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In Mexico, a coalition of Indigenous, farm, and environmental advocacy groups have been working for decades to safeguard the genetic diversity of the crop that is a cornerstone of both their diets and their cultural and ecological heritage: corn.

Just two years ago, they celebrated a major victory, when President Andrés Manuel López Obrador issued the first executive order that directed the government to “revoke and refrain from granting authorizations” for the use of genetically modified (GM) corn in Mexican diets and for “release into the environment” by January 2024. While growing GM corn in Mexico has not been allowed for 25 years, millions of tons of the corn enter the country each year via imports. The order also called for a complete phaseout of the controversial herbicide glyphosate by that date.

“It leaves the door open to GM corn coming from the U.S., and that, from our perspective, still poses a risk.”

“With the aim of achieving self-sufficiency and food sovereignty, our country should aim to establish sustainable and culturally appropriate agricultural production, through the use of agroecological practices and inputs that are safe for human health, the country’s biocultural diversity, and the environment, as well as congruent with the agricultural traditions of Mexico,” López Obrador wrote in the order.

Now, however, in the face of U.S. pressure, Mexico is weakening the ban, which was in part intended to prevent genetically modified seed from contaminating native varieties.

Because the executive order was short on specifics, it was unclear from the start what it would mean for the 17 million tons of mostly GM corn exported to Mexico from the U.S. every year—used primarily for livestock feed. And since last fall, U.S. officials, including Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack, have been meeting with Mexican officials to advocate for its reversal.

Vilsack and others said the recent order violated the free trade agreement between the U.S. and Mexico, a fact that some analyses of the agreement’s language dispute. As officials negotiated, preliminary reports suggested López Obrador’s government would stick to including corn used for livestock feed but delay the start date of the ban to 2025 to alleviate U.S. concerns.

Then, at the end of January, the U.S. agriculture trade chief demanded Mexican officials provide scientific evidence to support the bans on both GM corn and glyphosate by February 14. And finally, last week, the Mexican government issued an order that came with new clarifications. Officials said the ban on GM corn would still apply to corn used in flour, dough, or tortillas but not to livestock feed or industrial uses.

“It leaves the door open to GM corn coming from the U.S., and that, from our perspective, still poses a risk,” said Gustavo Ampugnani, the executive director of Greenpeace Mexico, in an interview with Civil Eats.

One 2004 commission focused on GM corn and biodiversity found clear evidence that transgenic DNA had been imported in U.S. corn.

Advocates worry that because the grain itself is a seed, those seeds will end up getting planted somewhere. Then the GM varieties, which are bred for traits including resistance to glyphosate and to include a protein that kills certain insects, will cross-pollinate with native corn varieties, called landraces.

“It’s not just hypothetical,” Ampugnani said, pointing to research from the early 2000s that found transgenic DNA in corn plants grown in Oaxaca. “The only explanation for this to happen was that the grain that we were importing from the U.S. was being used as seeds.” Past reports have shown those imported seeds can be viable, even when intended for use as feed.

Ampugnani and advocates from the many organizations he works with say that protecting the country’s native landraces is especially critical right now, given that economic, environmental, and other pressures on small- and medium-sized corn growers could lead to them abandoning farming.

“The ancient cultures who were living in Mexico and Central America domesticated the corn in such a way that you can find corn for very specific temperatures, soils, and altitudes in Mexico. So, we are talking about biodiversity. We are talking about plant diversity, but a special plant which is used for food as well,” he said. “So, from this ecological point of view, Mexico has to do as much as possible to protect these landraces from being contaminated with GE varieties.”

Critics of López Obrador’s ban say Mexico needs the corn imports to feed its citizens and keep the economy humming and that there is no evidence that shows GM corn is detrimental to the environment or human health. One 2004 commission focused on GM corn and biodiversity found clear evidence that transgenic DNA had been imported in U.S. corn—and that those genes were already present in and would continue to cross-contaminate Mexican landraces. But the commission also found that the introduction “of a few individual transgenes is unlikely to have any major biological effect on genetic diversity in maize landraces.”

Interestingly, in his original order phasing out GM corn, López Obrador cited reliance on the “precautionary principle” as a key component of international biodiversity treaties that “have determined that the authorities observe said principle to prevent serious or irreversible damage.” That principle basically holds that when evidence of harm is not conclusive, it’s better to be safe than sorry. But U.S. policy on genetic engineering and pesticide use tends to follow an opposite rule.

If the evidence of a crop or chemical’s harm is not bulletproof, agencies tend to allow its use until harm is sufficiently documented. With genetics and biodiversity, that approach could be especially risky, since the same 2004 commission found that “removing transgenes that have introgressed widely into landraces is likely to be very difficult and may in fact be impossible.”

“Right now, while we have authorities that are more like-minded, this is our opportunity to make it better.”

As the issue has continued to percolate, anti-GM advocacy organizations across the U.S., Mexico, and Canada have joined forces to protest the Biden administration’s stance and support Mexico’s original order. Groups in the U.S. have called the American stance “21st century imperialism” and pointed to an economic opportunity for U.S. farmers to respond to demand for non-GM corn.

On the ground in Mexico, Ampugnani said that their coalition was digesting the latest development and would be ready to come together to figure out their next steps next week.

“Right now, while we have authorities that are more like-minded, this is our opportunity to make it better,” he said.

Bee Breeding. In other genetic-diversity news, a new study conducted by researchers with USDA’s Agricultural Research Service (ARS) found an “alarming” lack of it among honeybees in the U.S., threatening the sustainability of the country’s beekeeping. In recent years, honeybees have faced a multitude of threats to their health and survival. Pesticide use, the loss of nutritious forage, climate change events like droughts, and pests and parasites have all contributed to a high rate of annual colony loss and lower honey production. In a press release, ARS researchers explained that a lack of genetic diversity makes U.S. honeybees more vulnerable to those threats. The researchers studied approximately 1,063 bees from hobbyist and commercial beekeepers in 45 U.S. states, the District of Columbia, and two U.S. territories (Guam and Puerto Rico) and found the nation’s managed populations rely almost entirely on a single evolutionary lineage. Ninety-four percent belonged to the North Mediterranean C lineage, 3 percent belonged to the West Mediterranean M lineage, and 3 percent belonged to the African A lineage. The research team is now looking at solutions, such as diversifying breeding stations.

Corporate Climate Accountability. In April 2021, global meat behemoth JBS took out a full-page ad in the New York Times to announce a goal of becoming a net-zero company by 2040. “Bacon, chicken wings, and steak with net-zero emissions,” the ad declared. “It’s possible.” However, according to an advertising watchdog organization’s ruling, based on the company’s plans so far, it’s really not—and that means the company is misleading consumers. JBS is appealing a decision by the National Advertising Division (NAD) of BBB National Programs found that, despite its progress on setting climate targets, the company’s plans and current work to meet those targets do not match its bold climate claims.

It’s just one of many examples of how food—and especially meat—companies’ climate commitments are coming under increased scrutiny. In a new study out of Europe, researchers investigated the net-zero claims of Swedish fast-food chain Max Burgers AB and found the company’s promises had many of the same problems as JBS. It relied heavily on offsetting emissions while publicly conflating that strategy with real greenhouse gas emissions reductions. The company also promoted reduced emissions based on relative numbers (emissions per unit of food sold) while the company’s overall emissions tripled between 2007 and 2021. “We conclude that even seemingly progressive corporate net-zero pledges and claims become problematic if they distract from real reductions and justify carbon-intensive lifestyles,” the researchers wrote.

At the same time, a report released last week looked at the net-zero claims made by 24 global companies. The authors estimated that far short of net-zero, their pledges will only reduce emissions by 36 percent, because of an overreliance on offsets and a lack of concrete, immediate actions in place to match long-term targets. Companies across eight sectors including tech and consumer goods were included, but food companies—including JBS—had some of the lowest scores.

This is all happening as agricultural lobbyists are fighting to defeat a proposal by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission that would require public food companies to report emissions throughout their supply chains.

Pesticide Protections for Farmworkers. Last week, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced it will rescind Trump-era provisions that weakened a standard meant to protect farmworkers from being sprayed by pesticides while on the job. As part of the Obama EPA’s update to the Worker Protection Standard in 2015, the agency established an “Application Exclusion Zone,” an area that is off limits to workers while harmful pesticides are being sprayed. Trump’s EPA shrunk the size of the zone and changed the rules so that it could not extend beyond property lines, which meant workers would not be protected from spray just over a field border. Now, Biden’s EPA reviewed the provisions and found that those provisions weakened the standard in a way that could harm workers. Agency officials are proposing reverting to most of the provisions of the 2015 rule; the new rules are available for public comment for 60 days. “Farmworker justice is environmental justice, and we’re continuing to take action to make sure these communities are protected equally under the law from pesticide exposure,” EPA Administrator Michael Regan said in a press release.

The post As the US Pressures Mexico to Import GM Corn, Can It Preserve Its Traditional Varieties? appeared first on Civil Eats.

]]> ‘Percy vs. Goliath’ Is a Cautionary Tale of Corporate Control in Agriculture https://civileats.com/2021/04/30/percy-vs-goliath-is-a-cautionary-tale-of-corporate-control-in-agriculture/ Fri, 30 Apr 2021 08:00:50 +0000 http://civileats.com/?p=41497 In 1998, Percy Schmeiser, a canola farmer on the plains of Saskatchewan, Canada received a letter from the agricultural biotech company Monsanto, claiming that he was growing its patented seeds in his fields without a license. Genetically modified (or GMO) seeds were relatively new to the market, and the company’s Roundup Ready canola was resistant […]

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What Will it Take for Farmers to Grow More Organic Cotton?

Mon, 15 Mar 2021 08:00:23 +0000

For years, organic cotton was a tough sell for the average American consumer. The consumers who did opt to pay extra for organic products tended to prioritize food, and the markup on cotton just didn’t seem worth it.

“The first concern of people, and why they gravitate toward organic, is because they are usually putting it in their mouths,” says Kathleen Delate, an Iowa State University professor and organic specialist.

But that’s all finally changing, says Delate, who joined two other researchers to produce a new study in conjunction with The Organic Center looking at the environmental impact of organic cotton compared to its conventional counterpart. The change stems in part because consumers are increasingly interested in ecosystem health across the entire commodity chain. A 2019 survey conducted by Nielsen found that 73 percent of global consumers said they would be willing to adjust their consumption habits to reduce their environmental footprint with nearly half saying they’d pay more for products containing organic or all-natural ingredients.

This shift has spurred demand for organic textiles, which have seen a 12 percent annual growth rate in recent years. In fact, according to the Organic Trade Association (OTA), organic cotton is the largest and fastest-growing organic commodity in the American marketplace that’s not a food, netting $2 billion in sales in 2019 alone.

This supply comes from more than 222,000 farmers in 19 countries who grew more than 1.1 million bales of organic cotton during the 2017-2018 growing season—the second largest organic cotton harvest on record. Most of this production centers in India, which produces 51 percent of the global cotton supply. American-grown organic cotton comprises only a tiny fraction of the fiber sector. Of the 1.1 million bales grown worldwide in 2017-2018, only slightly more than 23,000 bales originated in the U.S.

