. We had previuously had very few problems with our friends the gophers but all has changed over the last 6 months. Can anyone give me the lead on which is the most effective control method. I have heard of some one making a device to inject oxygen and propane into the run and igniting it with a spark plug? So what is more humane..traps, poisons, gas? We will be putting out some owl boxes this spring for long term protection. Regards...Nigel Walker http://www.eatwell.com organic@eatwell.com 530 759 8221 Eatwell Farm Winters California 95694 To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Mon Mar 22 12:57:46 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id MAA18021 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 12:57:45 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id LAA26324 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 11:42:42 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from helios.hampshire.edu (root@helios.hampshire.edu [192.33.12.140]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id LAA26299 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 11:42:35 -0500 (EST) Received: from cisa- (dhcppc31.hampshire.edu [172.20.23.31]) by helios.hampshire.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1) with SMTP id LAA13316 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 11:45:31 -0500 (EST) Message-Id: <3.0.6.32.19990322114525.00796460@crocker.com> X-Sender: earthspn@crocker.com X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Light Version 3.0.6 (32) Date: Mon, 22 Mar 1999 11:45:25 -0500 To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu From: Mark Subject: The return of prison labor (a long musing followed by a few short articles) In-Reply-To: <199903122218.RAA20682@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-MIME-Autoconverted: from quoted-printable to 8bit by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu id LAA26304 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 115 Never go away for a few days and try to read a dozen sanet digests in one sitting... After being away for a few days and reading all the threads on prison labor I wish to respond to a few points. First is the notion that we can spend -- or not spend -- our way out of an untenable economic system. This is something that has been nagging at me since I started working in sustainable ag last year. A lot of people put a lot of effort into their consumer choices, and that is certainly important. We all make choices about how to spend our money, what sorts of ag we support and so on. On a small, local scale that can make a difference. Sometimes even boycotts work. But don't think for a minute that these choices will change the underlying economic system. All the agonizing decisions made about which products to "support" (notice how we have created a euphemism which changes the basic transaction of buying a product into something more than it often is) do not change the fact that someone was paid less to make it than the product sold for, and someone else is keeping the profit. That's capitalism. Corporations using prison labor are no more or less "bad" than the local food coop -- they just have lower labor costs (although some at our coop may quibble over that statement)! Unless you buy everything from independent artisans and farmers who do all the work themselves, you are "buying in" to the exploitation of others. And even if you do, they have to get their supplies from someone, and you can bet there's a worker down the line who made something these people are using. Digging into the sordid past of our consumables makes for some tough bedtime reading. The unsavory conditions -- for labor and the environment -- that our products are created in can be hard face. I have seen some acquaintances take this realization so badly that they have taken extreme measures to try to extract themselves from the system: never riding in a car again because the were against the Gulf Oil War; not washing because they don't want to harm microorganisms (seriously!); yelling at a bakery clerk in the local coop about the fact that they are renovating the floor and throwing away perfectly good construction waste (this really happened)! The problem with such extremism is that it leads to wacky contradictions -- like my old upstairs neighbor who didn't want to use his refrigerator because he was against nuclear power but somehow felt fine about storing his ice cream in my freezer! Or the friends who don't own a TV but sent their kids to our house to watch videos. But back to exploitation (which Marx defined simply as the act of an owner keeping the surplus value generated by a worker's efforts). Exploitation is the foundation of all economic activity, including farming. But people need jobs and people need money. And prisoners are no different. They are going to have to earn a wage once released. And even if they never work in ag again, they may have learned new skills or ideas that will serve them in other ways. And now on to profit. Profit should NOT be a dirty word to farmers. In fact, the state of farming -- organic or otherwise -- would be better off if farmers spent more time thinking about profitability. Sustainability is about more than the environment -- farms need to also sustain farm families -- emotionally, socially and economically or we won't have any more farms! Someone posted this quote: " The free market system is very efficient in establishing prices, but is completely incapable in establishing costs." I would state that it is the producer who is responsible for understanding her costs, and if she can't make a living because her costs outweigh the price, she needs to figure out why. A whole farm planner told a story at a conference about a farmer in Kansas who went through the process of farm planning and learned that for 40 years his wheat crop had been losing money. She asked him if he would continue to grow wheat. His reply? "I guess so -- this is the wheat state, isn't it?" Now there are plenty of external factors which keep farmers from earning a decent wage, but don't you think it is important for farmers to at least make the decisions they can to affect their own bottom lines? I met an organic farmer in VT at this same conference. He studies the profitability of each crop he grows and if it does not make him enough money, he never grows it again. And he is a happy, successful farmer who can spend more time with his children and less time on vegetables that don't pay their way. Finally, here are two articles about another project which uses inmates in ag which I wrote for our newsletter. Mark Lattanzi ============================================================================ ============================== Profile: The Garden of Miracles/Jardín de Milagros Bridging the rural-urban divide is not easy, but one place where that row is being hoed is the Garden of Miracles in Springfield, MA. The Garden of Miracles is a collaboration between the Hampden County Sheriff's Department, NOFA and now CISA. It’s a community gardening project with a twist: the organic gardens are built and maintained by public housing residents and minimum security pre-release inmates from the Hampden County House of Correction. Betsy Corner is the project’s coordinator. “We want to bring together country and urban residents as well as community and prison residents.” says Betsy. The goals of the project are to teach work skills to inmates, beautify public housing and grow fresh, organic food for project residents. The Springfield Housing Authority gave permission to start a garden at its Riverview elderly housing complex last year and pitched in by removing old concrete from an abandoned playground. Then Betsy and her crew began the difficult process of enriching the compacted, gritty urban soil with compost and loam. The Hampden County Correctional Center crew does the bulk of the work. Minimum security inmates scheduled for release volunteer for places on the work crews, which offer interesting outdoor work, a chance to learn new skills and time off their sentence. They are supervised by a corrections officer who helps with Spanish translation and works with the crew. Betsy says that both work crew members and residents get excited about the gardening, and some have worked in agriculture in the past. Many lessons are learned throughout the growing season, but one predominant theme emerges. “Most of the inmates did not succeed in school. Gardening lessons don’t necessarily work. This is a process of doing and learning at the same time, not learning then doing,” says Betsy. “You have to let the inmates and residents try out their ideas to see if they will work.” Betsy recalls how Narciso, an 86 year old Latino housing project resident, insisted on putting in raised beds like he used to do in Puerto Rico. Betsy was certain that the sandy beds would dry out too fast. And they did, especially during last summer’s drought. This year, she says, Narciso insists on flat beds for the garden! The garden also changes the way inmates and residents relate to each other. “It is important to feel appreciated, to grow food for someone who is grateful and happy to receive it.” says Betsy. “Inmates are not used to feeling appreciated for what they do. This project helps reacquaint them with the community.” In the end, though, what people remember about a vegetable garden is what it produces. While last year’s harvest was affected by the drought – keeping urban gardens well watered is difficult – the excitement of the residents and inmates was high. Calabaza (a tropical squash), cilantro, tomatoes, and much more were eagerly consumed by all. Betsy is currently seeking funding for the project with the help of CISA and Hampshire College. We encourage you to help out in any way you can. Deliveries of compost or manure will be gratefully accepted. Contact Betsy at (413) 624-8858. Using Pre-Release Inmates on Your Farm Jim Pitts , CISA board member and owner of Delta Organic Farm in Amherst, participated in a program that places minimum security, pre-release inmates from the Hampden County Correction Center on a local farm for a day of work. Inmates bring their own tools and lunches, and work a 6-hour day on the farm. “There’s always something that needs doing on the farm,” said Jim. “It was great to have them come out, especially at critical times – putting straw on strawberries, planting potatoes, trellising tomatoes.” Betsy Corner stresses that the inmates are most productive when they see the farmer working alongside them and when they feel appreciated, especially with food. “We became good friends,” said Jim. “We always had a treat at the end of the day – they loved Penny’s cookies – and sang songs and told stories. It was a great social event plus we got a lot of work done.” For more information about working with inmates on your farm, contact Betsy Corner at (413)624-8858 or Toni Atmore at the Hampden County Correction Center, (413)547-8000 x 2180. To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Mon Mar 22 13:05:49 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id NAA18189 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 13:05:49 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id LAA06263 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 11:58:47 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from axil.wave.co.nz (Axil.wave.co.nz [202.49.46.2]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id LAA06240 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 11:58:40 -0500 (EST) Received: from hp-auth-user (p52.hn1.wave.co.nz [203.96.192.52]) by axil.wave.co.nz (8.8.7/8.8.7) with SMTP id EAA04451 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 04:58:39 +1200 (NZST) Message-Id: <3.0.3.32.19990323045726.006c4930@pop3.wave.co.nz> X-Sender: clements@pop3.wave.co.nz X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Pro Version 3.0.3 (32) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 1999 04:57:26 +1200 To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu From: Ashley Clements Subject: Updated Website Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/enriched; charset="us-ascii" Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 116 Hi all, For those interested I have updated my website. The new article I have written is "Calculating Feed Requirements on Pasture" There is also some interesting new links including a site to the great New Zealand All Black rugby team. Best Regards, Ash ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Visit a New Zealand pasture based farm http://www.clements.co.nz/ KENMOR SHEEP EARTAGS , Apex Water Valves, Hansen Fittings,NZ Woolen Socks, Peach Teat Nipples and Feeders Ash & Charlene Clements 168/1 Robson Road R D 10 Hamilton NEW ZEALAND Ph/fax: 64 (7) 829 8274 email: clements@wave.co.nz ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Mon Mar 22 13:05:56 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id NAA18197 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 13:05:56 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id MAA15970 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 12:12:06 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id MAA15955 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 12:12:01 -0500 (EST) Received: from aae.wisc.edu (aae.wisc.edu [144.92.122.133]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id MAA08954 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 12:12:01 -0500 (EST) Received: from mojo.aae.wisc.edu ([144.92.244.223]) by aae.wisc.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.0) with SMTP id LAA14928 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 11:11:58 -0600 Message-Id: <199903221711.LAA14928@aae.wisc.edu> Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "Michele Gale-Sinex/CIAS, UW-Madison" To: sanet-mg@amani.ces.ncsu.edu Date: Mon, 22 Mar 1999 11:11:49 -0500 Subject: Seeking Patricia Ann Julien X-mailer: Pegasus Mail for Windows (v2.53/R1) Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 117 Howdy, all-- Sorry to post this to the group, but Patricia Ann Julien e-mailed me for some information and the e-mail address in her header was not correct, so my response bounced. Patricia was writing to me about the Warren Porter/James Jaeger/Ian Carlson research on pesticide mixtures. If anyone has an e-mail address for her, would you please pass this info along? Thanks. peace mish <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< Michele Gale-Sinex, communications manager Center for Integrated Ag Systems UW-Madison College of Ag and Life Sciences Voice: (608) 262-8018 FAX: (608) 265-3020 http://www.wisc.edu/cias/ >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Pressure? Pressure was when I was a shoeshine boy trying to make it to America. --Sammy Sosa To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Mon Mar 22 14:35:13 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id OAA20156 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 14:35:12 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id NAA28949 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 13:25:46 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from hevanet.com (root@hevanet.com [198.5.254.1]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id NAA28922 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 13:25:42 -0500 (EST) Received: from [198.5.254.208] (br-ppp02.hevanet.com [198.5.254.208]) by hevanet.com (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id KAA20019; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 10:25:39 -0800 (PST) Message-Id: <199903221825.KAA20019@hevanet.com> X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express for Macintosh - 4.01 (295) Date: Mon, 22 Mar 1999 10:28:18 -0800 Subject: Re: Gopher Control From: "Lon J. Rombough" To: Nigel Walker CC: Sus Ag Network Mime-version: 1.0 X-Priority: 3 Content-type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 118 Must be gopher time - this topic just came up on the Organic Gardening list. Or was it Square Foot gardening? Personal favorite method: Get a large weed wand (also sold for melting ice) that attaches to a 5 gallon propoane tank. Buy sugar sulfur from an Ag supply house. It comes as small chunks or flakes, not powder. Open the gopher tunnel (dig around near a fresh mound) and put a large handful of sulfur in the opening. Play the propane wand on it to direct burning sulfur fumes into the tunnel. In 5-10 minutes you will probably notice yellow smoke puff up some distance (20 feet or so) away as the fumes reach the end of the tunnel. Continue another 5 minutes to be sure the tunnel is full all the way. You're done, and so is the gopher. The sulfur in the tunnel oxidizes and does no further harm. Keep this up any time you see a fresh mound and you can clear several acres a year, subject to re-infestation from the surrounding untreated areas. -Lon Rombough ---------- >From: Nigel Walker >To: Sus Ag Network >Subject: Gopher Control >Date: Mon, Mar 22, 1999, 10:34 AM > >Dear Gopher lovers, > Last year our neighbors barn burned down and with it the home of the >local owl. We had previuously had very few problems with our friends the >gophers but all has changed over the last 6 months. > Can anyone give me the lead on which is the most effective control >method. > I have heard of some one making a device to inject oxygen and >propane into the run and igniting it with a spark plug? > So what is more humane..traps, poisons, gas? > We will be putting out some owl boxes this spring for long term >protection. > >Regards...Nigel Walker > >http://www.eatwell.com >organic@eatwell.com >530 759 8221 >Eatwell Farm > Winters California 95694 > > > >To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command >"unsubscribe sanet-mg". >To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command >"subscribe sanet-mg-digest". > >All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: >http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail > To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Mon Mar 22 14:38:19 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id OAA20224 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 14:38:19 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id NAA29981 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 13:27:32 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from crow.prod.itd.earthlink.net (crow.prod.itd.earthlink.net [209.178.63.7]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id NAA29952 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 13:27:28 -0500 (EST) Received: from sprintmail.com (1Cust151.tnt4.chattanooga.tn.da.uu.net [208.253.100.151]) by crow.prod.itd.earthlink.net (8.8.7/8.8.5) with ESMTP id KAA29245; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 10:27:21 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <36F68BA7.308FB95@sprintmail.com> Date: Mon, 22 Mar 1999 13:27:51 -0500 From: Alex McGregor Reply-To: waldenfarm@sprintmail.com Organization: Walden Farm X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.02 [en]C-DIAL (Win95; U) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Nigel Walker CC: Sus Ag Network Subject: Re: Gopher Control References: <36F68D49.F29445A3@eatwell.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 119 Nigel, Using Oxygen and propane mixed and igniting it was a method described in a "Growing for Market" article some years ago (4 or 5). It was in a profile of a market farmer. He explained that propane is heavier than air and will go down the tunnels. I wondered if he used too much gas would he harvest his carrots at the same time. Please do not use poisons! Sick and/or thirsty gophers will come to the surface where raptors and owls will snatch them as easy prey. They'll feed them to their youngsters and eat them. Secondary poisoning is one of the main killers of these birds these days. If you think you have gopher problems now, wait till all the predators are dead. Alex Nigel Walker wrote: > Dear Gopher lovers, > Last year our neighbors barn burned down and with it the home of the > local owl. We had previuously had very few problems with our friends the > gophers but all has changed over the last 6 months. > Can anyone give me the lead on which is the most effective control > method. > I have heard of some one making a device to inject oxygen and > propane into the run and igniting it with a spark plug? > So what is more humane..traps, poisons, gas? > We will be putting out some owl boxes this spring for long term > protection. > > Regards...Nigel Walker > > http://www.eatwell.com > organic@eatwell.com > 530 759 8221 > Eatwell Farm > Winters California 95694 > > To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command > "unsubscribe sanet-mg". > To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command > "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". > > All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: > http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Mon Mar 22 16:23:14 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id QAA22860 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 16:23:13 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id PAA29425 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 15:06:24 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from scaup.prod.itd.earthlink.net (scaup.prod.itd.earthlink.net [207.217.120.49]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id PAA29378 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 15:06:17 -0500 (EST) From: gardenbetty@earthlink.net Received: from earthlink.net (ip145.laurel.md.pub-ip.psi.net [38.30.235.145]) by scaup.prod.itd.earthlink.net (8.8.7/8.8.5) with ESMTP id MAA11808; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 12:06:13 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <36F6A2A9.218F7157@earthlink.net> Date: Mon, 22 Mar 1999 15:06:05 -0500 Reply-To: gardenbetty@earthlink.net X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.07 (Macintosh; U; 68K) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Organic Gardening List , Sustainable Ag List Subject: Endocytosis query Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 120 It seems there is no consensus in my neck of the woods whether plants absorb nutrients via cation exchange (adsorption) or endocytosis. To my mind, Mother Nature always has more than one way to keep things running smoothly, and *both* seems like the most sensible answer. However, I am no soil scientist. Furthermore, there's a lot about the soilfoodweb we just don't know and may never fully understand. So, I would be eternally grateful if someone (Joel G.? M. Rateaver? anyone?) could explain --in layfarmer's terms-- how endocytosis works. The academic writings available on the net are just too thick and jargon-y to wade through. gracias, -- dawn aka gardenbetty We will be known by the tracks we leave behind... —Dakota proverb To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Mon Mar 22 16:34:14 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id QAA23084 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 16:34:13 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id PAA19809 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 15:41:06 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from gov.pe.ca (mail.gov.pe.ca [142.176.20.4]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with SMTP id PAA19774 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 15:41:01 -0500 (EST) Received: from PEIGOVT-Message_Server by gov.pe.ca with Novell_GroupWise; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 16:37:00 -0400 Message-Id: X-Mailer: Novell GroupWise 4.1 Date: Mon, 22 Mar 1999 16:49:28 -0400 From: Bob MacGregor To: DGreen47@aol.com, sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Subject: Re: SUSTAINABLE agriculture Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain Content-Disposition: inline Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 121 It is also international wealth redistribution. We may think that LDC labour is being exploited because they are paid so much less than North American or European workers, but they consider it development. When a country's currency gets too valuable, it becomes cheaper to buy things than to produce them. This slowly brings the world to equilibrium. If, on the other hand, we prefer to hold onto what we have, we can try to raise trade barriers to imports (usually while still keeping the export lines open!). This isn't helpful; the pressure just builds, and other industries are hurt in the process. If any industry isn't profitable it will go away by itself (true even when in competition with subsidized products, of course). Clearly this hasn't happened to US agriculture. There are a lot fewer farmers than their used to be, but agriculture is still seeing holding its own. In the end, the quality of the land is more important than the price of the labour -- and North America has a whole lot of good land. BOB To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Mon Mar 22 18:07:15 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id SAA24898 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 18:07:15 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id QAA29043 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 16:44:04 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from hotmail.com (f109.hotmail.com [207.82.250.228]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with SMTP id QAA28985 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 16:43:59 -0500 (EST) Received: (qmail 15023 invoked by uid 0); 22 Mar 1999 21:43:29 -0000 Message-ID: <19990322214329.15022.qmail@hotmail.com> Received: from 208.136.65.44 by www.hotmail.com with HTTP; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 13:43:20 PST X-Originating-IP: [208.136.65.44] From: "Kirsten Saylor" To: nefood-l@sardonyx.tufts.edu, comfood-l@sardonyx.tufts.edu, sanet-mg-digest@ces.ncsu.edu Subject: Corporate Food Control Date: Mon, 22 Mar 1999 13:43:20 PST Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 122 I have been asked to forward this post -- please pass it on. Kirsten Saylor The AGRIBUSINESS EXAMINER EXTRA St. Patrick's Day, 1999 Monitoring Corporate Agribusiness From a Public Interest Perspective A.V. Krebs Editor\Publisher Editors Note Any exposure or circulation you might be able to give to the "News Release" below within your community or organization will be greatly appreciated. ALLIANCE FOR DEMOCRACY ANNOUNCES "LAUNCHING THE PEOPLE'S MILLENNIUM, CHALLENGING CORPORATE CONTROL OF FOOD AND AGRICULTURE" CONFERENCE APRIL 29, 1999 IN BOULDER, COLORADO Contacts: * Ben Kjelshus bkjelshus@aol.com * A.V. Krebs avkrebs@earthlink.net Who will control the nation's and the world's food supply in the coming millennium? What will happen to family farms, farm and food workers and our rural communities as agriculture and our food system are threatened to become more globalized, centrally controlled and highly industrialized? How safe are genetically modified organisms (GMO) in our food and what economic, environmental, health and safety risks do they present to the family farmer and the consumer? What role will local sustainable agriculture food systems play in an increasingly globalized industrial agriculture and food system? These and related subjects will be discussed and responded to during an all-day April 29, 1999 conference, "Launching the People's Millennium, Challenging Corporate Control of Food & Agriculture," sponsored by the Alliance for Democracy as a prelude to the movement's four-day national convention (April 29-May 3) at the College Inn Conference Center, University of Colorado at Boulder, Boulder, Colorado. "In attempting to deify their own myopic view of efficiency," AfD National Council member A.V. Krebs, the conference's program coordinator points out, "corporate agribusiness has brought family farming, the democratic control of the people's food supply, and a wholesome and healthy natural environment to the brink of a crisis that unless recognized, confronted and reversed will inevitably lead to a worldwide economic, political, social and environmental disaster unlike any seen in human history. This one-day conference will seek to show how people can challenge this corporate agribusiness view." In an effort to take back the control and responsibility for the intrinsic safety of our food supply, free from contaminating and health-threatening toxics, the conference will focus on the Food Circles approach as offering a practical, hands-on, sensible, grass roots means of working for and attaining a sustainable food system. Ben Kjelshus, the AfD's Food and Agriculture Task Force Coordinator, explains: "Food Circles, as an alternative to the current global, faulty, environmentally and socially destructive and unsustainable food system, links consumers, farmers, retailers, environmentalists and other concerned citizens in a creative and comprehensive effort to deal with the critical problems of our present food system. Food Circles are a key to developing an integrated, decentralized, sustainable food system. "They and other grass roots projects working for a sustainable food system are vehicles with considerable potential for effecting social change," he adds. The all-day conference, beginning at 8:30 AM will be highlighted by three panels, composed of nationally and internationally prominent agriculture and food specialists and activists, and a series of subject-related afternoon workshops. They include: "ENDING THE CORPORATE CENTURY:" * John Hansen (Family Farmers), President, Nebraska Farmers Union, Lincoln, Neb; * Nelson Carrasquillo (Farm Workers), Member, USDA National Commission on Small Farms, Board Member, Rural Coalition, Comite de Apoyo a los Trabajadores Agricolas, Glassboro, NJ; * Josh Karliner (Environmental Issues), Corporate Watch Editorial Coordinator, Author of "The Corporate Planet: Ecology and Politics in the Age of Globalization," San Francisco, California, * Clara Oleson (Food Workers & Rural Communities), Program Coordinator, Labor Center, University of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa. "LAUNCHING THE PEOPLE'S MILLENNIUM" * Kathleen Sullivan Kelley (Family Farming), Cattle Rancher, Vice Co-Chair, USDA National Commission on Small Farms, Meeker, Colorado; * Dr. Vandana Shiva (Biosafety & Biotechnology), Author "Biopiracy" and "Seeds of Suicide: The Ecological & Human Costs of Globalization of Agriculture," Research Foundation for Science, Technology and Natural Resource Policy, New Delhi, India; * Dolores Huerta ( Women, Labor & Agriculture), Vice-President, United Farm Workers (UFW) Keene, California, Invited * Mark Ritchie (Trade), President, Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy, Minneapolis, Minnesota. "FOOD CIRCLES --- CHALLENGING THE GLOBAL FOOD SYSTEM" * William Heffernan, Professor of Rural Sociology University of Missouri, Columbia; * Mary Hendrickson, Post Graduate Fellow University of Missouri, Columbia; * Ben Kjelshus, Coordinator and Founder Kansas City Food Circle, Kansas City, MO, * Kathy Garcia Community Activist, Organizer with the Boulder County Y2K Community Preparedness Group. The objective of the workshops will be to draft recommendations for a "Boulder Agrarian Populist Agenda" and prepare recommendations for presentation and deliberation at the Alliance for Democracy Third Annual National Convention scheduled to begin later the evening of April 29. The Alliance for Democracy, currently with over 50 local chapters and 2000 members, is a three-year old national populist movement that seeks to end the domination of the nation's economy, government, culture, media and environment by large corporations. Believing that piecemeal reform has been rendered ineffective the AfD has united in examining ways in which various economic interests either enhance or harm the health of democracy, focusing its resources on creating basic change. For additional registration information contact: Alliance for Democracy, P.O. Box 683, Lincoln, Mass. 01773, (781) 259-9395, Peoplesall@aol.com Annalee Cobbett, Atty Chair, FarmCity Alliance coban@seanet.com (206) 626-0266 Fax (206) 626-6477 Views expressed on the farmcity listserv may or may not reflect those of myself or the FarmCity Alliance. Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Mon Mar 22 20:07:29 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id UAA26679 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 20:07:29 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id RAA11029 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 17:07:13 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from umc-mail01.missouri.edu (umc-mail01.missouri.edu [128.206.10.216]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id RAA10947 for ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 17:07:07 -0500 (EST) Received: by umc-mail01.missouri.edu with Internet Mail Service (5.5.2448.0) id ; Mon, 22 Mar 1999 16:07:09 -0600 Message-ID: <2DF3344FA15BD111B413006094516DFB062CB4B8@umc-mail02.missouri.edu> From: "Ikerd, John E." To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Subject: Steve Blank's American Agriculture Date: Mon, 22 Mar 1999 16:07:07 -0600 MIME-Version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2448.0) Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 123 Saneters; I agree Tom Abeles (below) that "Steven Blank represents a real position within the larger agricultural community" in his new book "The End of the American Farm. Blank represents the position of a professional "agricultural economist." Since I have been a "degree carrying" agricultural economist for almost 30 years, on the faculty of four different Land Grant Universities, I can usually identify one quite accurately when I read one. Blank should not be blamed for seeing the world through an economist's eyes. But, we neither should we blindly accept what the economist sees as the only objective reality - even if the "larger agriculture community," and the "larger global economic community" -- see the same things. Blank's fundamental arguments for the End of American Farm are based in the premise that economic considerations ultimately will prevail over all other considerations - industrial agribusiness replaces family farms because they are "more efficient" and American agribusiness eventually will be displaced by "more efficient" producers elsewhere in the global market. If the assumptions of economic theory were an accurate reflection on reality, Blank's predictions would be reasonable. If the world, at some point in the future, completely abandons human rationality for economic reality, then Blank's predictions could actually come true. Economics has become the dominant "religion" of our American society, and it is being rapidly spread around the World. But, people have not yet abandoned common sense - at least not completely. Economics is fundamentally incapable of dealing with relationships among people, or between people and their environment. This fact is freely admitted even in economics text books. In economics, a market is nothing more than a collection of independent individual consumers. Human institutions such as families, communities, nations and cultures have no economic relevance - other than as collections of individuals. Thus, one gains no economic well being from relationships -- from identifying with or being a part of any particular family, community, nation or culture. Does that make sense? Are believing, trusting, sharing, caring, and serving just empty words? Do faith, hope, and love have impacts on our quality of life, or these just illusions of the human imagination? In economics theory, the environment is a passive entity, and thus, has no specific active relationship with people. The environment is always external, or outside, the economic system. The environment may be ignored, treated as an external constraint, or as something outside impacted by economic activity within. But, the environment is always treated as something separate and apart from people and the economy. Does that make sense? How can we be separate from something that we are a part of? Do the serenity we feel and beauty we see in nature have no impact on our human well being? Does the sense of "rightness" that comes from our attempts to be good stewards of the Earth's resources contribute nothing to our quality of life? When one ignores relationships among people and between people and their environment, the economic arguments are logical. If one values relationships, with people or with the earth, then many economic arguments quite simply do not make sense. To assume that industrial agriculture should displace family farms simply because they may (or may not) have lower dollar and cent cost that the "average" family farm may make economic sense. But that assumption totally ignored the positive relationships that farming families have with the natural environment and with communities of other people with which they are interrelated. The industrial corporation is not human, and thus, if fundamentally incapable of such relationships. Does it make sense to turn the economy - a human creation to serve the needs of humans - over to something that is fundamentally non-human? To assume that food and fiber should be produced wherever on the globe that it can be produced at the lowest "dollar and cent" cost totally ignores the relationships among people, among communities, among nations and among cultures. Trade takes place between two people, or groups of people, not between two non-human economic entities. Economics assumes that trade always takes place between two entities that are equally competent and capable of pursuing their own self-interest. Sometimes this is a valid assumption, but often it is not. Any trade that is legal is generally accepted as "free" trade. Economics ignores the fact that the world is filled with people (and countries) who are inherently unequal in competence and capabilities. It ignores the fact that the strong may pressure the weak into trading by simply threatening or withholding benefits, or protection from harm, upon which the weak has become dependent. Since the strong are not legally required to provide these benefits, no law is broken. When trade occurs between the strong and the weak, particularly when motivated by profit as economists assume, the weak is invariably exploited by the strong. As long as the outcomes for strong and weak added together end up in a larger dollar and cent total, economics concludes that there have been gains from trade - no matter that the weak is now even weaken and more vulnerable and the strong is now stronger and even more dominant. Does that make sense? Are justice and equity just empty words that were written into our Constitution in our "romantic and idealistic" past. Or are they fundamental principles of democracy that must be upheld by any democracy that expects to survive as a democracy? Are we really willing to accept "He who has the gold rules" as the Golden Rule of America - or will we insist that Americans actually "Do unto others as we would have them do into us?" Economics is concerned totally and completely with pursuit of short run, self interests. Economics recognizes no unique social value - society is nothing more than a collection of individuals. Economics recognizes no unique spiritual values - and concern for the environment, at least for its sustainability - is fundamentally spiritual. Economist - and the industrial, corporate interests that now would raise economists to the priesthood - would cast out those of us who still believe that quality of life has social and spiritual dimensions that are just as important as our narrow economic self interests. Does economics really make sense? Or are we a society that is being shamed into doing things that don't make sense because we don't want to be publicly degraded and labeled as being economically illiterate and irrational? Sustainability, as a new model or paradigm for human society, simply makes