Sludge Watch ==> 2 short Organic Food - GMO trend stories

[maureen.reilly at sympatico.ca]

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Biotech food tears rifts in Europe
June 6, 2006
New York Times
Elisabeth Rosenthal

ATHENS —Theodore Koliopanos, a legislator and former deputy environment 
minister in Greece, was quoted as saying, "All political parties are 
opposed, which is odd because we disagree on everything else."
The story says that Greece and a few other countries in the European Union 
that have banned genetically modified organisms are on the front lines of a 
war over the future of modified food in Europe, the only large swath of the 
world that does not already grow or buy the crops. Facing international 
pressure and a lawsuit brought by the United States, Canada and Argentina at 
the World Trade Organization, the union said this year that all member 
states must open their doors to genetically engineered crops and prepare 
practical and legal regulations to ensure safety for health and the 
environment.
But five countries have imposed eight different types of bans. Many others 
use their votes in Europe's Council of Ministers to block the crops from 
entering.
Barbara Helferrich, a spokeswoman for the union's Environment Directorate, 
was quoted as saying, "We think we have a good policy but we have discovered 
extreme reluctance among consumers and many member states to move forward 
with G.M.O.'s, who again and again block the approvals."
Nikos Lappas, head of Greece's largest farmers' union, was quoted as saying, 
"The environment minister who gives in and allows G.M.O.'s into this country 
will never be minister again. For farmers, forcing G.M.O.'s would be 
economic suicide, since our market doesn't want them."
Simon Barber, of EuropaBio, an industry group in Brussels, was quoted as 
saying, "The E.U. has put systems in place to deal with G.M.O.'s, and now 
the market has to be allowed to operate. If member states are breaking E.U. 
law, we expect the commission to take action."




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Organic produce healthier than conventionally grown

June 6, 2006
The Edmonton Journal

Connie Howard of Edmonton writes that Lois Ferguson says that it's "simply 
not true" that organically grown produce is more nutritious than 
conventionally grown produce ("Don't feel pressured to buy organic, just eat 
your veggies," Guest Column, June 4). Howard says it depends where you get 
your information.
The truth is that there is a large peer-reviewed body of research telling us 
the exact opposite. Studies the world over have shown that organically grown 
produce has significantly higher mineral and antioxidant content.
If that's not enough to make us consider paying more for our food, or if the 
trouble we have getting our children to consume the recommended five to 10 
servings of fruits and vegetables every day isn't, maybe a reminder about 
the presence of pesticides and chemical fertilizers in conventionally grown 
produce will be. The adverse affects of many of these chemicals has been 
widely documented, as has the heightened need for antioxidants their 
presence in our bodies create.
Almost daily, we see "toxic shock" stories, chilling reports of 
unprecedented levels of known carcinogens and neurotoxins in our 
bloodstreams, and in the bloodstreams of our newborns.
Spiralling health-care costs and cancer rates are frightening -- breast 
cancer alone increased by 90 per cent between 1950 and 2001, prostate cancer 
by 286 per cent.
This despite the reality that we're spending more and more and on cancer 
research every year -- over $93 million in 2005, according to the Institute 
of Cancer Research. Our children are getting it earlier and more often than 
we did.
What Ferguson calls conventionally grown is only conventional as of the past 
60 years or so, out of thousands of years of farming -- conventional prior 
to the mid-20th century was pretty organic and didn't even remotely resemble 
the modern farming methods she calls conventional.
While it's true that no one toxic substance can be held responsible, the 
toxic soup of chemicals we ingest every day can and should be, and our 
"conventionally" grown produce is a key ingredient in that soup. Elevated 
cancer rates have been clearly linked to pesticide and chemical exposure, 
and we can keep giving our money to the Cancer Society instead of to those 
would bring us high-quality food, but it doesn't make sense to me.
Nor does it make sense to me to take the public relations word of an 
industry insider -- Ferguson is a former director of Communications for the 
Grocery Products Manufacturers of Canada and continues to represent those in 
the industry -- without a generous sprinkling of salt. Organic sea salt, of 
course.