That is a drop in the bucket compared to conventional cotton production—the world’s most popular natural fiber—where in 2019 alone, nearly 20 million bales of the crop were produced on American soil, accounting for $7 billion in global value. That’s a lot, considering that one bale makes more than 1,200 t-shirts.

And yet, Delate and her peers’ new research confirmed what many have long suspected: organic production results in remarkably less environmental degradation—in a sector highly dependent on genetically engineered seed and chemical inputs.

For Jessica Shade, director of science programs at The Organic Center and one of the report’s authors, the hope is to spur much-needed innovation in the industry. “It is incumbent upon universities, NGOs, and industry groups to work together toward the goal of creating an organic cotton sector steeped in the principles of ecology, health, fairness, and care,” the authors write in their report.

Why Organic?

Cotton production in the United States centers on 17 warm southern states, with Texas leading the pack as the largest cotton producer. The Lone Star state is also the heart of the fledgling organic cotton industry in the United States.

Conventionally grown cotton is not only one of the most traded crops on the planet—supplying billons of clothing and other various textile products each year—but it is also one of the most chemically intensive crops to produce. In the United States, cotton ranks third after corn and soybeans as the crop that requires the most pesticides in its production. In 2019, more than 68 million pounds of pesticide were applied to cotton fields across the U.S. alone. Additionally, most conventional cotton farmers plant genetically engineered seed, resulting in higher chemical application and the engineering of more robust products that have known environmental and human health impacts. Glyphosate, the active ingredient in the widely used herbicide Roundup, made up more than one third of all pesticide use on cotton in 2019 according to the USDA. The study reads:

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) approved new GMO cotton varieties, Xtend and Enlist, which are each resistant to three herbicides: glyphosate, glufosinate, and dicamba, and glyphosate, glufosinate, and 2,4-D, respectively. These new GMO varieties are expected to replace the traditional Roundup Ready cotton and are anticipated to increase the amounts of these chemicals used in conventional cotton production.

The researchers examined the environmental benefits of organic cotton using a survey of more than 100 growers and processors—most of whom reside in Texas. The researchers also sought information on the agronomic, manufacturing, and market challenges facing producers.

According to Shade, there has been little research to date looking at the environmental impacts of organic cotton on a large scale. More importantly, none of the research available has actively involved input from the nation’s small-scale organic cotton-producing community, Shade says.

“We wanted to do something that would look a little bit deeper and incorporate farmer and processor experiences in addition to the more academic knowledge that we have about the environmental impacts of organic cotton,” Shade notes. She says a lot of growers commented on perceivable improvements in things like soil quality and increased biodiversity on their farms since transitioning to organic.

Survey respondents cited weed management as their biggest obstacle in growing organic cotton. As Kelly Pepper, the manager of the Texas Organic Cotton Marketing Cooperative (TOCMC), attests, most organic cotton operations average 1,000 acres—which is mammoth compared to their counterparts in other organic industries—and organic management of weeds over this large terrain can be complicated. Cotton is a slow-growing crop that takes 150 to 180 days to come to maturation, giving weeds an ample opportunity to grow.

Other problems respondents cited include pest management, ensuring lack of contamination from genetically modified crops, accessing organic seed stock, the impact of extreme weather events—for example, last year’s drought in Texas slashed yields—and inadvertent pesticide contamination as well as a slew of marketplace barriers.

Organic farmers grow cotton in rotation with other crops while conventional producers are more likely to grow cotton in back-to-back seasons. Members of TOCMC also grow peanuts, wheat, corn, milo, forage sorghum, soybeans, black-eyed peas, and sesame.

These rotations mean more biodiversity, says Delate. As a result, organic farms contribute a range of ecosystem services to the regions where they are located. This approach has real and tangible impacts on soil, waterways, and human and animal health, the researcher said.

“There are higher carbon sequestration benefits with organic production in general,” Delate added. “Organic systems have always used cover crops and there are a plethora of options—rye, vetch, clovers. Cover crops add carbon—and some folks use compost and manure too, which adds to the carbon profile of the soil.”

Cotton also requires intensive water use. However, based on the researchers’ findings, organic growers appear to use less. According to the Textile Exchange, global cotton production comprises 69 percent of the textile industry’s water footprint. Meanwhile, organic cotton production reduces water consumption by as much as 91 percent. Many organic producers forgo irrigation—one study found that 80 percent of organic cotton production globally relies on rainfed systems—and they foster healthier soil that contains a higher percentage of organic matter, which does a better job of holding in moisture.

Beyond the farm, organic certification in the cotton industry extends to the ban on environmentally harmful chemicals at other points in the production process. This step safeguards the health of handlers and makers at further points in the value chain. Specifically, to be certified organic, the product must be free of chlorine bleach, dyes containing heavy metals, ammonia, and formaldehyde, as well as a slew of other hazardous inputs that are used in conventional cotton processing. Water is also saved in organic production processing compared to conventional production, which is generally dependent on large amounts of water for dyeing and finishing.

From Farm to Fashion

“Cotton is a very difficult crop to grow organically,” Pepper of TOCMC says.

Pepper used to farm more than 1,000 acres of organic upland cotton alongside his brother in the High Plains region of Texas, a fertile zone where more than 60 percent of the state’s cotton crop is seeded and harvested. Now, he helps more than three-dozen farmers affiliated with TOCMC find markets for their harvests from nearly 20,000 acres of combined cropland.

Despite the many challenges of growing cotton organically, Pepper also recognizes the crop’s potential. “Demand has gone absolutely crazy,” he says. “We’ve been turning away new business.”

However, the American market still favors conventional growers. “As long as conventional cotton is significantly cheaper in general it is hard for organic growers to compete,” Pepper says about current volatility in the sector. Building in more flexibility with products that blend organic and conventional cotton or permit cotton from farmers still in the three-year transition to organic would aid growers in expanding, he adds.

“The best way for there to be significant growth would be for large brands—and some of them have done this in the past—to have a program where they blend organic or transitional cotton with regular cotton,” Pepper says. “If they would come to farmers with a commitment to buy a certain number of pounds knowing that weather and other impacts may limit the amount available, but if the agreement is open-ended and has an attractive price, there is potential for growth.”

Patagonia offers a version of this with the “Cotton in Conversion” product line it launched last year. “Our support of this crop rewards the efforts of farmers who are committed to reaching organic cotton certification and helps them stay on the path to organic” the brand notes on its website. Other clothing brands, ranging from giants like Nike to small ones like Everlane, also have various commitments to organic production in their product lines.

“We need pioneer brands who will create an incentive for farmers to transition,” says Angela Wartes-Kahl, vice chair of the OTA’s Fiber Council. “It’s unfair to put everything on the farmer,” she adds while explaining that contracts from industry buyers are the structure needed to incentivize organic cotton’s expansion.

Jesse Daystar, chief sustainability officer for industry association Cotton Incorporated, doesn’t see a sole focus on organic as the only answer. “While organic cotton production is key to many brand sourcing strategies, relying on organic production alone is problematic for many reasons,” Daystar told Civil Eats via email. “First, cotton is purchased based upon its fiber quality, rather than by production system or geography. It could be challenging, especially for large brands, to source sufficient quantities of specific qualities of organic cotton for their apparel.”

Daystar says the support of other industry-specific tools such as the recently launched U.S. Cotton Trust Protocol, managed by his own company with the National Cotton Council among others, is one key to growing sustainability in the sector. The Protocol brands itself as “setting a new standard for more sustainably grown cotton” and claims to vet the fiber using metrics on land and water use, soil carbon and soil loss, as well as energy efficiency.

“Scaling up organic cotton production to meet the industry preferred fiber needs would be challenging, if not impossible, within the timelines set forth by many brands and organizations,” Daystar said. He wants to see sustainable fiber production take a “both and” mentality that includes both organic production and stricter standards for conventional cotton under the U.S. Cotton Trust Protocol.

The authors of the new study say the heart of their effort focuses on pushing industry partners to pursue deeper agronomic and market research to aid the sector. One effort that Delate says could be monumental is support for seed programs, like those at Texas A&M University, which aim to develop and make higher-yielding organic seed stock more widely available. The research institution houses the only program on organic cotton seed in the United States.

Meanwhile, at Iowa State—where Delate works—there are two research programs devoted to organic corn seed stock amongst a range of other academic institutions and private sector labs working on the topic. “[Organic] needs a lot more research power,” Delate says.

Shade calls the report a “scaffolding” for growth in the fledgling organic cotton sector. “There’s been a lot of research on organics in general but cotton has gotten left behind,” she adds. But, she adds that “there’s economic opportunity and, as the tools develop, hopefully they can really help people overcome barriers in transitioning from conventional.”

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]]> https://civileats.com/2021/03/15/what-will-it-take-for-farmers-to-grow-more-organic-cotton/feed/ 2 Bayer Forges Ahead with New Crops Resistant to 5 Herbicides https://civileats.com/2020/07/01/bayer-forges-ahead-with-new-crops-resistant-to-5-herbicides-glyphosate-dicamba-2-4-d-glufosinate-quizalofop/ https://civileats.com/2020/07/01/bayer-forges-ahead-with-new-crops-resistant-to-5-herbicides-glyphosate-dicamba-2-4-d-glufosinate-quizalofop/#comments Wed, 01 Jul 2020 09:00:16 +0000 http://civileats.com/?p=37353 Over the past few years, Bayer (which now owns Monsanto) has repeatedly lost in court to those who have claimed its Roundup herbicide is responsible for their cancer diagnoses. Things appeared to get worse for the agrichemical company last week, when it agreed to pay $10 billion to settle tens of thousands of similar lawsuits. At […]

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At Dicamba Trial, Evidence Shows Monsanto Execs Anticipated Pesticide Drift

Fri, 31 Jan 2020 09:00:23 +0000

Monsanto expected thousands of farmers to complain about its new weed killer drifting and harming their crops when it launched the new dicamba-tolerant soybean and cotton cropping systems, documents presented in federal court on Wednesday show.

“We anticipated it might happen,” said Dr. Boyd Carey, regional agronomy lead at Bayer Crop Science, which bought Monsanto in 2018.

Carey oversaw the claims process for Monsanto’s 2017 launch of the new herbicide.

Carey testified from 9 a.m. until 5 p.m. Wednesday in a trial of a civil lawsuit filed by Bader Farms, the largest peach farm in Missouri, against Bayer and BASF.

Bader Farms, which says it is no longer a sustainable business because off-target movement of dicamba harmed its orchards, alleges that the companies intentionally created the problem in order to increase profits.

Monsanto developed the new technology after an increasing number of weeds developed resistance to the herbicide glyphosate (also called Roundup).

The St. Louis-based agribusiness company developed new genetically modified soybean and cotton seeds to withstand being sprayed by dicamba. Dicamba was developed in the 1950s but was not widely used in growing season because of its propensity to unintentionally move from field to field. Many crops, including traditional soybeans, are extremely sensitive to and can be damaged by dicamba.

In addition to the seeds, Monsanto and BASF, the original maker of dicamba, developed new versions of the weed killer touted to be less volatile than previous versions designed to be sprayed on the crops.

Even with those new versions, Monsanto expected complaints, documents show.