more sense that does conventional economics. Current economic theory has its foundations in assumptions that are at least 200 years out of date. It is economics -- not family farms, rural communities, families, nations, and cultures - that is out of date. We have no ethical or moral obligation to accept economics as the final arbitrator of who gets to farm and who doesn't, what we do in rural communities and what we don't, where food is produced and where it is not, whether or not we trade, or anything else. Economics is a creation of people. We simply cannot afford turn the thing we created for our benefit loose to exploit the very people it was designed to serve. Does that make any sense? The religion of free market economics, would quite likely take us to a future much like that forecasted in "The End of the American Farm." This is a distinct possibility and certainly not a trivial matter to be considered lightly. If our concerns for each other and for our natural environment are simply illusions of our imagination, then we may all be better off as a consequence. But if relationships, with other people and with nature, really do matter, we could find out too late. There is a positive alternative to conventional economics emerging from the sustainability movement. The time to choose between the religion of economics and the common sense of sustainability may well be at hand. Let's hope we choose wisely. How do choose wisely? Quite simply -- continue to use our common sense. John Ikerd University of Missouri -----Original Message----- From: tom abeles [mailto:tabeles@tmn.com] Sent: Sunday, March 21, 1999 7:00 PM To: Ronald Nigh Cc: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Subject: Re: End of Steven Blank's nonesense There have been several cutting posts regarding Steven Blank's article in the recent issue of "The Futuist". None has contributed a single counterpoint, any rational respnse or constructive alternatives. Blank represents a real position within the larger agricultural community. Yet no peer from The Academy or government has come forward with anything to counter. And the alternative agricultural community, including think tanks have been stragely silent. Sometimes silence serves as a reasoned respnse. Not in this case and not on this list devoted to a partisan vision of agriculture which might be considered antithetical to the positon postulated by Blank thoughts? tom abeles To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 23 09:39:09 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id JAA05772 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 09:39:09 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id IAA29884 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 08:37:56 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id IAA29861 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 08:37:50 -0500 (EST) Received: from comet.connix.com (root@comet.connix.com [198.69.10.4]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id IAA28828 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 08:37:46 -0500 (EST) Received: from kim (entomol.connix.com [205.246.104.21]) by comet.connix.com (8.8.7/8.8.7) with SMTP id IAA01618; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 08:37:38 -0500 (EST) Message-ID: <000001be7531$f64de560$1568f6cd@kim> From: "Kimberly Stoner" To: "Russ Bulluck" , "Kevin Smyth" , "Sustainable Ag" Subject: Re: 17 year locusts Date: Mon, 22 Mar 1999 16:36:28 -0500 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.72.2106.4 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.2106.4 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 124 Actually, this post is not correct. There are species of cicadas that emerge every year, even though they take several years to develop, and there are other species with a (mostly) synchronized life cycle of 13 or 17 years. I have refrained from sticking my two cents in as a Ph.D. entomologist because all the other responses have been very accurate. The cicadas that emerge every year (in eastern U.S.) are commonly called the dog-day cicadas, because they emerge in July and August. It is not known (at least according to my old general entomology textbook) how long they take to develop, but it is probably longer than 4 years. However, the broods overlap, so some adults emerge each year. "Tibicen" is the name of a common genus. The periodical cicadas (sometimes called locusts because of their sudden appearance in large numbers -- the real locusts are swarming species of grasshopers) have 13 or 17 year life cycles that are synchronized, so many adults appear at once. They belong to the genus "Magicicada." They generally emerge in late May and early June. It is true that the cicadas are not a threat to vegetables, except possibly incidentally while emerging from the ground in recently cleared areas. Periodical cicadas in dense populations can do substantial damage to some trees. A colleague of mine who works with insects of apple trees has found locally heavy damage. Kimberly Stoner Department of Entomology CT Agricultural Experiment Station P.O.Box 1106 New Haven, CT 06504 203-974-8480 -----Original Message----- From: Russ Bulluck To: Kevin Smyth ; Sustainable Ag Date: Monday, March 22, 1999 9:31 AM Subject: Re: 17 year locusts >Actually, the 17 year locust appears each year, just that every 17 years, a >bumper crop appears. Cicadas mainly like oak trees (especially Quercus alba, >the white oak). I thought that 1995 or 96 was the 17th year. (There is also >a three year locust, and several other species, I think.) The main effect of >the cicada is tip dieback in oak trees. They seem to like the fresh tips of >oak branches. I don't think you have to worry about the veggies. > >In the summer of 1996, while moving from PA to NC to finish graduate work, >_all_ of the oak trees on highway 15 through Virginia had dead tips. It was >quite a sight. When I reached NC State, I asked a forest pathologist here, >who said it was the 17 year locust. > >Kevin Smyth wrote: > >> Friends - This is the year for the 17 year locusts (I heard they were >> actually cicadas), and I am wondering what effect they might have on our >> vegetable crops here in SE Ohio. We grow 2.5 acres organic vegetables for >> a CSA here. Anybody know? >> Kevin Smyth >> ab210@seorf.ohiou.edu >> >> To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command >> "unsubscribe sanet-mg". >> To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command >> "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". >> >> All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: >> http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail > >-- >Russ Bulluck >Ph.D. Student >Department of Plant Pathology >North Carolina State University >PO Box 7616 >Raleigh, NC 27695-7616 > >~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >The soil population is so complex that it manifestly cannot >be dealt with as a whole with any detail by any one person, >and at the same time it plays so important a part in the soil >economy that it must be studied. >--Sir E. John Russell >The Micro-organisms of the Soil, 1923 >~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ > > > >To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command >"unsubscribe sanet-mg". >To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command >"subscribe sanet-mg-digest". > >All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: >http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail > To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 23 10:31:23 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id KAA06920 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 10:31:23 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id JAA25303 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 09:24:34 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from ns.rockbridge.net (ns.rockbridge.net [206.151.4.1]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id JAA25294 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 09:24:29 -0500 (EST) Received: from [206.151.4.34] by ns.rockbridge.net (Post.Office MTA v3.5.3 release 223 ID# 0-59513U2500L250S0V35) with ESMTP id net for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 09:24:21 -0500 X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express Macintosh Edition - 4.5 (0410) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 1999 09:34:54 -0400 Subject: Market Gardening Short Course From: "Patricia Foreman" To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Mime-version: 1.0 X-Priority: 3 Content-type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit Message-ID: <19990323142421636.AAA279@ns.rockbridge.net@[206.151.4.34]> Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 125 Good Earth Farm School, Buena Vista, Virginia, is offering a 3-day intensive market gardening short course on April 9-11, 1999. Participants will be introduced to everything they need to know to design and create a profitable small farm business. Topics include site selection and development, soil regeneration, crop and market choices, labor and equipment needs, integrated pest management, value added processing, complimentary marketing options and poultry and small livestock in the garden rotation. Instructors are Michael LaChance, Virginia Extension Entomologist, and Andy Lee, organic market gardener and author of BACKYARD MARKET GARDENING and CHICKEN TRACTOR. Course fee of $285 includes course materials, lunches and snacks. Inexpensive lodging is available in nearby Lexington, Virginia. For more information contact Andy Lee, Director, Good Earth Farm School, 1702 Mountain View Road, Buena Vista, Virginia 24416, phone and fax 540-261-8775. To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 23 12:10:54 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id MAA09488 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 12:10:49 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id LAA01840 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 11:24:07 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from aurora.nal.usda.gov (aurora.nal.usda.gov [192.54.138.38]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id LAA01774 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 11:24:02 -0500 (EST) Received: by aurora.nal.usda.gov with Internet Mail Service (5.5.2448.0) id ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 11:22:33 -0500 Message-ID: From: Sustainable Agriculture Network To: "'sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu'" Subject: FW: Exhibits Wanted for Small Farm Conf Oct 99 Date: Tue, 23 Mar 1999 11:22:28 -0500 MIME-Version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2448.0) Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 126 > > ------- Forwarded Message Follows ------- > Date: Mon, 15 Mar 1999 14:48:09 GMT > From: owner-smallfarm@maat.reeusda.gov > > SOLICITATION FOR EXHIBIT DISPLAYS > Sender: owner-smallfarm@reeusda.gov > Precedence: bulk > > SECOND NATIONAL SMALL FARM CONFERENCE > > We invite non-profit community based organizations, foundations, > educational institutions, and other groups who work directly > with small > farm communities to set up informational displays to promote their > agencies/organizations/institutions, and their their work > with small and > mid-size farmers. The booths will be located in the hotel exhibition > hall. Each exhibitor will receive the following: one 8' table with > skirting and two chairs, a one-line ID sign, and listing in > the Conference > Program Guide. There is no charge for the space but we we do > ask that you > staff your display, particularly during breaks. We cannot include > registration to the conference with this invitataion. We will have a > resource room at the conference if your organization cannot > participate > but would like to send literature. > > Deadline for submission is May 31, 1999. You will be > notified before June > 15, 1999 if your exhibit has been selected for the > conference. Please > send a description of programs and services your organization > provides to > the small farm communities in 200 words or less. > > If your organization or institution is selected, your exhibit display > write up will be included in the conference program agenda. > Solicitations > from individuals will not be accepted. Any individual > success story or > educational information can be shared by way of the poster display. > For updates about the conference or the solicitation for > poster displays, > please visit the conference website at: > http://www.luce.lincolnu.edu/nsfc > > Your response on or before May 31, 1999 will be most appreciated. > > > Thank You > > > Denis Ebodaghe, Ph.D > National Program Leader--Small Farms > USDA-CSREES > Phone: 202-401-4385; Fax: 202-401-5179 > E-mail: debodaghe@reeusda.gov > Website: http://www.reeusda.gov/smallfarm > Tollfree: 1-800-583-3071 > -- > To Subscribe > Send a message to -- majordomo@reeusda.gov > In the body, type -- subscribe smallfarm > > To Unsubscribe > Send a message to -- majordomo@reeusda.gov > In the body, type -- unsubscribe smallfarm > To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 23 12:16:00 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id MAA09600 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 12:15:59 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id LAA28069 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 11:15:50 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from aurora.nal.usda.gov (aurora.nal.usda.gov [192.54.138.38]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id LAA28039 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 11:15:42 -0500 (EST) Received: by aurora.nal.usda.gov with Internet Mail Service (5.5.2448.0) id ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 11:13:02 -0500 Message-ID: From: Sustainable Agriculture Network To: "'sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu'" Cc: "'sdavis@farmland.org'" Subject: FW: Keep America Growing Conference Announcement Date: Tue, 23 Mar 1999 11:12:54 -0500 Importance: high X-Priority: 1 MIME-Version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2448.0) Content-Type: multipart/mixed; boundary="----_=_NextPart_000_01BE7548.065D42F0" Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 127 This message is in MIME format. Since your mail reader does not understand this format, some or all of this message may not be legible. ------_=_NextPart_000_01BE7548.065D42F0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" -----Original Message----- From: Shaka Davis [mailto:sdavis@farmland.org] Sent: Tuesday, March 23, 1999 10:42 AM To: All Keep America Growing Conference Participants Subject: Keep America Growing Conference Announcement Importance: High CONFERENCE ANNOUNCEMENT KEEP AMERICA GROWING CONFERENCE: BALANCING WORKING LANDS AND DEVELOPMENT June 6-9, 1999 Philadelphia, PA A cross section of public officials and professionals from fields as diverse as transportation, rural and urban development, agricultural, ranching, forestry, housing, and environmental conservation will join together for Keep America Growing, a conference dedicated to striking the balance between working lands and development. The conference, which will be held June 6-9, 1999 at the Adams Mark Hotel in Philadelphia, presents a unique opportunity to define a common agenda between people whose paths might not normally cross. Keep America Growing will feature over 150 presentations on land use issues including keynote and panel addresses by nationally acclaimed experts in growth management. Participants from across the country will network and share ideas on topics such as land use and population trends, the impact of unplanned growth, successful programs that balance development and land use, and the urban-rural connection. Participants will walk away with the necessary tools and networks to take action in their own communities. Speakers include leaders from the fields of policy, agriculture, conservation, development and politics. Invited speakers include Vice President Al Gore, New Jersey Governor Christine Todd Whitman, Pennsylvania Governor Thomas Ridge, and other nationally known leaders. The conference also will offer regional workshops facilitated by The Pinchot Institute for Conservation to understand issues on a regional basis and to promote networking. The conference begins on Sunday with 10 pre-conference technical and recreational field trips. For complete information and latest updates, visit the conference website at www.farmland.org/KAG.html . Visit the website or contact Cindy Delaney at 802-655-7769 or by e-mail at delaney@together.net , to request a conference registration brochure. To register, visit the website or click ' registration form ', print it, and mail it in, or fill out the registration brochure. The conference provides an excellent forum to display new industry-related products and information. A number of exhibit and sponsorship opportunities are still available. 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All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 23 12:36:55 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id MAA10089 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 12:36:55 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id LAA17426 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 11:49:16 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from dfw-ix10.ix.netcom.com (dfw-ix10.ix.netcom.com [206.214.98.10]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id LAA17281 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 11:49:08 -0500 (EST) Received: (from smap@localhost) by dfw-ix10.ix.netcom.com (8.8.4/8.8.4) id KAA29912; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 10:48:26 -0600 (CST) Received: from wor-ma1-21.ix.netcom.com(205.184.168.53) by dfw-ix10.ix.netcom.com via smap (V1.3) id rma029805; Tue Mar 23 10:48:01 1999 Message-ID: <008c01be754c$aeceb820$35a8b8cd@guldann.ix.netcom.com> Reply-To: "Dan Hook" From: "Dan Hook" To: "Sustainable Agriculture Network" , Subject: Re: Exhibits Wanted for Small Farm Conf Oct 99 Date: Tue, 23 Mar 1999 11:46:19 -0500 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.72.3115.0 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.3110.3 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 128 Where is this conference? Hotel? Beth >> We invite non-profit community based organizations, foundations, >> educational institutions, and other groups who work directly >> with small >> farm communities to set up informational displays to promote their >> agencies/organizations/institutions, and their their work >> with small and >> mid-size farmers. The booths will be located in the hotel exhibition >> hall. Each exhibitor will receive the following: one 8' table with >> skirting and two chairs, a one-line ID sign, and listing in >> the Conference >> Program Guide. There is no charge for the space but we we do >> ask that you >> staff your display, particularly during breaks. We cannot include >> registration to the conference with this invitataion. We will have a >> resource room at the conference if your organization cannot >> participate >> but would like to send literature. >> To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 23 12:39:58 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id MAA10232 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 12:39:57 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id LAA19568 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 11:51:06 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from aurora.nal.usda.gov (aurora.nal.usda.gov [192.54.138.38]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id LAA19559 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 11:51:01 -0500 (EST) Received: by aurora.nal.usda.gov with Internet Mail Service (5.5.2448.0) id ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 11:53:24 -0500 Message-ID: From: Sustainable Agriculture Network To: "'sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu'" Subject: RE: (Fwd) Farm women in Europe (and India) Date: Tue, 23 Mar 1999 11:53:19 -0500 MIME-Version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2448.0) Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 129 Sanet: I saw the following three movies as part of the Environmental Film Festival in DC last Friday, March 19th. They were each compelling views of agriculture, and the role of women in the agriculture of India. I recommend them to anyone with an interest in labor issues, women's rights, sustainable agriculture, seed-saving and the role of multinational companies in the international seed industry. The third film, Eternal Seed showed some forceful juxtapositions of seed saving in traditional agriculture vs. high-tech and biotech agriculture. FROM the Environmental Film Festival web site http://www.capaccess.org/ane/eff/ Kamala and Raji (USA, 1996, 46 min.) In Ahmedabad, India, two working women struggle to make their lives better, sometimes defying their husbands, the police, and a tradition in which women are still viewed as second-class citizens. Kamala, a young mother with an abusive husband, and Raji, a vegetable seller, become involved with the Self-Employed Women's Association. Their personal struggles have made them aware of the general plight of women in their country. By Michael Camerini and Shari Robertson. Once This Land Was Ours (India, 1991, 19 min.) is a poetic documentary about women agriculture workers in India and their struggle to provide for their families. Although they work to produce food for others, they have increasing difficulties feeding their own children. By Shikha Jhingan. Eternal Seed (India, 1996, 43 min.) With insightful interviews and rare footage from India's agricultural industry, this film depicts Indian women's struggles to use traditional farming practices instead of chemically-based agriculture. Comparing the practices of women who consider seeds sacred with multinational companies' use of sterilized hybrids, this evocative analysis celebrates the scientific basis of women's native traditions in a look at the evolving meaning of healthy land use. By Meera Dewan. Andy Andy Clark, Ph.D. SAN Coordinator c/o AFSIC, Room 304 National Agricultural Library 10301 Baltimore Ave. Beltsville, MD 20705-2351 PH: 301-504-6425 FAX: 301-504-6409 san@nal.usda.gov http://www.sare.org To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 23 12:53:22 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id MAA11542 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 12:53:21 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id LAA21974 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 11:59:08 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from aurora.nal.usda.gov (aurora.nal.usda.gov [192.54.138.38]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id LAA21930 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 11:59:02 -0500 (EST) Received: by aurora.nal.usda.gov with Internet Mail Service (5.5.2448.0) id ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 12:01:26 -0500 Message-ID: From: Sustainable Agriculture Network To: "'Dan Hook'" , Sustainable Agriculture Network , sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Subject: RE: AGAIN: Exhibits Wanted for Small Farm Conf Oct 99 Date: Tue, 23 Mar 1999 12:01:20 -0500 MIME-Version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2448.0) Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 130 I'll try this again. Sorry if my forwarded message was incomplete. :( See the web site, too: http://www.luce.lincolnu.edu/nsfc THEME: Building Partnerships for the 21st Century WHERE: REGAL RIVERFRONT HOTEL, ST. LOUIS, MISSOURI WHEN: OCTOBER 12-15, 1999 HOSTS: Lincoln University, Jefferson City, Missouri; University of Missouri, Columbia; USDA-CSREES The Second National Small Farm Conference will provide an opportunity for people in the public and private sectors, including community based organizations, land-grant institutions, small and medium sized farmers to strengthen collaboration and partnerships to work more effectively with the small farm community. Participation is the key to the conference's success. Hands-on workshops, open forum discussions, and participant-organized networking sessions will be key features of the conference. Some of the issues that participants will address include: marketing strategies, value added enterprises, grant writing, business and entrepreneurial skills, farmer-to-farmer and beginning farmer networks. Representatives from USDA and its partners will make reports on follow-up from the 1996 National Small Farm Conference held in Nashville, Tennessee, and on the implementation of the recommendations made by the National Commission on Small Farms. The conference will include poster presentations and exhibits. Solicitations for posters and exhibits are also posted at this website. SPONSORS: Lincoln University, Jefferson City; University of Missouri, Columbia; W. K. Kellogg Foundation; Farm Foundation; U.S. Environmental Protection Agency;U.S. Department of Agriculture--Agricultural Research Service; Agricultural Marketing Service; Cooperative State Research, Education and Extension Service, Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program; Farm Service Agency; Foreign Agricultural Service; Forest Service; National Office of Outreach; National Agricultural Statistics Service; Natural Resources Conservation Service; and Rural Development. > > ------- Forwarded Message Follows ------- > Date: Mon, 15 Mar 1999 14:48:09 GMT > From: owner-smallfarm@maat.reeusda.gov > > SOLICITATION FOR EXHIBIT DISPLAYS > Sender: owner-smallfarm@reeusda.gov > Precedence: bulk > > SECOND NATIONAL SMALL FARM CONFERENCE > > We invite non-profit community based organizations, foundations, > educational institutions, and other groups who work directly > with small > farm communities to set up informational displays to promote their > agencies/organizations/institutions, and their their work > with small and > mid-size farmers. The booths will be located in the hotel exhibition > hall. Each exhibitor will receive the following: one 8' table with > skirting and two chairs, a one-line ID sign, and listing in > the Conference > Program Guide. There is no charge for the space but we we do > ask that you > staff your display, particularly during breaks. We cannot include > registration to the conference with this invitataion. We will have a > resource room at the conference if your organization cannot > participate > but would like to send literature. > > Deadline for submission is May 31, 1999. You will be > notified before June > 15, 1999 if your exhibit has been selected for the > conference. Please > send a description of programs and services your organization > provides to > the small farm communities in 200 words or less. > > If your organization or institution is selected, your exhibit display > write up will be included in the conference program agenda. > Solicitations > from individuals will not be accepted. Any individual > success story or > educational information can be shared by way of the poster display. > For updates about the conference or the solicitation for > poster displays, > please visit the conference website at: > http://www.luce.lincolnu.edu/nsfc > > Your response on or before May 31, 1999 will be most appreciated. > > > Thank You > > > Denis Ebodaghe, Ph.D > National Program Leader--Small Farms > USDA-CSREES > Phone: 202-401-4385; Fax: 202-401-5179 > E-mail: debodaghe@reeusda.gov > Website: http://www.reeusda.gov/smallfarm > Tollfree: 1-800-583-3071 To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 23 15:17:25 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id PAA14665 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 15:17:25 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id OAA02872 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 14:20:23 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from beavis.hostdepot.com ([207.141.153.190]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id OAA02809 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 14:20:15 -0500 (EST) Received: from cafarmersmarkets.org (pool006-max2.ds12-ca-us.dialup.earthlink.net [209.178.13.6]) by beavis.hostdepot.com with SMTP (Microsoft Exchange Internet Mail Service Version 5.5.2232.9) id HQ1Q6CMR; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 14:24:46 -0500 Message-ID: <36F7E8CC.E755F1BC@cafarmersmarkets.org> Date: Tue, 23 Mar 1999 11:17:33 -0800 From: Phil Gillman Organization: Southland Farmers' Market Association X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.5 [en] (Win98; I) X-Accept-Language: en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Subject: Re: sustainable agriculture References: <199903222310.SAA17780@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 131 The only problem is that north america is rapidly losing the majority of its good land, and will continue to do so until the current rate of developement and the current methods of production are changed. for obvious reasons, cities have frequently grown up amongst highly fertile land, and now, that they can import their food, are swallowing that very same land- enter the sustainable communities movement... on the degredation of the land note, current conventional agriculture practices send a vast amount of topsoil into the gulf of mexico (amongst other water bodies) each year, and do nothing to increase ore replenish the biomass. studies by ucdavis and the rodale institute have recently shown that transition to organic methods of production in the majority of this continent could reverse that trend, and in fact return north america to its previous stature as the fertile cresent of the modern world. Furthermore, both studies have shown organic methods to be just as, if not more economically viable than conventional ag, and to maintain the same levels of production, both areas that the conventional groups have attacked- science is now on our side, consumers are now on our side, even the corporations are begining to come around (general mills is releasing a line of organic cereals)- the time has come to begin the publicity To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 23 15:45:21 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id PAA15206 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 15:45:21 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id OAA09165 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 14:28:25 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from relay2.rcp.net.pe (relay2.rcp.net.pe [200.1.178.248]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id OAA09140 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 14:28:17 -0500 (EST) Received: from amauta.rcp.net.pe ([161.132.5.5]:59986 "HELO amauta.rcp.net.pe" ident: "NO-IDENT-SERVICE[2]") by relay2.rcp.net.pe with SMTP id <7738-16100>; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 14:31:28 +0500 Received: from amauta.rcp.net.pe(asy3.rcp.net.pe[200.1.182.3]) (1507 bytes) by amauta.rcp.net.pe via smail with P:esmtp/R:smart_host/T:smtp (sender: ) id for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 14:26:07 -0500 (GMT) (Smail-3.2.0.105 1999-Mar-3 #33 built 1999-Mar-8) Message-ID: <36F7EBD7.68C2AF72@amauta.rcp.net.pe> Date: Tue, 23 Mar 1999 14:30:48 -0500 From: Sharon Stevenson Reply-To: ssteve@amauta.rcp.net.pe X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.5 (Macintosh; I; PPC) X-Accept-Language: en-US, es MIME-Version: 1.0 To: SANET-MG@ces.ncsu.edu Subject: Who speaks Spanish and... Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; x-mac-type="54455854"; x-mac-creator="4D4F5353" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 132 ...would be --theoretically--willing to respond to organic agriculture questions from campesinos trying to get and stay out of coca? A couple of years ago I put up a note about my idea for a project to get internet access to the farmers here in Peru which actually may finally have a chance of seeing reality. In order not to disturb the list, you could just email me privately and I'll sum up for the list after a week or so.....optimistically thinking that there will be considerable response!!! Thanks loads.... (BTW--I have been sending the digests of responses to the NPR story on MOnsanto to the foreign editor to whom I occasionally send stories and assume he forwarded them to the right person.) -- Sharon Stevenson Tel/fax (51-1) 444-4749 Lima, Peru ---------------------- Our best hope for civility? The Golden Rule: Treat others as you wish to be treated--for the good of us all! :-) To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 23 15:46:03 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id PAA15233 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 15:46:03 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id OAA20233 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 14:48:22 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from x15.boston.juno.com (x15.boston.juno.com [205.231.100.28]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id OAA20224 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 14:48:18 -0500 (EST) From: holocene@juno.com Received: (from holocene@juno.com) by x15.boston.juno.com (queuemail) id D6EW27V3; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 14:46:32 EST To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Subject: pigs - traditional breeds Message-ID: <19990323.120209.11046.0.holocene@juno.com> References: <199903202310.SAA05604@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu> X-Mailer: Juno 1.49 X-Juno-Line-Breaks: 11-12,14-17,19-21 Date: Tue, 23 Mar 1999 14:46:32 EST Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 133 I am intrigued to know if there is much debate in American sustainable agricultural circles re the advantages of maintaining traditional (and all too frequently, rare) breeds of livestock? The question about pigs brought this to mind, as I remembered how lucky we felt when we had a small farm in the UK and found that in a neighboring village there was a Gloucester Old Spot boar ready and eager to service our Old Spot sow. These fabulous pigs are tough, hardy, good out door pigs, nearly lost in the enthusiasm about the new wonder pigs, but now slowly making a comeback, thanks largely to backyard farmer enthusiasm. WHo knows when we will need these traits again, especially when/if we shift to more integrated farming with animals filling ecological niches in land management.. Similar to the reminder that GMO's don't just affect plants, neither does loss of biodiversity on the farm. Cheers, Jo Tippett Holocene Design -helps you and your organization understand and apply sustainable development and learn skills to design innovative solutions. http://www.holocene.net ___________________________________________________________________ You don't need to buy Internet access to use free Internet e-mail. Get completely free e-mail from Juno at http://www.juno.com/getjuno.html or call Juno at (800) 654-JUNO [654-5866] To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 23 16:03:29 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id QAA15584 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 16:03:28 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id OAA24124 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 14:56:52 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from aurora.nal.usda.gov (aurora.nal.usda.gov [192.54.138.38]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id OAA23990 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 14:56:41 -0500 (EST) Received: by aurora.nal.usda.gov with Internet Mail Service (5.5.2448.0) id ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 14:59:06 -0500 Message-ID: From: Sustainable Agriculture Network To: "'sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu'" Subject: FW: Position: Crop Science Head- NCSU Date: Tue, 23 Mar 1999 14:58:59 -0500 MIME-Version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2448.0) Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 134 -----Original Message----- From: Carolina Farm Stewardship Association [mailto:cfsa@intrex.net] Sent: Tuesday, March 23, 1999 3:02 PM To: Sustainable Agriculture Network; Subject: Crop Science Head- NCSU Greetings- I wanted to share this position announcement for Department Head/Crop Science at NCSU (Raleigh, NC) directly with the sustainable ag community. NCSU is growing as a land grant that supports Sustainable Agriculture. CFSA collaborated with NCSU on our Kellogg project and we have many other joint projects between us. The Center for Environmental Farming Systems is receiving increased attention from the legislature, the Department of Ag and the College of Ag and Life Sciences- the Head would have an important opportunity to move the systems, and organic research forward at the research station. Please contact Laura or the chair of the search committee directly if you'd like any more information. cheers Laura Lauffer Carolina Farm Stewardship Association PO Box 448, Pittsboro, NC 27312 (919) 542-2402 Fax 542-7401 www.sunsite.unc.edu/cfsa/index.htm HEAD, DEPARTMENT OF CROP SCIENCE COLLEGE OF AGRICULTURE AND LIFE SCIENCES NORTH CAROLINA STATE UNIVERSITY TITLE: Professor and Head POSITION: The Department Head provides leadership and administers teaching, research, and extension activities in a large and diverse department. The Head plays a key role in faculty and staff recruitment and development, program planning and evaluation, and budgetary matters including fund allocations and accountability. The Head also represents the Department to College and University administrations, to the agricultural industry, to environmental and consumer communities, and collaborates with other university departments and state, national, and international institutions and agencies. The headship is viewed as a full-time administrative position. DEPARTMENT: The Department of Crop Science consists of approximately 60 faculty which include USDA appointments and is internationally recognized with fully integrated programs in teaching, research, and extension. It offers education and training leading to the following degrees: two-year associate, bachelor of science, master of crop science (non-thesis), master of science, and doctor of philosophy. Major areas of research include plant breeding, molecular biology, crop production, crop physiology, forage crop ecology and utilization, turfgrass management, weed science, plant chemistry, nutrient management, and water quality. Research includes both basic and applied elements, the applied components being influenced by regional and international needs as well as those of the state's agricultural and urban clientele. A comprehensive extension program communicates research findings throughout the state; the department is responsible for providing contemporary training and educational programs to agricultural agents in 100 counties. QUALIFICATIONS: Applicants must have earned the Ph.D. degree in Agronomy or a closely related discipline, have a record of professional achievement and leadership in the field with an intimate knowledge of current developments. The successful candidate must have a commitment to teaching, research, and extension appropriate to a land-grant university, and be able to communicate effectively with faculty, staff, students, administrators, agricultural industry leaders, and the public. Administrative experience is preferred. APPLICATION: Applicants should submit a complete vita, a complete list of publications, a statement of goals, and letters of recommendation from at least three sources to: Dr. T.J. Monaco Crop Science Head Search Committee Department of Horticultural Science Campus Box 7609 North Carolina State University Raleigh, NC 27695-7609 Phone (919) 515-3131 FAX (919) 513-3191 e-mail: tom_monaco@ncsu.edu Deadline for receiving applications is May 10, 1999 or until a suitable candidate is found. NORTH CAROLINA STATE UNIVERSITY IS AN