In an October 2015 document, Monsanto projected that farmers would file thousands of complaints in each of the next five years.

At that time, Monsanto was projecting that its weed killer would be available for the 2016 growing season, but it was not approved by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) until the 2017 growing season.

Still, the complaint projection proved accurate.

Monsanto projected 2,765 complaints about dicamba in 2017. In fact, the company received 3,101 complaints, Carey testified.

The projections for the overall number of dicamba-tolerant soybean acres planted were also accurate. Bayer has said that the acreage totals were about 20 million acres in 2017, 40 million acres in 2018 and 60 million acres in 2019.

In Oct. 2017, Kevin Bradley, a professor at the University of Missouri, projected that at least 3.6 million acres of soybeans were damaged across the Midwest and South in 2017. The complaints have continued in 2018 and 2019.

This chart, from a 2015 Monsanto Xtend soy projection entered into evidence, shows how many millions of acres and how many farmers would be growing dicamba-resistent soy between 2016 and 2020.

The number of complaints after the seeds were launched was significantly higher than in previous years.

Nationwide, in the five years preceding 2015, farmers never filed more than 40 claims about dicamba drifting, said Billy Randles, lead attorney for Bader Farms. However, that changed in 2015, when Monsanto released its new cotton seeds that could withstand being sprayed by dicamba.

Though dicamba was not approved for use on the crops, Monsanto felt it was worthwhile to release the new seeds because they were resistant to glyphosate and glufosinate, another herbicide that is sold by BASF under the brand name Liberty, Carey said.

Despite it not being legal to spray dicamba, some cotton farmers reportedly sprayed older versions of the herbicide, which drifted and harmed other farmers’ crops in 2015.

Monsanto and BASF were aware of the issue, Carey testified. However, Monsanto chose not to track drift complaints in 2015 or 2016. The company also had a policy not to investigate any complaints. Monsanto did not sell any versions of dicamba in 2015 or 2016. When Randles suggested Monsanto only started tracking claims because the EPA required it in 2017, Carey disagreed.

“We would have done that anyway,” he said.

In that time period and to this day, Monsanto and Bayer have a policy to not settle any claims of off-target movement, Carey said.

Dan Westberg, regional tech service manager at BASF, expressed concerns that the “widespread” illegal spraying would likely become “rampant” after Monsanto released its dicamba-tolerant soybeans in 2016. Westberg told officials that at a meeting in San Juan, Puerto Rico, on Feb. 11, 2016, Carey testified off his notes from the meeting.

In 2016, the alleged illegal spraying became so bad that the EPA issued a compliance advisory that said the Missouri Department of Agriculture had received 117 complaints of off-target movement.

The crops damaged included non-tolerant soybeans, as well as specialty crops like peaches. Bader had complained to Monsanto about his peaches being damaged by off-target movement of dicamba in 2015 and 2016.

Carey, who was in charge of developing the claims system for the launch of Monsanto’s Xtendimax with VaporGrip dicamba herbicide, testified that he wanted to investigate some claims just to see if he could learn anything but was advised not to.

In August 2016, the month of the advisory, Carey testified that he asked for a budget increase for the 2017 claims process from $2.4 million to $6.5 million.

The request included a projection that 20 percent of growers using the system would have inquiries about the system, including drift complaints. Randles raised questions about Monsanto’s handling of those inquiries.

A 2015 Mosanto document that discussed tools “available or under development” mentioned a dicamba inquiry form for the claims process once Xtendimax was launched. The document said the form was “developed to gather data that could defend Monsanto” and instructed field inspectors to look for symptoms other than dicamba, including environmental stress and other pesticide drift.

Carey said he was confident any 2015 form was not the final version of the form and that one of the best ways to investigate claims is to look at all possible options, including ruling out other potential causes.

“The most important thing is to visit the field,” Carey said. He said that’s the best way to understand the symptomology and eliminate other potential causes.

A 2016 incident management flow chart to help show how to process claims in 2017 showed that every claim that came in ended in “no settlement.” Carey said that is a long-standing company policy.

Carey testified that in 2017, Monsanto refused to visit any “driftee”—an internal term for those who received crop damage—who was not a customer. Inspectors were told to research the purchasing history to see if they were current Monsanto customers in “good standing,” or did not owe the company money.

Direct examination on Carey wrapped up Wednesday afternoon, and then Monsanto started its cross-examination, which took the rest of the day.

This article was originally published by the Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting, which is following this story on a daily basis. Visit their website to sign up for daily updates from the dicamba trial.

Top photo: Bill Bader, owner of Bader Farms, and his wife Denise pose in front of the Rush Hudson Limbaugh Sr. United States Courthouse in Cape Girardeau, Missouri, on Monday, Jan. 27, 2020. (Photo by Johnathan Hettinger/Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting)

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Oregon’s Seed War: Can Vegetable Crops and Canola Coexist in the Seed Capitol of America?

Thu, 20 Jun 2019 09:00:18 +0000

(Update: The Oregon state legislature voted on June 30 to pass SB 885, which extends for five years the moratorium on growing more than 500 acres of canola in the Willamette Valley.)

On July 1, a state law that restricts canola cultivation in Oregon’s Willamette Valley will expire. Around the state capitol, two groups of farmers and their advocates are locked in battle over the potential expansion of canola production. It’s the latest flare-up in a 20-plus-year fight over the future of these prime farmlands stretching 125 miles due south from Portland.

Cradled between two mountain ranges, the populous Willamette Valley is one of the most productive and protected agricultural regions in the country. While renowned for its diversity of farm crops and wine grapes that feed a thriving farm-to-table movement, it’s also the epicenter of a lucrative seed industry. Lands for growing grass seed, cover crop seed, and flower and vegetable seeds dominate the corridor’s 1.7 million arable acres.

Within the world of vegetable seed production, brassicas such as kale, broccoli, cabbage, and rutabaga contribute significantly to the valley’s specialty seed market, ranked fifth in the world. The canola plant is in the same Brassicaceae family (commonly known as mustard or cabbage). Also called rapeseed, the yellow flowering Brassica napus is a useful rotational crop for grass seed farmers in the valley, and the oilseed is crushed for oil and animal feed.

While canola has been raised in the Willamette Valley since before World War II, the state has taken a precautionary approach to the crop because it is a notorious cross-pollinator with rampant pest, disease, and weed issues. In 2013, the legislature implemented a 500-acre limit for canola cultivation in the Willamette Valley Protected District and tagged on a mandate for Oregon State University (OSU) to study the fields.

Now, with the July sunset date looming, a fierce debate has reignited between specialty vegetable seed stakeholders and pro-canola supporters.

An Oregon canola field. (Photo CC-licensed by the Oregon Department of Agriculture)

Organic and vegetable seed producers fear that the potential for contamination from cross-pollination from canola, which also has the potential to carry genetically engineered (GE) materials, is so high it threatens the viability of Oregon’s specialty seed industry. Led by the Willamette Valley Specialty Seed Association (WVSSA), they’re seeking the protections of a renewed state law, SB 885, which would extend the 500-acre limit on canola for four more years.

Oilseed growers have long bristled at strict regulations that single out the canola crop from other brassicas and limit the development of an oilseed industry. They are pushing for expansion under a new set of rules from the Oregon Department of Agriculture (ODA) that would go into effect if the legislature allows the cap on canola to expire.

The central question in play is: Is there a way for vegetable seed and oilseed production to coexist? The matter is far from settled, and the pro- and anti-canola groups have found little, if any, common ground.

What’s at Stake for Oregon Farmers

Oregon’s Willamette Valley, with its mild, moist winters, long summers, and fertile soils, is one of few places, along with Chile, Australia, the Mediterranean, and western Canada, ideal for cultivating high-quality vegetable seeds. There is no official data collected on the number of seed companies located in the valley nor how many acres they farm. But industry sources reported to Civil Eats that there are at least 40 and as many as 100 seed companies operating on 10,000 to 12,000 acres. This includes valuable brassica seeds, including most of the world’s supply of European cabbage, Brussels sprouts, rutabaga, and turnip seed, and a quarter of the radish, Chinese cabbage, and other Chinese Brassica vegetable seed, according to a 2010 OSU report.

It’s well-established that when any variety of brassica blossoms, there is the potential for pollen to be transferred by insects or wind to other brassicas. If turnip pollen drifts to Chinese cabbage, for instance, it can produce undesirable traits in the resulting seed. However, the WVSSA has maintained a voluntary system of safeguards for decades that include field spacing (“isolation distances”) and crop mapping (“pinning”).

This same system is in use for GE sugar beet seed production, which was introduced in the valley in 2010. So far, it has worked to prevent sugar beets from contaminating fields of chard (a close relative) as well as non-GE table beets. But growers remain vigilant for transgenic contamination and test every seed lot.

While only non-GE canola is currently planted in Oregon, there is widespread concern that, because 90 percent of global canola seed is GE, it could make the canola seed supply vulnerable. Contamination from cross-pollination or seed mixing would make vegetable seed unsalable to the U.S. organic market or to countries that ban genetically modified materials, including Japan, Europe, and New Zealand. And there is no recourse or compensation for farmers.

Even without the GE issue, anti-canola advocates say low-value canola is a direct threat to the high-value specialty seed market. They point to places such as the U.K., Denmark, and France, where vegetable seed production declined or disappeared in the wake of commercial canola production as a result of disease and pest problems.

Nonetheless, the state-mandated OSU study on those 500 acres of canola has cleared a pathway for expanded canola production. Researchers collected data on the disease and pest impacts—but not cross-pollination—of canola on other brassica crops. It concluded, “The results of this research provide no reasons, agronomic or biological, that canola production should be prohibited in the Willamette Valley when there are no restrictions on the production of other [brassica] crops.” It also recommended an expansion of canola acreage to the state legislature as “reasonable and feasible.”

The Willamette Valley Oilseed Producers Association (WVOPA) touted the findings as a green light for canola production. Over the past two years, farmers have requested permits to plant twice the number of allowable acres. Canola is one of several crops that farmers can grow in rotation with grass seeds to break pest and disease cycles and doesn’t need irrigation. It’s desirable for farmers like Anna Scharf, WVOPA board president, who raises 11 different crops, including grass seed, turnip, clover, and wine grapes on close to 3,000 acres. “Because [canola] is a commodity, as a farmer I can grow the crop and play the market,” she told Civil Eats. “At the end of the day this fight comes down to economics.”

Currently, all canola seed grown in the valley is processed at Willamette Biomass Processors, located about 20 miles west of Salem. If canola production increased, its advocates say the certified organic facility could be used to produce more valuable food-grade canola oil. Growers like Scharf see alarmist fears over canola blocking its market potential She said, “I can grow marijuana easily in this state, but I can’t grow canola.”

The grass seed industry in the Willamette Valley is immense, representing most of the seed crops grown, or about 250,000 acres valued at over $228 million per year. In contrast, the acreage devoted to vegetable seed production is small, but the value is high, reportedly worth $50 million per year. And despite the study’s results, the anti-canola camp remains unconvinced that both an oilseed industry and specialty seed industry can coexist and thrive in the valley.

OSU vegetable breeder Jim Myers was one of the research advisors on the canola report. In his opinion, while the latest research provides more knowledge, the results have limitations. “I think it’s a problem of scale,” he said in a phone conversation with Civil Eats. “When you mix commercial acreage with seed production, then we get into problems.”

Specialty vegetable seeds are bred and selected to meet high quality standards for varietal and genetic purity—requirements that oilseed does not have. Myers detailed how increased acreages of canola with three-mile isolation distances between fields would fragment production areas. What’s more, just a few seeds blown off farm equipment and transport trucks could spread feral weeds, and because canola seed stays dormant in the soil for at least two years, weed problems could persist.

“I think the crux is, ‘What do we do best in western Oregon?’” he said. And that’s not growing commodity crops, in Myers’s view. He added, “It’s hard to know where the [vegetable seed] production would go if it couldn’t be done in the Valley.”

“Is Oregon willing to sacrifice this region to the interests of canola?” said Kiki Hubbard, advocacy and communications director at the Organic Seed Alliance (OSA). “What’s at stake is the diversity of our seed supply and the diverse seed economy currently thriving in the Willamette Valley.”

Countdown to Sunset

Underlying the controversy over canola, there is widespread agreement that the specialty seed industry is unique and valued. But there is no agreement over how to move forward. The oilseed growers insist on their right to farm, while the vegetable seed growers, along with plant breeders and seed companies, fight for self-preservation.

“Coexistence requires compromises,” the OSU report stated. But it also acknowledged the uneven playing field: “Coexistence does not mean that risks, if any, are equally distributed among the sectors.” The report noted that the data could not predict that “unlimited Brassicaceae crop production within the Willamette Valley would not result in production problems.” This is the heart of issue for the specialty seed industry: in the current paradigm of coexistence, they are the ones with everything to lose.

Photo CC-licensed by Ian Sane.

After years of meetings with all stakeholders, the ODA’s draft regulations for canola include an isolation area banning 937,000 acres of the Willamette Valley from canola production. The zone outside of this area, about 1.5 million acres, could be planted with canola by permit from ODA, as reported by The Capital Press.

“Nobody likes it,” said Jonathan Sandau, government affairs director for the Oregon Farm Bureau (OFB), which participated in the rule making. Members of OFB include farmers growing specialty crops as well as farmers who would like the opportunity to grow canola.

“I don’t think you can ban one industry,” Sandau said. “I think the department really strived to find within their existing authority an ability to protect the specialty seed industry.”

In their current form, seed growers say the regulations leave a lot of unanswered questions, including permitting requirements and pinning system details. “There’s a lot of gaps in what they’ve proposed,” says Smith of WVSSA. “I’m worried.” And three organic seed companies, Adaptive Seeds, Moondog’s Farm, and Wild Garden Seed, are located outside of the proposed isolation area.

But Sandau wonders, “If you’re asking for greater protection, how much protection is enough?” At the same time, he acknowledges that no one knows the market capacity for canola or the long-term impacts it could have on agriculture in the Willamette Valley. As a representative from the U.K. seed company Limagrain put it during 2009 discussions about permitting canola in Willamette Valley, “Once the genie of canola production is out of the bottle, you will never put it back.”

With the deadline on the canola law closing in, oilseed opponents may get their wish from the legislature. According to several sources in the Oregon capitol, SB 885—the continuation of the existing 500-acre limit—appears to be moving to a vote and may pass before the end of June. If approved, it would go into effect immediately, with a new expiration date in 2023. If it doesn’t pass, the ODA is mobilizing to present new rules in time for fall canola planting.

But even a four-year reprieve will not resolve the canola war in Oregon. “Either the legislature’s going to act or ODA is going to have a rule,” said Scharf of WVOPA. “No matter what happens, it is very consequential for the state of Oregon.”

Stewardship is one of the hallmarks of the diverse Willamette Valley farm community. So, as the canola schism draws out, many have argued for being “good neighbors.” Even the OSU report urged “the entire agricultural industry to maintain good stewardship practices to protect the status of the Willamette Valley as a premier seed production region.”

But some growers, including veteran plant breeder Frank Morton of Wild Garden Seed, question the presumption that peaceful coexistence between producing oilseed and specialty vegetable seeds is reasonable and feasible. “This is a road paved with good intentions, perhaps,” he said in a testimony to ODA, “but it will lead to a world of conflict without end.”

(Correction: This article was updated to reflect the fact that Willamette Valley canola is not currently sold for biofuels. Craig Parker, CEO of Willamette Biomass Processors, told Civil Eats that the plant used to sell to the biofuels industry, but the economics were not sustainable.)

The post Oregon’s Seed War: Can Vegetable Crops and Canola Coexist in the Seed Capitol of America? appeared first on Civil Eats.

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The Sobering Details Behind the Latest Seed Monopoly Chart

Fri, 11 Jan 2019 12:00:50 +0000

When Philip Howard of Michigan State University published the first iteration of his now well-known seed industry consolidation chart in 2008, it starkly illustrated the extent of acquisitions and mergers of the previous decade: Six corporations dominated the majority of the brand-name seed market, and they were starting to enter into new alliances with competitors that threatened to further weaken competition.

Howard’s newly updated seed chart is similar but even starker. It shows how weak antitrust law enforcement and oversight by the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) has allowed a handful of firms to amass enormous market, economic, and political power over our global seed supply. The newest findings show that the Big 6 (Monsanto, DuPont, Syngenta, Dow, Bayer, and BASF) have consolidated into a Big 4 dominated by Bayer and Corteva (a new firm created as a result of the Dow–DuPont merger), and rounded out with ChemChina and BASF. These four firms control more than 60 percent of global proprietary seed sales.

Howard began his annual tracking of seed industry ownership changes in 1998, a year that served as a turning point for industry consolidation. Two years after genetically engineered (GE) varieties were introduced in 1996, by 1998 the large agribusiness companies had accelerated their consolidation by buying up smaller firms to accumulate more intellectual property (IP) rights. By 2008, Monsanto’s patented genetics alone were planted on 80 percent of U.S. corn acres, 86 percent of cotton acres, and 92 percent of soybean acres. Today, these percentages are even higher.

Economists say that an industry has lost its competitive character when the concentration ratio of the top four firms is 40 percent or higher. The seed industry continues to exceed this benchmark not only across the entire global supply, but across crop types as well. For example, even before the Big 4 merged, three firms (Monsanto, Syngenta, and Vilmorin) controlled 60 percent of the global vegetable seed market.

The most notable mega-mergers in Howard’s updated chart include:

• Dow and DuPont: This $130 billion merger resulted in the two chemical companies dividing into three companies, including a new agriculture firm called Corteva.
• ChemChina and Syngenta: This $43 billion merger allowed China to add its second company ranking in the top 10 of global seed sales (along with Longping High-Tech).
• Bayer and Monsanto: This $63 billion deal was the second-biggest merger announced in 2016; Bayer has since dropped Monsanto’s 117-year-old name.

“For farmers, the options continue to be reduced,” says Howard. “Although Bayer sold a number of seed divisions to BASF to pave the way for its acquisition of Monsanto, the share of the market controlled by the largest firms has only increased.” What’s more, he added that although those firms made promises of job growth and greater innovation if the merger was approved, Bayer last month announced it would cut 12,000 jobs, or about 10 percent of its global workforce.

History shows us that seed industry consolidation leads to less choice and higher prices for farmers. These companies also aggressively protect their IP rights, which means less innovation and more restrictions on how seed is used and exchanged, including for seed saving and research purposes. These restrictions affect conventional and organic agriculture alike by making a large pool of plant genetics inaccessible to public researchers, farmers, and independent breeders, which in turn limits the diversity of seed in our landscapes and marketplace and weakens our food security.

A number of studies suggest increased market domination removes companies’ incentive to innovate. The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s own data confirms this trend, finding that fewer players mean less innovation. As the seed industry became more concentrated, private research “dropped or slowed” and those companies that survived consolidation are “sponsoring less research relative to the size of their individual markets than when more companies were involved.”

While the three mergers mentioned above received the most media attention and public resistance, Howard’s latest report found that 2018 brought 56 additional acquisitions and joint ventures involving other top seed companies, including Limagrain’s Vilmorin-Mikado subsidiary in France and Longping High-Tech in China, which acquired Dow’s maize division in Brazil. Both ChemChina and Longping High-Tech are planning more acquisitions of seed companies in China.

“There is a strong need to make these hidden ownership ties more visible to both farmers and eaters,” Howard explains, “so that we can avoid supporting firms that threaten the resilience of our food systems.”

Seed represents profound potential for improving our food and agricultural systems. Plants can be bred to thrive without pesticides and to naturally resist disease, and to be adaptable to changing climates and environmental conditions; they can also be bred to improve the quality of our food. But to realize all of this potential, we must create structural changes to how seed is managed and shared.

The DOJ has abdicated its responsibility to investigate and prosecute violations of antitrust laws, meaning that it is up to the public to demand action and resist companies that put the sustainability and security of our food and farming future at risk. We must also demand and support more investment in public plant breeding programs that are truly responsive to the needs of regional and resilient farming systems that support the health of both people and the planet.

As the industry continues to consolidate at a scale previously thought unimaginable, and policymakers begin to grapple with solutions, there is a growing community of seed stewards who are making an immediate difference today. Seed leaders including Ellen Bartholomew, Edmund Frost, Walter Goldstein, Ken Greene, Sarah Kleeger and Andrew Still, Frank Morton, Judy Owsowitz, Laura Parker, Theresa and Dan Podoll, Clifton Slade, Don Tipping, Rowen White, and many others are actively increasing the security of our seed and food supply.

By supporting more democratic seed systems—whether it’s buying from a seed company that aligns with your values, visiting your local seed library exchange, or growing and saving your own seed—we can take back control of our seed supply while actively conserving, improving, and generating more diversity on farms and in our backyards. This is the kind of diversity that, when considered collectively, is globally important.

The post The Sobering Details Behind the Latest Seed Monopoly Chart appeared first on Civil Eats.

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Op-ed: 3 Reasons to be Concerned about the USDA’s Proposed GMO Labeling Rules

Fri, 22 Jun 2018 09:00:06 +0000

Food labels help consumers quickly discern whether their food contains gluten, aspartame, high fructose corn syrup, trans-fats, or MSG. This same right to know should be clearly offered for foods that are genetically engineered (“GE” or “GMO”), especially since polls consistently show that Americans overwhelmingly believe they have the right to know if their food is GE, with roughly 90 percent regularly voicing support for mandatory GMO labeling as a result of concerns about health, food safety, and environmental impacts from GE foods.

That’s why the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) long-awaited proposed regulations for GMO labeling on food are so surprising.

Released in May, the regulations come out of a 2016 law signed by President Obama prohibiting existing state GE labeling laws, such as Vermont’s, which required on-package mandatory labeling, and instead created a nationwide standard. Instead of proposing straightforward rules, the 100-page USDA document presents a range of alternatives on a number of key issues, and leaves a handful of questions open for comment, to be decided in the final rule.

For many consumers and influencers in the food movement, the federal GE labeling law has offered a ray of hope for transparency about what’s in our food and how it’s produced. After the 2016 law was passed, food journalist Mark Bittman wrote that the law “could stir a revolution” of folks wanting to know more about their food, including whether antibiotics or pesticides were used in the production of those foods.