EQUAL OPPORTUNITY EMPLOYER. THE UNIVERSITY URGES ALL QUALIFIED APPLICANTS TO APPLY. DOCUMENTATION OF IDENTITY AND EMPLOYABILITY OF THE APPLICANT WILL BE REQUIRED BEFORE THE HIRING PROCESS CAN BE FINALIZED. INDIVIDUALS WITH DISABILITIES DESIRING ACCOMMODATIONS IN THE APPLICATION PROCESS SHOULD CONTACT THE ABOVE INDIVIDUAL. To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 23 16:32:26 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id QAA16156 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 16:32:25 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id PAA12231 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 15:25:35 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from webserf.net (webserf.net [204.77.122.1]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with SMTP id PAA12130 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 15:25:28 -0500 (EST) Message-Id: <199903232025.PAA12130@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu> Received: from bluestem [204.77.126.168] by webserf.net (SMTPD32-4.03) id A8A147B0514; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 14:25:05 CST From: "Bluestem Associates" To: "sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu" Date: Tue, 23 Mar 1999 20:21:30 Reply-To: "Bluestem Associates" X-Mailer: PMMail 98 Professional (2.01.1600) For Windows 98 (4.10.1998) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Subject: End of American Agriculture Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 135 On Mon, 22 Mar 1999 16:07:07 -0600, John Ikerd wrote: >Blank's fundamental arguments for the End of American Farm are based in the >premise that economic considerations ultimately will prevail over all other >considerations - industrial agribusiness replaces family farms because they >are "more efficient" and American agribusiness eventually will be displaced >by "more efficient" producers elsewhere in the global market. It also assumes that establishment of American levels of agricultural infrastructure (which would be required to develop American levels of "efficiency") will occur without affecting labor, land, and capital costs now prevailing in most other areas of the world. Having spent a fair deal of time on farms in the developing world, and even in Central Europe, I need to point out that in such areas it is currently difficult to find an O-ring within 300 km when you need one, leave alone anything even slightly more esoteric like shear pins and V-belts. Low labor costs and the absence of social programs are not sufficient to make agriculture more "efficient." American style corporate intensive agriculture depends upon a complex distribution system for many of its inputs. Most other countries aren't even remotely close to having one. > Economics has become the >dominant "religion" of our American society, and it is being rapidly spread >around the World. Back about 600 or 700 years ago, it was *religion* that dominated the intellectual and social framework of the era. It gradually became clear that in themselves the religious understandings of the era were inadequate to explain assorted important phenomena arising at the time (bubonic plague, for example). Economics today is in a very similar position, and equally inadequate. Some of the major responses to the inadequacy of then prevailing religious thought were (ironically) the development of economics to understand the cash economy that developed in response to plague-induced labor shortages. Another was the Reformation, which could be described (in part) as a democratization of religion by making the original basis of the faith (ie scripture) available to the people in their own language. That same two-pronged approach (develop *additional* understandings and democratize the old ones) would seem to offer some promise of ameliorating the very conditions forming the assumptions on which Mr. Blank's thinking appears to be based. In this case such an approach would add a social/environmental component on the one hand and help the average farmer better understand the bases of economics on the other. >Economics is fundamentally incapable of dealing with relationships among >people, or between people and their environment. [snip] Are believing, trusting, sharing, caring, and serving just >empty words? Do faith, hope, and love have impacts on our quality of life, >or these just illusions of the human imagination? Ironically, both prongs of the response suggested above would fit quite comfortably within Judaeo-Christian precepts of stewardship. The Old Testament has some six dozen pertinent references to land care, to say nothing of abundant Old and New Testament references to caring for each other. >When one ignores relationships among people and between people and their >environment, the economic arguments are logical. If one values >relationships, with people or with the earth, then many economic arguments >quite simply do not make sense. We should not rule out the role of government in worsening the problem. I think you can make a reasonable case that government demands for revenue are partly responsible for having led us down this path of economically defined agriculture. The more times agricultural inputs or outputs are handled, processed, moved, sold, and resold the more it requires an industrial approach --- the more tax revenue it can generate for the government. Of course it all requires a bigger bureaucracy to supervise the transactions, along with another bureacracy to deal with the social wreckage. Which requires more revenue, etc. etc. I suspect government would be very reluctant to see food production go offshore because it would greatly reduce the number of key transactions that could be taxed. Nor should we overlook the current accounts impact of food exports. While I do not support present export-focused ag policy, it must be admitted that food exports make our trade deficit situation somewhat less ugly. The bottom line is this. Over the long term, the well managed medium-sized family farm will probably out-perform (in a *fair* competion) the consolidated corporate operation most of the time. There is an historic ebb and flow of agricultural concentration that runs through centuries. A hundred years ago we had "Bonanza" farms of up to 75,000 acres that eventually failed because they couldn't be managed. Nearly a century before that there were immense plantations that struggled to maintain themselves even before their slaves were forcibly set free. Ditto in 15th century England. As far back as the prophets Micah and Isaiah (750 BC) it was written "Woe to you who join field to field and land to land ... until there are no inhabitants left." Right now we're in another consolidation phase, but I don't expect it will be any more permanent than any of the several dozen previous consolidations. Mr. Blank's argument would seem to depend on conditions that are neither particularly long-lasting nor stable. >Sustainability, as a new model or paradigm for human society, simply makes >more sense that does conventional economics. The agronomy of sustainability, however, is not yet as well developed as it will need to be in order to supplant current systems. Since we are not presently starving, *now* is the time to experiment and develop these new systems. The abundance of our food supply is not guaranteed forever, and arguments that we should do more of the same, only someplace else, are not particularly forward-looking. Even if all the economics behind Mr. Blank's logic were correct, his assumption that current conditions will prevail indefinitely flies in the face of several thousand years of human history, to say nothing of the dynamics of natural systems. Bart Hall Lawrence, Kansas To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 23 17:17:08 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id RAA17874 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 17:17:08 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id QAA16560 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 16:22:29 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from gold.wvnet.edu (gold.wvnet.edu [129.71.2.25]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id QAA16518 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 16:22:24 -0500 (EST) Received: from smtp.wvnet.edu (129.71.87.12) by gold.wvnet.edu (LSMTP for Windows NT v1.1a) with SMTP id <0.34232220@gold.wvnet.edu>; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 16:28:37 -0500 Message-id: Date: Tue, 23 Mar 1999 16:24:53 -0500 Subject: Re: A New Perspective of Agriculture From: MEBUCKNER@wvwise.org (Marian Buckner) To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Cc: prairiedf@globaldialog.com MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 136 Greg David's recent thoughtful piece on this subject was most interesting and of potential value to many of us on this listserve. His quotations were very well-selected. The possibilities for our comment are many, including factory farming, farmer-environmentalist relationships, and the farmer's perspective on stewardship of his farmland, and even the future of farming and rural communities in America. I'd like to see comments from others of you on questions that he posed to us. Although it wasn't his main point, I particularly reacted to Greg's point about farmers cashing in on their land after they had made their lifelong contribution of food and fiber to their fellow citizens. The main option now for the retiring farmer is often selling to a developer to put houses on prime farmland. Farmers must be allowed to profit from their land, yet is there a more sustainable, and practical, way than turning farmland into new houses? Certainly farmers ought to profit from the sale of their farmland, just as others do from other types of land. Yet, the main present option of turning farmland into new houses doesn't seem sustainable. How long can we continue the present US trend to add three million new appetites every year and lose one million acres of our best farmland every year? Money for Purchase of Development Rights is one solution. But at the present, there is far from enough money to buy up the development rights of all the prime farmland at risk. Can others of you see any other options? Do you think that as taxpayers realize that new houses on farmland cost them money and add to the taxes they pay for new infrastructure, especially schools, that they will follow the lead of communities like Pittsford, NY, and others who voted to tax themselves to buy adjacent farmland and keep it in farming because it will cost them less in the end in the amount of taxes they pay? I hope that some of you have some new thoughts on this subject. I wonder if you will agree that whether or not we continue to have a rural America is riding on your answers. Marian Buckner, West Virginia To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 23 18:12:00 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id SAA19369 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 18:12:00 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id RAA11919 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 17:06:09 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id RAA11799 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 17:06:02 -0500 (EST) Received: from aae.wisc.edu (aae.wisc.edu [144.92.122.133]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id RAA09860 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 17:05:56 -0500 (EST) Received: from mojo.aae.wisc.edu ([144.92.244.223]) by aae.wisc.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.0) with SMTP id QAA23033 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 16:05:58 -0600 Message-Id: <199903232205.QAA23033@aae.wisc.edu> Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "Michele Gale-Sinex/CIAS, UW-Madison" To: sanet-mg@amani.ces.ncsu.edu Date: Tue, 23 Mar 1999 16:05:49 -0500 Subject: Nonfiction farm books for kids X-mailer: Pegasus Mail for Windows (v2.53/R1) Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 137 Howdy, all-- While doing a quick search for a .JPG of a gratuitously cute baby duck or chick for Darth Cheezer, I ran across this resource listing that I thought some of you might enjoy. http://www.kyfb.com/nonficti.htm The Kentucky Farm Bureau assembled this list of nonfiction resources for primary, intermediate, and middle school kids. It's part of their larger ag in the classroom resource lists: http://www.kyfb.com/aglibrary.htm Some of the cited works require more than a grain of salt...but all in all, I saw a lot of potential good stuff there. FYI. No baby duck/chick photo, BTW. Ah well. pax misha <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< Michele Gale-Sinex, communications manager Center for Integrated Ag Systems UW-Madison College of Ag and Life Sciences Voice: (608) 262-8018 FAX: (608) 265-3020 http://www.wisc.edu/cias/ >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> If you knew what life was worth, you would look for yours on earth. --Bob Marley To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 23 19:10:05 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id TAA20729 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 19:10:05 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id RAA15575 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 17:58:57 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from webserf.net (webserf.net [204.77.122.1]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with SMTP id RAA15467 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 17:58:52 -0500 (EST) Message-Id: <199903232258.RAA15467@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu> Received: from bluestem [204.77.126.143] by webserf.net (SMTPD32-4.03) id AC946D803CC; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 16:58:28 CST From: "Bluestem Associates" To: "sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu" Date: Tue, 23 Mar 1999 22:54:55 Reply-To: "Bluestem Associates" X-Mailer: PMMail 98 Professional (2.01.1600) For Windows 98 (4.10.1998) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Subject: Re: A New Perspective of Agriculture Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 138 On Tue, 23 Mar 1999 16:24:53 -0500, Marian Buckner wrote: >now for the retiring farmer is often selling to a developer to put houses >on prime farmland. Farmers must be allowed to profit from their land, >yet is there a more sustainable, and practical, way than turning farmland >into new houses? > > Certainly farmers ought to profit from the sale of their farmland, just >as others do from other types of land. Yet, the main present option of >turning farmland into new houses doesn't seem sustainable. [snip] > > Can others of you see any other options? Here's something to think about. Perhaps the suburbanization of our prime farmland will ultimately be seen as a piece of good luck. Many of us advocate both small farms and local food supplies, while we decry the concentration of land ownership in the corporate/industrial model of agriculture. A one-acre lot on prime farmland is capable of producing a substantial quantity of high quality food, and it is highly unlikely such land will ever again be re-consolidated. When conditions are ripe for it, these suburban lots could quickly be developed into mini-farms, either as home-based businesses or as a source of much good food for the family living there. That sort of flexibility, coupled with broad-based ownership of prime agricultural land in the form of suburban lots, may turn out to be a very lucky and important break at a moment when we need one badly. The history of land tenure issues (albeit oversimplified) can be summarised roughly as follows. There are three interacting components --- free (open) access to land, free peasantry, and non-working landowners --- and in a given land regime you will have any *two* of those components, but not the third. Much American farmland is now in the hands of non-working owners (rented by neighbors), and there is a fluidity as to whether land access will diminish (outmigration of youth) or whether the average rural person will tend to become somewhat enserfed (as in corporate poultry). By allowing for large numbers of working landowners, suburbanised farmland could facilitate much more open access to land and a more entrepreneurial (ie freer) "peasantry." That would be an important safety valve in times of social and/or economic upheaval such as another serious Depression. To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Tue Mar 23 21:13:34 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id VAA23997 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 21:13:34 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id UAA07852 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 20:11:42 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from imo29.mx.aol.com (imo29.mx.aol.com [198.81.17.73]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id UAA07754 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 20:11:35 -0500 (EST) From: Sprinkraft@aol.com Received: from Sprinkraft@aol.com by imo29.mx.aol.com (IMOv19.3) id sVVWa03224 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 20:10:13 +1900 (EST) Message-ID: Date: Tue, 23 Mar 1999 20:10:13 EST To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Mime-Version: 1.0 Subject: GMO Summary Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit X-Mailer: AOL 4.0 for Windows 95 sub 206 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 139 To: Texas Animal Health Control Board and the Texas Department of Agriculture >From Steven Sprinkel Texas Organic Growers Association 23 March 1999 Regarding: Genetic Engineering Technology and Certified Organic Livestock Production and Processing Standards This memorandum is a summary of facts and precedents pertaining to the use of genetically modified organisms (GMOs) in organic food and fiber production. 1. In October, 1996, in Indianapolis, Indiana, the USDA National Organic Standards Board ruled that the use of GMOs in organic production and processing is prohibited. The GMO technological process and its products were defined as " synthetic". The US Organic Foods Production Act calls for a prohibition on synthetics unless they have been reviewed according to the criteria in the Act. The petition to include GMOs was appropriately made and recognized by the NOSB, who then rendered their unanimous decision to prohibit . 2. Thereafter, state agencies in the US and private certification agencies in the US and internationally moved to prohibit the use of GMOS if they had not already done so. 3. The original list of proposed materials, substances and life forms that are defined as genetically and or transgenetically modified has been expanded to include a large number of such items that were formerlly considered "naturals" according to the Act. They now include, but are not limited to, GMO plant species such as glyphos resistant soybeans, Bt corn and cotton, GMO livestock including aquatics, livestock feeds that contain GMO ingredients, such as GMO cotton seed meal, soybean meal, alfalfa hay, corn and their byproducts when used as feed supplements and vitamins. They include microbial soil amendments and enhancers, legume inoculants, sugars, GMO rennets for cheese production and cultures used in yogurt and other dairy products. The organic standard now provides that any material or derivation can not have been sourced from GMO raw products, been altered by genetic engineering or have come in contact with them during processing. 4. Authoritative health and environmental reseach has not been conducted appropriately to determine the negative affects on the environment and human and livestock health by GMO products even though they are planted on millions of acres and are now found abundantly in conventional food and livestock feeds. Within the past two years, growing scientific evidence indicates that, at the very least, a field production moratorium be imposed and require point- of-purchase labeling for consumers, included on the ingredient panel. Much anecdotal field observation from farmers also indicates that the claimed production benefits and negligible affects on the environment are not entirely valid. 5. Among the many substantiated findings in the field and analytical laboratories are the following: that unintended mortality from non-target insect species has been observed in GMO potato production, that laboratory animals that ingested GMO agricultural products were biologically injured, that "genetic drift" has been identified in GMO rape seed and corn production, that cotton production has been severely affected leading to litigation by farmers in many US states against the manufacturer and supplier of the seed for the cotton. That because of the use of Bacilus thuringiensis-modified cotton and corn varieties, rapid Bt resistance to European cornborer and cotton bollworm is now suspected, that glyphos-resistant weed species are now identified in those growing areas of the US midwest where the glyphos- resistant soybean crops have been planted for a number of years. 6. This latter development may lead to the prolonged use of materials identified as restricted or scheduled for phase-out, and/or the introduction of new herbicides on an emergency basis, for which environmental evaluation may be foreshortened. The same can be said for newly-resistant insects which were at one time susceptible to the topical use of Bacillus thuringiensis. A broad coaltion of concerned environmentalists and organic farmers filed suit in February, 1999 against EPA in order to halt the planting of Bt altered crops in order to guard the continued effectiveness of the product, which is used by organic and conventional farmers. Government, researchers, conventional farm officials and industry responded tardily to the prospect of Bt resistance by suggesting that refuges be planted to guard against such resistance. Many entomolgists consider that after the 1999 planting season this effort will be moot. 7. Market access for GMO raw products and ingredients is severely affected by consumer concerns in Japan, the UK and the EU, and building within the US. Proposed mandatory labeling of GMOs in consumer goods has now been overtaken by private sector initatives to either label or prohbit the use of GMO consumer products. These initatives are now in place within the mainstream retail sector in the UK and France. WTO may in the end force member states to accept these products, but consumers have shown in some cases a nation-wide unwillingness to take at face value the safety claims made by the supply sector and regulators. These concerns are not limited to the "second wave" of GMOs in grains and horticulture, but are historical, as observed in the longstanding prohbitions on meat products where GMO-derived hormones were used and in rBGH dairy. Health Canada recently prohibited rBGH in dairy production. 8. Organic certification is a systems-based quality assurance program and process which utilizes laboratory analysis normally in the event when synthetic contamination of soil or the product is suspected. However, due to the nature of the absolute prohibitions on GMOS in organic products as well as suppliers making claims that products are "GMO-free" , laboratory-based GMO analysis is becoming more commonplace. One result of the concern has lead organic farmers to seek crop insurance against "genetic drift" or contamination and to more carefully monitor neighboring land use. Contamination concerns have provoked agricultural authorities in Spain to require that GMO agricultural suppliers fund actuarial programs in order to create a liability protocol, in the event that the environmental guarantees made by the suppliers and government regulators are indicated otherwise in the field. I am glad to be able to respond to your recent inquiries. Please contact me if I can provide any further information. Steve Sprinkel Austin, Texas 512-326-3222 To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Wed Mar 24 01:01:43 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id BAA27543 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 01:01:43 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id XAA28212 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 23:52:15 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from billman.kuntrynet.com (billman.kuntrynet.com [207.40.85.3]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id XAA28122 for ; Tue, 23 Mar 1999 23:52:09 -0500 (EST) Received: from greg (tnt-13-31.kuntrynet.com [207.40.95.223]) by billman.kuntrynet.com (8.8.5/8.6.9) with ESMTP id AAA00644; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 00:27:41 -0500 Message-Id: <199903240527.AAA00644@billman.kuntrynet.com> From: "Greg & Lei Gunthorp" To: , Subject: Re: pigs - traditional breeds Date: Tue, 23 Mar 1999 23:50:42 -0500 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Priority: 3 X-Mailer: Microsoft Internet Mail 4.70.1155 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 140 I don't think the minor breeds have played a large role in US sustainable hog production. They should have a huge role to play. It should be alarming the lack of diversity in all livestock genetics. The biggest drawback is some do not fit easily in the traditional marketing channels. I've raised Tamworth pigs. They are the toughest outdoor hog I have ever seen. But they do have a lower percent lean because of a smaller loin size than the traditional, intensely selected breeds. I know of one natural meat distributor that will not allow them because of tougher meat(they don't have the internal muscling of say a Duroc) and they also have small, kidney shaped loins. I'd like to say it isn't true, but I have cut too many of them up on the kitchen table. And they are much harder to keep in on an electric fence. HOWEVER, they will survive in conditions and on feed that should give them the title of the low input hog machine. They are as suited today as they were for their role in the orchards of England last century as scavenger animals. I have crossbreds available that would make an excellent addition to an organic orchard to clean up the dropped fruit so diseases aren't carried over to the following season. So far, I have never sold a single one for this reason. I think that is a shame. I don't think we can afford to lose them and therefore I will also raise a few in my breed rotation. In the long term they are going to need to have a commercial use to justify their existence. Its obvious that with the current hog market that this farm cannot justify them long term for philosophical reasons! Best wishes, Greg Gunthorp's Pasture-ized Pork LaGrange, Indiana visit our farm at www.grassfarmer.com ---------- > From: holocene@juno.com > To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu > Subject: pigs - traditional breeds > Date: Tuesday, March 23, 1999 2:46 PM > > I am intrigued to know if there is much debate in American sustainable > agricultural circles re the advantages of maintaining traditional (and > all too frequently, rare) breeds of livestock? The question about pigs > brought this to mind, as I remembered how lucky we felt when we had a > small farm in the UK and found that in a neighboring village there was a > Gloucester Old Spot boar ready and eager to service our Old Spot sow. > These fabulous pigs are tough, hardy, good out door pigs, nearly lost in > the enthusiasm about the new wonder pigs, but now slowly making a > comeback, thanks largely to backyard farmer enthusiasm. WHo knows when we > will need these traits again, especially when/if we shift to more > integrated farming with animals filling ecological niches in land > management.. > > Similar to the reminder that GMO's don't just affect plants, neither does > loss of biodiversity on the farm. > > Cheers, Jo Tippett > > Holocene Design -helps you and your organization understand and apply > sustainable development and learn skills to design innovative solutions. > > http://www.holocene.net > > ___________________________________________________________________ > You don't need to buy Internet access to use free Internet e-mail. > Get completely free e-mail from Juno at http://www.juno.com/getjuno.html > or call Juno at (800) 654-JUNO [654-5866] > > To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command > "unsubscribe sanet-mg". > To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command > "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". > > All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: > http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Wed Mar 24 08:20:08 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id IAA01045 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 08:20:08 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id HAA04815 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 07:22:04 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from mail.caribe.net (root@mail.caribe.net [209.91.196.5]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id HAA04804 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 07:21:58 -0500 (EST) Received: from ddworley (ppp190.203dip.netdial.caribe.net [209.91.203.190]) by mail.caribe.net (8.9.0/8.9.0) with SMTP id IAA22472; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 08:24:45 -0400 (AST) Message-Id: X-Sender: ddworley@mail.caribe.net X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Pro Version 4.0 Date: Wed, 24 Mar 1999 07:51:10 -0400 To: Mark , sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu From: Daniel Worley Subject: Re: The return of prison labor (a long musing followed by a few short articles) In-Reply-To: <3.0.6.32.19990322114525.00796460@crocker.com> References: <199903122218.RAA20682@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 141 At 11:45 3/22/99 -0500, Mark wrote: >But back to exploitation (which Marx defined simply as the act of an owner >keeping the surplus value generated by a worker's efforts). Exploitation >is the foundation of all economic activity, including farming. Karl Marx is not a "Hero" I would want to be quoting! In every country where his theories and ideas were implemented or were even tried and discarded, the level of "exploitation" was much more severe than any you will find in any capitalistic society. The key difference between a free "exploited" worker who may be underpaid and a prisoner who almost surely will be underpaid, is the free worker has the option of quitting and finding other work. That may not always be practical, but it is an option that is technically available. Capitalism may not be a great system, but it is the best that has been devised by man thus far. And in its pure form, it is based on a worker being paid "an honest day's pay for an honest day's work". The capitalist (owner) who puts his/her money at risk investing it in what ever venture, deserves a reasonable profit for his investment and effort. A lot of people have attempted over the years to define "reasonable" in the above context and have come up short. I do not intend to go there myself. I will say that any exploitation of prison labor for private profit is unreasonable. And it certainly has no place in sustainable agriculture. --Dan in Sunny Puerto Rico-- dan.worley@mindless.com To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Wed Mar 24 08:20:25 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id IAA01050 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 08:20:25 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id HAA04818 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 07:22:06 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from mail.caribe.net (root@mail.caribe.net [209.91.196.5]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id HAA04805 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 07:21:58 -0500 (EST) Received: from ddworley (ppp190.203dip.netdial.caribe.net [209.91.203.190]) by mail.caribe.net (8.9.0/8.9.0) with SMTP id IAA22560 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 08:25:04 -0400 (AST) Message-Id: X-Sender: ddworley@mail.caribe.net X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Pro Version 4.0 Date: Wed, 24 Mar 1999 08:00:54 -0400 To: sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu From: Richard Wolfson (by way of Daniel Worley ) Subject: GEN3-21; Fwd, Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-MIME-Autoconverted: from quoted-printable to 8bit by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu id HAA04810 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 142 [Reposted with permission] I have been away for a few days. Here are the updates Richard ....... FOCUS-UK waiters must know if foods contain GMOs March 19, 1999 LONDON, Reuters [WS] via NewsEdge Corporation : British waiters will have to be able to tell diners whether their food contains genetically modified soya or maize, under new rules announced on Thursday by food safety minister Jeff Rooker. And if they cannot, their employers in any of some 125,000 catering establishments of various types, from hot-dog stands to the most expensive restaurant in Britain, face fines of up to 5,000 pounds, Rooker said. The same fine is imposed on food shops if they fail to label according to the EU rules. ``We don't think it's impractical,'' Rooker told a news conference at the ministry of agriculture. ``If a customer wants to ask if any ingredients have been genetically modified then they ought to be able to answer,'' he said. .......... U.S. urges EU to speed up GM crop approvals March 19, 1999 BRUSSELS, Reuters [WS] via NewsEdge Corporation : The European Union must act swiftly to improve its approval system for genetically modified crops which is losing U.S. firms millions of dollars, Richard Rominger, Deputy U.S. Secretary of Agriculture, said on Thursday. ``For the U.S., in the short term, the EU's lengthy, complex process costs us money -- about $200 million last year in lost exports to Spain, Portugal and other EU members,'' Rominger told a Brussels conference on GMOs. ...... FOCUS-Euro stores link to seek non-modified foods By Richard Meares LONDON, March 17 (Reuters) - Major European supermarkets, fighting U.S. refusal to say if foods are genetically modified, set up a consortium on Wednesday to ensure no such ingredients make it into their own-label products. Britain's J.Sainsbury Plc said it had formed the organisation with six other European supermarket groups to weed genetically modified (GM) foods out of any stage of production. By establishing verified non-GM sources in the farmers' field and ensuring segregation through the supply chain, we will be GM-free," it said in a statement. "This move will enable Sainsbury's to eliminate all GM ingredients from its own-label products in response to customer demand for GM-free foods." The environmentalist group Greenpeace hoped other retailers would follow suit, saying:. "This is the beginning of the end of trying to force-feed consumers unwanted and unneeded genetically manipulated food." The consortium includes Britain's Marks & Spencer, Carrefour of France, Delhaize of Belgium, Italy's Effelunga, Swiss Migros and Superquinn of Ireland. ........ Restaurants must declare any GM food The Daily Telegraph, London 18 March 1999 RESTAURANTS and cafes will be forced to tell their customers about any genetically modified ingredients contained in their food under measures to be announced by the Government today. It is expected that declarations will have to be made on menus. Bakers and delicatessens will also have to comply with the new labelling controls, which will exceed current European Union requirements. At present EU labelling regulations lay down that all foods sold in shops and supermarkets must be clearly marked if they contain more than two per cent of GM ingredients. The move follows an announcement this week that Marks & Spencer is to ban all genetically modified food from its shelves. ......... Daily Telegraph 19.3.99 UK Fines for failing to declare GM food attacked By David Brown, Agriculture Editor CAFES and restaurants will be fined up to £5,000 if they fail to tell customers that they are serving genetically modified food, the Government announced yesterday. The measures - the first of their kind in the European Union - will come into force today. Under the Food Labelling (Amendment) Regulations 1999, trading standards officers will have the power to check bakers, delicatessens and other establishments, including hot dog stands, to make sure they declare genetically modified ingredients. But the move, forecast in The Telegraph yesterday, was immediately denounced as "a con" by environmental groups who said it did not go far enough to guarantee proper choice for consumers. Restaurateurs said it would be too difficult to enforce. The powers, announced by Jeff Rooker, the food safety minister, cover only foods containing genetically modified soya and maize. They do not cover derivatives of GM soya and maize including oils which are used in a wide range of food processes including chocolate. This is because, Mr Rooker explained, they are not covered by EU regulations. ........... posted by Paul Davis UK Daily Mail 16 March 99 A million mutant animals used in GM experiments By SEAN POULTER Consumer Affairs Correspondent MORE than one million animals have been genetic modified for use in British laboratory experiments in the past four years. The bulk of the research involved mice and rats and was carried out in the hope of medical breakthroughs. Scientists however have also started creating genetically modified animals which could be farmed for food. Pigs, cattle, sheep, chicken and fish are being altered so they grow faster, are bigger and produce more young. While advocates of the technology point to the potential benefits in the field of medicine, the possibility of clones and other GM animals being used in farming can only fuel the already intense debate over genetically modified foods. The most recent statistics show 353,000 GM animals were used in experiments in 1997, a 17 per cent increase on the 303,000 in 1996 and more than 60 per cent up on the 215,308 1995. ....... Thursday March 18, 6:30 pm Eastern Time Brazil state threatens to destroy Monsanto soy By Phil Stewart SAO PAULO, March 18 (Reuters) - Brazil's major soybean producing state of Rio Grande do Sul is threatening to destroy genetically-modified soybeans grown on a test plot by the local unit of U.S. biotechnology giant Monsanto Co. (NYSE:MTC - news). ``The soybean area will be destroyed by the end of the month if they continue in violation of state law,'' the state's Agriculture Secretary Jose Hermeto Hoffamann told Reuters. Rio Grande do Sul, which aims to sell soybeans to European consumers opposed to transgenics, accused the multinational of breaking a new, March 3 state law by failing to provide an environmental risk analysis for the 435-hectare test plot. ...... France's Auchan Joins Drive To Weed Out GM Foods PARIS (Reuters) - French retailers say they have led the way in the drive among European supermarkets to root out genetically modified foods from among their own-brand products. Spurred on by a fresh wave of consumer concern, family-owned Auchan Friday added its name to a list of European retailers who are outlawing genetic engineering in their own-brand food. Both Auchan and rival Carrefour say a policy of eradicating GM ingredients from their own products, as heralded by Britain's J. Sainsbury Plc this week, has been in place in their supply chains for over a year. ...... SUPERMARKETS SAY FOOD LABELLING ``DOES NOT GO FAR ENOU PA News 19.03.99 03:49 Major supermarket chains have vowed to inform consumers about any GM ingredients in their products after declaring that new Government labelling laws on genetically modified foods do not go far enough. The move came after the Government announced yesterday it was extending existing European Union rules on GM labelling to cover the catering trade. Diners eating out at restaurants, cafes and even burger bars will be told if the food they are eating contains GM ingredients. The Government said new powers enforcing EU regulations on the labelling of GM food will include fines of up to 5,000 for anyone breaching the rules and will be extended to cover the catering industry. After the announcement the UK's major food retailers - including the supermarket chains M&S, Sainsbury's, Safeway, Tesco, Asda, Somerfield, Waitrose and Morrison's - said they would now adopt a policy of labelling all GM derivatives. The British Retail Consortium, which represents 90% of UK retailers, issued a statement on behalf of its members stating that the decision had been made because the Government legislation did not go far enough to help consumers. The BRC said retailers had introduced GM labelling long before yesterday's announcement and the supermarkets had been looking into the possibility of extending this to GM derivatives for some time. The major supermarkets said they will label GM soya and maize derivatives in all their own-brand foods although it is not clear how long this process will take. ....... UK Observer 21 March 99 Iceland sales rise 9 per cent after the ban on GM foods By Ben Laurance Sunday March 21, 1999 Food retailer Iceland is expected this week to unveil sales figures showing that it is reaping big sales increases in the wake of its stand against genetically modified foods. Iceland last year launched a drive to ensure that nothing it sold contained GM ingredients. Other, larger, food retailing groups have subsequently said they will try to phase out GM ingredients from their merchandise. Iceland is expected this week to publish figures showing that its like-for-like sales - that is sales excluding the effect of opening new stores - have been around 9 per cent higher in the first 10 weeks of 1999 than they were a year earlier. The [other] major supermarket chains have shown far more modest sales increases, according to recent information. Sainsbury's like-for-like sales were up 1.5 per cent over Christmas; Tesco's increase was 3.1 per cent and Safeway's 3 per cent. _________________________________________________________ Richard Wolfson, PhD Consumer Right to Know Campaign, for Mandatory Labelling and Long-term Testing of all Genetically Engineered Foods, 500 Wilbrod Street Ottawa, ON Canada K1N 6N2 tel. 613-565-8517 fax. 613-565-1596 email: rwolfson@concentric.net Our website, http://www.natural-law.ca/genetic/geindex.html contains more information on genetic engineering as well as previous genetic engineering news items. Subscription fee to genetic engineering news is $35 for 12 months, payable to "BanGEF" and mailed to the above address. Or see website for details. __________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________ To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Wed Mar 24 08:30:34 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id IAA01186 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 08:30:34 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id HAA04819 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 07:22:08 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from mail.caribe.net (root@mail.caribe.net [209.91.196.5]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id HAA04811 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 07:22:01 -0500 (EST) Received: from ddworley (ppp190.203dip.netdial.caribe.net [209.91.203.190]) by mail.caribe.net (8.9.0/8.9.0) with SMTP id IAA22582 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 08:25:08 -0400 (AST) Message-Id: X-Sender: ddworley@mail.caribe.net X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Pro Version 4.0 Date: Wed, 24 Mar 1999 08:23:41 -0400 To: sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu From: Richard Wolfson (by way of Daniel Worley ) Subject: GEN-3-22; Fwd, Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 143 [Reposted with permission] So why all the fuss over GE Foods? by Jill Davies - - March 16, 1999 >From the Sanders County Ledger, Thompson Falls, Montana March 18, 1999 Why are foreign countries ready to start trade wars with the U.S. over the import of genetically engineered (GE) foods? First, it is because of what goes in to the creation of a GE variety. Plants have elaborate defense mechanisms for dealing with foreign compounds, including foreign DNA. To overcome these defense mechanisms in order to insert a gene into the germ cell of a host plant, which will then grow into a plant with the desired trait, biologists have to construct what are called "vectors" which will carry the chosen gene into the host cell. The vectors are constructed using pieces of DNA taken from virulent pathological organisms (virus, bacteria) because these organisms have the ability to overcome a cell's defense mechanisms. Generally, there are three parts to a vector: genes which carry the package into the cell and invade the DNA, genes called promoters which assure that the package is 'turned on', and genes for antibiotic resistance that are used as markers to help the biologist find the plant cells in which the insertion has been successful (a small percentage). The concern is that these sections of DNA from pathological organisms will recombine to form active pathogens once again, either new ones, or old ones with renewed virulence, or with new (broader) host specificity; and that antibiotic resistance will continue to spread throughout the microbial world. This process, called "horizontal gene transfer" is already known to be the cause of the widespread antibiotic resistance in disease organisms that has emerged in the past decade, facilitated by the over-use of antibiotics. Second, it is because the insertion of this gene package - a complex vector with the trait gene attached - into the DNA of the host plant can disrupt the functioning of the host's DNA. This can and does lead to 'freak' plants which supposedly are weeded out by the biotech company, but subtle chemical changes would be very difficult to detect, and the testing that is currently required is inadequate. What ignited the controversy last month in Britain, was the disclosure of a study (after it had been suppressed for 6 months) which tested GE potatoes that were engineered to express an insect toxin. This study was the first to carefully examine the chemical composition of the GE potatoes as compared to the regular potatoes. They found significant differences in levels of protein (20% less), starch, sugar, other enzymes. Then they fed the potatoes to young rats for a time and examined the development of organs. They found impaired development in the intestine, pancreas, kidneys, liver, lungs and brain; an enlarged thymus, and a depressed immune response with evidence of intestinal infection. Third, it is because people don't want to eat a plant that expresses an insecticide in every cell, or a plant that can resist an herbicide so that more of the herbicide is sprayed on the field while the plant is growing, and these are what are now being widely grown. Corn, cotton and potatoes are engineered to express the Bt insecticide and soy is resistant to Monsanto's Roundup. contact info: Jill Davies ~~~ River Care ........ Thu, Mar 18, 1999 Monsanto Dairy Hormone May Be Carcinogenic -EU Vet Committee LONDON (Dow Jones)--Milk from cows treated with a synthetic hormone produced by U.S.-based firms Monsanto Corp. (MTC) and Eli-Lily & Co. (LLY) may cause cancer, a key European Union veterinary committee has said. Use of the hormone in dairy cows could also foster resistance to antibiotics and induce allergic reactions in humans, according to the E.U. Scientific Committee on Veterinary Measures Relating to Public Health. The doubt cast upon the safety of synthetic bovine somatotropin (BST) by the E.U.-appointed scientists could mean the E.U. Commission will not lift the ban on sale of the product later this year. The ban on synthetic BST was imposed by the E.U. Commission some years ago due to similar health concerns. The E.U. scientists made their statement in a summary of a report obtained by Dow Jones Newswires Thursday. The full report is due to be published within the next few days. The E.U. Commission will debate the report and use it as a basis for its decision on whether to renew the E.U. ban on synthetic BST. The deadline for renewal of the ban is Dec. 31, 1999. Synthetic BST, which stimulates milk production in dairy cows, is produced by inserting genes from cows into microscopic organisms, which then reproduce the hormone. It is widely used in U.S. dairy herds. Injection of the synthetic hormone into cows could mean consumers are exposed to "an increased relative risk of breast and prostate cancer" it was stated in the summary report. The E.U. scientists said also that the increased use of antibiotics in cows treated with synthetic BST could lead to those antibiotics finding their way into milk and could foster the development of antibiotic-resistant bacteria. As the use of synthetic BST increases the risk of cows developing mastitis, a disease which causes the deterioration of cows' udders, cows treated with the hormone are typically given extra doses of antibiotics. An E.U. Commission agriculture official declined to comment on what impact the report could have on E.U. policy but he did say the summary of the report was 'vague' in its conclusions. * By Daniel Balint-Kurti 44-171-832-9561; daniel.balint-kurti@cor.dowjones.com (END) DOW JONES NEWS 03-18-99 12:05 PM ....... Sunday Independent 21 March 99 Super-viruses threat to farms By Marie Woolf, Political Correspondent Genetically engineered crops, altered to be resistant to common plant viruses, risk creating new mutant strains of "super-viruses" which could wipe out entire farms, a damning research report commissioned by the Government has warned. The report, ordered under the Government's Genetically Modified Organisms Research Programme, has found that plants engineered to be resistant to common viruses could in fact lead to the creation of more virulent strains which could spread throughout the British countryside. The report, prepared for the Department of the Environment by the Scottish Crop Institute, has been seized on by ecological campaigners as evidence that the countryside could be irrevocably damaged by introducing GM crops. The report says that there is insufficient research to determine the long-term effects of introducing viral resistance. Environmentalists fear that indigenous plants could be wiped out by the new viruses created by genetic engineering. ....... International Scientific Committee Warns of Serious Risks of Breast and Prostate Cancer from Monsanto`s Hormonal Milk March 22, 1999 CHICAGO, March 21 /PRNewswire/ via NewsEdge Corporation -- The following was released today by Samuel S. Epstein, M.D., Professor Environmental Medicine, University of Illinois School of Public Health and Chairman of The Cancer Prevention Coalition: The European Commission (EC) has just released a report by its authoritative international 16-member scientific committee, based on meticulous scientific documentation, confirming excess levels of the naturally occurring Insulin-like Growth Factor-1 (IGF-1) in milk of cows injected with Monsanto's biotech hormone (rBGH). The report concludes that the excess levels of IGF-1 pose serious risks of breast and prostate cancer. "Experimental evidence for an association between IGF-1 and breast and prostate cancer is supported by epidemiological -- evidence arising from recently published cohort studies -- . " The report also warns that excess levels of IGF-1 may promote the growth and invasiveness of any cancer by inhibiting programmed self-destruction of cancer cells (apoptosis), and that contamination of milk with residues of antibiotics used to treat mastitis in rBGH cows is likely to spread antibiotic resistant infections in the general population. The EC human health report finally emphasized the need for additional investigation of several other potential risks of rBGH milk. A parallel EC report also warns of serious veterinary risks of rBGH. It may be noted that FDA has ignored such evidence reported in detail by the author in peer reviewed scientific publications over the last decade. The EC warnings are in sharp conflict with the policies of the Food and Drug Administration, largely based on unpublished and confidential Monsanto claims, that hormonal milk is safe. As seriously, the report raises serious questions on the competence and conflicts of interest of Codex, the WHO organization responsible for setting international food safety standards, which has given an unqualified clean bill of health to rBGH milk. It should further be emphasized that senior FDA officials and industry consultants are members of Codex, which meets in secrecy and relies on unpublished industry assurances of safety. Interlocking relationships between U.S. and Canadian regulatory officials and Codex are matters of critical concern to U.S. consumers and global food safety. Faced with escalating rates of >breast and prostate cancers, besides other avoidable public health hazards, FDA should immediately withdraw its approval of rBGH milk whose sale benefits only Monsanto while posing major public health risks for the entire U.S. population. A Congressional investigation of FDA's abdication of >responsibility and of its reliance on Codex authority for food safety, analogous to that recently conducted on rBGH milk by the Canadian Parliament, is well overdue. SOURCE Dr. Samuel S. Epstein CONTACT: Samuel S. Epstein, M.D., Professor of Environmental Medicine, University of Illinois School of Public Health, Chicago, and Chairman of the Cancer Prevention Coalition, 312-996-2297/ _________________________________________________________ Richard Wolfson, PhD Consumer Right to Know Campaign, for Mandatory Labelling and Long-term Testing of all Genetically Engineered Foods, 500 Wilbrod Street Ottawa, ON Canada K1N 6N2 tel. 613-565-8517 fax. 613-565-1596 email: rwolfson@concentric.net Our website, http://www.natural-law.ca/genetic/geindex.html contains more information on genetic engineering as well as previous genetic engineering news items. Subscription fee to genetic engineering news is $35 for 12 months, payable to "BanGEF" and mailed to the above address. Or see website for details. __________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________ To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Wed Mar 24 09:01:36 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id JAA01594 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 09:01:36 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id IAA00805 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 08:03:23 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id IAA00709 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 08:03:19 -0500 (EST) Received: from ns.mntm.org (ns.mntm.org [209.18.254.130]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id IAA21842 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 08:03:18 -0500 (EST) Received: from rrc2.rrcnet.org (rrc2.rrcnet.org [209.18.245.2]) by ns.mntm.org (8.9.1/8.9.1) with SMTP id HAA09479 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 07:03:29 -0600 (CST) Received: from anp32.rrcnet.org by rrc2.rrcnet.org; (5.65v3.2/1.1.8.2/11Jul96-0511PM) id AA14767; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 07:02:10 -0600 Message-Id: <9903241302.AA14767@rrc2.rrcnet.org> From: "Phil Batalden" To: "sanet" Subject: Rotations after RR soybeans Date: Wed, 24 Mar 1999 07:03:29 -0600 X-Msmail-Priority: Normal X-Priority: 3 X-Mailer: Microsoft Internet Mail 4.70.1155 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 144 While attending a sustainable meeting someone mentioned that alfalfa could not be planted on land that had been planted to RR soybeans for 5 years. It was said that the alfalfa would not grow. Is that correct? Doesn,t sound right to me. Can anyone out there document this? If that is the case, people in transition should be aware of it, if they had planted gmo beans prior to starting transition. Thank you To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Wed Mar 24 11:23:47 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id LAA03108 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 11:23:46 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id JAA13168 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 09:14:24 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from foe.org (No.Such.Address.at.Essential.ORG [216.0.124.66] (may be forged)) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with SMTP id JAA13137 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 09:14:18 -0500 (EST) Received: from FOE-Message_Server by foe.org with Novell_GroupWise; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 09:05:20 -0500 Message-Id: X-Mailer: Novell GroupWise 5.2 Date: Wed, 24 Mar 1999 09:05:01 -0500 From: "valerie frances" To: sanet-mg-digest@ces.ncsu.edu Subject: A New Perspective on Agriculture Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Disposition: inline Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-MIME-Autoconverted: from quoted-printable to 8bit by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu id JAA13147 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 145 "When conditions are ripe for it, these suburban lots could quickly be developed into mini-farms, either as home-based businesses or as a source of much good food for the family living there. That sort of flexibility, coupled with broad-based ownership of prime agricultural land in the form of suburban lots, may turn out to be a very lucky and important break at a moment when we need one badly." This is certainly my personal plan. I am a devoted activist on one-hand living in the DC Area at the moment, but spent the last 3 years on a small organic farm. I miss it - but I hate long commutes from rural to urban areas, so over the next couple of years I hope to have my little farm in the city. Sidhe, Valerie Frances DC area To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Wed Mar 24 11:24:02 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id LAA03118 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 11:24:02 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id IAA02412 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 08:55:53 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id IAA02356 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 08:55:48 -0500 (EST) Received: from billman.kuntrynet.com (billman.kuntrynet.com [207.40.85.3]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id IAA23476 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 08:55:48 -0500 (EST) Received: from greg (tnt-11-12.kuntrynet.com [207.40.95.156]) by billman.kuntrynet.com (8.8.5/8.6.9) with ESMTP id JAA22349; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 09:31:21 -0500 Message-Id: <199903241431.JAA22349@billman.kuntrynet.com> From: "Greg & Lei Gunthorp" To: "Phil Batalden" , "sanet" Subject: Re: Rotations after RR soybeans Date: Wed, 24 Mar 1999 08:54:28 -0500 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Priority: 3 X-Mailer: Microsoft Internet Mail 4.70.1155 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 146 What would planting RR soybeans have to do with future alfalfa plantings? By the same arguement, couldn't we assume that alfalfa couldn't be planted on fields that had Roundup applications whether there were GMO's planted or not? Greg ---------- > From: Phil Batalden > To: sanet > Subject: Rotations after RR soybeans > Date: Wednesday, March 24, 1999 8:03 AM > > While attending a sustainable meeting someone mentioned that alfalfa could > not be planted on land that had been planted to RR soybeans for 5 years. It > was said that the alfalfa would not grow. Is that correct? Doesn,t sound > right to me. Can anyone out there document this? If that is the case, > people in transition should be aware of it, if they had planted gmo beans > prior to starting transition. > Thank you > > > To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command > "unsubscribe sanet-mg". > To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command > "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". > > All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: > http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Wed Mar 24 11:52:17 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id LAA04742 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 11:52:17 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id JAA12245 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 09:12:28 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from web603.mail.yahoo.com (web603.mail.yahoo.com [128.11.68.167]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with SMTP id JAA12190 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 09:12:22 -0500 (EST) Message-ID: <19990324141352.23478.rocketmail@web603.mail.yahoo.com> Received: from [128.11.68.168] by web603.mail.yahoo.com; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 06:13:52 PST Date: Wed, 24 Mar 1999 06:13:52 -0800 (PST) From: Kate Smith Subject: pig talk To: sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 147 Forward from Wall Street Journal article... > > March 24, 1999 > A-hed > The Hog Farmers' Losses Put > A Butcher Shop on Knife-Edge > By CARL QUINTANILLA > Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL > > > HAUBSTADT, Ind. -- As farmers here saw hog prices plunge > to Depression-era lows this winter, they felt as if salt > were being rubbed in their wounds. For even as they were > losing heavily, somebody down the line -- big meatpackers > or supermarket chains -- seemed to be getting rich on > pigs: The price of pork at the supermarket was staying > about as high as ever. > > > Janet and Tom Dewig > > "These big companies are essentially saying, 'Your goods > are worth $20 -- we'll pay you $4,' " says Tom Dewig, a > local businessman. "That's what our farmers are going > through." > > He knows what he's talking about. His business is Dewig > Meats, a place where hogs waddle in the back, then are > displayed out front a few hours later as ham and sausage. > Mr. Dewig (pronounced DAY-wig) is a meatpacker and a meat > retailer, too. > > But he's not one of those "big companies," for whom > farmers' pain is assumed to be just an abstraction. Mr. > Dewig lives right here in Haubstadt. His delivery truck, > with a pink pig painted on the side, is a familiar sight > as it rumbles through this small town's streets. Dewig > Meats, run by Tom and Janet Dewig, even caters local > picnics. > > Rare Moment > > So what to do? On the one hand, the depressed hog market > presented the chance of a lifetime for them, a historic > "spread" between what they could buy pork for alive and > what they could sell it for dressed. But if the Dewigs > made a killing on this, they knew they were doing it off > the misfortune of hard-working rural neighbors, some of > them on the verge of bankruptcy. And other people would > know it, too. > > Then again, the Dewigs are hard-working themselves, and > they too have their dreams. The couple, both 52 years old, > wanted to expand and remodel the business. "It was > difficult," says Mr. Dewig, as he recalls the family's > deliberations over how to deal with local farmers when the > hog business first fell out of bed. "Prices were an > absolute bargain, but we also had to know in the back of > our head that if we weren't fair, we'd end up paying for > it." > > This isn't the kind of thing that much troubles a big, > publicly held company. It is different when, as Mr. Dewig > says, "I've got to live with these people." > > Except for the 175-year-old Log Inn, said to have once > served Abraham Lincoln, Dewig Meats is about the only > widely known business in Haubstadt, a town of 1,445 set > among the rolling hills of southern Indiana. Dewig has 50 > employees and close to $10 million in annual sales. But it > is also something of an anachronism. As a few companies > like IBP Inc., Excel, Smithfield Foods Inc. and the Swift > & Co. unit of ConAgra Inc. have grabbed most of the > hog-slaughter business, and as supermarket chains have > supplanted local butchers, the independent meat shop with > its own "kill floor" has been getting scarcer. Only about > 1,800 remain, and almost nobody is opening a new one. > Dewig Meats dates from 1916, when Tom's grandfather > started it. > > It is a place where locals take visitors, showing them > displays of special cuts and sausages made from local > livestock. Its following is loyal. "Nothing compares to > what those guys make," says Thomas Chamberlain, a South > Carolina resident who never visits his mother in Haubstadt > without buying a 10-pound box of the Dewigs' frozen > bratwursts to grill at home. > > The Dewigs have made a good living. Their home is a brick > estate with circular driveway, topiary and pig statues. > But they don't take their welcome for granted. Each June > they have a customer-appreciation day, selling bratwurst > for a quarter and giving proceeds to a hospital. ("They > hire extra people just to help park the cars," says City > Clerk Bonnie Wagner.) When the volunteer fire department's > oldest engine, a 1947 Ford, was about to be taken away by > a vintage-truck collector. Mr. Dewig bought it. He gives > schoolchildren rides in it. > > Mr. Dewig typically pays hog farmers the same price as > Excel, a Cargill Inc. unit and the nation's second-largest > meatpacker, which has a large plant down the road. Dewig > Meats can slaughter a mere 200 hogs a week, but some > farmers would rather sell to it than to Excel; that way > they know their produce is served on local dinner tables > and in restaurants. > > And selling to the Dewigs is more personal. The Excel > plant is a fortress-like edifice with a wire fence and > security guards at the gate. At Dewig Meats, a farmer > dropping off livestock can sip coffee with the proprietors > while watching his hogs amble off trailers. (Their next > stop is the kill floor, where a bolt of electricity to the > head kills them, after which half a dozen workers with > knives set to work.) > > The loyalty is such that when hog prices rose two years > ago to a lofty 63 cents a pound, a few farmers offered to > sell to Dewig Meats for about 60 cents. Mr. Dewig wouldn't > accept the discount. "No matter what I said, I couldn't > make him do it," says Joe Knapp, a farmer. "I know he was > losing money on that pork." Large packers also took a > beating in that period. > > That price spike helped fuel a nationwide hog-herd > overexpansion, which began to depress prices last summer. > By August, prices hovered at 30 cents a pound, or about > five cents less than break-even for most growers. > > At his meat shop, Mr. Dewig rushed to a monitor each > morning to check the price of hogs, unable to believe his > eyes. "We'd sit there and look at the thing and say, 'It > can't go any lower.' But it did," he says, shaking his > head. "The next day, we'd say, 'It can't go any lower.' > But it did again." > > Mr. Dewig had always said that no hog should sell for less > than 30 cents a pound. So when the market price dipped > into the mid-20s in September and October, he continued > paying farmers 30, knowing that even at that price, he > could profit handily. By Halloween, though, the price > farmers could get elsewhere was down almost to 20 cents. > Mr. Dewig finally broke his rule and started paying less > than 30 cents. "I lowered my standards," he says. > > When the market price fell into the teens, Mr. Dewig set > himself a new floor: 20 cents a pound. But then, in > mid-December, prices briefly dipped below 10 cents a pound > -- about a 60-year low -- and Mr. Dewig lowered his > standards yet again. Still, on a day when the Excel plant > was offering farmers 11.5 cents a pound, Mr. Dewig offered > a nickel more. > > Losing Big > > Like hog growers all across America, farmers around > Haubstadt were losing megabucks. A 240-pound market-weight > hog that would have brought $140 or so a few years ago was > at one point worth only $25 or $30. Farmers were losing > roughly $50 a head, just when the profitability had > vanished from virtually everything else they could raise. > > But IBP Inc., acquiring hogs at this depressed price, saw > its profits quadruple in the fourth quarter. Besides the > low hog prices, packers benefited from being able to run > their plants at full capacity, and thus efficiently. > Packers lowered wholesale prices somewhat, but they by no > means passed along all their savings. > > Meanwhile, supermarkets, although they had room to cut > pork prices, had scant competitive reason to do so. For > one thing, food shoppers are chiefly sensitive to price > increases, not to price cuts. And in this case, even if > price cuts did spur demand, supermarkets couldn't obtain > more pork to sell, because the packers couldn't kill hogs > any faster. Both industries reject farmers' suspicions of > collusion. > > The Dewigs also fared well: They had the best fourth > quarter in their history. "Our margins went up because > costs were low-plain and simple," Mr. Dewig says. > > He and his wife started celebrating: Pursuing their dream > of expansion, they put $300,000 into new freezers and > slaughtering equipment. They are planning a $1.6 million > improvement to the store's retail front, expanding the > 60-foot refrigerator case, which holds a mother lode of > rib-eye steaks, pork chops and smoked jowl. This month, > the Dewigs missed the installation of a new smokehouse > because they were on a cruise to Barbados. The meat > business "has been good to me," Mr. Dewig says. "Real, > real good." > > 'Good Guy' > > For his hog-farmer neighbors, the above-market prices > Dewig Meats paid helped ease both losses and resentment. > "He's fair," says Ray Rexing, who has sold hogs to Mr. > Dewig since 1970. > > Mr. Knapp is of two minds. Mr. Dewig "understands we're > losing our a___ and he's making money faster than he can > rake it in," the farmer says. But the next moment, he > recalls the losses Mr. Dewig himself took two or three > years ago when hog farmers were doing well, and calls him > a "dang good guy." > > Talk of farmers throwing their hands in the air in > frustration elicits only understanding from Mr. Dewig. > "Where would your hands be?" he says. "Some were out of > humor, and rightfully so." Still, inside the shop, > farmers' plight has created tension with customers, who > sometimes "look at you like it was your fault," says Mrs. > Dewig. > > To convince farmers of its support, Dewig Meats advertised > that it would sell pork items at special prices every > week. One week, while supermarkets charged $1.99 a pound > for pork loin, Dewig Meats sold it for 99 cents. "I've > never heard of anyone else doing 99 cents a pound," says > Steve Pohl, another local farmer. > > Hog prices have rebounded a bit. Some economists expect > them to get back above 35 cents a pound later this year, > which would narrow farmers' losses and meatpackers' and > meat retailers' profits. Mr. Dewig says nothing will have > changed between him and his suppliers, some of them > friends since grade school. He says he is pleased with > "the way I've treated these farmers. ... And I'm sure they > are, too." > > > -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- > URL for this Article: > http://interactive.wsj.com/archive/retrieve.cgi?id=SB922228266738209342.djm > > -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- > > > Copyright © 1999 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights > Reserved. > Printing, distribution, and use of this material is > governed by your Subscription Agreement and copyright > laws. > === ------------------ Kate A. Smith, Ph.D. Vice President AUS Consultants, Inc. 155 Gaither Drive Moorestown, NJ 08057 609-234-9200 _________________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Get your free @yahoo.com address at http://mail.yahoo.com To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Wed Mar 24 11:56:46 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id LAA04927 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 11:56:45 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id LAA16721 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 11:00:39 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from goose.prod.itd.earthlink.net (goose.prod.itd.earthlink.net [207.217.120.18]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id LAA16701 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 11:00:34 -0500 (EST) From: gardenbetty@earthlink.net Received: from earthlink.net (ip204.laurel.md.pub-ip.psi.net [38.30.235.204]) by goose.prod.itd.earthlink.net (8.8.7/8.8.5) with ESMTP id IAA18386 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 08:00:32 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <36F90C15.BAAE936B@earthlink.net> Date: Wed, 24 Mar 1999 11:00:25 -0500 Reply-To: gardenbetty@earthlink.net X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.07 (Macintosh; U; 68K) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Sustainable Ag List Subject: Re: Marx, let each choose her own heroes Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 148 Dan Worley wrote: >Karl Marx is not a "Hero" I would want to be quoting! In every country >where his theories and ideas were implemented or were even tried and >discarded, the level of "exploitation" was much more severe than any you >will find in any capitalistic society. While the largest implementation of Marx's theories left much to be desired, it does not logically follow that the essential idea was flawed. In fact, everywhere his ideas where tried, the "ruling parties" (which in itself is antithetical to true communism) never let social equality and collective economics really happen. It was forced upon many, without their input, which is also antithetical to an egalitarian society. To my mind, Marxism and communism have never truly happened on a national scale. However, the threat that they might was enough to create the Red Scare, the Arms Race, the Cold War, and other nasty skeletons in our collective national closet. It seems there might be greater exploitation in fighting communism than in letting it truly come to fruition. However on a local scale, cooperative economics have a long history of success, longer in fact than capitalism. Without trying to spark another debate on capitalism, it seems that capitalism is inherently unsustainable and will ultimately be short-lived (in human history terms) because of (as John Ikerd so eloquently pointed out) its failure to take full cost accounting and to assign true value to our environment, relationships, resources and labor. You can witness this unsustainability manifested all around you. As to alternatives: Barter, for example, is more widespread in my neck of the woods than capital exchange. May I also point out Ithaca Hours and the LETS system. Also the flourishing intentional secular and religious communities movement which has functioned largely outside of the capitalist system for over a century. And the worker-owned cooperatives that have existed globally for a very long time. Worker-owned cooperatives are showing a reemergence here, in fact. Many announcements of such forming have crossed my desk in the past two years or so. I have worked on two in my life; one that publishes a monthly newsjournal in D.C. and another that sews organic cotton clothing. Now I live and work developing cooperative, diversified, agrarian businesses, in the city and on our own land. I should also add that I live in an intentional secular community, a "commune;" we have our own consensus-based economy which extends outward to the larger farm community we live in. We collaborate on all business decisions, barter eggs, honey, veggies, fruit, medicinal herbs, carpentry services, machine repair, you name it. When we do use money, $10 per hour is the common standard for all skilled work (that means farming, among other things), no more, no less. This doesn't mean that we don't participate in the capitalist system at all—that would be impossible living in the US! What it does mean is that we are shifting the paradigm in our own homes and communities based upon models and theories (including Marx) available to us, and so far (the past 25 years) it has been an unmitigated success. I don't think I want to work "under" or "over" anyone again. Even in the most benign of ways. My personal hero is Emma Goldman ;) -- dawn aka gardenbetty We will be known by the tracks we leave behind... —Dakota proverb To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Wed Mar 24 11:57:55 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id LAA04993 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 11:57:55 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id KAA26869 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 10:29:30 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from po3.wam.umd.edu (po3.wam.umd.edu [128.8.10.165]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id KAA26842 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 10:29:25 -0500 (EST) Received: from [129.2.68.82] (aglifesurge-82.umd.edu [129.2.68.82]) by po3.wam.umd.edu (8.9.3/8.9.0.Beta6) with SMTP id KAA01307; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 10:29:24 -0500 (EST) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 1999 10:29:24 -0500 (EST) X-Sender: vberton@pop.wam.umd.edu Message-Id: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu From: vberton@wam.umd.edu (Valerie Berton) Subject: Fwd: Keep America Growing Conference Announcement Cc: sdavis@farmland.org Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 149 > CONFERENCE ANNOUNCEMENT > KEEP AMERICA GROWING CONFERENCE: > BALANCING WORKING LANDS AND DEVELOPMENT > June 6-9, 1999 > Philadelphia, PA > >A cross section of public officials and professionals from fields as >diverse as transportation, rural and urban development, agricultural, >ranching, forestry, housing, and environmental conservation will join >together for Keep America Growing, a conference dedicated to striking >the balance between working lands and development. The conference, >which will be held June 6-9, 1999 at the Adams Mark Hotel in >Philadelphia, presents a unique opportunity to define a common agenda >between people whose paths might not normally cross. > >Keep America Growing will feature over 150 presentations on land use >issues including keynote and panel addresses by nationally acclaimed >experts in growth management. Participants from across the country will >network and share ideas on topics such as land use and population >trends, the impact of unplanned growth, successful programs that balance >development and land use, and the urban-rural connection. Participants >will walk away with the necessary tools and networks to take action in >their own communities. > >Speakers include leaders from the fields of policy, agriculture, >conservation, development and politics. Invited speakers include Vice >President Al Gore, New Jersey Governor Christine Todd Whitman, >Pennsylvania Governor Thomas Ridge, and other nationally known leaders. > >The conference also will offer regional workshops facilitated by The >Pinchot Institute for Conservation to understand issues on a regional >basis and to promote networking. The conference begins on Sunday with 10 >pre-conference technical and recreational field trips. > >For complete information and latest updates, visit the conference >website at www.farmland.org/KAG.html. Visit the website or contact Cindy >Delaney at 802-655-7769 or by e-mail at delaney@together.net , to >request a conference registration brochure. To register, visit the >website or click 'registration form', print it, and mail it in, or fill >out the registration brochure. > >The conference provides an excellent forum to display new >industry-related products and information. A number of exhibit and >sponsorship opportunities are still available. To find out how you can >get involved contact Cindy Delaney