However, for those of us advocating for true transparency of foods produced using genetic engineering, the new USDA rules raise a number of big red flags. Here are the three ways the rules could end up causing more confusion than clarity.

1. They Propose Using “Bioengineered,” and the Acronym BE Instead of “Genetically Engineered” or GMO.

The term GMO has been used by farmers, food manufacturers, retailers, and the government for over a decade and is widely familiar to many. The National Organic Program, proposed by the USDA in 2000, excluded the use of GMOs in organic production and handling. The Non-GMO Project, founded in 2007, tests food products for the presence of GMOs and has certified thousands of food products in the marketplace.

The USDA proposes only allowing the term “bioengineered,” or “BE,” on products produced using genetic engineering, and does not allow other more well-known terms—a scenario that would likely confuse many consumers.

Government-mandated speech such as food labeling should be presented in a neutral way. The 2016 law requires that for purposes of the regulations, “a bioengineered food … shall not be treated as safer than, or not as safe as, a non-bioengineered counterpart.” Yet the symbols proposed to be used on packaging include an image of a sun, and another that uses the letters BE to create a smiley-face—both project an image that these foods are healthy and beneficial for the environment.

Do these symbols say GMO to you?

2. They Propose the Use of Digital QR Codes Instead of On-Package Text Labeling.

The agency proposes that QR codes (encoded images on a package that must be scanned with a smartphone) be allowed as a substitute for clear, legible language on the package. In 2017, the Center for Food Safety (CFS) forced the public disclosure of the USDA’s own study on the efficacy of this labeling, which showed it would not provide adequate disclosure to millions of Americans.

Among other things, the study concluded that consumers are: unfamiliar with QR codes or do not know that digital links contain food information; may not have equipment capable of scanning digital links on their own; may be unable to connect to broadband, or connect at a speed that is so slow that they cannot load information; and that technological challenges disproportionately impact low-income earners, rural residents, and Americans over the age of 65. By not mandating on-package text labeling, the proposed rule discriminates against more than 100 million Americans who do not have adequate access to this technology.

3. It Proposes that Highly Refined Foods such as Oils and Candy be Exempt from Labeling.

Another big question left unanswered in the proposed rules is whether or not genetically engineered foods such as cooking oil, candy, and soda will get labeled. These are ingredients that are typically derived from GE crops, but they’ve been processed in such a way that the GE content may or may not be detectable by a genetic test in the final product. This puts labeling on thousands of GE products in question.

In addition to these big three issues, the USDA’s proposal also seeks comments on how to deal with newer forms of genetic engineering—such as synthetic biology, gene-editing, and CRISPR—and whether or not to include foods produced using this technology.

The USDA will be accepting public comments on the proposed rule until July 3, 2018.

The post Op-ed: 3 Reasons to be Concerned about the USDA’s Proposed GMO Labeling Rules appeared first on Civil Eats.

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Hawaii Shows States’ Power to Regulate Pesticides

Wed, 20 Jun 2018 09:00:41 +0000

“I apologize if my anger comes across too strongly,” says Gary Hooser, on the phone from the island of Kauai in Hawaii, “but these companies sued my county for the right to use pesticides next to our schools and not tell us about it. And they can’t do that anymore.”

Hooser is a local policy advocate who has been elected to several county and state offices over the years and now serves as the president of the board of directors for the Hawaii Alliance for Progressive Action (HAPA). This week, his anger is mixed with a sense of victory.

On June 13, Governor David Ige signed Senate Bill 3095 into law, making Hawaii the first U.S. state to completely ban the use of the pesticide chlorpyrifos. The law also requires agrochemical companies including DuPont-Pioneer and Dow Chemical (one of the main manufacturers of chlorpyrifos) to share information about when and where they apply all restricted-use pesticides—including atrazine and paraquat—and sets up buffer zones around schools to protect children from pesticide drift.

Gov. David Ige after signing the chlorpyrifos ban into law. (Photo credit: Cameron Sato)

The bill was born out of nearly a decade of grassroots organizing by community activists and organizations in the islands, including HAPA, the Pesticide Action Network (PAN), Protect Our Keiki [children], and others.

“It’s the first bill in decades, of any kind, that I’m aware of, to regulate big agriculture in Hawaii [at the state level],” Hooser says. “It’s a miracle, in some sense, that we passed this.” Not for lack of trying: Hawaii has been on the frontlines of community activism for years to regulate pesticide use in the state.

The bill is especially significant on the national stage because it prohibits the use of “pesticides containing chlorpyrifos as an active ingredient” beginning January 1, 2019, with some opportunities for exemption through 2022.

In 2000, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) banned the popular insecticide for household use. Then, based on further research on its potential health risks, especially regarding developmental problems in children, the EPA recommended banning the chemical from agriculture nationwide.

However, when Scott Pruitt took over the agency under President Trump, he reversed course and rejected the agency’s own recommendation. Pruitt has also pushed back against a recent report that showed the use of chlorpyrifos endangers nearly 40 species of fish and their marine habitats.

For those who believe chlorpyrifos is a threat to both human health and the environment, Hawaii demonstrated that it’s possible for states to move forward on pesticide regulation, despite a rollback of proposed federal regulations.

Jay Vroom is the president and CEO of CropLife America, a trade organization representing the agrochemical companies that manufacture pesticides, including chlorpyrifos. In a statement emailed to Civil Eats, Vroom said pesticides are subject to “years of diligent and thorough testing. It is crucial to remember that pesticide registration decisions … are based on extensive scientific data to establish that these products are safe to human health and the environment when used properly.”

The statement adds that “a total ban of any product that ignores this scientific, risk-based regulation is informed not by science but by politics and has the potential to lead to confusion in the marketplace, leaving farmers and other pesticide users without the tools they need.”

For Hawaii residents, though, banning the restricted-use insecticide is one piece of a much bigger issue their communities have been facing for many years. Because the climate there allows for year-round growing seasons and the islands are isolated, agrochemical companies have flocked to the state to grow seed crops and do field-testing, a development that was chronicled in the recent documentary, “Poisoning Paradise.”

“For too long, these corporations have used Hawaii as its test grounds, poisoning our land and our people,” says Leslee Matthews, a Pesticide Action Network (PAN) policy fellow based in Honolulu.

According to a recent report, in 2015, more than 25,000 acres of land were used by Monsanto (now owned by Bayer), DuPont-Pioneer, Dow Chemical, Syngenta, and BASF for genetically engineered seed crop operations in Hawaii. Since 1987, Hawaii has hosted more cumulative field trials than any other state, and between 2010 and 2015, herbicide resistance was the most frequently tested trait, suggesting high applications of herbicides during those trials.

Between 2007 and 2012, DuPont-Pioneer alone applied 90 different pesticide formulations on Kauai, spraying on two-thirds of the days in that period an average of 8.3 to 16 applications per day. The report also found that restricted-use pesticides like chlorpyrifos, which are classified that way because they are considered more dangerous, were used in large amounts, especially on Kauai.

While the report provides a broad picture of frequent field trials and pesticide use, agrochemical companies have largely not been required to reveal what or when they were spraying. And because Hawaii is small, many of the fields are located close to residential communities and schools.

Reports of children getting sick at school as a result of pesticide drift was one of the main sparks that launched the movement. At Waimea Canyon Middle School in 2008, for example, several students and teachers were sent to the emergency room due to headaches, nausea, and dizziness after a chemical smell hit the school.

Keani Rawlins-Fernandez and her family. (Photo credit: Hanohano Naehu)

“My children attend an elementary school across the street from fields that are regularly sprayed with a variety of pesticides,” says Keani Rawlins-Fernandez, a lawyer and advocate based on the island of Molokai who is now running for Maui County Council.

“This elementary school is the only one with a Hawaiian immersion program on Molokai,” she says. “The decision to send my children to school in a setting that builds a strong foundation for their identity as Kanaka ‘Oiwi [Native Hawaiians], and children of this place, taught in the language of their ancestors, while potentially being exposed to dangerous chemicals constantly weighs heavy on me, as their mother.”

Rawlins-Fernandez says the issue has also broken up local communities, since some believe the jobs companies provide outweigh the health and environmental risks and resent the residents who challenge the companies.

However, enough opposition had built up by 2013 and 2014, that Hooser decided to introduce a Kauai county ordinance that would mandate pesticide disclosure and school buffer zones.

“It was an epic battle—thousands of people marching in the streets, the largest, longest public hearings ever in Kauai,” he says. The ordinance passed. Shortly after, both Maui and Hawaii counties passed similar ordinances. Then, the chemical companies fought back and a federal judge overturned all three laws on the basis that the counties couldn’t preempt state law on the issue.

‘The judge clarified, though, that the state could take action,” says Paul Towers, an organizing director and policy advocate at PAN North America. “It sort of forced advocates to say, ‘Okay, we’ve got to take this to the state.’”

Advocates then shifted to focus on getting state legislation passed that would achieve the same goals but at a higher level.

“It was similarly difficult but … when we started working at the state level, we had a coalition already,“ Hooser says. “Every day we had people knocking on legislators’ doors, sending them emails, and calling them.”

And at the state level, Towers explains, the law is much less likely to be overturned, especially since a judge already ruled it was in the state’s power to regulate pesticide use. Overturning a legislature-passed bill is a tall order, Towers says, although he notes, “what seems more likely is that they try to sabotage implementation of the law to delay its effect. Or for the company to voluntarily cancel use in Hawaii in efforts to try and keep it on the market in other states, as well as globally.”

In the meantime, Syngenta has responded to the news about Hawaii’s law and other international pushback against pesticide use by warning of global food shortages. Independent experts have repeatedly found that the claim that pesticides are needed to feed the world’s growing population is a myth.

“Hopefully this is a sign for other states that they can take the lead, especially given the vacuum of leadership at the federal level,” Towers says, pointing to the fact that California, Maryland, and New Jersey are already considering implementing restrictions or bans on chlorpyrifos.

“It shows that you can stand up to powerful industrial agriculture interests and do things in the best interest of frontline communities.”

This article was updated to reflect the fact that California is considering tighter restrictions on chlorpyrifos, but not a full ban.

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In High Demand, Organic Soy and Corn Farmers Stand to Win

Fri, 01 Jun 2018 09:00:07 +0000

The United States is importing more organic corn and soybeans than it’s producing, according to recent data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Foreign Agricultural Service.

Despite a steady increase in demand for organic products among consumers, U.S. crop growers have been reluctant to make the switch from conventional crops, even if it could mean higher profits for farmers struggling with low commodity prices.

“Corn, soybeans and cotton have pretty much the lowest (organic) adoption level of any crop we grow in the U.S.,” said Catherine Greene, an agricultural economist at the USDA Economic Research Service. “We’re orders of magnitude lower in the adoption level of feed grains than we are for many of the fruits and vegetables.”

But soybeans and corn, the two crops that dominate much of the agricultural landscape in the Midwest, have become lucrative organic imports since the USDA implemented the National Organic Program in 2002.

The volume of imported organic soybeans increased from $41 million in 2011 to $271 million last year. Organic corn imports jumped from about $24 million in 2013 to nearly $122 million in 2017.

Greene said increased demand for organic corn and soybeans are fueled by the need for organic livestock and poultry feed.

India was the leading exporter of soybeans to the U.S. last year, followed closely by Turkey, the leading exporter of corn to the U.S.

Meanwhile, incomes for American farmers have been trending downward. According to the USDA 2018 Farm Sector Income Forecast, net farm incomes are expected to decline to the lowest levels in 12 years. Many row crop farmers are barely breaking even, which makes premiums offered for organic corn and soybeans more appealing.

Enticing Price Premiums for Farmers Who Grow Organic

“We have had three large farms convert from conventional to organic in the last five years,” said Jim Traub, a merchandiser at Clarkson Grain Company near Cerro Gordo, Ill. “In 1992, we did not know what organic meant.”

Clarkson Grain Company processes both non-GMO and organic corn and soybeans. Farmers who sell non-GMO soybeans to Clarkson, even without the full organic distinction, have access to Japanese markets, where Midwestern beans are used in tofu, soymilk, and other food products.

Traub said it’s a relationship Clarkson has had with a Japanese trading company for more than 20 years that provides growers a $1.50 premium per bushel compared to genetically modified beans. Farmers who grow non-GMO corn see a premium of about 75 cents.

The price for organic corn and soybeans is even higher, paying farmers two to three times what they might make on a bushel of conventional grain.

But Traub said making the switch to full organic is not a quick and easy transition.

Farmers cannot use any pesticides or synthetic fertilizers on their land for three years before they can receive the green and white label conferred by the USDA that has appeared on an increasing number of food labels.

“That’s the big barrier,” Traub said, adding that it’s part of the reason so much organic feed comes from overseas.

The organic standards, first established by the 1990 Farm Bill, go beyond using non-GMO seeds and forgoing chemicals. Equipment can only be used on organic crops, which can add significant costs for farmers wanting to grow both conventional and organic.

There are financial assistance programs offered for the transition period, including the USDA’s Environmental Quality Incentives Program, but it is capped at $20,000 a year, and some lawmakers say assistance is nowhere near the level of the agency’s other programs for conventional farms, where risk is more controlled.

“We need thousands of additional farms to convert,” said Peter Golbitz, CEO of the agricultural consulting firm Agromeris. According to Agromeris, imports of organic corn and soybeans for feed have been growing at an average rate of 33 percent over the past five years, outpacing growth of organic feed grains produced by American farmers.

Golbitz said during a presentation at the USDA’s Agricultural Outlook Forum in February that skyrocketing imports in recent years have not only created a trade gap, but also raised questions about fraud. He questions whether countries like Turkey and India can produce as much organic product as they are reportedly contributing to the U.S. market.

Trade Gap Leaves Room for Foreign Fraud

A 2017 audit from the Office of the Inspector General found that controls on organic imports are weak. In some cases, products coming into U.S. ports that were labeled as organic were treated with pesticides upon arrival in the same manner as conventional products.

The audit also provided little assurance that the necessary documents required under the National Organic Program were reviewed at ports of entry to verify that foods labeled as organic were from certified farms.

The audit came after a Washington Post report from May of last year revealed that nearly 36 million pounds of Ukrainian soybeans en route to California had been fumigated with a pesticide, then relabeled as “organic.” A shipment of Romanian corn underwent a similar relabeling from conventional to organic during its journey to the U.S., the Washington Post investigation found.

In order for the U.S. to rely less on imports and help meet growing demand for organic corn and soybeans, American farmers would need to convert approximately 600,000 more acres, according to Golbitz.

Dallas Glazik in a organic wheat field his family farms near Paxton, IL on Friday, April 13, 2018. (Photo by Darrell Hoemann/The Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting)

Price of Making the Switch

Tyler Young farms 3,500 acres of conventional corn and soybeans in east-central Illinois. Young has done his research on organic growing options and what transitioning his farm might look like. But he’s not convinced it’s realistic for an operation of his size, even with the enticing price premiums.

“Larger operations like ours are adopting some of the things that come out of organic agriculture without going whole hog,” Young said.

He plants cover crops, a natural way to promote soil health and prevent runoff. But when it comes to going all-in on organic, Young said weed control and using natural fertilizer would pose big challenges.

“Other than switching to a vegetable crop, you’re looking at labor bills and hand weeding,” Young said. He currently uses five different herbicides to keep weeds under control on his soybeans, something that would be prohibited by organic standards.

Young said he would also have to consider bringing cows back into his operation, something his grandfather had as a dairy farmer, to provide a natural fertilizer.

The transition to organic on smaller farms, on the other hand, can be more manageable.

Dallas Glazik, 24, is a fifth-generation farmer in Ford County, Ill. He said his family was one of the first in the area to become certified organic in 2003.

Will Glazik with some wheat the family grows on their farm near Paxton, IL on Friday, April 13, 2018. (Photo by Darrell Hoemann/The Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting)

“We transitioned 400 acres when I was in second or third grade,” Glazik recalls.

He also remembers walking the soybean rows during the summer, picking weeds on the family’s farm. “But now we have the procedure down a lot better,” Glazik said.

It was partly the farm’s size that made the switch to organic easier for the family. Now, they have a five-year rotation of corn, soybeans, small grains (wheat, oats, barley, and rye), as well as pasture. Glazik and his two older brothers have also started a distilling business, making their own whiskey.

“We decided to make more money on what we already had instead of buying more land,” Glazik said.

While overall yields are lower and the cost of labor higher for organic corn and soybean farmers, USDA surveys have shown that there are higher returns in organic crops.

Greene, with the USDA, said corn and soybean farmers also face challenges finding access to markets and access to non-GMO seed. But there is long-term payoff.

“In the studies we’ve done, organic production tends to be more profitable,” Greene said.

Glazik explained that while the three-year transition period to organic can be less lucrative, it will determine the future success of the farm. He recommended framing the investment in another way.

“You have to go into it with a mindset of you’re not going to make much money in the transition,” Glazik said. “You’re investing in the soil.”

This article was originally published by the Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting, and is reprinted with permission.

Top photo: Dallas Glazik (right) and brother Will Glazik with some of the corn varieties they grow on their farm near Paxton, IL on Friday, April 13, 2018. (Photo by Darrell Hoemann/The Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting)

Anna Casey is the Audience Engagement Fellow at the Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting. The fellowship is sponsored by Illinois Humanities, a private 501(c)(3) state-level affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities, with support from the Robert R. McCormick Foundation. The story was inspired by a listening session the Midwest Center hosted in Tuscola, Illinois, where a diverse group of farmers spoke about some of the misconceptions about transitioning from conventional to organic farming.

The Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting is a nonprofit, online newsroom offering investigative and enterprise coverage of agribusiness, Big Ag and related issues through data analysis, visualizations, in-depth reports and interactive web tools. Visit us online at www.investigatemidwest.org

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A Family Farmer Looks Back at 30 Years in the Field

Fri, 27 Apr 2018 09:00:21 +0000

Mike Madison wants to make it clear from the get-go that his new book, Fruitful Labor: The Ecology, Economy, and Practice of a Family Farm is not meant to be a guide—even if it does at times veer into granular detail about his farming practices. Instead, he refers to it as a “report card” to himself, a 30-year journal of the small family farm he created in California’s Sacramento Valley with his wife Dianne.

The 21-acre piece of land is a diverse patchwork of native forest, wild plants, and annual and perennial crops, but the majority of the organic farm is planted to orchards, mainly olive trees. They sell their fresh fruit, vegetables, cut flowers, olive oil, jam, and soap at local farmers’ markets.

This isn’t an idealistic, everyone-should-become-a-farmer kind of book. It’s factual accounting of the hardships, challenges, and rewards involved in farming. It’s also radically transparent in some places, such as the chapter in which Madison chose to share a copy of his Schedule F tax form.

“Being a good farmer is like being a good musician—it takes a knack,” Madison writes. “Ably strumming a guitar in your living room does not mean you can become a professional rock-and-roll musician, which is a far more stringent calling. And similarly, growing a productive garden in your backyard does not mean that you’re suited to earn your living by farming, which requires both aptitude and a particular personality. Possibly only one person in a dozen, or one in 20, is temperamentally suited to farming.”

If you happen to be among the “one in 20” that can weather the work and maintain a livelihood in farming, you will surely find a huge amount of value in the book. But it still holds nuggets of advice and wisdom for the rest of us, in topics such as wildlife diversity, water, soil, energy inputs and outputs, economics and the vast network of social contexts we all find ourselves embedded in whether we want to be or not.

Madison’s prose is witty, slightly sarcastic, and poetic at times, which makes reading about seemingly mundane details like tractor parts and the energy efficiency ratio of crops can be a pleasure. He recently delved a bit deeper with Civil Eats.

You say you wrote this book as more an account than a guide. What do you hope readers will gain from reading it?

Every time I visit a farm, I learn something—a new way of laying out irrigation, an ingenious way of rigging tillage equipment, a new source of supplies. A farm is a bundle of idiosyncratic practices which nonetheless adhere to fundamental principles, and a farmer who has been at it for enough years will have figured out a coherent system. I would like the reader to experience this book like an extensive visit to my farm, with both the idiosyncrasies and the fundamentals in evidence.

Tell us a bit about your writing background and how this book came about.

My second year at boarding school, [at] age 14, I had a wonderful English teacher—Mr. Guy Hughes. He taught me to write and encouraged me to become a writer. That impulse lay dormant for quite a while, but then in my 50s, I started writing, mostly essays for magazines and newspapers, and also a few books. (I haven’t yet managed to get a novel published.) I wrote Fruitful Labor to clarify my own understanding of my farm and how it was operating—a sort of report card to myself. I thought I would get an “A,” but it turned out to be more like a “B.” Even with virtuous practices, my dependence on fossil fuels was greater than I had expected. The pumps and cooler and olive mill, along with the tractors and cars and trucks all require fossil fuels to operate, even if that use is mediated through electricity. And the $10,000 a year I spend on bottles and jars for packaging mostly reflects the fossil fuel costs of manufacturing and shipping glass.

When did you know you wanted to be a farmer? What would you tell your young farmer self now?

Although I was born on a farm and worked on farms as a child—in an era when child labor was considered admirable rather than criminal—I didn’t consider farming when I was young. Farming was my fifth, or maybe sixth, career; I stumbled into it at age 39 with little planning and only vague intentions and immediately loved it. I knew right away that it was my destiny, to use an antique term. What would I tell my beginning farmer self now? “Don’t worry, be happy—it will all work out.”

Could you explain the difference between ecology and agroecology?

Agroecology applies the principles and techniques of traditional wildlands ecology in an agricultural setting. In the narrow sense, it is the study of crop and livestock ecology. But in its broader sense, agroecology includes the social, economic, cultural, and institutional factors operating on a farm. This book is a study of agroecology in the broader sense.

You write that “the social and institutional side of farming” is favorable in your region. Do you think you would be a farmer if you didn’t have those conditions in your community?