at 802-655-7769 or by e-mail at >delaney@together.net. > To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Wed Mar 24 13:22:12 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id NAA07419 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 13:22:12 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id KAA08350 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 10:49:44 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from imo27.mx.aol.com (imo27.mx.aol.com [198.81.17.71]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id KAA08313 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 10:49:38 -0500 (EST) From: DGreen47@aol.com Received: from DGreen47@aol.com by imo27.mx.aol.com (IMOv19.3) id 7VFWa13701 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 10:47:45 -0500 (EST) Message-ID: <94586c0c.36f90921@aol.com> Date: Wed, 24 Mar 1999 10:47:45 EST To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Mime-Version: 1.0 Subject: Homesteading Workshop Weekend Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit X-Mailer: AOL 4.0 for Windows 95 sub 4 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 150 WHEN: June 18-20, 1999 WHERE: Ash Grove Community Farm, Corning NY WHAT: Buncha workshops. Want to teach one? I've got professionals coming in, too. I'll teach some, but not all! Possible workshops include the following. Vote now! Fencing Field Shelters Goats Poultry Grants CSA Creation & Maintenance Organic gardening Certification Marketing Wildcrafting Garden structures Old house repair Making herbal products Private-label sales Farm markets Market gardening (not always the same as organic gardening) Instant garden with permanent raised beds Agro-forestry Animal rescue Field trips to a meat goat farm, Draper Super Bee Apiary, a goat dairy, a cement statue manufacturer, a u-pick strawberry farm (ice cream, anyone?) and a very successful diversified farm/greenhouse/ice cream parlor business. If it's worth an extra $10 to enough folks, I can hire my friend Ed and his team to take y'all on the one-hour "around the block" tour. He requires $300 for an afternoon (includes all of the exhorbitant insurances). Anybody who takes the accommodations option and wishes to do so may add a day or two to the beginning or end of the weekend for $50 per day (including meals), in order to enjoy the many attractions of this area. We need to know right away if folks want to do this. If we get at least ten (and they have room), accommodations will be at Watson Homestead Conference and Retreat Center near Corning. If they're full by the time we get their minimum number assembled, we'll find someplace else -- we're blessed with quite a few options! HOW MUCH: $200 with meals and hotel-type accommodations Fri. & Sat. nights $150 with meals and hotel-type accommodations Sat. night only $100 with meals if you find your own accommodations $50 if you find your own accommodations and provide own meals $100 deposit required ASAP to reserve accommodations. Dori Green Ash Grove Community Farm & Center for Sustainable Living Corning, NY http://www.agrove.com To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Wed Mar 24 13:45:54 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id NAA08146 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 13:45:54 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id MAA28807 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 12:14:26 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id MAA28726 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 12:14:21 -0500 (EST) Received: from enaila.nidlink.com (root@enaila.nidlink.com [216.18.128.8]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id MAA27946 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 12:14:19 -0500 (EST) Received: from benbrook.nidlink.com (pm5-28.nidlink.com [216.18.141.35]) by enaila.nidlink.com (8.9.0/8.9.0) with SMTP id JAA08858 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 09:14:18 -0800 (PST) Message-Id: <2.2.32.19990324173738.0095fe6c@mail.nidlink.com> X-Sender: benbrook@mail.nidlink.com X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Pro Version 2.2 (32) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Wed, 24 Mar 1999 09:37:38 -0800 To: sanet-mg@amani.ces.ncsu.edu From: Charles Benbrook Subject: RR Beans, Alfalfa and Plant Back Restrictions Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 151 There are no crop rotation or plant back restrictions associated with any uses of Roundup, whether with a GMO variety or not. Roundup breaks down quickly and is not persistent, which is why it must be applied two or three times in most RR systems. The information on restrictions against planting alfalfa (or many other rotation crops, cover crops and grasses/legumes) probably was in reference to imidazolinone or sulfonylurea resistant corn or beans varieties. These products typically have a 12 month or more crop rotation restriction, in some cases, much more (see below). Some major soybean herbicides by class associated with GMOs and some of the crop-rotation or plant-back restrictions are briefly reviewed below. Soybean herbicide percent acres treated data are from USDA/NASS, for 1997. Plant back, crop rotation restrictions are from pages 143 to 168, section on soybeans, in "Weed Control Manual," Meister publication, Vol. 31, 1998. Sulfonylureas Chlorimuron-ethyl (Classic), 13% national soybean acres treated. Plant back depends on soil Ph and region, have to see the label, but is surely 12 to 24 months or longer for most crops. Sulfentrazone+chlorimuron-ethyl (Authority), new product, market-share unknown. Canola, beets, 30 months. Alfalfa, sorghum, 42 months. (Recall one reason the low doses work is because of the chemical' persistence; persistence=longer plant back restrictions, and more undiagnosed (and diagnosed) crop injury when, for one reason or another, herbicide residues in the soil take longer to break down than "normal"). Sulfentrazone (Cover). New product. Alfalfa, 12 months. Many other crops 12-18 months, and rest, 30 months. Imidazolinone Imazaquin (Scepter), 13% acres treated. Most crops, 18 months (include alfalfa). Sugar beets, 24 months. Imazethapyr (Pursuit), 38% acres treated (average rate of only 0.05 pounds a.i. per acre). Potatoes, 26 months. Sweet corn, 18 months. All other crops 40 months after application. (So much for cover crops, small grain rotations, alfalfa, etc, on 1/3 of soybean acres). Clomazone (Command). 5% acres treated. No crop rotation until 16 months after planting in Northern U.S., 12 months elsewhere. Clearly, some herbicide tolerant plant varieties are going to cause some serious localized problems. Application rates tend to be a bit higher, and repeat applications are much more common in herbicide tolerant programs. One reason -- herbicide/GMO-seed companies are, in effect, guaranteeing "satisfactory" weed control, and give growers the chemical needed for later season resprays. These extend the crop rotation restrictions, but more worrisome, can lead to runoff following an early summer thunderstorm. Imagine what a little of these herbicides will do to that nice new grassed waterway, or grass filter strip, half or 3/4 paid for with public dollars, as runoff flows over the newly established grass stand. Also, expanded use of these technologies will lead to more problems among neighbors when either drift, runoff, or volatization (and drift) lead to herbicide injury in nearby fields. chuck Charles Benbrook 208-263-5236 (voice) Benbrook Consulting Services 208-263-7342 (fax) 5085 Upper Pack River Road benbrook@hillnet.com [e-mail] Sandpoint, Idaho 83864 http://www.pmac.net To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Wed Mar 24 13:50:34 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id NAA08323 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 13:50:34 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id LAA09352 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 11:39:21 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from hil-img-8.compuserve.com (hil-img-8.compuserve.com [149.174.177.138]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id LAA09289 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 11:39:15 -0500 (EST) Received: (from mailgate@localhost) by hil-img-8.compuserve.com (8.8.6/8.8.6/2.18) id LAA24175 for sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 11:38:45 -0500 (EST) Date: Wed, 24 Mar 1999 11:35:26 -0500 From: BILL DUESING <71042.2023@compuserve.com> Subject: Deserves a profit? To: SANET-mg Message-ID: <199903241138_MC2-6F19-7E3F@compuserve.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: A X-Keywords: X-UID: 152 Daniel wrote " The capitalist (owner) who puts his/her money at risk investing it in what ever venture, deserves a reasonable profit for his investment and effort." What ever venture? Guns, drugs, tobacco, nuclear energy, agricultural and societal poisons, perverted entertainment and junk food? How does anyone DESERVE a reasonable profit on those ventures? It is in choosing what we will do and what we will not do that we can make a reasonable future. Unless we include social and health (human and ecosystem) costs and Second Law efficiency along with economic considerations, capitalism (especially when corporate-controlled and government-subsidized) looks to be terminally destructive. Bill Duesing To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Wed Mar 24 13:59:59 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id NAA08487 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 13:59:58 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id LAA13121 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 11:50:35 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from lima.epix.net (lima.epix.net [199.224.64.56]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id LAA13070 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 11:50:30 -0500 (EST) Received: from epix.net (qrvl-67ppp235.epix.net [199.224.67.235]) by lima.epix.net (8.9.3/8.9.3/1999032301/Philippe Levan) with ESMTP id LAA13754; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 11:50:21 -0500 (EST) Message-ID: <36F91846.4410FD46@epix.net> Date: Wed, 24 Mar 1999 11:52:22 -0500 From: Steve Groff Reply-To: sgroff@epix.net Organization: Cedar Meadow Farm X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.51 [en] (Win95; I) X-Accept-Language: en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: valerie frances CC: sanet-mg-digest@ces.ncsu.edu Subject: Re: A New Perspective on Agriculture References: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: A X-Keywords: X-UID: 153 valerie frances wrote: > "When conditions are ripe for it, these suburban lots could quickly be > developed into mini-farms, either as home-based businesses or as a > source of much good food for the family living there. That sort of > flexibility, coupled with broad-based ownership of prime agricultural > land in the form of suburban lots, may turn out to be a very lucky and > important break at a moment when we need one badly." > Anyone interested in seeing this type of agriculture first hand should go to Japan. I was there a year ago and was amazed at the intensity of food producing plots. Not a single square foot is wasted! Even in the downtown areas in of Tokyo there were plots as small as 4x5 ft that had veggies growing in them. There is no grass for yards *anywhere* near the population centers. It is considered a waste of resourses not to grow food in open spaces. Even at major interchanges on the highways they have planted the whole area in vegetables. Steve Groff. -- "New Generation Cropping Systems": the cutting edge of sustainable agriculture http://www.cedarmeadowfarm.com Steve Groff Cedar Meadow Farm 679 Hilldale Rd Holtwood PA 17532 USA Ph. 717-284-5152 To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Wed Mar 24 19:23:43 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id TAA17140 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 19:23:43 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id SAA05892 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 18:17:42 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from dfw-ix2.ix.netcom.com (dfw-ix2.ix.netcom.com [206.214.98.2]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id SAA05790 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 18:17:37 -0500 (EST) Received: (from smap@localhost) by dfw-ix2.ix.netcom.com (8.8.4/8.8.4) id RAA21944; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 17:14:49 -0600 (CST) Received: from bsg-ma1-37.ix.netcom.com(209.110.249.37) by dfw-ix2.ix.netcom.com via smap (V1.3) id rma021904; Wed Mar 24 17:14:12 1999 Message-ID: <00a201be764b$cad2f400$25f96ed1@guldann.ix.netcom.com> Reply-To: "Dan Hook" From: "Dan Hook" To: , "valerie frances" Cc: Subject: Re: A New Perspective on Agriculture Date: Wed, 24 Mar 1999 18:12:27 -0500 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.72.3115.0 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.3110.3 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 154 >I think more people in suburbia should grow their own garden, they'd probably be amazed at how good everything taste. However as someone who owns a smallish big farm 85 acres located in suburbia I do not see farms being replaced by houses as a blessing. Keep in mind our 85 acres is about 1/2 1/2 open and wooded and is home to various wildlife including wet lands. I always feel very sad when I see a field replaced by houses. Beth > >valerie frances wrote: > >> "When conditions are ripe for it, these suburban lots could quickly be >> developed into mini-farms, either as home-based businesses or as a >> source of much good food for the family living there. That sort of >> flexibility, coupled with broad-based ownership of prime agricultural >> land in the form of suburban lots, may turn out to be a very lucky and >> important break at a moment when we need one badly." >> > >Anyone interested in seeing this type of agriculture first hand should go to Japan. I was there a year ago and was amazed at the intensity of food producing plots. Not a single square foot is wasted! Even in the downtown areas in of Tokyo there were plots as small as 4x5 ft that had veggies growing in >them. There is no grass for yards *anywhere* near the population centers. It is considered a waste of resourses not to grow food in open spaces. Even at major interchanges on the highways they have planted the whole area in vegetables. > >Steve Groff. >-- >"New Generation Cropping Systems": the cutting edge of sustainable agriculture >http://www.cedarmeadowfarm.com >Steve Groff >Cedar Meadow Farm >679 Hilldale Rd >Holtwood PA 17532 USA >Ph. 717-284-5152 > > > >To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command >"unsubscribe sanet-mg". >To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command >"subscribe sanet-mg-digest". > >All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: >http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail > To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Wed Mar 24 21:05:53 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id VAA18955 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 21:05:52 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id UAA20032 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 20:13:52 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from scaup.prod.itd.earthlink.net (scaup.prod.itd.earthlink.net [207.217.120.49]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id UAA19933 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 20:13:45 -0500 (EST) From: gardenbetty@earthlink.net Received: from earthlink.net (ip111.laurel.md.pub-ip.psi.net [38.30.235.111]) by scaup.prod.itd.earthlink.net (8.8.7/8.8.5) with ESMTP id RAA24377 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 17:13:37 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <36F98DB4.F22EC3C1@earthlink.net> Date: Wed, 24 Mar 1999 20:13:25 -0500 Reply-To: gardenbetty@earthlink.net X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.07 (Macintosh; U; 68K) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Sustainable Ag List Subject: Re: a new perspective on agriculture Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 155 valerie frances wrote: > "When conditions are ripe for it, these suburban lots could quickly be > developed into mini-farms, either as home-based businesses or as a > source of much good food for the family living there. That sort of > flexibility, coupled with broad-based ownership of prime agricultural > land in the form of suburban lots, may turn out to be a very lucky and > important break at a moment when we need one badly." > then steve groff wrote: >Anyone interested in seeing this type of agriculture first hand should go to Japan. I was >there a year ago and was amazed at the intensity of >food producing plots. Not a single square foot is wasted! Even in the downtown areas in >of Tokyo there were plots as small as 4x5 ft that had >veggies growing in them. There is no grass for yards *anywhere* near the population >centers. It is considered a waste of resourses not to grow food in open >spaces. Even at major interchanges on the highways they have planted the whole area in >vegetables. When I was in South Korea a few years ago the phenomenon was the same. Even at the gas stations, bitter melon grew on wires up the sides of the pumps! All public landscaping was edible and people cultivated in every square inch of available space they had access to. Old women would dry, grind and process chili peppers into paste right on the sidewalks! I felt like I had come to the gardeners mecca! Since N and S Korea are very mountainous and have little arable land, this urban agriculture is essential. I have seen statistics that say as much as 95% of all food is produced in the cities of Japan, Korea and China. In the US, that number is less than 1/2 of a %. Hmmmm... -- dawn aka gardenbetty We will be known by the tracks we leave behind... —Dakota proverb To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Thu Mar 25 08:58:20 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id IAA25520 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 08:58:20 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id HAA04083 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 07:50:27 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from mail.caribe.net (root@mail.caribe.net [209.91.196.5]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id HAA03951 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 07:50:19 -0500 (EST) Received: from ddworley (ppp223.203dip.netdial.caribe.net [209.91.203.223]) by mail.caribe.net (8.9.0/8.9.0) with SMTP id IAA19274; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 08:53:28 -0400 (AST) Message-Id: X-Sender: ddworley@mail.caribe.net X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Pro Version 4.0 Date: Thu, 25 Mar 1999 08:45:11 -0400 To: BILL DUESING <71042.2023@compuserve.com>, SANET-mg From: Daniel Worley Subject: Re: Deserves a profit? In-Reply-To: <199903241138_MC2-6F19-7E3F@compuserve.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 156 At 11:35 3/24/99 -0500, BILL DUESING wrote: >What ever venture? Guns, drugs, tobacco, nuclear energy, agricultural and >societal poisons, perverted entertainment and junk food? > >How does anyone DESERVE a reasonable profit on those ventures? I am not going to place myself in the position of deciding for the entire nation what business a person may or may not engage in. I have my own priorities and spend my money on those items I choose. If I have a problem with a specific product or product line, and I feel it is something so bad it should be banned, I can contact my representatives in government and lobby for the laws to be changed. But don't jump on my case for not being specific about the business type! Your interests might be better served by looking at what I was suggesting we attempt to ban; exploitation of prison labor. Exploitation of prison labor for the profit of any private business is immoral! Probably just as immoral as selling illicit drugs to grammar school kids. But, if as an adult, I should choose to use tobacco or alcohol (both of which were still legal the last time I checked), I don't want some "do-gooder" telling me I can't. And for those who think socialism is a better way than capitalism, I think you can now purchase an airline ticket to Cuba; one way. --Dan in Sunny Puerto Rico-- dan.worley@mindless.com To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Thu Mar 25 10:12:49 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id KAA27213 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 10:12:48 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id JAA22552 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 09:13:01 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id JAA22459 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 09:12:56 -0500 (EST) Received: from billman.kuntrynet.com (billman.kuntrynet.com [207.40.85.3]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id JAA04657 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 09:12:54 -0500 (EST) Received: from greg (tnt-13-13.kuntrynet.com [207.40.95.205]) by billman.kuntrynet.com (8.8.5/8.6.9) with ESMTP id JAA30986; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 09:48:24 -0500 Message-Id: <199903251448.JAA30986@billman.kuntrynet.com> From: "Greg & Lei Gunthorp" To: , "Charles Benbrook" Subject: Re: RR Beans, Alfalfa and Plant Back Restrictions Date: Thu, 25 Mar 1999 09:11:31 -0500 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Priority: 3 X-Mailer: Microsoft Internet Mail 4.70.1155 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 157 This post brings up a point that they were discussing on WGN radio, Chicago yesterday on the noon show. They were talking about the EPA potentially regulating GMO's. Now I can see in an instance that just because we put the chemical in the plant that it does not imply that it is safe. Is it surprising that they didn't see it that way on the radio? I was going to call them and ask does that mean it would be safe to genetically engineer a plant to produce 12 tons/acre of DDT? Best wishes, Greg Gunthorp's Pasture-ized Pork LaGrange, Indiana visit our farm at www.grassfarmer.com ---------- > From: Charles Benbrook > To: sanet-mg@amani.ces.ncsu.edu > Subject: RR Beans, Alfalfa and Plant Back Restrictions > Date: Wednesday, March 24, 1999 12:37 PM > > There are no crop rotation or plant back restrictions associated > with any uses of Roundup, whether with a GMO variety or not. Roundup breaks > down quickly and is not persistent, which is why it must be applied two or > three times in most RR systems. > > The information on restrictions against planting alfalfa (or many > other rotation crops, cover crops and grasses/legumes) probably was in > reference to imidazolinone or sulfonylurea resistant corn or beans > varieties. These products typically have a 12 month or more crop rotation > restriction, in some cases, much more (see below). > > Some major soybean herbicides by class associated with GMOs and some > of the crop-rotation or plant-back restrictions are briefly reviewed below. > Soybean herbicide percent acres treated data are from USDA/NASS, for 1997. > Plant back, crop rotation restrictions are from pages 143 to 168, section on > soybeans, in "Weed Control Manual," Meister publication, Vol. 31, 1998. > > Sulfonylureas > > Chlorimuron-ethyl (Classic), 13% national soybean acres treated. Plant back > depends on soil Ph and region, have to see the label, but is surely 12 to 24 > months or longer for most crops. > > Sulfentrazone+chlorimuron-ethyl (Authority), new product, market-share > unknown. Canola, beets, 30 months. Alfalfa, sorghum, 42 months. (Recall > one reason the low doses work is because of the chemical' persistence; > persistence=longer plant back restrictions, and more undiagnosed (and > diagnosed) crop injury when, for one reason or another, herbicide residues > in the soil take longer to break down than "normal"). > > Sulfentrazone (Cover). New product. Alfalfa, 12 months. Many other crops > 12-18 months, and rest, 30 months. > > Imidazolinone > > Imazaquin (Scepter), 13% acres treated. Most crops, 18 months (include > alfalfa). Sugar beets, 24 months. > > Imazethapyr (Pursuit), 38% acres treated (average rate of only 0.05 pounds > a.i. per acre). Potatoes, 26 months. Sweet corn, 18 months. All other > crops 40 months after application. (So much for cover crops, small grain > rotations, alfalfa, etc, on 1/3 of soybean acres). > > Clomazone (Command). 5% acres treated. No crop rotation until 16 months > after planting in Northern U.S., 12 months elsewhere. > > Clearly, some herbicide tolerant plant varieties are going to cause > some serious localized problems. Application rates tend to be a bit higher, > and repeat applications are much more common in herbicide tolerant programs. > One reason -- herbicide/GMO-seed companies are, in effect, guaranteeing > "satisfactory" weed control, and give growers the chemical needed for later > season resprays. These extend the crop rotation restrictions, but more > worrisome, can lead to runoff following an early summer thunderstorm. > Imagine what a little of these herbicides will do to that nice new grassed > waterway, or grass filter strip, half or 3/4 paid for with public dollars, > as runoff flows over the newly established grass stand. Also, expanded use > of these technologies will lead to more problems among neighbors when either > drift, runoff, or volatization (and drift) lead to herbicide injury in > nearby fields. > > chuck > > > > > > > > > > > > Charles Benbrook 208-263-5236 (voice) > Benbrook Consulting Services 208-263-7342 (fax) > 5085 Upper Pack River Road benbrook@hillnet.com [e-mail] > Sandpoint, Idaho 83864 http://www.pmac.net > > > To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command > "unsubscribe sanet-mg". > To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command > "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". > > All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: > http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Thu Mar 25 10:46:42 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id KAA27877 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 10:46:41 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id JAA12972 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 09:48:22 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from supermail.globaldialog.com (root@pop.globaldialog.com [156.46.122.14]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id JAA12924 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 09:48:16 -0500 (EST) Received: from LOCALNAME (wtn40tc4.gdinet.com [156.46.27.169]) by supermail.globaldialog.com (8.9.1/8.9.1) with SMTP id IAA02254; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 08:47:18 -0600 (CST) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 1999 08:47:18 -0600 (CST) Message-Id: <199903251447.IAA02254@supermail.globaldialog.com> X-Sender: prairiedf@pop.globaldialog.com X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Version 1.4.5 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" To: Daniel Worley , sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu From: prairiedf@globaldialog.com (Greg David) Subject: A New Perspective of... Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 158 Hi All, Earlier Dan Wrote: > Capitalism may not be a great system, but it is the best that has been >devised by man thus far. And in its pure form, it is based on a worker >being paid "an honest day's pay for an honest day's work". The capitalist >(owner) who puts his/her money at risk investing it in what ever venture, >deserves a reasonable profit for his investment and effort. A lot of >people have attempted over the years to define "reasonable" in the above >context and have come up short. I do not intend to go there myself. > I don't agree that capitalism is the best that has been devised so far. It is certainly the most powerful. Capitalism has ruthlessly conquered any system that has had resources to plunder. Some of these systems have had a better way of existence than what capitalism is providing. We simply haven't heard about, or thought about it, or cared to think about, because evidence of previous cultures has been destroyed or pushed aside by capitalistic public relations(PR). Plus, it's too cosy in our pleasant capitalistic system to worry about such tedious details. The reason you perceive capitalism to be the best system that has been devised so far, is because it's great economic engines are being fueled by consumption of natural and social capital. As long as we have natural capital to consume and the waste generated by this system does not foul our own nest, then the capitalistic system works(unless your one of those being socially exploited)(ask the Ecquadorian Indians what they think about capitalism). However, when the natural capital runs out, and the filth of polution sicken even the highest in the capitalistic system, then the ways of capitalism will be laid bare, and the truth, will be known...capitalism is a failure too. For any system to function, it first of all, has to be a democracy. We no longer have that here. We have an oligarchy, or as Jim Hightower likes to say, 'A cleptocracy...Government by Thieves". Capitalism, socialism, communism and any other 'ism', will not work unless it is based in democracy! The experiments based on Carl Marx's work were not democratic, and they failed. But that does not mean that a democratic form of socialism could not work. And I'm not saying that is what I endorse. I think a democratic capitalistic system, that is held accountable for it's action could be a very pausible for of government. But that is not what we have now! We have no accountability. The faster you can exploit, the better. Our world is being stolen undying mega-oligarchies, known as corporations. With no concsience, only profit as a motive, and more influence in government than my Senators, they become perpetrators of an irresponsible form of capitalism that is degenerating into a form of tyranny that we may be unable to recover from. I hope I'm wrong...but I don't think so. Greg To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Thu Mar 25 11:13:18 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id LAA28513 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 11:13:18 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id KAA22511 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 10:03:36 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id KAA22483 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 10:03:31 -0500 (EST) Received: from ccshst09.cs.uoguelph.ca (ccshst09.cs.uoguelph.ca [131.104.96.18]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id KAA05840 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 10:03:29 -0500 (EST) Received: from csnet.nw.uoguelph.ca (csnet.nw.uoguelph.ca [131.104.232.2]) by ccshst09.cs.uoguelph.ca (8.8.6/8.8.6) with ESMTP id KAA27621 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 10:03:29 -0500 (EST) Received: from CSNET/MAILQ by csnet.nw.uoguelph.ca (Mercury 1.43); 25 Mar 99 10:08:55 GMT-5 Received: from MAILQ by CSNET (Mercury 1.43); 25 Mar 99 10:08:30 GMT-5 From: "E. Ann Clark, Associate Professor" Organization: Plant Agriculture, Univ. of Guelph To: Date: Thu, 25 Mar 1999 10:08:29 EST Subject: Re: RR Beans, Alfalfa and Plant Back Restrictions In-reply-to: <199903251448.JAA30986@billman.kuntrynet.com> X-mailer: Pegasus Mail for Windows (v2.54) Message-ID: <120923874D4@csnet.nw.uoguelph.ca> Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 159 Greg and others: I am a bit confused on this issue of Roundup and carryover effects. In Caroline Cox' review article on glyphosate in J. Pesticide Reform, she makes reference to possible carryover effects on succeeding lettuce and I think it was carrot crops. I remember checking with colleagues, including weed scientists, each of whom said that it was impossible because Roundup degraded almost instantly. So, of course, being myself, I had to look it up and sure enough, Roundup doesn't degrade instantly. It is bound to soil particles, so doesn't "move", but has a half-life in soil of something like 50 to 300 days, depending on soil type and moisture. It remains physiologically active, but soil-bound, where some have reported effects on soil organisms etc. So, I filed this all away mentally until last week, when a colleague reported on an unusual seminar he'd heard. Apparently a farmer-breeder of potatoes in PEI had grown some GMO potatoes for a major Canadian potato concern. The GE was not for Roundup Resistance (RR), but for Bt, if I recall correctly. But for some reason, he decided to spray Roundup on the potatoes and what do you know, they were RR. Then, being a farmer, he had the foresight to retain the tubers and plant them out the next year. The tubers which had grown on plants sprayed with Roundup the previous year had very weak emergence and poor seedling growth. Reportedly (and I don't know this to be true, as I'm getting this all second hand), the tubers had accumulated the Roundup, which acted to suppress or retard growth when the tubers were planted out the following year. I do not know if he had the tubers tested for this, or surmised it. This is rather intriguing. I'm wondering if anyone has seen studies on the metabolic fate of glyphosate (and the various "inerts" such as POEA) which are in Roundup) WITHIN the soybean or canola plant after it has been sprayed? Could it stay there compartmentalized in the seed, as in the apparent tuber example, and affect germination and growth the following year? What happens to you and me when we eat grain, vegetable oil, or french fries made from plant parts which have accumulated glyphosate (if indeed, this happens)? Could this be a factor in the 50% increase in soybean-related allergies recently reported by a lab at York University in the UK? They reportedly tested 4500 people for potential vegetable-related allergies (using blood antibody levels as the indicator, coupled with other symptoms) and for the first time in 17 years, soybean was in the top 10 species causing allergic responses in people. They do not know the soybeans to be GMO, but it seems likely as they were not segregated at source and the trial was conducted last year. Ann ACLARK@plant.uoguelph.ca Dr. E. Ann Clark Associate Professor Crop Science University of Guelph Guelph, ON N1G 2W1 Phone: 519-824-4120 Ext. 2508 FAX: 519 763-8933 http://www.oac.uoguelph.ca/www/CRSC/faculty/eac.htm To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Thu Mar 25 13:31:23 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id NAA05312 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 13:31:23 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id MAA12785 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 12:16:37 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from hevanet.com (root@hevanet.com [198.5.254.1]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id MAA12733 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 12:16:31 -0500 (EST) Received: from [198.5.254.205] (st-ppp31.hevanet.com [198.5.254.205]) by hevanet.com (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id JAA08955; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 09:16:21 -0800 (PST) Message-Id: <199903251716.JAA08955@hevanet.com> X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express for Macintosh - 4.01 (295) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 1999 09:18:32 -0800 Subject: FW: Growers' Group to Work With USDA Seed Banks From: "Lon J. Rombough" To: AGRISYNERGY , SANET , Organic Gardening Discussion List CC: Bargyla Rateaver Mime-version: 1.0 X-Priority: 3 Content-type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 160 ---------- From: "ARS News Service" To: "ARS News List" Subject: Growers' Group to Work With USDA Seed Banks Date: Thu, Mar 25, 1999, 6:47 AM STORY LEAD: Growers' Group to Work With USDA Seed Banks ----------- ARS News Service Agricultural Research Service, USDA March 25, 1999 Jim De Quattro, (301) 504-1626, jdequattro@asrr.arsusda.gov ----------- A budding cooperative project of researchers, organic growers and others that begins this week could help replenish the nation's seed banks. More important, it could create market opportunities for new public and heirloom crop varieties. The Agricultural Research Service, USDA's chief scientific agency, maintains the National Plant Germplasm System. Its 27 repositories now hold about 437,000 specimens of germplasm--seed, cuttings and other tissue. Thousands of accessions are added each year. Researchers worldwide use the germplasm to breed crops with improved yield, nutrition, resistance to pests, disease and environmental stress or other traits. ARS is cooperating with the Farmer Cooperative Genome Project to test a new way for organic growers, farmer cooperatives and small seed companies to tap into this storehouse of genetic diversity. FCGP members will grow fresh supplies of germplasm, following NPGS guidelines. These ensure, for example, that regenerated seed is true to type--not contaminated by pollen from nearby crops of the same species. FCGP members will also develop marketable new varieties from germplasm they may never have known about otherwise. For example, an ARS repository in Corvallis, Ore., has more than 400 heirloom pear varieties. In Pullman, Wash., ARS maintains more than 200 lines of garlic. These represent most of the crop's genetic diversity. Only a few varieties account for nearly all commercial production, according to horticulturist Richard Hannan. He's based at ARS' Western Regional Plant Introduction Station in Pullman. On March 27-28 in Salem, Ore., Hannan, Corvallis ARS plant pathologist Joseph Postman and other scientists are among scheduled panelists at FCGP's first general meeting. Other plants with FCGP potential include heirloom varieties and wild relatives of tomato, lettuce, bean, broccoli, Egyptian onion, radish, blue and other Native American corn, blackberry, strawberry, Turkish grain legumes and little-known herbs such as black cumin. More than 200 small family farmers, organic farmers, seed producers, breeders and others will participate in FCGP, according to J.J. Haapala. He is research and education director of Oregon Tilth, a growers' group in Salem that certifies organic growers and processors. Haapala administers a USDA Fund for Rural America grant to the FCGP. ---------- Scientific contact: Richard M. Hannan, ARS Western Regional Plant Introduction Station, Pullman, Wash., phone (509) 335-1502, fax (509) 335-6654, hannan@wsunix.wsu.edu. ---------- This item is one of the news releases and story leads that ARS Information distributes on weekdays to fax and e-mail subscribers. You can also get the latest ARS news on the World Wide Web at http://www.ars.usda.gov/is/pr/thelatest.htm. * Feedback and questions to ARS News Service via e-mail: isnv@ars-grin.gov. * ARS Information Staff, 5601 Sunnyside Ave., Room 1-2251, Beltsville MD 20705- 5128, (301) 504-1617, fax 504-1648. To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Thu Mar 25 15:07:04 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id PAA09690 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 15:07:03 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id NAA14484 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 13:53:39 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id NAA14478 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 13:53:35 -0500 (EST) Received: from billman.kuntrynet.com (billman.kuntrynet.com [207.40.85.3]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id NAA10776 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 13:53:33 -0500 (EST) Received: from greg (tnt-7-11.kuntrynet.com [207.40.95.59]) by billman.kuntrynet.com (8.8.5/8.6.9) with ESMTP id OAA14107; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 14:28:40 -0500 Message-Id: <199903251928.OAA14107@billman.kuntrynet.com> From: "Greg & Lei Gunthorp" To: "E. Ann Clark, Associate Professor" , Subject: Re: RR Beans, Alfalfa and Plant Back Restrictions Date: Thu, 25 Mar 1999 13:51:47 -0500 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Priority: 3 X-Mailer: Microsoft Internet Mail 4.70.1155 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 161 I do not doubt at all that potatoes, soybeans, canola, etc accumulate roundup with post applications. Isn't that one of roundup's selling points that it translocates to the roots where as Gramaxone(paraquat) doesn't? I would assume that it should have been tested before the labelling of the Roundup. But, oh, could this one have slipped through the cracks in pesticide testing because roundup was always a preemerge burn down before GMO's. And GMO's are not regulated in the US. Is there any retesting of herbicides required when they were initially labeled for pre-emergence and then later they develop a GMO that is resitant to them? I really hate to send this over the list but I am going to anyhow. I have generated enemies from these type of questions that challenge the status quo. Might as well have the chemical companies join the bandwagon. Best wishes, Greg Gunthorp's Pasture-ized Pork LaGrange, Indiana visit our farm at www.grassfarmer.com ---------- > From: E. Ann Clark, Associate Professor > To: sanet-mg@amani.ces.ncsu.edu > Subject: Re: RR Beans, Alfalfa and Plant Back Restrictions > Date: Thursday, March 25, 1999 10:08 AM > > Greg and others: I am a bit confused on this issue of Roundup and > carryover effects. In Caroline Cox' review article on glyphosate in > J. Pesticide Reform, she makes reference to possible carryover > effects on succeeding lettuce and I think it was carrot crops. > > I remember checking with colleagues, including weed scientists, each > of whom said that it was impossible because Roundup degraded almost > instantly. So, of course, being myself, I had to look it up and sure > enough, Roundup doesn't degrade instantly. It is bound to soil > particles, so doesn't "move", but has a half-life in soil of > something like 50 to 300 days, depending on soil type and moisture. > It remains physiologically active, but soil-bound, where some have > reported effects on soil organisms etc. > > So, I filed this all away mentally until last week, when a colleague > reported on an unusual seminar he'd heard. Apparently a > farmer-breeder of potatoes in PEI had grown some GMO potatoes for a > major Canadian potato concern. The GE was not for Roundup > Resistance (RR), but for Bt, if I recall correctly. But for some > reason, he decided to spray Roundup on the potatoes and what do you > know, they were RR. > > Then, being a farmer, he had the foresight to retain the tubers and > plant them out the next year. The tubers which had grown on plants > sprayed with Roundup the previous year had very weak emergence and > poor seedling growth. Reportedly (and I don't know this to be true, > as I'm getting this all second hand), the tubers had accumulated the > Roundup, which acted to suppress or retard growth when the tubers > were planted out the following year. I do not know if he had the > tubers tested for this, or surmised it. > > This is rather intriguing. I'm wondering if anyone has seen studies > on the metabolic fate of glyphosate (and the various "inerts" such as > POEA) which are in Roundup) WITHIN the soybean or canola plant after > it has been sprayed? Could it stay there compartmentalized in the > seed, as in the apparent tuber example, and affect germination and > growth the following year? What happens to you and me when we eat > grain, vegetable oil, or french fries made from plant parts which > have accumulated glyphosate (if indeed, this happens)? > > Could this be a factor in the 50% increase in soybean-related > allergies recently reported by a lab at York University in the UK? > They reportedly tested 4500 people for potential vegetable-related > allergies (using blood antibody levels as the indicator, coupled with > other symptoms) and for the first time in 17 years, soybean was in > the top 10 species causing allergic responses in people. They do not > know the soybeans to be GMO, but it seems likely as they were not > segregated at source and the trial was conducted last year. Ann > > ACLARK@plant.uoguelph.ca > Dr. E. Ann Clark > Associate Professor > Crop Science > University of Guelph > Guelph, ON N1G 2W1 > Phone: 519-824-4120 Ext. 2508 > FAX: 519 763-8933 > http://www.oac.uoguelph.ca/www/CRSC/faculty/eac.htm > > To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command > "unsubscribe sanet-mg". > To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command > "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". > > All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: > http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Thu Mar 25 16:20:28 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id QAA11669 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 16:20:27 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id OAA20732 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 14:56:51 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from chet.brysonweb.com (IDENT:root@chet.brysonweb.com [209.67.195.73]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id OAA20718 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 14:56:46 -0500 (EST) Received: from pavilion (ABD60452.ipt.aol.com [171.214.4.82]) by chet.brysonweb.com (8.9.1a/8.9.1) with SMTP id PAA28808; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 15:57:19 -0500 Message-Id: <199903252057.PAA28808@chet.brysonweb.com> X-Sender: twilliams@progressivepubs.com X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Pro Version 4.0 Date: Thu, 25 Mar 1999 14:57:06 -0500 To: prairiedf@globaldialog.com (Greg David), sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu From: Tad Williams Subject: Re: A New Perspective of... In-Reply-To: <199903251447.IAA02254@supermail.globaldialog.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 162 >Hi All, > > >Earlier Dan Wrote: >> Capitalism may not be a great system, but it is the best that has been >>devised by man thus far. And in its pure form, it is based on a worker >>being paid "an honest day's pay for an honest day's work". The capitalist >>(owner) who puts his/her money at risk investing it in what ever venture, >>deserves a reasonable profit for his investment and effort. A lot of >>people have attempted over the years to define "reasonable" in the above >>context and have come up short. I do not intend to go there myself. >> > >I don't agree that capitalism is the best that has been devised so far. It >is certainly the most powerful. Capitalism has ruthlessly conquered any >system that has had resources to plunder. Some of these systems have had a >better way of existence than what capitalism is providing. We simply haven't >heard about, or thought about it, or cared to think about, because evidence >of previous cultures has been destroyed or pushed aside by capitalistic >public relations(PR). Plus, it's too cosy in our pleasant capitalistic >system to worry about such tedious details. > >The reason you perceive capitalism to be the best system that has been >devised so far, is because it's great economic engines are being fueled by >consumption of natural and social capital. As long as we have natural >capital to consume and the waste generated by this system does not foul our >own nest, then the capitalistic system works(unless your one of those being >socially exploited)(ask the Ecquadorian Indians what they think about >capitalism). > >However, when the natural capital runs out, and the filth of polution sicken >even the highest in the capitalistic system, then the ways of capitalism >will be laid bare, and the truth, will be known...capitalism is a failure too. > >For any system to function, it first of all, has to be a democracy. We no >longer have that here. We have an oligarchy, or as Jim Hightower likes to >say, 'A cleptocracy...Government by Thieves". > >Capitalism, socialism, communism and any other 'ism', will not work unless >it is based in democracy! The experiments based on Carl Marx's work were not >democratic, and they failed. But that does not mean that a democratic form >of socialism could not work. > >And I'm not saying that is what I endorse. I think a democratic capitalistic >system, that is held accountable for it's action could be a very pausible >for of government. >But that is not what we have now! We have no accountability. The faster you >can exploit, the better. > >Our world is being stolen undying mega-oligarchies, known as corporations. >With no concsience, only profit as a motive, and more influence in >government than my Senators, they become perpetrators of an irresponsible >form of capitalism that is degenerating into a form of tyranny that we may >be unable to recover from. > >I hope I'm wrong...but I don't think so. > >Greg I thought I would add my two cents worth to the discussion. The viability of any economic or political system rests on its ability to change or adapt. For example, capitalism adopted some of the ideas that Marx was advocating in the form of unions and social welfare. Everything that was said about accountability and the power of corporations is true, however when systems whether economic or political do not adapt or change like in the former Soviet Union they fail. On the other hand communism in China has adjusted just enough to mantain its viability by adopting some of capitalism's ideas. I feel that any system has its limits and capitalism is no exception. Its just a matter of new ideas blossoming and old ones reaching their capacities. Tad Williams To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Thu Mar 25 16:38:18 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id QAA12153 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 16:38:17 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id PAA08886 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 15:21:54 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id PAA08800 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 15:21:48 -0500 (EST) Received: from hevanet.com (root@hevanet.com [198.5.254.1]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id PAA12967 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 15:21:47 -0500 (EST) Received: from [198.5.254.127] (br-ppp28.hevanet.com [198.5.254.127]) by hevanet.com (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id MAA13217 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 12:21:45 -0800 (PST) Message-Id: <199903252021.MAA13217@hevanet.com> X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express for Macintosh - 4.01 (295) Date: Thu, 25 Mar 1999 12:24:33 -0800 Subject: Re: A New Perspective of... From: "Lon J. Rombough" To: Sustained Agriculture Mime-version: 1.0 X-Priority: 3 Content-type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 163 Ahoy, mateys! Throw out the anchor - we're drifting away from SANET. ---------- >From: Tad Williams >To: prairiedf@globaldialog.com (Greg David), sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu >Subject: Re: A New Perspective of... >Date: Thu, Mar 25, 1999, 11:57 AM > > >>Hi All, >> >> >>Earlier Dan Wrote: >>> Capitalism may not be a great system, but it is the best that has been >>>devised by man thus far. And in its pure form, it is based on a worker >>>being paid "an honest day's pay for an honest day's work". The capitalist >>>(owner) who puts his/her money at risk investing it in what ever venture, >>>deserves a reasonable profit for his investment and effort. A lot of >>>people have attempted over the years to define "reasonable" in the above >>>context and have come up short. I do not intend to go there myself. >>> >> >>I don't agree that capitalism is the best that has been devised so far. It >>is certainly the most powerful. Capitalism has ruthlessly conquered any >>system that has had resources to plunder. Some of these systems have had a >>better way of existence than what capitalism is providing. We simply haven't >>heard about, or thought about it, or cared to think about, because evidence >>of previous cultures has been destroyed or pushed aside by capitalistic >>public relations(PR). Plus, it's too cosy in our pleasant capitalistic >>system to worry about such tedious details. >> >>The reason you perceive capitalism to be the best system that has been >>devised so far, is because it's great economic engines are being fueled by >>consumption of natural and social capital. As long as we have natural >>capital to consume and the waste generated by this system does not foul our >>own nest, then the capitalistic system works(unless your one of those being >>socially exploited)(ask the Ecquadorian Indians what they think about >>capitalism). >> >>However, when the natural capital runs out, and the filth of polution sicken >>even the highest in the capitalistic system, then the ways of capitalism >>will be laid bare, and the truth, will be known...capitalism is a failure >too. >> >>For any system to function, it first of all, has to be a democracy. We no >>longer have that here. We have an oligarchy, or as Jim Hightower likes to >>say, 'A cleptocracy...Government by Thieves". >> >>Capitalism, socialism, communism and any other 'ism', will not work unless >>it is based in democracy! The experiments based on Carl Marx's work were not >>democratic, and they failed. But that does not mean that a democratic form >>of socialism could not work. >> >>And I'm not saying that is what I endorse. I think a democratic capitalistic >>system, that is held accountable for it's action could be a very pausible >>for of government. >>But that is not what we have now! We have no accountability. The faster you >>can exploit, the better. >> >>Our world is being stolen undying mega-oligarchies, known as corporations. >>With no concsience, only profit as a motive, and more influence in >>government than my Senators, they become perpetrators of an irresponsible >>form of capitalism that is degenerating into a form of tyranny that we may >>be unable to recover from. >> >>I hope I'm wrong...but I don't think so. >> >>Greg > >I thought I would add my two cents worth to the discussion. The viability >of any economic or political system rests on its ability to change or >adapt. For example, capitalism adopted some of the ideas that Marx was >advocating in the form of unions and social welfare. Everything that was >said about accountability and the power of corporations is true, however >when systems whether economic or political do not adapt or change like in >the former Soviet Union they fail. On the other hand communism in China has >adjusted just enough to mantain its viability by adopting some of >capitalism's ideas. > >I feel that any system has its limits and capitalism is no exception. Its >just a matter of new ideas blossoming and old ones reaching their capacities. > >Tad Williams > > >To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command >"unsubscribe sanet-mg". >To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command >"subscribe sanet-mg-digest". > >All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: >http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail > To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Thu Mar 25 16:49:04 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id QAA12502 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 16:49:03 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id PAA14349 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 15:35:06 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from relay3.smtp.psi.net (relay3.smtp.psi.net [38.8.210.2]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id PAA14229 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 15:34:58 -0500 (EST) Received: from [38.167.41.1] (helo=facserver.fifthave.org) by relay3.smtp.psi.net with esmtp (Exim 1.90 #1) for sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu id 10QGq9-00005s-00; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 15:34:57 -0500 Received: by FACSERVER with Internet Mail Service (5.0.1457.3) id <4N1W1F6D>; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 15:42:40 -0500 Message-ID: From: Tom Smith To: "'sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu'" Subject: Dan's pro-capitalist arguments Date: Thu, 25 Mar 1999 15:42:38 -0500 X-Priority: 3 MIME-Version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.0.1457.3) Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 164 I agree that prison labor ought to be banned, and that organic farming ought not to wed ourselves to it. But Dan's pro-capitalist views are really beginning to irk me. So here's my reply Earlier Dan Wrote: > Capitalism may not be a great system, but it is the best that has been >devised by man thus far. And in its pure form, it is based on a worker >being paid "an honest day's pay for an honest day's work". I reply This does not sound like the historic basis of capitalism. It sounds more like one of the slogans of the nineteenth century labor movement, as it was opposing capitalism. Dan wrote The capitalist >(owner) who puts his/her money at risk investing it in what ever venture, >deserves a reasonable profit for his investment and effort. I reply 1) How does he get his venture capital in the first place? More importantly, how does the capitalist class get their capital, in the first place? Slavery, wars of imperial conquest, enclosure, ruthlessly driving their competitiors out of business, are some of the answers Marx and others come up with. But Dan doesn't address such analyses or arguments--he merely refers us to the historic experience of what he considers to be socialism--socialism based upon a (the Bolsheviks') notion that political pluralism was virtually impossible, trying to develop in the underdeveloped areas of the world, while facing tremendous resistance from advanced capitalist societies, including economic blockade, invasions, coups-d'etats. 2) Let's substitute "thief" for "capitalist" in the above passage from Dan: "The thief who puts the money he steals at risk investing in new schemes for robbery--buying guns, hiring accomplices, etc.--deserves a reasonable profit for his investment and effort." Well, what's the difference? In both cases, what we would be presenting would still be basically, "might makes right." The thief and the capitalist have the might (the capital), therefore, them that's got, should get more. 3) Obviously, some other measure of "justice," which seems to be what Dan is talking about, is necessary. Which is the point that the other person (don't remember his name) was trying to make--the "justice" of an economic system must be measured by how it benefits or does not benefit the community. Yet even in terms of how much profit the capitalist ought to make, let alone whether there should be capitalism, Dan begs off from coming up with any "reasonable" measure. He writes further: (Dan writes) A lot of >people have attempted over the years to define "reasonable" in the above >context and have come up short. I do not intend to go there myself. > I reply Dan seems to be of the opinion that it's all relative, that we as a community do not even need to make choices about how much we should get ripped off in terms of profit, let alone whether we should be ripped off, in the first place. Further, in response to the person who wrote that capitalism does not benefit the community, Dan wrote: Dan writes But, if as an adult, I should choose to use tobacco or alcohol (both of which were still legal the last time I checked), I don't want some "do-gooder" telling me I can't. I reply: Dan is confusing the realm of personal morality, where indeed it should all be relative, as J.S. Mills wrote, with complaints made against capitalism that it allows a few to exploit the rest of us and of natural world, and engages in ("profitable") practices that threaten to destroy us as a species and our world. Do you really want to argue, Dan, that these two are the same thing? Mills argued that morality should not be legislated if the behavior in question threatens to hurt no one but the person performing the behavior. Certainly capitalism hurts a lot of other people animals, plants, etc. other than the capitalist. Dan wrote: And for those who think socialism is a better way than capitalism, I think you can now purchase an airline ticket to Cuba; one way. I reply: Dan, I invite you to take a one-way trip to one of the outer regions of Russia right now, where capitalism has been restored in all its glory. Or Yugoslavia? Or how about Indonesia, where the peasants are being urged to eat only twice a week? Or Latin America, where people are attempting to subsist on boiled water with a little salt? Or how about any of our own nation's fine ghettos, or impoverished rural areas? How about the Midwest, where a lot of small farmers are getting run out of business because of recent mergers among grain corporations and falling prices? Tom To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Thu Mar 25 17:49:53 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id RAA13921 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 17:49:52 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id QAA06480 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 16:58:03 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from beavis.hostdepot.com ([207.141.153.190]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id QAA06466 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 16:57:57 -0500 (EST) Received: from cafarmersmarkets.org (pool016-max14.ds12-ca-us.dialup.earthlink.net [209.178.15.116]) by beavis.hostdepot.com with SMTP (Microsoft Exchange Internet Mail Service Version 5.5.2232.9) id HTN6XVTR; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 17:02:57 -0500 Message-ID: <36FAB0D5.E83B3056@cafarmersmarkets.org> Date: Thu, 25 Mar 1999 13:55:34 -0800 From: Phil Gillman Organization: Southland Farmers' Market Association X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.5 [en] (Win98; I) X-Accept-Language: en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Subject: Re: urban ag References: <199903251858.NAA16340@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 165 While it would sure be nice to have many more of our urban and suburban lawns converted into gardens, the fact remains that suburban and urban contruction frequently involves vast disruption of soil ecology, and even more often, the complete removal of native topsoil to be replaces by chem fertilizer and imported sod. If folks want to farm and urban 1/2 acre plots are too small for them, perhaps they should buy multiple lots in suburban area, or even better, farm land prior to subdivision. As can be seen by the fact that Japan and Korea are net importers of food, and soon china may be as well, the concept of urban/suburban ag is NOT a solution, only one of many parts- other crucial parts include the conservation of farmland in immediate proximity to urban area, and the continued profitability of that land, which is, i believe, the primary reason we are reading this list. phil gillman To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Thu Mar 25 17:55:06 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id RAA14047 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 17:55:06 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id QAA06468 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 16:57:57 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id QAA06424 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 16:57:53 -0500 (EST) Received: from fw1.phibred.com (firewall-user@fw1.phibred.com [204.233.143.2]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with SMTP id QAA14952 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 16:57:50 -0500 (EST) Received: by fw1.phibred.com; id PAA28028; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 15:57:50 -0600 Received: from orion.phibred.com(170.54.241.13) by fw1.phibred.com via smap (4.1) id xmaa23860; Thu, 25 Mar 99 15:54:03 -0600 Received: by orion.phibred.com with Internet Mail Service (5.5.2448.0) id ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 15:54:02 -0600 Message-ID: <8FEE1BDA0910D111BEB500805F1999C7FFC05F@vela.phibred.com> From: "Wilson, Dale" To: sanet-mg@amani.ces.ncsu.edu Subject: RE: RR Beans, Alfalfa and Plant Back Restrictions Date: Thu, 25 Mar 1999 15:53:55 -0600 MIME-Version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2448.0) Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 166 Ann and Greg, > Then, being a farmer, he had the foresight to retain the > tubers and plant them out the next year. The tubers which > had grown on plants sprayed with Roundup the previous year > had very weak emergence and poor seedling growth. Reportedly > (and I don't know this to be true, as I'm getting this all > second hand), the tubers had accumulated the Roundup, which > acted to suppress or retard growth when the tubers were > planted out the following year. I do not know if he had the > tubers tested for this, or surmised it. It is difficult to kill mature, senescing dicots with glyphosate. The farmer probably sprayed the potatoes late, and mistook the lack of response for resistance. Glyphosate would be translocated into the tubers. It is not surprising that effects were only apparent upon regrowth. I found a possibly useful reference: Haderlie,-L.C.; Petersen,-P.J. Herbicide drift and fall application at herbicide rates to potatoes. Res-Prog-Rep-West-Soc-Weed-Sci. [S.l.] : Western Society of Weed Science. 1986. p. 334-340. Unfortunately the hit didn't include an abstract and I don't have the journal on hand. > This is rather intriguing. I'm wondering if anyone has seen studies > on the metabolic fate of glyphosate (and the various "inerts" such as > POEA) which are in Roundup) WITHIN the soybean or canola plant after > it has been sprayed? This is the main kind of data that the EPA collects on pesticides. They are pretty conservative, but when you get into off-label uses, who knows? > Could it stay there compartmentalized in the > seed, as in the apparent tuber example, and affect germination and > growth the following year? What happens to you and me when we eat > grain, vegetable oil, or french fries made from plant parts which > have accumulated glyphosate (if indeed, this happens)? Glyphosate is way, WAY more toxic to plants than to animals. It is a weak acid and unlikely to be compartmentalized in tissue. There is probably a way to get these data from the EPA. Anyone know how? Greg wrote: > But, oh, could this one have slipped through the cracks in > pesticide testing because roundup was always a preemerge burn > down before GMO's. But the whole point of RR plants is that they metabolize and destroy glyphosate. Anyhow, the EPA doesn't let things slip by from what I have seen. > Could this be a factor in the 50% increase in soybean-related > allergies recently reported by a lab at York University in the UK? > They reportedly tested 4500 people for potential vegetable-related > allergies (using blood antibody levels as the indicator, coupled with > other symptoms) and for the first time in 17 years, soybean was in > the top 10 species causing allergic responses in people. They do not > know the soybeans to be GMO, but it seems likely as they were not > segregated at source and the trial was conducted last year. The engineered proteins are more antigenic than pesticides in general. I happened on the following reference in trying to find out about roundup toxicity: AU: Harrison,-L.A.; Bailey,-M.R.; Naylor,-M.W.; Ream,-J.E.; Hammond,-B.G.; Nida,-D.L.; Burnette,-B.L.; Nickson,-T.E.; Mitsky,-T.A.; Taylor,-M.L. TI: The expressed protein in glyphosate-tolerant soybean, 5-enolypyruvylshikimate-3-phosphate synthase from Agrobacterium sp. strain CP4, is rapidly digested in vitro and is not toxic to acutely gavaged mice. SO: J-nutr. Bethesda, Md. : American Institute of Nutrition. Mar 1996. v. 126 (3) p. 728-740. CN: DNAL 389.8-J82 LA: English AB: The safety of 5-enolpyruvylshikimate-3-phosphate synthase enzyme derived from Agrobacterium sp. strain CP4 (CP4 EPSPS) was assessed. CP4 EPSPS is the only protein introduced by genetic manipulation that is expressed in glyphosate-tolerant soybeans, which are being developed to provide new weed-control options for farmers. Expression of this protein in plants imparts high levels of glyphosate tolerance. The safety of CP4 EPSPS was ascertained by evaluating both physical and functional characteristics. CP4 EPSPS degrades readily in simulated gastric and intestinal fluids, suggesting that this protein will be degraded in the mammalian digestive tract upon ingestion as a component of food or feed. There were no deleterious effects due to the acute administration of CP4 EPSPS to mice by gavage at a high dosage of 572 mg/kg body wt, which exceeds 1000-fold the anticipated consumption level of food products potentially containing CP4 EPSPS protein. CP4 EPSPS does not pose any important allergen concerns because this protein does not possess characteristics typical of allergenic proteins. These data, in combination with seed compositional analysis and animal feeding studies, support the conclusion that glyphosate-tolerant soybeans are as safe and nutritious as traditional soybeans currently being marketed. Dale To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From london@metalab.unc.edu Thu Mar 25 17:49:53 1999 -0500 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id RAA13921 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 17:49:52 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id QAA06480 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 16:58:03 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from beavis.hostdepot.com ([207.141.153.190]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id QAA06466 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 16:57:57 -0500 (EST) Received: from cafarmersmarkets.org (pool016-max14.ds12-ca-us.dialup.earthlink.net [209.178.15.116]) by beavis.hostdepot.com with SMTP (Microsoft Exchange Internet Mail Service Version 5.5.2232.9) id HTN6XVTR; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 17:02:57 -0500 Message-ID: <36FAB0D5.E83B3056@cafarmersmarkets.org> Date: Thu, 25 Mar 1999 13:55:34 -0800 From: Phil Gillman Organization: Southland Farmers' Market Association X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.5 [en] (Win98; I) X-Accept-Language: en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Subject: Re: urban ag References: <199903251858.NAA16340@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 167 While it would sure be nice to have many more of our urban and suburban lawns converted into gardens, the fact remains that suburban and urban contruction frequently involves vast disruption of soil ecology, and even more often, the complete removal of native topsoil to be replaces by chem fertilizer and imported sod. If folks want to farm and urban 1/2 acre plots are too small for them, perhaps they should buy multiple lots in suburban area, or even better, farm land prior to subdivision. As can be seen by the fact that Japan and Korea are net importers of food, and soon china may be as well, the concept of urban/suburban ag is NOT a solution, only one of many parts- other crucial parts include the conservation of farmland in immediate proximity to urban area, and the continued profitability of that land, which is, i believe, the primary reason we are reading this list. phil gillman To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From london@metalab.unc.edu Wed Mar 24 13:59:59 1999 -0500 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id NAA08487 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 13:59:58 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id LAA13121 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 11:50:35 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from lima.epix.net (lima.epix.net [199.224.64.56]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id LAA13070 for ; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 11:50:30 -0500 (EST) Received: from epix.net (qrvl-67ppp235.epix.net [199.224.67.235]) by lima.epix.net (8.9.3/8.9.3/1999032301/Philippe Levan) with ESMTP id LAA13754; Wed, 24 Mar 1999 11:50:21 -0500 (EST) Message-ID: <36F91846.4410FD46@epix.net> Date: Wed, 24 Mar 1999 11:52:22 -0500 From: Steve Groff Reply-To: sgroff@epix.net Organization: Cedar Meadow Farm X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.51 [en] (Win95; I) X-Accept-Language: en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: valerie frances CC: sanet-mg-digest@ces.ncsu.edu Subject: Re: A New Perspective on Agriculture References: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: A X-Keywords: X-UID: 168 valerie frances wrote: > "When conditions are ripe for it, these suburban lots could quickly be > developed into mini-farms, either as home-based businesses or as a > source of much good food for the family living there. That sort of > flexibility, coupled with broad-based ownership of prime agricultural > land in the form of suburban lots, may turn out to be a very lucky and > important break at a moment when we need one badly." > Anyone interested in seeing this type of agriculture first hand should go to Japan. I was there a year ago and was amazed at the intensity of food producing plots. Not a single square foot is wasted! Even in the downtown areas in of Tokyo there were plots as small as 4x5 ft that had veggies growing in them. There is no grass for yards *anywhere* near the population centers. It is considered a waste of resourses not to grow food in open spaces. Even at major interchanges on the highways they have planted the whole area in vegetables. Steve Groff. -- "New Generation Cropping Systems": the cutting edge of sustainable agriculture http://www.cedarmeadowfarm.com Steve Groff Cedar Meadow Farm 679 Hilldale Rd Holtwood PA 17532 USA Ph. 717-284-5152 To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Thu Mar 25 21:50:25 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id VAA18527 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 21:50:24 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id VAA14944 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 21:10:51 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from vesta.plain.co.nz (IDENT:root@vesta.plain.co.nz [202.36.174.1]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id VAA14841 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 21:10:43 -0500 (EST) Received: from agnzch.UUCP (uucp@localhost) by vesta.plain.co.nz (8.9.3/8.9.3) with UUCP id OAA02762 for sanet-mg-digest@ces.ncsu.edu; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 14:03:51 +1200 Received: from chch.agnz.co.nz by chch.agnz.co.nz (UUPC/extended 1.12p/sm3) with UUCP for sanet-mg-digest@ces.ncsu.edu; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 13:00:24 +1200 Message-ID: <33525343196f@chch.agnz.co.nz> From: WOHLFART@chch.agnz.co.nz (Samira Wohlfart) Organization: Agriculture New Zealand To: sanet-mg-digest@ces.ncsu.edu Date: Fri, 26 Mar 1999 12:42:38 +1200 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Subject: organic onion production X-mailer: Pegasus Mail for Windows (v2.54) Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 169 Does anyone have any pointers on the web for organic onion production?? thanx for your help! Samira Wohlfart Agribusiness Consultant Agriculture New Zealand PO Box 8640 Christchurch New Zealand Ph: +64 3 348-0979 Fax: +64 3 348-1867 Email: wohlfart@chch.agnz.co.nz http://www.agnz.co.nz To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Thu Mar 25 23:42:39 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id XAA20689 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 23:42:39 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id WAA19434 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 22:51:31 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id WAA19359 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 22:51:24 -0500 (EST) Received: from ns.mntm.org (ns.mntm.org [209.18.254.130]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id WAA19703 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 22:51:20 -0500 (EST) Received: from rrc2.rrcnet.org (rrc2.rrcnet.org [209.18.245.2]) by ns.mntm.org (8.9.1/8.9.1) with SMTP id VAA19641 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 21:51:32 -0600 (CST) Received: from anp32.rrcnet.org by rrc2.rrcnet.org; (5.65v3.2/1.1.8.2/11Jul96-0511PM) id AA23920; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 21:50:12 -0600 Message-Id: <9903260350.AA23920@rrc2.rrcnet.org> From: "Phil Batalden" To: "sanet" Subject: organic tomato transplants Date: Thu, 25 Mar 1999 21:51:30 -0600 X-Msmail-Priority: Normal X-Priority: 3 X-Mailer: Microsoft Internet Mail 4.70.1155 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 170 We live in southwestern Minnesota and would like to purchase some organic tomato transplants for spring planting in May. Where can I find them? Phil Batalden To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Fri Mar 26 09:05:40 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id JAA02190 for ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 09:05:39 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id IAA14621 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 08:09:39 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from arl-img-12.compuserve.com (arl-img-12.compuserve.com [149.174.217.142]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id IAA14542 for ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 08:09:30 -0500 (EST) Received: (from root@localhost) by arl-img-12.compuserve.com (8.8.6/8.8.6/2.18) id IAA16676; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 08:08:24 -0500 (EST) Date: Fri, 26 Mar 1999 08:05:22 -0500 From: BILL DUESING <71042.2023@compuserve.com> Subject: Terminator Technology To: Adrian , asloan_bmavus , Tarah Cherry , Eva Cuadrado , "Robert G. Flory" , "INTERNET:KSFAIR@aol.com" , "INTERNET:SamCorn@aol.com" , "Tom & Joan Kemble" , Cahow McDonald , nycirt , SANET-mg , Marge Wood Message-ID: <199903260808_MC2-6F75-3CB8@compuserve.