Operating a small farm successfully is certainly easier where you have a sophisticated and wealthy populace enthusiastic about good food. Artisanal farming would be a tougher proposition in rural Oklahoma than in California. But there are other, less obvious, factors as well. For example, there are four commercial compost manufacturing facilities close to my farm; I only have to pick up the phone to get 40 yards of compost delivered the same day. In other parts of the country, that’s just not possible. I might well still be a farmer if I lived in a less congenial place, but it would have to be a different kind of farming than what I do now.

What are some of the biggest changes and challenges you have seen over the course of your 30-year farming career?

The industrial farming of today is almost unrecognizable compared to the artisanal scale farming that I knew in the 1950s. The changes could be summarized as mechanization, commodification, and globalization. And it’s not done yet. An engineer friend tells me that the future of agriculture is drones and robots. Dismal prospect!

Have you always been as organized as you describe in the book? And do you think it is a requirement for successful farming?

The successful farmers that I know usually share three traits: they’re information seekers, fast workers, and orderly. I run a very orderly farm. Everything has a place, and either it’s in use or it’s in its place. This is partly for the great efficiency it confers and partly for the aesthetics of orderliness. The aesthetics of the farm are more important to me than the economics of it.

In your chapter on economics (excerpted here), you discuss the true costs of food. Do you think our society will ever get to a place of transparency in regards to cost?

Our federal policy for the last 80 years has been “cheap food/cheap energy.” Since industrial farming is basically a system for turning petroleum into food, those two are tightly linked. The true costs of food—environmental, geopolitical, social, and economic—are not reflected in its low prices. Will that ever be remedied? I doubt it. Truth is held in low regard in our culture, certainly well below comfortable entitlements.

What is the most important advice you would like to give to a young farmer just starting out?

Good farmland is very expensive—in my district, $30,000 per acre or more. The kind of farm that a young farmer can afford to buy—steep, stony soil 40 miles down a dirt road—is not worth owning. My advice to young farmers is to seek a long-term lease (10 to 30 years) on excellent soil close to your markets—and forget about buying a farm. These leases are complex, and they require a penalty-free escape clause for the farmer if things don’t work out. In many parts of the country, this is the best option. Not being able to buy your own farm is partly an economic problem, but mostly a psychological problem. And once you accept the idea, there are many advantages. Your capital is free to use for the best possible equipment and supplies. You needn’t worry about mortgage payments and property taxes. And you will be following in the footsteps of our nation’s foremost farmer, Thomas Jefferson, who did much of his farming on leased land.

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Ancient Corn is Coming to Whole Foods. Just Don’t Try to Buy it in Mexico.

Fri, 27 Oct 2017 09:00:28 +0000

There is nothing quite like a good tortilla. Unfortunately, almost no one in the U.S. has ever had a good, authentic tortilla—handmade, still warm from the comal it’s been cooked on, from landrace corn grown, nixtamalized, and ground nearby, often by the very same hands making the tortillas. A tortilla speaks of a particular soil, a variety of corn, a certain landscape, and the community that have been its guardians for millennia.

But despite being a staple of Mexican cuisine, culture and history, finding a fresh tortilla made from landrace corn—domesticated, heirloom varieties—is surprisingly difficult in the nation’s capital, and until recently almost impossible outside of Mexico. However, Jorge Gaviria, who founded Masienda in San Francisco in 2014 and began supplying restaurants like Cosme and Taco Maria with landrace Mexican corns, is about to launch Masienda Bodega’s new line of tortillas in 200 different stores across the U.S., including Whole Foods.

“The whole reason we’re launching Masienda Bodega is to democratize the access to landrace corns,” Gaviria explained.

The 30,000 to 40,000 tortillas Masienda will make daily will be made from not only landrace corns imported from several states in Mexico, but also corns farmed organically and sustainably in the U.S. corn belt, a region historically dominated by GMO corn. The company’s goal is to “improve regional ecosystems dedicated to corn production with every pack sold.”

Masienda’s landrace corn tortillas. (Photo credit: Molly DeCoudreaux, courtesy of Masienda.)

Corn, arguably one of humanity’s greatest agronomic achievements, originated in Mexico. It’s now the most widely produced crop in the world, and while the vast majority of this is industrialized, super high-yielding genetically modified or modern hybrid corns dependent on heavy pesticide and herbicide use, in Mexico there are still at least 59 recorded unique native landraces.

Corn is unique because it evolved entirely thanks to ancient meso-American farmers who saved and selected different kernels over thousands of years of domestication to produce varieties not only suited to Mexico’s many different ecosystems, but also for purposes including their specific colors, textures, flavors, and ceremonial uses. As a result, there is now a plant species with tremendous diversity.

Preserving these ancient varietals is essential, not least to ensure its future sustainability, but also because “this goes beyond food; reduced diversity takes away a part of civilization’s identity and traditions,” says Martha Willcox, geneticist and Landrace Maize Improvement Coordinator at the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT). “Traditional landraces are the backbone of rural farming in Mexico, and a source of tradition in cooking and ceremonies as well as being an economic driver through tourism. They need to be preserved.”

Masienda’s tortillas will be the first commercially available, fully traceable landrace corn tortillas to enter the thriving U.S. tortilla market. And making them using the ancient, pre-Columbian nixtamal process—cooking the corn in slaked lime, or cal, to make the calcium, amino acids, and vitamin B3 in every kernel bio-available for humans—will bring them even closer to authenticity. But will popularity and accessibility follow suit?

State of the Tortilla in Mexico and the U.S.

U.S. supermarket demand for tortillas has been steadily rising, due to the burgeoning Hispanic population, the worldwide Mexican food trend, the growing gluten-free market, and the availability of low-cost corn.

But the popularity of the tortilla masks serious polemics in the world of corn that explain why Masienda wants to enter the marketplace. The Mexican multinational Gruma, founded in 1949, currently dominates the tortilla market in Mexico and the U.S., although their heavily processed products—including Maseca corn flour and Mission and Guerrero brand tortillas in the U.S.—concern people like Rafael Mier, founder of the Mexico City-based foundation Tortilla de Maíz Mexicana, which lobbies to improve the quality of the tortillas we are eating.

Mier recently spoke at the 7th National Heirloom Expo in Santa Rosa, California, to call for new norms in both Mexico and the U.S., beginning with a legal definition of the words “corn tortilla” designed to prevent further misrepresentation of the Mexican staple, which Mier believes amounts to a form of cultural appropriation.

“It’s crucial we differentiate between a nixtamalized corn tortilla and other corn-based products which are not tortillas,” Mier says. Like many, he worries that there are “whole generations of young Mexicans and Americans who have never tasted an authentic tortilla, made from nixtamalized landrace corn, and who think that a tortilla made from Maseca is how corn tastes.”

Benedicta Alejo Vargas making her famous tricolor tortillas in Morelia, Michoacan using corn from her town, San Lorenzo, Michoacan. (Photo credit: Venetia Thompson)

Gruma’s tortillerías can be found all over Mexico, from the tiniest villages in rural Yucatan to the vast cities of the industrial north; they even offer financial support to anyone wanting to open one. Their “just add water” concept made instant masa accessible to busy working urban mothers who still wanted to prepare fresh tortillas, but has now become commonplace in both rural and urban kitchens.

Mexico imported around 13 million tons of corn in 2016 from the U.S., expected to increase to between 16.8 and 19.2 million tonnes in the 2017-2018 harvest. The vast majority of this is genetically modified yellow corn, ostensibly for industrial use and animal feed, but there have long been allegations of unscrupulous use of cheap imported yellow corn in processed food, popcorn for cinema chains, and tortillas by large multinationals. Gruma’s 2016 annual investors’ report notes that the company may have inadvertently bought GMO corn that hasn’t been approved for human consumption and that this corn may have found its way into its products. It is no surprise, therefore, that a recent report found that 90.4 percent of tortillas in Mexico contain GMO corn.

While GMO corn remains illegal to farm in Mexico (though not to import), farming modern hybrid corn is also a subject of huge controversy in Mexico. Hybrids are widely thought to be the only way Mexico can produce the 23.5 million metric tons of white corn the country needs annually, because as Martha Willcox explains, “when you industrialize, you have to have something that’s more homogenized.”

Many scientists and farmers of landrace corn fear that the increasingly widespread planting of hybrid varietals (using seed from Monsanto or Pioneer, for example, and their corresponding chemical fertilizers and pesticides) is a major threat to not only the purity of landraces, soil quality, and the entire Mexican ecosystem, but also the Mexican palate.

“We only have to look to the U.S. to see where hybrid corn ultimately leads,” Willcox says. “Some people would argue it’s a marvel that three states can supply the whole of the U.S. with corn, and still have enough left over to export, but it’s a very yield-driven mentality.” She adds that the consolidation of the corn industry has narrowed the genetic base corn growers are working with, but because “we are facing an unknown future, there needs to be a broader genetic base available in plant breeding.”

And of course, preserving a broad genetic base also preserves the huge variety of flavors and textures found in Mexican landraces.

Examples of Ixtenco, Tlaxcala’s extensive landrace corn varietals at the home of Cornelio Hernández Rojas. (Photo credit: Venetia Thompson.)

“New hybrid varietals have been created specifically for certain conditions,” says Cornélio Hernández Rojas. “[Seed companies] have homogenized everything, from the plant’s height, to its taste and color. These companies only care about quantity, not preserving flavor.”

Hernández is a smallholder and anthropologist who lives in Ixtenco in the south-central state of Tlaxcala, where 95 percent of smallholders still farm landrace corns. For him, the idea of a pozole or tamal made from hybrid corn is unthinkable. “These hybrids won’t allow you to enjoy Mexican food—everything would taste the same!” he says.

Capitalizing on Supply and Demand

While finding a tortilla made from rare landraces is relatively easy in Ixtenco, it is much more difficult a couple of hours’ drive east in Mexico City—and expensive. There are of course traditional tortillas made at some of the capital’s top restaurants, such as Pujol (which sources its own corn) and as of a few months ago, Maizajo, a new landrace corn tortillería and research center in the trendy neighborhood of Roma. But the vast majority of tortillas are industrially made, not least because of the prohibitive cost of landrace tortillas—15 pesos for a dozen Maizajo tortillas, compared to around 13 pesos for a kilo of Maseca cornflour tortillas.

Tortillas in Mexico are a staple, to the point that the government has intervened when the price creeps too high. The divide between what the average Mexican can afford to spend on a kilo of tortillas and what it costs to produce a kilo of landrace corn is currently just too wide, limiting the market for many landrace corn farmers to chefs in both the U.S. and Mexico who are willing to pay a premium for its flavor profiles and textures—and people who shop in Whole Foods and see premium tortillas as a gourmet luxury, rather than a daily necessity. For everyone else, it’s the hybrids—at least until Mexico’s landrace farmers are able to increase their yields in a way sustainable to both the land and themselves.

“Mexico has an enormous number of landrace corn farmers,” Willcox says, “but they don’t have a way to connect to the market. The idea is to get them connected and keep them connected, without it becoming something that only Big Ag benefits from.”

Farmers in a milpa, the ancient pre-hispanic crop-growing system still used throughout Mexico. (Photo credit: Molly DeCoudreaux, courtesy of Masienda)

Willcox hopes that the growing U.S. interest in landrace corns will continue to “reverberate in Mexico” and that Maizajo is hopefully the first of many tortillerías focusing on landrace corns—which will eventually improve the efficiency of the supply chain and in turn the availability of good tortillas both sides of the border.