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 171 Living on the Earth, March 26, 1999: Terminator Technology We grow a small patch of Longfellow Flint Corn every year. This beautiful drying corn, with ears almost one foot long, has eight rows of nicely-rounded, golden-orange kernels which we grind to make cornbread and polenta. Each year we save seed from 30 choice ears for replanting. We've been doing this for about four years, since we got the original kernels from ethno-botanist Mel Bristol. He has been growing Longfellow Flint Corn on Bloomingfields Farm in Gaylordsville, Connecticut, for nearly two decades. Over that time, he has saved seeds from ears with tightly wrapped leaves at the tips in order to minimize crow damage. There is variability within the overall genetic stability of this corn which allows a careful grower to gradually select for traits that are important locally. To be successful, this process requires knowledge and skill, as well as at least 200 plants which can be isolated from other wind-blown corn pollen. Mel tells me that Longfellow Flint is the same corn that the Native Americans were growing widely over this part of the continent before the Europeans invaded. Apparently, many of the river bottom lands that grow corn today were cleared and cultivated six hundred years ago. Growers have been selectively saving seeds from the biggest, tastiest and most reliable ears of corn for about 5,000 years, beginning in Mexico with something like "teocinte" whose cob is about the size of the eraser on a pencil. Year after year, generation after generation, century after century, growers selected among this corn's natural variations in specific ecosystems. Unlike maple trees and tomato plants, corn will not self seed. It must be harvested, saved and planted again by humans. Apparently, the Native Americans used great care in this process. Growing Longfellow Flint Corn connects us not only to last year's crop and to our friend Mel and his work, but also to countless generations of other careful growers. Their skill and devotion, born of respect and the will to survive, are responsible for turning that small cob into beautiful ears, and for passing this gift on to future generations. Hybrid corn, which has to be newly created from two different parents each year, has already broken this age-old connection for many large growers. Now they are connected to the seed company instead. For other important crops, however, and especially for the world's poorer growers, saving the best seeds for replanting makes both agronomic and economic sense. This explains why millions of growers around the world are very concerned about the prospect of the so-called "Terminator Technology." This is the name given to a genetic engineering technique which, in effect, turns off the germination switch in future generations of seeds. A special treatment allows the first generation to grow, but seeds it produces will not germinate. A grower must buy next year's supply from the seed company. This technology was first developed with our tax dollars by the USDA working with a cotton seed company. That company was recently purchased by Monsanto, one of the planet's most aggressive promoters of agricultural biotechnology. Monsanto currently engineers cotton, soy and canola seeds to be sales tools for its herbicide, and puts a biological pesticide inside corn, potatoes and cotton, among other things. Its success in getting these novel varieties (dubbed "Frankenfoods" by critics) planted on a large portion of this country's farms and its aggressive legal tactics against farmers, make its acquisition and promotion of "Terminator Technology" especially worrisome. There are many unanswered questions about genetically-engineered crops and food. What are their long-term effects on human and ecosystem health? How fast will resistance to herbicides and internal pesticides develop in weeds and insects? How much will these novel traits cross with wild or cultivated relatives and what dangers are involved if and when they do? Recent reports from England and Canada suggest some serious problems in these areas. Inserting a suicide gene in seeds for the narrow interest of corporate profit is disrespectful to the people and processes which have allowed humans to live here for the last 10,000 years. It is simply not a good idea for our long-term survival. This is Bill Duesing, Living on the Earth (C)1999, Bill Duesing, Solar Farm Education, Box 135, Stevenson, CT 06491 If you do not want to recieve these essays, please reply with that information. Bill and Suzanne Duesing operate the Old Solar Farm (raising NOFA/CT certified organic vegetables) and Solar Farm Education (working on urban agriculture projects in southern Connecticut and producing "Living on the Earth" radio programs). Their collection of essays Living on the Earth: Eclectic Essays for a Sustainable and Joyful Future is available from Bill Duesing, Box 135, Stevenson, CT 06491 for $10 postpaid. These essays first appeared on WSHU, public radio from Fairfield, CT. New essays are posted weekly at http://www.wshu.org/duesing and those since November 1995 are available there. To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Fri Mar 26 09:33:28 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id JAA02725 for ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 09:33:28 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id IAA04547 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 08:43:30 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from aurora.nal.usda.gov (aurora.nal.usda.gov [192.54.138.38]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id IAA04481 for ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 08:43:24 -0500 (EST) Received: by aurora.nal.usda.gov with Internet Mail Service (5.5.2448.0) id ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 08:43:03 -0500 Message-ID: From: Sustainable Agriculture Network To: "'sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu'" Cc: "Wallace Institute (E-mail)" Subject: Alternative Agriculture News, 4/99 Date: Fri, 26 Mar 1999 08:42:52 -0500 MIME-Version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2448.0) Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 172 April, 1999 Henry A. Wallace Institute for Alternative Agriculture 9200 Edmonston Road, #117 Greenbelt, MD 20770 (301) 441-8777 E-mail: hawiaa@access.digex.net World Wide Web: http://www.hawiaa.org * * * If You Are Interested in Sustainable Agriculture... In addition to this monthly newsletter, the Henry A. Wallace Institute for Alternative Agriculture publishes the American Journal of Alternative Agriculture, a quarterly, peer-reviewed journal of research on alternative agriculture. It is a scientific forum for disseminating technical, economic, and social research findings about the character and requirements of alternative agriculture systems. A comparison of alternative pest and soil management strategies for Maine potato production systems is featured in the new issue (Volume 13, No. 4). Other articles cover a comparison of conventional and organic apple production systems during three years of conversion to organic management in coastal California, and the response of corn, soybean, and wheat crops to fertilizer and herbicides in Ohio compared with low-input production practices. Subscriptions to AJAA are $44 for libraries; $24 for individuals; and $12 for students; contact the Wallace Institute, 9200 Edmonston Road, #117, Greenbelt, MD 20770; (301) 441-8777; e-mail hawiaa@access.digex.net Table of Contents USDA Outlines Improvements in Proposed Organic Standards, p.1 Groups Ask FDA To Ban Antibiotics for Farm Animals, p.2 Wallace Board Re-Elects Officers, Announces Reorganization, p.2 Organic Practices Can Reduce Groundwater Contamination, p.3 New Strategy Will Clean Up Factory Farms, p. 4 Peach Oil Could Replace Methyl Bromide, p. 4 Special Issue of Audubon Chronicles Organic's Progress, p. 4 Resources, p. 4 Positions, p.5 Upcoming Events, p. 5 USDA OUTLINES IMPROVEMENTS IN PROPOSED ORGANIC STANDARDS At the most recent meeting of the National Organic Standards Board, the USDA announced several significant improvements on policy issues for the National Organic Standards that were among the most controversial of the first proposed standards. Keith Jones, Director of the USDA's National Organic Program, outlined improvements in standards for livestock, synthetic materials, inert ingredients in pesticide formulations, and ecolabeling. Important provisions include a 100% organic feed requirement; a ban on antibiotic use in livestock; a requirement for access to the outdoors for all animals and pasture for all ruminants, with some limited exceptions; NOSB authorization for all approved synthetic materials; a prohibition on all List 2 EPA inerts and all List 3 inerts unless specifically approved by the NOSB; and no restrictions on label claims other than the organic claim. The USDA will seek a one-time authorization to cover the cost of the first round of certifier accreditation, which will enable small, private certifiers to work in the national program. It is also negotiating a contract with the Organic Materials Review Institute to conduct the necessary technical reviews of materials being considered for the National List of allowable synthetics in organic production. The NOSB has also brokered a tentative compromise between the USDA and the private certifier community on provisions for termination of certification. The arrangement would allow private certifiers, after finding a serious violation of standards and conducting an internal appeal process, to revoke the letter of certification through which it authorized the offending operation to use its seal. The operation can elect to appeal the certifier's decision to the USDA Secretary, who retains final authority to terminate certification. Kathleen Merrigan, the Wallace Institute's Senior Analyst, is a member of the NOSB. GROUPS ASK FDA TO BAN ANTIBIOTICS FOR FARM ANIMALS Five health, consumer, and other public interest groups last month asked the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to ban the use of certain antibiotics to fatten farm animals. Scientists have said that the use of antibiotics to promote animal growth increases the prevalence of bacteria that are resistant to antibiotics' effects, and jeopardizes human health. Adding antibiotics to livestock feed can lead to antibiotics resistance in foodborne pathogens, which can make cases of food poisoning difficult to treat or even deadly, according to the Center for Science in the Public Interest, one of the groups which signed the petition to the FDA. The other groups are the Environmental Defense Fund, Food Animal Concerns Trust, Public Citizen's Health Research Group, and Union of Concerned Scientists. For more than 40 years, ranchers and growers have fed low levels of penicillin, tetracycline, and other antibiotics to poultry, cattle, and pigs to speed their growth and to cut costs, according to the Center. In the past two years, the World Health Organization and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have called for ending the use of several antibiotics for growth promotion in livestock. The groups' concerns are shared in Europe, where the Soil Association of England has released a report revealing "statistics on the enormous increases in use of the most common antibiotics such as penicillin, despite the supposed efforts of successful governments to curtail it. And it reveals some of the failures in the regulatory system which are leaving the human population exposed to the increasing risk of drug-resistant disease." In its magazine Living Earth (January-March, 1999), the Association calls for a ban on all non-medical uses of antibiotics in agriculture. WALLACE BOARD RE-ELECTS OFFICERS, ANNOUNCES REORGANIZATION The Wallace Institute Board of Directors last month re-elected officers and announced reorganization plans for the Institute. Three board members were re-elected to serve another term: Christine (Cass) Peterson, owner/operator, Flickerville Mountain Farm and Groundhog Ranch; Jose Montenegro, Director, Rural Development Center, Salinas, CA; and Neil Anderson, Anderson Associates Sheep Consultants, Manhattan, KS. These members of the Executive Committee were re-elected: President, Cornelia Butler Flora, Professor, Iowa State University; Vice President, Dr. Frederick Magdoff, Professor, Department of Plant and Soil Science, University of Vermont; Secretary, Cass Peterson; and Treasurer, Jose Montenegro. The board also announced that after 16 years, the Wallace Institute will broaden its scope and reorganize to deliver its message closer to home. "Sustainable agriculture has finally achieved scientific legitimacy," said Garth Youngberg, Institute, executive director, citing a multitude of sustainable agriculture initiatives at the USDA and land grant universities across the country. "When we began this Institute, our goal was to provide a safe haven for alternative farming practices that were shunned by the establishment. Now those practices are considered credible mainstream science. It is time for the Institute to focus on a new analytical agenda that includes rural development, marketing, and the environment, issues of enormous importance to all Americans, and all Americans should know about them." At its annual meeting, the Board reviewed the challenges that remain. "Achieving scientific legitimacy is only the first step," said Board chair Cornelia Flora. "It does not mean that we have fulfilled our vision of an agricultural system that is environmentally sound, socially just, and economically viable. In many ways, our work has just begun." To fulfill its new mission, the Wallace Institute is considering several reorganization plans, including mergers and new virtual facilities to take advantage of technological advances in communication and research. "We will have a new look," said Flora. "We will avail ourselves of cutting-edge communications technologies and build new partnership networks not available throughout much of the Institute's history." Flora said that credible policy analysis will continue to be the heart of the Institute's work, but the agenda will expand to include environmental management, rural development, and marketing. Final decisions about the Institute's new design are not expected until later this year. "The Institute and its founding executive director, Garth Youngberg, have contributed enormously to the success of sustainable agriculture," said Jean Wallace Douglas, the Institute's Honorary President and longtime benefactor. "Whatever turn the Institute takes, it will honor and build upon that legacy." ORGANIC PRACTICES CAN REDUCE GROUNDWATER CONTAMINATION The adoption of organic soil practices can effectively reduce nitrate contamination of groundwater while maintaining yields and improving overall soil quality, according to a 15-year study by the Rodale Institute. The research highlights an organic solution that could reduce the harmful effects of agricultural groundwater pollution and its contamination of surrounding waters. The study also found that organic management increased soil fertility, improved water filtration and holding capacity, reduced erosion, and increased crop productivity, especially during dry years. NEW STRATEGY WILL CLEAN UP FACTORY FARMS A Unified National Strategy for Animal Feeding Operations, announced last month by the EPA and USDA, will reduce polluted runoff from 450,000 cattle, dairy, poultry, and hog farms where animals are raised in confined operations across the country. The strategy sets a goal of developing and implementing Comprehensive Nutrient Management Plans for all animal feeding operations by 2009. Those plans will include actions to prevent or reduce runoff, improve storage and handling of manure, and identify new technologies to implement the plans. Voluntary programs will be the main approach for smaller operations, but larger operations with more than 1,000 animal units, which comprise 5 percent of all animal feeding operations, will be required to obtain Clean Water Act discharge permits. The strategy requires large livestock companies that contract with smaller operators to share responsibility for meeting regulatory requirements. The strategy is available on the Internet at http://www.epa.gov/owm; from the EPA at (202) 260-7786; or the USDA at (202) 720-5974. PEACH OIL COULD REPLACE METHYL BROMIDE The natural oil that gives peaches their perfume also kills fungus and other pests in the soil, and could replace the pesticide methyl bromide, according to The New York Times (March 14, 1999). The peach compound, called benzaldehyde, is manufactured synthetically and has been screened by researchers at the Agricultural Research Service. "When it proved effective, they developed a new approach for applying benzaldehyde onto soil using granules of activated charcoal saturated with the fragrant chemical," according to the article. "Not only does the peach essence kill off pathogens like Fusarium oxysporum, Rhizoctonia solani, Pythium aphanidermaturm, and Sclerotinia minor, the researchers found, but it seems to favor other, beneficial organisms in the soil that then continue to muscle out the unwanted pests." The use of methyl bromide, which damages the Earth's ozone layer, is required to end in 2005. SPECIAL ISSUE OF AUDUBON CHRONICLES ORGANIC'S PROGRESS A special issue of Audubon (March-April, 1999) examines the progress of organic farming with articles on "The Organic Revolution," the increase in integrated pest management practices, and Wes Jackson and the Land Institute. Conventional farmers this year "will apply 24 million tons of fertilizer and nearly 1 billion pounds of pesticides on their land," according to the lead article. "Some of these chemicals will invariably wind up in our groundwater, rivers, and estuaries." But "some experts are starting to come around," realizing the potential for organic farming which "increases biodiversity and benefits soil microorganisms that break down organic matter, earthworms that build soil structure, and soil arthropods that prey on insect pests." A second article explores the "quiet revolution in American agriculture called integrated pest management, or simply IPM," and a third describes Wes Jackson's "grand experiment: a form of agriculture that, like a prairie, runs entirely on sunlight and rain." RESOURCES "Cultivating Diversity: Agrobiodiversity and Food Security" is available from World Resources Institute, 10 G St., NE, Washington, D.C. 20002; on the Internet, http://www.wri.org/wri/ "Pests of the Garden and Small Farm: A Grower's Guide to Using Less Pesticide," 286 pages, is $35; "1999-2000 Catalog" of publications, videos, and slide is free; both are available from the University of California, DANR Communication Services/Publications, 6701 San Pablo Ave., Oakland, CA 94608; (800) 994-8849, or (510) 642-2431. "Getting Food on the Table: An Action Guide to Local Food Policy" is $12 from Community Food Security Coalition, P.O. Box 209, Venice, CA 90294; (310) 822-5410. POSITIONS California Sustainable Agriculture Working Group seeks a full-time Coordinator to lead policy advocacy, movement-building, and educational activities; contact CSAWG, P.O. Box 1599, Santa Cruz, CA 95061; (831) 457-2815; e-mail casawg@igc.org Farmers' Market Trust seeks an assistant to the Executive Director, Food Security Meeting Planner, Technology/Web Site Assistant, and GIS Specialist; contact Meredith Stone, FMT, 1201 Chestnut St., 4th Floor, Philadelphia, PA 19107; (215) 568-0882; e-mail fmtrust@libertynet.org Mothers & Others seeks an Executive Director; send resume to ED Search, Mothers & Others, 40 West 20th St., New York, N.Y. 10011; e-mail wgordon@mothers.org Washington Tilth Producers seek apprentices on their farms; contact Lisa Taylor, Seattle Tilth, 4649 Sunnyside Ave. N., Seattle, WA 98103; (206) 633-0451; e-mail tilth@speakeasy.org UPCOMING EVENTS May 14-16, "Beyond Pesticides: Pollution Prevention Is the Cure," the 17th National Pesticide Forum and 8th Annual California Pesticide Organizing Conference, will be held in Santa Barbara, CA; contact Beyond Pesticides/National Coalition Against the Misuse of Pesticides, (202) 543-5450; e-mail ncamp@ncamp.org May 14-16, Organic Landscaping Workshop will be held in East Troy, WI; contact Michael Fields Agricultural Institute, W2493 County Rd. ES, East Troy, WI 53120; (414) 642-3303; e-mail: mfai@igc.apc.org May 17-19, 29th Annual Composting and Recycling National Conference will be held in Albuquerque, N.M.; contact BioCycle Magazine, 419 State Ave., Emmaus, PA 18049; 1-800-661-4905. May 19-20, Summit on Organic Food Technology will be held in Gilroy, CA; contact Gay Franklin, SOFT, (408) 842-4893; e-mail gvnc@safemail.com May 21-23, American Livestock Breeds Conservancy's Annual Conference will be held in LaFox, IL; contact Cynthia Ehrman, ALBC, P.O. Box 477, Pittsboro, N.C. 27312; (919) 542-5704. May 23-28, 10th International Soil Conservation Organization Conference will be held in West Lafayette, IN; contact Nona Schaler, Purdue University, 1-800-359-2968 ext. 92N; e-mail njschaler@cea.purdue.edu; on the Internet, http://topsoil.nserl.purdue.edu/isco99/isco99.htm May 26-29, "Permanent Agriculture: Designing Our Farms for a Future That Matters" will be held in Buena Vista, VA; contact Good Earth Farm School, (540) 261-8775. June 6-8, "NABC 11: World Food Security and Sustainability: The Impacts of Biotechnology and Industrial Consolidation," the 11th annual meeting of the National Agricultural Biotechnology Council, co-hosted by the Wallace Institute, will be held in Lincoln, NE; contact the Center for Biotechnology, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, (402) 472-2635; or NABC, (607) 254-4856; e-mail nabc@cornell.edu To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". 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All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Fri Mar 26 11:16:50 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id LAA05453 for ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 11:16:49 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id KAA18332 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 10:07:16 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from ccshst09.cs.uoguelph.ca (ccshst09.cs.uoguelph.ca [131.104.96.18]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id KAA18193 for ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 10:07:02 -0500 (EST) Received: from csnet.nw.uoguelph.ca (csnet.nw.uoguelph.ca [131.104.232.2]) by ccshst09.cs.uoguelph.ca (8.8.6/8.8.6) with ESMTP id KAA18277 for ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 10:07:00 -0500 (EST) Received: from CSNET/MAILQ by csnet.nw.uoguelph.ca (Mercury 1.43); 26 Mar 99 10:13:01 GMT-5 Received: from MAILQ by CSNET (Mercury 1.43); 26 Mar 99 10:12:57 GMT-5 From: "E. Ann Clark, Associate Professor" Organization: Plant Agriculture, Univ. of Guelph To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Date: Fri, 26 Mar 1999 10:12:56 EST Subject: (Fwd) Rachel #643: Studying a Town to Death X-mailer: Pegasus Mail for Windows (v2.54) Message-ID: <138A5E01137@csnet.nw.uoguelph.ca> Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 173 Folks: may be of interest regarding recent thread on cancer and agricultural pesticides. Ann =======================Electronic Edition======================== . . . RACHEL'S ENVIRONMENT & HEALTH WEEKLY #643 . . ---March 25, 1999--- . . HEADLINES: . . STUDYING A TOWN TO DEATH . . ========== . . Environmental Research Foundation . . P.O. Box 5036, Annapolis, MD 21403 . . Fax (410) 263-8944; E-mail: erf@rachel.org . . ========== . . All back issues are available by E-mail: send E-mail to . . info@rachel.org with the single word HELP in the message. . . Back issues are also available from http://www.rachel.org. . . To start your own free subscription, send E-mail to . . listserv@rachel.org with the words . . SUBSCRIBE RACHEL-WEEKLY YOUR NAME in the message. . ================================================================= STUDYING A TOWN TO DEATH Lompoc, California is a small city of 42,000 people that lies within a valley along California's central coast, about 100 miles above Los Angeles. Lompoc is separated from the Pacific Ocean by 7 miles of rich, flat farmland. Here, farming is a year-round activity, so pesticides waft up the valley into the city most of the year, carried by the ocean breeze. According to California's state Environmental Protection Agency (Cal EPA), the people of Lompoc have been lodging formal complaints about pesticide drift and health problems for at least six years, since 1993. George Rauh, a teacher who moved to Lompoc in 1989, says, "For the first two years, I thought it was great. Then I got chronic bronchitis. I had never had anything like it, and I knew something was wrong. I started asking around and I found many, many people had problems -- bronchitis, asthma, headaches, the flu when it wasn't flu season, even reproductive problems, and a host of other ailments. It was obvious that there was something really wrong." In 1992 Rauh and his neighbors formed Volunteers for a Healthy Valley and began asking local and state health officials to pay attention. Now, if you have ever complained to your health department about an environmental problem, you know that the response is rarely swift or decisive. Of course this is not always true, but as a general rule public health officials are reluctant to admit that there is a problem, or even to look for a problem diligently. There seem to be two main reasons for this: If health officials admit there is a problem today, they are admitting that someone failed to do their job in the past. Secondly, if a problem is identified today, health officials are obligated to do something about it, and this often puts them into conflict with one or more polluters -- many of whom have considerable political clout. Therefore, despite what a civics textbook may say, public health officials often do not respond positively when the public asks for help. Indeed, officials often begin to define the victims of pollution as "the problem" and spend their time trying to discredit the victims instead of looking into the underlying public health questions. Lompoc is no exception to this general rule. After getting no satisfactory answers from state officials for more than a year, Volunteers for a Healthy Valley conducted a letter-writing campaign to Region 9 of U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (U.S. EPA). U.S. EPA responded by asking Cal EPA's Department of Pesticide Regulation (DPR) to conduct a study. Reluctantly, DPR then asked Cal EPA's Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment (OEHHA) to study health conditions in Lompoc. Cal EPA's OEHHA began to study cancer incidence in Lompoc 1988-1995, birth defects in Lompoc 1987-1989, live births in Lompoc 1988-1994, and hospital discharges in Lompoc 1991-1994. The study did not collect any new data but examined only existing data. Government officials were caught falsifying data (see REHW #519) and the study took three years to complete. Meantime, Cal EPA's Department of Pesticide Regulation (DPR) decided to study pesticide use in the Lompoc Valley. They initially proposed to study two pesticides "but we laughed them off the stage," says Rauh. Then DPR agreed to study all pesticides used in the valley. Since 1991, California has maintained detailed records of pesticide use -- the only state in the nation to do so. Six months later, DPR reported that about 50 different pesticides are used regularly in the Lompoc Valley, many of them carcinogens and many of them nerve poisons.[1] In June, 1998, Cal EPA announced the results of its three-year health study:[2] ** The people of Lompoc have 37% more lung cancer than people in the surrounding three counties (San Luis Obispo, Santa Barbara, and Ventura). This finding was statistically significant at the 0.01 level -- an unusually strict statistical standard. (It means that there was only 1 chance in 100 that the results of the study occurred by chance.) Another part of the study found that the incidence of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) was low among Lompoc residents, "suggesting a lower prevalence of smoking among adults." High lung cancer and a low smoking rate. Curious. The study also found elevated rates of breast cancer, kidney cancer, liver cancer, cancers of the female reproductive organs, non-Hodgkins lymphomas, multiple myelomas, all cancers combined, and all cancers combined excluding lung cancer. However, none of these elevated rates passed the test of significance at the 0.01 level, so Cal EPA disregarded the pattern as meaningless statistical flukes. ** The incidence of 7 kinds of birth defects was investigated; nothing unusual turned up. ** Cal EPA studied what proportion of hospital discharges in Lompoc was attributable to particular illnesses. (Hospital discharge records are assumed to represent serious illnesses, after subtracting out normal births.) The study divided hospital discharges into 18 groups of illnesses. Of the 18 groups, two were elevated in Lompoc -- a "respiratory" group and a "reproductive" group. For the respiratory group, bronchitis and asthma were consistently elevated the most. Compared to the surrounding area, people leaving the hospital in Lompoc had 69% more bronchitis and 58% more asthma. By a different measure, Cal EPA found asthma and bronchitis 85% more common in Lompoc than in the three surrounding counties. Bronchitis occurred in the young and the old; asthma was elevated only among adults. The "reproductive" group of illnesses included abnormal birth outcomes and female reproductive cancers. Four other groups of diseases were considered "suggestive" -- female breast cancer, pleurisy-pneumonia, headaches and seizures, and all respiratory malignancies. Abnormal birth outcomes showed "a strong pattern for infant respiratory conditions," Cal EPA reported. Compared to infants in surrounding counties, Lompoc infants had a two-fold or greater chance of being hospitalized for respiratory disorders. In sum, Cal EPA now knew that 50 pesticides were being used in a geographic setting that channeled drifting poisons into a residential community on a continuing basis. By this time, people had been complaining for 5 years of bronchitis, difficulty breathing, headaches, and flu-like symptoms, among other medical complaints. Using rigorous statistical criteria, Cal EPA's three-year health study had documented 37% more lung cancer, 69% more bronchitis and 58% more asthma in Lompoc, compared to surrounding communities, plus a two-fold increase in respiratory problems requiring hospitalization of infants. Given this information, ordinary citizens in Lompoc saw a pretty clear pattern. They came to believe that they are being poisoned by year-round exposure to a thin soup of mixed pesticides. But Cal EPA scientists concluded only that "without information on potential exposures, we can only speculate as to why respiratory illnesses appear to be elevated in Lompoc." So another study is begun. The plan is to monitor the air in Lompoc for all 50 pesticides for a year. This will provide the exposure data that the scientists say they need to reach a conclusion. However, such a study requires $142,000 in funds and Cal EPA drags its feet and the state legislature drags its feet. So instead of a year-long study of 50 pesticides, Cal EPA can only conduct a one-month study of 12 pesticides late in the growing season of 1998. The results of this study are released in February, 1999. According to the Department of Pesticide Regulation (DPR), which conducted the study, 179 air samples were taken during a 28-day period. Of these 179 samples, 140 (78%) showed no detectable levels of pesticides, DPR said. Furthermore, the study looked for two metals, manganese and aluminum, because these are found in three common pesticides, maneb, mancozeb, and fosetyl-aluminum. Manganese and aluminum were not elevated in the air in Lompoc "suggesting no appreciable exposure" to these 3 pesticides, DPR said.[3] This is now known as the "Phase I" study. According to the WALL STREET JOURNAL, Lompoc farmers "seized upon the Phase I numbers as proof that pesticides pose no health threat to valley residents."[4] In sum, it looked as if Volunteers for a Healthy Valley had been proven wrong. However, when DPR's data were subjected to close scrutiny by a former chemistry professor from the University of California at Berkeley, the picture changed. Dr. Susan Kegley, now staff scientist for the Pesticide Action Network in San Francisco, found that "DPR made numerous mistakes -- and led the public to believe that fewer than one quarter of air samples taken in Lompoc contained pesticides. An independent and scientific analysis shows that pesticides were detected in 97% of the air samples..."[5] Kegley also pointed out that DPR had waited six weeks before analyzing samples of pesticides that would degrade within a week's time. In sum, "DPR drew erroneous conclusions from data that were not collected in a scientifically valid way," Kegley wrote. Kegley was particularly scornful of DPR's study of manganese and aluminum. She wrote, "Because aluminum and manganese are very abundant in soils, looking for the 'extra' aluminum and manganese as an indicator of exposure to these pesticides is like adding a bucket of water to the ocean and looking for the 'extra' water. This method is not a valid one for analysis of metal-containing pesticides, and it is impossible to conclude that the data show there is 'no appreciable exposure.'" No one has refuted Kegley's criticism of Cal EPA's study. In sum, Cal EPA -- the health officials responsible for determining what is killing people in Lompoc (few people survive lung cancer) and making others sick -- were shown to be incompetent, or liars, or both. As far as the people of Lompoc are concerned, they now have sufficient data: excess illnesses and deaths have been rigorously documented; the use of 50 pesticides has been documented; and 97% of air samples taken in their town contain one or more pesticides. What is the response of California health officials? Are they ready to advocate pollution prevention and the precautionary principle? Are they ready to help Lompoc farmers phase out expensive, toxic pesticides and shift to organic farming methods that produce higher yields and higher financial returns[6] than chemical methods? No. Cal EPA now wants to conduct a new, longer study of air quality in Lompoc before reaching any conclusions. Why are health officials studying this town to death and refusing to act? Perhaps it is because 4 million people in California live adjacent to fields that are sprayed year round with dangerous pesticides.[7] If health officials confront the truth in Lompoc, they will be opening a Pandora's box of trouble for chemical agriculture and for the chemical corporations that invented it. If they really open that box, no telling where it might end. ========== [1] See http://www.cdpr.ca.gov/docs/dprdocs/lompoc/lpur_sum.pdf. [2] Joy A. Wisniewski and others, ILLNESS INDICATORS IN LOMPOC, CALIFORNIA; AN EVALUATION OF AVAILABLE DATA (Sacramento, Cal.: California Environmental Protection Agency, June, 1998). See http://www.oehha.ca.gov/archive/getlomp.htm. [3] See www.cdpr.ca.gov/docs/dprdocs/lompoc/lompoc.htm. [4] Marc Lifsher, "Funding Delay Threatens Air Monitoring," WALL STREET JOURNAL February 17, 1999, pg. CA1. [5] Susan Kegley, CRITIQUE OF THE DEPARTMENT OF PESTICIDE REGULATION'S PHASE ONE LOMPOC AIR MONITORING (San Francisco, California: Pesticide Action Network, March 1999). [6] National Research Council, ALTERNATIVE AGRICULTURE (Washington, D.C.: National Academy Press, 1989). [7] Daryl Kelley and Deborah Schoch, "Health: Ventura County faces more threat from airborne pesticides than all but two counties in state, environmental group says" LOS ANGELES TIMES August 20, 1998, pg. A-3. Descriptor terms: pesticides; lompoc; ca; lung cancer; bronchitis; asthma; california environmental protection agency; cal epa; health studies; george rauh; volunteers for a healthy valley; ################################################################ NOTICE Environmental Research Foundation provides this electronic version of RACHEL'S ENVIRONMENT & HEALTH WEEKLY free of charge even though it costs our organization considerable time and money to produce it. We would like to continue to provide this service free. You could help by making a tax-deductible contribution (anything you can afford, whether $5.00 or $500.00). Please send your tax-deductible contribution to: Environmental Research Foundation, P.O. Box 5036, Annapolis, MD 21403-7036. Please do not send credit card information via E-mail. For further information about making tax-deductible contributions to E.R.F. by credit card please phone us toll free at 1-888-2RACHEL, or at (410) 263-1584, or fax us at (410) 263-8944. --Peter Montague, Editor ################################################################ ACLARK@plant.uoguelph.ca Dr. E. Ann Clark Associate Professor Crop Science University of Guelph Guelph, ON N1G 2W1 Phone: 519-824-4120 Ext. 2508 FAX: 519 763-8933 http://www.oac.uoguelph.ca/www/CRSC/faculty/eac.htm To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". 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All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Fri Mar 26 11:29:04 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id LAA05781 for ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 11:29:03 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id KAA02263 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 10:38:26 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from helios.hampshire.edu (root@helios.hampshire.edu [192.33.12.140]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id KAA02150 for ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 10:38:08 -0500 (EST) Received: from cisa- (dhcppc31.hampshire.edu [172.20.23.31]) by helios.hampshire.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1) with SMTP id KAA10063 for ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 10:41:06 -0500 (EST) Message-Id: <3.0.6.32.19990326104107.0079ba30@crocker.com> X-Sender: earthspn@crocker.com X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Light Version 3.0.6 (32) Date: Fri, 26 Mar 1999 10:41:07 -0500 To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu From: Mark Subject: Re: Dan's pro-capitalist arguments In-Reply-To: <199903252310.SAA21210@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 174 >Dan wrote: >And for those who think socialism is a better way than capitalism, I >think you can now purchase an airline ticket to Cuba; one way. Dan, The poverty of your opinions makes itself clear when you resort to statements like this. You are apparently incapable of seeing even the glaring problems of capitalism that are so obvious in "sunny Puerto Rico." I can't image this discussion is going to bring about any real dialog at this point, so stick a fork in me, I'm done. Mark ---------------------------------------------------- Community Involved in Sustaining Agriculture (CISA) Hampshire College 893 West Street Amherst MA 01002-5001 T: 413-559-5338 F: 413-559-5404 To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Fri Mar 26 12:03:45 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id MAA07070 for ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 12:03:45 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id LAA15553 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 11:09:25 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from amani.ces.ncsu.edu (amani.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.51]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id LAA15454 for ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 11:09:09 -0500 (EST) Received: from cwb.ca ([205.200.215.2]) by amani.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id LAA02054 for ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 11:09:04 -0500 (EST) Received: by mint.cwb.ca id <26885>; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 10:09:15 -0600 X-Lotus-FromDomain: CWB From: "Pat Elazar" To: "Phil Batalden" cc: "sanet" Message-Id: <99Mar26.100915cst.26885@mint.cwb.ca> Date: Fri, 26 Mar 1999 10:05:06 -0600 Subject: Re: organic tomato transplants Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 175 It may be too late for this season already, but I grew my own organic tomato transplants this year. I'm not strictly organic, but I only use fertilizer on my corn & garlic on my suburban Winnipeg self-sufficiency operation. My 12 year old did an experiment this winter growing seeds in flats in a south-facing window. He planted durum wheat, barley, mung-beans & Desi chick-pea seedlings in soil-less growing medium & the same medium plus 10-20% mushroom compost. He fertilized the no-compost with a complete fertilizer every 4 days & the compost trial with a 'tea' made from the same mushroom compost. The compost trial seedlings came up 2 days on average earlier than either control or fertilizer trials even though moisture levels & temps were uniform. The trial was concluded after 22 days. Barley seedlings in the compost trial were visibly more developed than control or fertilizer trials (began tillering). Barley & wheat growth was 25% higher in the compost seedlings than the fertilizer seedlings & 250% higher than the control group. Mung-bean growth was harder to compare. The compost plants weren't taller than the fertilizer plants, but they were talerl than the control & their leaves were 30% longer than the fertilizer plants. Sooooooo...... I used 15% mushroom compost in my growing mix for starting my own transplants! (Even though I know that this trial was not replicated properly & the experimental blocks were not randomised) My Flor del Creole, Charlie Redstaker & Mama Mia tomatoes & heirloom Hungarian wax peppers are roaring along just fine thank you! Pat "Phil Batalden" on 03/25/99 09:51:30 PM To: "sanet" cc: Subject: organic tomato transplants We live in southwestern Minnesota and would like to purchase some organic tomato transplants for spring planting in May. Where can I find them? Phil Batalden To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Fri Mar 26 12:14:41 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id MAA07460 for ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 12:14:41 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id LAA22263 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 11:22:00 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from supermail.globaldialog.com (root@pop.globaldialog.com [156.46.122.14]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id LAA22052 for ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 11:21:41 -0500 (EST) Received: from LOCALNAME (wtn69tc4.gdinet.com [156.46.27.198]) by supermail.globaldialog.com (8.9.1/8.9.1) with SMTP id KAA09935 for ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 10:22:04 -0600 (CST) Date: Fri, 26 Mar 1999 10:22:04 -0600 (CST) Message-Id: <199903261622.KAA09935@supermail.globaldialog.com> X-Sender: prairiedf@pop.globaldialog.com X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Version 1.4.5 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" To: sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu From: prairiedf@globaldialog.com (Greg David) Subject: The Importance of Perspective Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 176 Tad wrote: Ahoy, mateys! Throw out the anchor - we're drifting away from SANET. Respectfully, While discussion of economic and governmental systems is not direct disscusion of agriculture, agriculture in most of the world is a subset of economic and governmental conditions. It is therefore vital to understand these forces, because they the main controlling forces in how agriculture is practiced throughtout the world. >From free market capitalism springs oligarchical corporate agriculture, and from that springs many unwholesome forms of exploitive agriculture. To understand the lies upon which corporate agriculture is based is paramount to changing the system. So please endure these postings relating to governing paradigms, as worthwhile background information. If they rub you the wrong way, ignore them or delete them. Others may not have the understanding of these fundamental concepts and find them very enlightning. Cheers, Greg To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Fri Mar 26 12:51:43 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id MAA08490 for ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 12:51:43 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id MAA09452 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 12:02:26 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from fw1.phibred.com (firewall-user@fw1.phibred.com [204.233.143.2]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with SMTP id MAA09376 for ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 12:02:12 -0500 (EST) Received: by fw1.phibred.com; id LAA03498; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 11:02:10 -0600 Received: from orion.phibred.com(170.54.241.13) by fw1.phibred.com via smap (4.1) id xma000292; Fri, 26 Mar 99 10:59:53 -0600 Received: by orion.phibred.com with Internet Mail Service (5.5.2448.0) id ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 10:59:53 -0600 Message-ID: <8FEE1BDA0910D111BEB500805F1999C7FFC066@vela.phibred.com> From: "Wilson, Dale" To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Subject: RE: Dan's pro-capitalist arguments Date: Fri, 26 Mar 1999 10:59:51 -0600 MIME-Version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2448.0) Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 177 Mark, > I can't image this discussion is going to bring about any > real dialog at this point, so stick a fork in me, I'm done. Be patient, I'm trying to prepare a proper fork. Dale To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Fri Mar 26 12:51:43 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id MAA08491 for ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 12:51:43 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id MAA09289 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 12:01:51 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from fw1.phibred.com (firewall-user@fw1.phibred.com [204.233.143.2]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with SMTP id MAA09128 for ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 12:01:31 -0500 (EST) Received: by fw1.phibred.com; id LAA02316; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 11:01:25 -0600 Received: from orion.phibred.com(170.54.241.13) by fw1.phibred.com via smap (4.1) id xma025614; Fri, 26 Mar 99 10:56:00 -0600 Received: by orion.phibred.com with Internet Mail Service (5.5.2448.0) id ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 10:55:59 -0600 Message-ID: <8FEE1BDA0910D111BEB500805F1999C7FFC065@vela.phibred.com> From: "Wilson, Dale" To: sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Subject: The Importance of Perspective Date: Fri, 26 Mar 1999 10:55:58 -0600 MIME-Version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2448.0) Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 178 Greg, > While discussion of economic and governmental systems is not > direct disscusion of agriculture, agriculture in most of the > world is a subset of economic and governmental conditions. > It is therefore vital to understand these forces, because they > the main controlling forces in how agriculture is > practiced throughtout the world. I agree completely. It is essential to examine economic theory and policy in the agricultural context to deal with sustainability issues. If people don't like that subject, they can use their delete key. Dale To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Fri Mar 26 12:54:09 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id MAA08527 for ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 12:54:08 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id LAA22682 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 11:22:44 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from travelers.mail.cornell.edu (TRAVELERS.MAIL.CORNELL.EDU [132.236.56.13]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id LAA22494 for ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 11:22:21 -0500 (EST) From: dsc17@cornell.edu Received: from travelers.mail.cornell.edu (travelers.mail.cornell.edu [132.236.56.13]) by travelers.mail.cornell.edu (8.8.8/8.8.5) with SMTP id LAA15588; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 11:22:20 -0500 (EST) Date: Fri, 26 Mar 1999 11:22:20 -0500 (EST) X-Sender: dsc17@travelers.mail.cornell.edu To: Mark cc: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Subject: Re: Dan's pro-capitalist arguments In-Reply-To: <3.0.6.32.19990326104107.0079ba30@crocker.com> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 179 My $.02 on the matter: I agree with Dan in that I am very happy I was born an American and not a Cuban, Russian, etc. I enjoy the freedoms of choice that our system brings I'm not gloating or putting those people down. in fact, I think that the realization of the priviledge under which I was born and raised obligates me to help those less lucky; in my own way, I'd like to think I am My argument is that the problem is not with the economics system but with people. Marxism would work wonderfully if people worked hard and contributed to society not based on incentives of financial gain but in reality, it does not work. there is no incentive to innovate or improve other than altruisitc motives and sadly history has borne out that these motivations are insufficient capitalism works well in that it does provide incentives to innovate, improve, be efficient, etc. I believe that markets make better decisions than bureaucrats..if the proper costs and prices are assigned to various activities. The problem arises because we do not assign the right prices to things. In our system,for example, pollution (if legal) is encouraged over proper disposal of waste. Clealry, paying someone to haul away your garbage is more expensive than throwing it out in the street. So if street dumping is legal, these produers will gain an competitive advantage, be able to charge a lower price (or have lower costs) and thus benefit from this harmful action. Part of this problem, frankly, is our fault (as consumers). We too often buy the lowest cost or most convenient thing over what is socially best. We ask for legislation (e.g., banning pollution, child labor or requiring minimum wage)to protect us from ourselves because we know we can't trust ourselves. As one former professor of mine stated, we wear very different hats as consumers than we do as voters/citizens. And this makes for a very muddled picture in which the price of many goods do not reflect the true social cost. If people stopped buying things made in "bad" ways, no one would produce them and the bad things would go away What is the answer? I have no simple one, except that as long as we live in a capitalist system, enjoying the great freedom of choice as consumers that we do, we need to also be responsible in our purchases, exercise our values in the marketplace and educate others to do the same. No quick fix, I agree, but it's a start I also must add that many of the interventions of governemnts exacerbate this problem. It is a simple rule of economics that if you tax something you'll have less of it; if you subsidize, you'll have more. Yet the US governemnt taxes labor (twice, if you include social security, which taxes a much higher percentage of poor people's income than that of rich people), and taxes land ownership... things most of us consider good.. while subsidizing things that cause pollution and deplete resources (such as facilitating timber, mining, grazing domestically (at a net loss to taxpayers), plus our foreign policy of engagement in the middle east to protect our cheap oil supply) Go figure! We tax labor twice, then burn up the environment double time to provide jobs. This ties in to the idea stated here about the importance of true democracy. Clealry, the majority's interests are not helped by these policies Well, enough of my ramblings. take care folks David To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Fri Mar 26 13:42:24 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id NAA09603 for ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 13:42:24 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id MAA28306 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 12:47:00 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from webserf.net (webserf.net [204.77.122.1]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with SMTP id MAA28219 for ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 12:46:43 -0500 (EST) Message-Id: <199903261746.MAA28219@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu> Received: from bluestem [204.77.126.155] by webserf.net (SMTPD32-4.03) id A7C7E650188; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 11:45:43 CST From: "Bluestem Associates" To: "sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu" Date: Fri, 26 Mar 1999 17:42:40 Reply-To: "Bluestem Associates" X-Mailer: PMMail 98 Professional (2.01.1600) For Windows 98 (4.10.1998) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Subject: Econo-political diatribes Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: A X-Keywords: X-UID: 180 On Fri, 26 Mar 1999 10:22:04 -0600 (CST), Greg David wrote: >From free market capitalism springs oligarchical corporate agriculture, and >from that springs many unwholesome forms of exploitive agriculture. To >understand the lies upon which corporate agriculture is based is paramount >to changing the system. Agree or disagree, it is all so reminiscent of the politico-intellectual blather that I had to endure when in university in the mid-1960s. And equally effective. >So please endure these postings relating to governing paradigms, as >worthwhile background information. If they *were* worthwhile background you'd have a point. >Others may not have the understanding of these fundamental concepts and find >them very enlightning. The operative fundamental concept is that like it or not, in a representative democracy most people get more or less what they want. Whether any of us agree or disagree is irrelevant. Stop by any WalMart Super Center on a Saturday afternoon and you will see that Larry Lunchbucket, Joe Sixpack, and Mr. & Mrs. Frontporch are quite content with the food system as it is currently structured. Their food costs them less and less (at the till, and as a percentage of their disposable income), and it's more and more convenient for them, every year. Given their contentment with the system, rambling philosophical discussions (particularly on *this* list) give them no reason to change their eating habits, leave alone go out and vote for a substantial change in our economic system and form of government. Covey highlights the fundamental difference between our 'Circle of Influence' and our 'Circle of Concern.' Governmental systems *may* fall within some people's Circle of Concern. This list, however, should generally concentrate on those areas in which we have some reasonable expectation of influence within a tolerable time frame. To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Fri Mar 26 15:23:40 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id PAA12162 for ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 15:23:40 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id NAA07812 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 13:07:03 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from merlin.rtpnc.epa.gov (merlin.rtpnc.epa.gov [134.67.208.148]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id NAA07511 for ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 13:06:30 -0500 (EST) From: Manale.Andrew@epamail.epa.gov Received: from myrtle.rtpnc.epa.gov by epamail.epa.gov (PMDF V5.1-12 #26439) with ESMTP id <0F9700KYROKXXR@epamail.epa.gov> for sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 12:02:59 -0500 (EST) Received: from EPAHUB8.RTP.EPA.GOV by epamail.epa.gov (PMDF V5.1-12 #26438) with SMTP id <0F9700J2ROBMT4@epamail.epa.gov> for sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 11:54:58 -0500 (EST) Received: by EPAHUB8.RTP.EPA.GOV(Lotus SMTP MTA v4.6.3 hotfix 1 (767.1 12-15-1998)) id 85256740.005BFBE3 ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 11:44:42 -0500 Date: Fri, 26 Mar 1999 11:46:19 -0500 Subject: Re: sanet-mg-digest V1 #924 To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Message-id: <85256740.005B8634.00@EPAHUB8.RTP.EPA.GOV> MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-disposition: inline X-Lotus-FromDomain: EPA Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 181 Re. the Rachel article: There is another problem with the Cal-EPA study if it only involved taking air samples. Many of the pesticides Cal-EPA should be trying to monitor (semi-volatile compounds) are notoriously difficult to capture in air monitoring equipment. I supported a study some ten years ago that, even with over a million dollars to spend, produced only limited data on pesticide exposure for only a small number of pesticides. Most monitoring studies only examine the particulate phase and ignore the gaseous--fine if the concern is drift onto a neighbor's cropland, but not so good if the concern is exposures that may occur miles away. Fogs and other weather conditions can also affect the likelihood of exposures various distances away. A better and far cheaper study would involve modeling emissions and their fate and transport using monitoring data to calibrate the models. A strictly monitoring study for a reasonably large airshed, given the cost and difficulty of taking enough air samples and analyzing them so as to have enough data to draw statistically valid conclusions, has a low likelihood at the outset of proving significant exposure and is certainly not the best approach to estimating short and longer term exposure unless the agency has many millions of dollars to spend and has the best equipment and scientists involved. To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest". All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Fri Mar 26 16:22:18 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id QAA13343 for ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 16:22:18 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id NAA07687 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 13:06:49 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from mail2.greenbuilder.com ([216.171.28.121]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with SMTP id NAA07418 for ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 13:06:21 -0500 (EST) Received: from [216.171.28.125] ([216.171.28.125] verified) by mail2.greenbuilder.com (Stalker SMTP Server 1.6) with ESMTP id S.0000107676 for ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 12:02:45 +0000 To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu From: Judy_Kew@greenbuilder.com (Judy Kew), Judy_Kew@greenbuilder.com Reply-To: Judy_Kew@greenbuilder.com (Judy Kew) Date: Fri, 26 Mar 1999 18:03:06 GMT Subject: Panel members' biotech biases (Nat'l Acad Sciences) Message-ID: <2409234430.50142680@greenbuilder.com> Organization: Sustainable Sources X-Gateway: FirstClass Gateway for SMTP/NNTP (Mac68K) version 1.02 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 182 >From National Academy of Sciences website: http://www4.nas.edu/webcr.nsf/CommitteeDisplay/BANR-O-99-02-A?OpenDocument (Biotech highlights in bold below) Committee Membership Committee on Genetically Modified Crops Containing Pesticide Genes Project Identification Number: BANR-O-99-02-A Responsible Staff Officer: Mike Phillips Major Unit: Board on Agriculture Committee Membership: Date Posted: 03/17/99 Perry Adkisson (chair), Chancellor Emeritus and Distinguished Professor Emeritus, Texas A&M University Dr. Adkisson is known as the father of integrated pest management and was awarded the World Food Prize in 1997 for his significant contributions in plant protection. As Chancellor of the Texas A&M University System, Dr. Adkisson provided extraordinary leadership in a major agricultural state in meeting the needs of state clientele and at the same time developing the university into a world class research institution. He has had a distinguished career as a researcher, educator, and administrator. Dr. Adkisson was elected to the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) in 1979 for his cutting-edge research in entomology and integrated pest management programs. He has served on a number of National Research Council (NRC) boards and commissions including Board on Agriculture and Natural Resources, Food and Nutrition Board, Commission on Life Sciences, and several NAS/NRC ad hoc committees. Dr. Adkisson received his Ph.D. in entomology from Kansas State University in 1956. Stanley Abramson, Member, Arent Fox Kintner Plotkin & Kahn, Washington, DC. Mr. Abramson's law practice is focused on biotechnology, food safety and environmental law. He works extensively with risk assessment and risk management issues and assists clients with obtaining regulatory approvals for agricultural, industrial and consumer products, including products of genetic engineering. Mr. Abramson represents clients in federal and state enforcement proceedings and defends products before regulatory agencies and the courts. He is the past Associate General Counsel for Pesticides and Toxic Substances at EPA and a principal author of the federal government's Coordinated Framework for Regulation of Biotechnology. Mr. Abramson received his J.D. from Rutgers University. Stephen Baezinger, Eugene W. Price Professor, Department of Agronomy, University of Nebraska Dr. Baezinger's research interests focus on cultivar and germplasm development for small grains and improved breeding methodology. New breeding methods include use of tissue culture, genetic engineering, cytogenetic stocks, molecular markers, and statistical designs. Dr. Baezinger has had experience as a plant breeder in industry and with the U.S. Department of Agriculture. He obtained his B.A. in biochemical sciences at Harvard University and his M.S. and Ph.D. in plant breeding and genetics from Purdue University. Fred Betz, Senior Scientist, Jellinek, Schwartz & Connolly, Arlington, VA Mr. Betz directs the biotechnology and biopesticides practice for this environmental consulting firm. He advises companies in regulatory strategy, provides technical advice on biopesticide matters, and assists with product registrations. These registrations include several of the first genetically engineered plant pesticides and the first genetically engineered microbial pesticides. Mr. Betz was the principal scientist and regulatory specialist at EPA, where he was responsible for biopesticide risk assessment and biotechnology policy. He received his M.S. in environmental engineering from the University of Florida. William Fry, Professor, Plant Pathology Department, Cornell University Dr. Fry conducts research on the integrated management and epidemiology of fungal pathogens. Areas of research emphasis include: integrated management of potato late blight; epidemiology of potato late blight; genetics of Phytophthora infestans and its interaction with host plants; and population genetics and migrations of P. infestans. Dr. Fry's research also involves genetic analysis and modeling for the detection of plant and pathogen resistance. He is a Fellow of the American Phytopathological Society and a Past President of the Society. Dr. Fry received his Ph.D. from Cornell University in 1970. Fred Gould, William Neal Reynolds Professor, Department of Entomology, North Carolina State University Dr. Gould's expertise is in the ecological, genetic, and chemical aspects of plant/herbivore interactions. In particular, he is conducting seminal work on resistance management strategies for transgenic crops containing Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) insecticidal genes. Dr. Gould has served on several NRC committees including the Committee on the Future Role of Pesticides in Agriculture and on the Committee on Biological Pest and Pathogen Control. He was involved in the NRC report titled Ecologically Based Pest Management: New Solutions for a New Century (1995). Dr. Gould received his Ph.D. from SUNY at Stony Brook in 1977. Ernest Hodgson, William Neal Reynolds Professor of Toxicology, North Carolina State University Dr. Hodgson's areas of expertise are pesticide metabolism and toxicology. In particular, his lab studies the induction and mechanism of human and rodent cytochrome P450 isoforms in oxidizing agricultural chemicals. Dr. Hodgson has authored well-known basic textbooks of toxicology, A Textbook of Modern Toxicology and An Introduction to Biochemical Toxicology. He served on the NRC committee which authored the report Carcinogens and Anticarcinogens in the Human Diet: A Comparison of Naturally Occurring and Synthetic Substances (1996) and is the editor of the Journal of Biochemical and Molecular Toxicology. Dr Hodgson received his Ph.D. in Biochemistry from Oregon State University in 1960. Tobi Jones, Special Assistant for Special Projects and Public Outreach, Department of Pesticide Regulation, California Environmental Protection Agency Dr. Jones is recognized as a national expert in state and federal pesticide regulatory programs, and emerging regulatory issues affecting genetically engineered organisms. She has a strong working knowledge of evolving biotechnology regulation and genetic engineering issues. Dr. Jones is an experienced manager of science-based regulatory programs, serves as the state agency's representative at the national level, and chairs the national committee of state pesticide officials that advises U.S. EPA on federal-state partnership issues. Dr. Jones received her Ph.D. in microbiology from Northwestern University. Brian Larkins, Porterfield Professor of Plant Sciences, Department of Plant Sciences, University of Arizona Dr. Larkins was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 1996 for his outstanding research on the control of gene expression and protein synthesis during seed development in maize. His current work involves studying mutations that alter the synthesis of maize seed storage proteins and has important implications for increasing the nutritional quality of grains. Dr. Larkins has published extensively in prestigious journals such as Science and PNAS. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Nebraska. Morris Levin, Professor, University of Maryland and Biotechnology Institute's Center for Public Issues in Biotechnology Dr. Levin has extensive experience with risk assessment for genetically engineered organisms both in the federal government and in academia. He has been employed by the Department of Defense and the Department of Interior as an environmental microbiologist. Dr. Levins was in Biotechnology Risk Assessment at the EPA and continues to do risk assessment research at the University of Maryland. He has edited several books including the recent publication Engineered Organisms in Environmental Settings: Biotechnological and Agricultural Applications (1996). Dr. Levin received his Ph.D. in Bacteriology and Biophysics from the University of Rhode Island. Erik Lichtenberg, Professor, Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics, University of Maryland Dr. Lichtenberg has conducted extensive research on productivity and environmental tradeoffs of pesticide regulation, economics of pesticide regulation, and risk-reducing and risk-increasing effects of pesticide regulation. He has served as the Senior Agricultural and Natural Resources Economist on the President's Council of Economic Advisers, as a consultant to the pesticide industry and to EPA, and as an advisor to USDA and EPA. Dr. Lichtenberg received his Ph.D. in agricultural and resource economics from the University of California at Berkeley. (As a regulator, he cannot speak out against GE. It is said that he is pro-GE, and was used to promote the USDA move on organic standards.) Allison Snow, Associate Professor, Department of Evolution, Ecology, and Organismal Biology, Ohio State University Dr. Snow has conducted important research on gene flow and hybridization in several crop-weed systems. Her lab uses molecular techniques to investigate transgene escape to weedy relatives of crops. Dr. Snow's current research focuses on the effects of transgenic insect resistance on herbivory and fitness in wild sunflowers. Dr. Snow has published extensively on the ecological implications of genetically modified crops and has been an associate editor for the journals Ecology and Evolution. She served on the steering committee for the recent USDA Workshop on the Ecological Effects of Pest Resistance Genes in Managed Ecosystems. Dr. Snow received her Ph.D. in Botany from the University of Massachusetts in 1982. (Her work is mainly used to promote biotechnology, and squash research that hurts biotechnology by being used as a peer reviewer of grant application and journal articles.) Brian Staskawicz, Professor, Department of Plant and Microbial Biology, University of California, Berkeley Dr. Staskawicz's work has greatly contributed to understanding the molecular interactions between plants and their pathogens. He was recently elected to the National Academy of Sciences for elucidating the mechanisms of disease resistance, as his lab was the first to clone an avirulence gene from a pathogen and among the first to demonstrate the interaction of plant resistance genes with genes from plant pathogens. Dr. Staskawicz's research focuses on the interaction of the bacteria, Pseudomonas and Xanthomonas, with Arabidopsis, tomato and pepper. He has published extensively in this area in journals such as Science, PNAS, and Nature. Dr. Staskawicz received his Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley in 1980. Comment on Committee Membership http://www4.nas.edu/webcr.nsf/CommitteeDisplay/BANR-O-99-02-A?OpenDocument The public comment period lasts twenty days from date of Committee Membership Posting. You have 13 day(s) remaining to provide comments. We welcome your feedback on the Committee Membership. You must copy the Project Identification Number at the top of this form, and then paste it into your feedback message. -- http://www.greenbuilder.com modem: 512.288.3903 -- Green Building Professionals Directory at http://www.greenbuilder.com/directory/ ---- For instructions on joining, leaving, or otherwise using the Ban-GEF list, send email to Ban-GEF@lists.txinfinet.com with HELP in the SUBJECT line. ---- -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= RFC822 Headers Follow =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- X-ENSMTPTo: ban-gef X-ENSMTPSubnet: txinfinet Received: from lists.greenbuilder.com (216.171.28.120) by [216.171.28.2] with SMTP (Eudora Internet Mail Server 1.2); Thu, 25 Mar 1999 21:53:47 -0600 Date: Fri, 26 Mar 1999 03:45:00 GMT From: Judy_Kew@greenbuilder.com (Judy Kew) To: Ban-GEF@lists.txinfinet.com Message-ID: <328859646.47046075@greenbuilder.com> X-Processed-By: HSKT 1.0 by Joshua Baer Subject: B-GE: Panel membership's biotech leanings (Nat'l Acad Sciences) -- http://www.greenbuilder.com modem: 512.288.3903 -- Green Building Professionals Directory at http://www.greenbuilder.com/directory/ To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "unsubscribe sanet-mg". 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All messages to sanet-mg are archived at: http://www.sare.org/san/htdocs/hypermail From owner-sanet-mg@shasta.ces.ncsu.edu Fri Mar 26 16:31:49 1999 Received: from shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (shasta.ces.ncsu.edu [152.1.45.61]) by luna.oit.unc.edu (8.8.6/8.8.6/rchk1.19) with ESMTP id QAA13594 for ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 16:31:49 -0500 (EST) Received: by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) id NAA07443 for sanet-mg-outgoing; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 13:06:25 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: shasta.ces.ncsu.edu: majord set sender to owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu using -f Received: from mail2.greenbuilder.com ([216.171.28.121]) by shasta.ces.ncsu.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with SMTP id NAA07143 for ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 13:05:58 -0500 (EST) Received: from [216.171.28.125] ([216.171.28.125] verified) by mail2.greenbuilder.com (Stalker SMTP Server 1.6) with ESMTP id S.0000107674 for ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 12:02:18 +0000 To: sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu From: Judy_Kew@greenbuilder.com (Judy Kew) Reply-To: Judy_Kew@greenbuilder.com (Judy Kew) Date: Fri, 26 Mar 1999 18:02:39 GMT Subject: Urgent Action Needed - Biased panel to set US biotech policy, laws Message-ID: <1658056702.50141038@greenbuilder.com> Organization: Sustainable Sources X-Gateway: FirstClass Gateway for SMTP/NNTP (Mac68K) version 1.02 Sender: owner-sanet-mg@ces.ncsu.edu Precedence: bulk Status: O X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 183 This is an alert that I hope you will help with. We only have 2 weeks to make a loud noise about this bogus review panel. It is felt that if we do not and the panel succeeds in their goal of a major PR coup, in a few months it will be much harder for the US public to hear us. We have them running already, let's keep it up. Supporting documents are included or will follow. Thank you for any help you can give. Judy ------- Urgent Action Needed - Biased panel to set US biotech policy, laws The National Academy of Sciences will begin a "fast track" study on April 8 in order to give GE foods a rubber stamp of approval - by investigating the benefits and potential risks of genetically engineered crops with an eye toward recommending changes in government regulations. (see article below) The NAS study is an attempt to minimize the effect on the US public of the European furor over GE food. The NAS is a highly respected body, and supposedly "independent," so it has the power to pull off a major biotech PR coup. The NAS is largely responsible for the US policy on biotech. Since the 70's it has promoted GE to Congress, to the Carter, Reagan, Bush, and Clinton Administrations, to Wall Street investors, federal agencies, etc. Also, the NAS is under the thumb of Monsanto, et al, and under pressure to show the biotech flag. Plus it wants to protect its reputation. The study is expected to be narrow in scope, and will conclude that there are some problems which can be handled, and that the benefits far outweigh the risks. As Joe Cummins says, it "will show the bias of the committee and serve as a public relations scheme to revive the worldwide image of biotechnology." Please note: 1. The panel is stacked in favor of the biotech companies (you can see for yourself in a separate post (with biotech interest emboldened or explained) or by going to this URL http://www4.nas.edu/webcr.nsf/CommitteeDisplay/BANR-O-99-02-A?OpenDocument 2. Usually NAS studies take 18 months but this study will take 1/3 that time - 6 months. 3. The review is unannounced. Monsanto was upset when they heard that the author of the article knew about it. LET THE NAS KNOW WE ARE WATCHING AND THAT THEY CAN'T DO A WASH JOB. What you can do: 1) We have until April 8 to flood the NAS with comments on the NAS Committee membership - demand they reveal any biotech conflicts of interest. A response form is set up on the NAS website (sample letter below): http://www4.nas.edu/webcr.nsf/CommitteeDisplay/BANR-O-99-02-A?OpenDocument Project ID is BANR-O-99-02-A. Here you can e-mail the NAS directly, access the committee membership, and the project scope. 2) Send the article below and this information to as many environmental organizations, websites, listserves, etc., as possible so their members can send their responses to the NAS as soon as possible. 3) Contact your Congressperson asking them to inquire whether the panel members are really objective. 4) Contact media telling them to follow up on the story. Send them the article with a cover letter (2 samples below). Sample letter for website: Dear NAS, I am concerned that the committee that is reviewing the health, safety, and environmental impact of genetically engineered agricultural products is made up primarily of scientists that derive their livelihood from genetic engineering, work for organizations who rely on grants from bio-engineering companies, or are official regulators of the technology (and therefore cannot easily take a public stand against it). It would almost appear that the role of this committee is to get an NAS rubber stamp to proceed, while many scientists in the US, Europe and Asia are questioning the long-term environmental impact of this technology. - Ornithologists and entymologists are concerned about the destruction of beneficial insects (through Bt ingestion) and mass death of birds that prey on these (and pest) insects. - Ecologists are concerned about horizontal gene transfer to similar species of plants (through cross-pollination), recombination of plant viruses used as the DNA transfer mechanism, and genetic pollution of the biosphere. - Agronomists are concerned about the massive transformation of the biodiversity of food plant species to monocultures. - Economists are concerned about the transformation of entire rural economies from subsistence horticulture to cash commodity agriculture. - Medical doctors are concerned that the enzymes and proteins expressed by the inserted or modified genes may have adverse health effects, such as the increase in allergy to RRS soybeans found in Europe. Yet none of the many scientifically credentialed critics of agricultural genetic engineering have been included on the committee destined to provide a review of this technology in the name of the National Academy of Sciences. Without such members on the committee, and an unrestricted open debate about the full range of issues, any report that the committee prepares will, by its very nature, be discredited before it is published. I strongly urge you to reconsider the membership of the committee to include serious critics of the technology, so as to make them at least 50% of the membership of the committee. Sincerely, -------- Sample letter - media 1: Dear Editor, On April 8, 1999 the U.S. National Academy of Sciences is going to begin a "fast track" study to investigate the risks and benefits of genetically modified (GM) crops. NAS Studies usually take about 18 months but this study is expected to be completed in six months. Biotech companies like Monsanto, Dupont, and Dow have invested billons of dollars in GM food crops. They are now facing a meltdown of public trust in Europe and the possibility of that happening in the United States. The NAS panel is stacked in favor of the biotech companies. We believe they are behind this "fast-track' NAS study in order to gain a rubber stamp approval for their products.. The URL for the NAS Committee on Genetically Modified Crops is: http://www4.nas.edu/webcr.nsf/CommitteeDisplay/BANR-O-99-02-A?OpenDocument Below please find an article by Journalist Bill Lambrecht of the St. Louis Post regarding the NAS study. Sincerely, ------- Sample letter - media 2: Dear Editor, On April 8, 1999 the U.S. National Academy of Sciences is going to begin a "fast track" study to investigate the risks and benefits of genetically modified (GM) crops. NAS Studies usually take about 18 months but this study is expected to be completed in 6 months. Biotech companies like Monsanto, Dupont, and Dow have invested billons of dollars in GM food crops. They are now facing a meltdown of public trust in Europe and the possibility of that happening in the United States. The furor has reached firestorm proportions in other parts of the world, with people burning and uprooting biotech plots, UK MPs calling Monsanto "Public Enemy #1", supermarkets declaring themselves Genetic Engineering-free zones, the European Union potentially blockading against GM foods, and Brazil halting all GM seeds. Farmers in the US have eagerly bought into the biotech revolution, unaware of the environmental problems and potentially catastrophic economic downside: inability to sell their crop and contamination of their land and grain silos if the furor spreads to US consumers. Thus an immediate whitewash of the technology is crucial for these biotech food giants and their contractors, supporters, and farm clients. We believe that is the impetus behind this "fast-track" NAS study. The composition of the NAS panel is telling because it is heavily stacked in favor of the biotech industry. Monsanto, Dupont, and Dow already exert powerful influence in several critical parts of the federal government: trade, FDA, USDA, EPA, and the President and VP. A rubber stamp of the National Academy of Sciences might overcome the objections of many researchers and activists if they don't have the full story in front of them, and would influence the decisions of regulatory agencies abroad. The URL for the NAS Committee on Genetically Modified Crops is: http://www4.nas.edu/webcr.nsf/CommitteeDisplay/BANR-O-99-02-A?OpenDocument Below please find an article by Journalist Bill Lambrecht of the St. Louis Post regarding the NAS study. Sincerely, ------- Altered crops will get safety review By Bill Lambrecht St. Louis Post-Dispatch Washington Bureau The National Academy of Sciences is beginning an urgent study of the benefits and potential risks of gen