Willcox also encourages U.S.-based companies like Masienda to not only focus on Mexico, but to seek out the few remaining U.S. landrace corn farmers. “Instead of trying to replicate in the U.S. what we have in Mexico, foment what you have in the U.S. that has almost died out,” she says.

The Future of Ancient Corn

Eating a tortilla made from landrace corn, whether Mexican or U.S.-grown, from Masienda, Maizajo, or any of the companies that will inevitably follow in their steps, is a communion of sorts; receiving it, freshly made from a comal or out of a vacuum sealed pack, acknowledges the millennia of work that has led to that point, to that particular tortilla tasting that way, having that color and texture and reflecting that particular soil. A single tortilla can be a stark reminder of the world’s fragile biodiversity, humanity’s role in shaping it, and the imperative to try and protect it.

Antonia Chulim Noh’s handmade tortillas on her comal in Kahua, Yucatán. (Photo credit: Venetia Thompson.)

For Oaxacan agronomist Amado Ramírez Leyva, it is therefore important to distinguish between the price and true value of landrace corn. “We have to remember that the market is a false idol; a means rather than an end,” he says.

In Ramírez’s opinion, there “isn’t enough landrace corn to feed everyone. The individual farmer who has grown it thus has the right to eat as much of it as he wants, and can then sell what’s left over to those who can afford it. And if more people want it, they will either have to find a way of farming it themselves, or do without.”

Ramírez is quick to insist that whether we’re lucky enough to consume landrace corn or not, we share a duty to “acknowledge their immeasurable historical, cultural and biological value.”

“All of this work on supporting sales of landraces in the U.S., either U.S. or Mexican, is to support small farmers,” Willcox says. “That’s the bottom line, because corn is so dependent on the farmer for conservation.”

Top photo: Antonia Chulim Noh making tortillas by hand in Kahua, Yucatan. The corn is from her own milpa. (Photo credit: Venetia Thompson.)

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Reporting on the World’s Most Controversial Farm Chemical

Tue, 10 Oct 2017 09:00:33 +0000

Want to start a fight at a state fair, agriculture show, or meeting of the European Commission? Get farmers, consumers, and politicians discussing Monsanto, genetic engineering, and pesticide use.

The entwined topics all happen to comprise one of the most contentious food and agriculture debates of the last decade. In fact, the European Union is set to vote later this month on whether to approve a 10-year license renewal for the chemical glyphosate—the main ingredient in Monsanto’s flagship Roundup weed-killer and a probable carcinogen, according to the World Health Organization’s International Agency for Research on Cancer. (A year later, the WHO and Food and Agriculture Organization said glyphosate was unlikely to cause cancer to humans “through the diet.”)

Carey Gillam ventures right into this global hornets’ nest in her new book, Whitewash: The Story of a Weed Killer, Cancer, and the Corruption of Science, published today from Island Press. An investigative journalist for more than two decades, Gillam covered business and agriculture for national news outlets, including Reuters, where she wrote some of the first articles looking at the potential dangers of glyphosate. After spending years on the “Monsanto beat,” Gillam left Reuters in 2015 to serve as research director at U.S. Right to Know, a nonprofit group that advocates for transparency in America’s food system.

Civil Eats spoke with Gillam about her life in and out of mainstream journalism, the farmers she met along the way, and the big business of agriculture.

The main character in your book is glyphosate. Can you say more about how it’s made, what it’s used for, and why you center your book around this fairly obscure chemical?

[Laughs.] Few people at cocktail parties want to talk about glyphosate, right? It’s not a household term. Glyphosate is the active ingredient in what many people are familiar with, which is Monsanto’s Roundup-branded herbicide. Glyphosate is the most widely used weed-killer in the world, and it came to market in 1974 as a miracle for combating weeds, which are very difficult for farmers to tackle.

Glyphosate was remarkable in that it was very efficient and could be applied broadly to a range of different weed types. It was considered much safer than many other herbicides, and it was considered much more environmentally benign. It got a lot of applause, a lot of attention. The Monsanto scientists who discovered the weed-killing properties won awards for that.

It was embraced pretty widely around the world as a replacement for some more dangerous weed killers, and of course moms and dads know it because people use it on their lawns and gardens. It’s used on golf courses, and cities and municipalities use it in parks and playgrounds. [Roundup] really has become pervasive in our world, and I see it as the poster child for larger discussions about pesticide use.

You begin and end Whitewash with the story of Jack McCall. Who was he and why did you feel it was important to start with him?

Throughout Whitewash, I tried to tell the stories of real people, because that’s what I care about—I think that’s what we all care about. People like Jack McCall, his wife Teri, and their family have this beautiful little farm in Cambria, California, and grew different types of citrus fruits as well as avocados. Jack developed non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, a very aggressive kind, and died a particularly horrible, suffering death the day after Christmas in 2015.

Their story is particularly compelling to me because Jack did not want to use pesticides on his farm. He was kind of a hippie environmentalist, and he used Roundup because he had been told and believed it was very, very safe. Which is a story that we hear from a lot of people—that they believed Roundup to be safe.

You write a lot about what you see as Monsanto’s effort to cover-up evidence that glyphosate effects farm communities and the environment adversely. Can you say more about that?

The research and the revelations in Whitewash really are the culmination of 19 years of work I’ve done on glyphosate and Monsanto. Over those years, I’ve learned about Monsanto’s business strategies, and their efforts to promote and expand the use of their glyphosate products. In the course of doing that, I’ve interviewed a lot of individuals, and I’ve learned that the company’s position, and the narrative that it put forward didn’t really always jibe with the story on the ground—what you were hearing from farmers, scientists, or other researchers.

You also add on top of that Freedom of Information Act documents that I have obtained—literally thousands of pages—from different regulatory agencies: U.S. Food and Drug Administration, Environmental Protection Agency, and Department of Agriculture.

You layer on top of that the other documents that the organization I work for, U.S. Right to Know, has obtained from agricultural professors and plant pathologists at universities who have been working secretly behind the scenes with Monsanto. Then you layer on top of that the documents that have been recently coming out through discovery in the litigation that is pending against Monsanto.

When you put all this together, it paints a very clear picture of strategic efforts to control, manipulate, and deceive. It’s indisputable that Monsanto has made a grand effort to deceive regulators, policymakers, and the public for many, many years about this chemical.

What did you find in the course of reviewing the FOIA documents that particularly shocked you?

There’s such a long list. One example is the network of scientists around the world that Monsanto has developed as a secret army of soldiers that it can deploy whenever it needs in order to convince regulators, scientific journals, or the press that Monsanto’s position is valid and that any concerns are not. As I found in the documents, Monsanto is giving assignments to these professors to write a policy paper or put out a particular journal article that Monsanto’s public relations firm has written, that will carry the name of the scientist and appear to be independent.

One very specific example is University of Illinois professor Bruce Chassy, who, while he was at the university, received a lot of money over the years for his program. When he was retiring, Monsanto wanted to set him up in the nonprofit organization called Academics Review—which purports to be independent and publishes articles and weighs in on important issues.

Monsanto in the emails back and forth is talking about how they want to set this up, don’t want anyone to know Monsanto’s behind it. And they’ve done that over and over again with numerous organizations and numerous professors that they can deploy as attack dogs to discredit scientists or journalists or put forth false narratives regarding the safety of Monsanto’s products. To me, it’s outrageous and egregious. It seems unethical and deceitful.

There have been Marches Against Monsanto around the globe and a great deal of efforts to illuminate the company’s practices. Has any of this impacted Monsanto’s bottom line?

I don’t think so. The company’s share price has been on the uptick the last few months. Shareholders love it, investors love it, and yes, they get a lot of negativity and earn the ire of food safety advocates and environmentalists, but they know how to generate money and profits, and they have such a dominant position in the agriculture market with their seeds and traits. That’s what the market rewards.

You document the lengths to which Monsanto goes to discredit and attack scientists and journalists. Have they come after you?

Yes. Monsanto admits that they reached out to my editors, and made efforts to get me removed from the food and agriculture beat at Reuters. They also employed surrogates like BIO and CropLife in the ag-chemical industry who tried to block my and limit my coverage. They had nonprofits like Academics Review write attack articles about me. They’ve tried to vilify and discredit my work for at least the last decade—after they discovered that I wasn’t going to parrot the propaganda that they want reporters to use.

You worked for a couple decades as an investigative journalist. Why did you give up such a successful career as a reporter?

I had a new editor come in [at Reuters] who wasn’t fully familiar with the food and ag beat. The pressure from Monsanto and the industry created a lot of tensions, and I eventually decided it was best to move to U.S. Right to Know, where I could focus full-time on researching food and ag—a topic I had become particularly passionate about.

Was it hard to make that switch from a neutral journalist position to more of an advocacy position?

I still reject the “advocacy” label—other than advocating for truth and transparency, which, as a journalist, that’s what you’re supposed to do. When you are a journalist, you are a seeker of truth, and you share that with others. That’s what I’m trying to do now.

For instance, I do not take a position or weigh in on whether glyphosate should be banned or not. That is a risk management position to be made by policymakers and regulators—it is not my job. My job is to present truthful, relevant information that has been hidden from the public or that is not readily available to the public so that informed decisions can be made. That doesn’t sit well with a lot of people, and eventually maybe I will be more comfortable in [an advocacy] role, but at this point I think it’s simply enough just to tell the truth.

How do you think the issue’s being reported in the mainstream media?

I think there is a lack of sufficient, in-depth reporting on the important topics surrounding food and agriculture and the health of our environment. That’s for a lot of reasons: space demands for other stories; a lack of clarity on very complex, complicated, highly controversial issues. There are a lot of reasons why it’s difficult for a journalist at a newswire, for instance, or a radio station or a newspaper to dig deep into these things…. There are outlets that are doing really good investigative work, but they’re few and far between. But you see this with a lot of really important issues today.

You were just in France presenting on glyphosate before Parliament. The E.U. has traditionally been much tougher on regulating the weed killer than the U.S. Why do you think this is?

What I have found in Europe is that they have long had a more precautionary view of protecting their food, their people, and their environment than we do here. Historically, it doesn’t seem like they’ve had the kind of regulatory capture by corporations that we have here in the U.S., although there certainly appear to be concerns about that there. They value their public and environmental health, and quality and purity of their food, more than we do here in the United States.

Here, we all just expect a rubber stamp from the EPA because that’s what we always get from the EPA. That is another, bigger message: I don’t see this as just a Monsanto or glyphosate problem. If we did away with Monsanto or glyphosate tomorrow, that doesn’t solve the pesticide problem. We have become so dependent on pesticides as an easy or quick fix for anything we identify as a problem. It’s not healthy, and it’s not sustainable for the long term.

What do you anticipate happening under EPA head Scott Pruitt, who has shown himself to be quite cozy with the agrichemical companies and the other industries he regulates.

We’re definitely not improving, and it seems to be pretty clear we’re going in the opposite direction, where it doesn’t matter what the science says or what the concerns are—if the corporation wants it, the corporation’s going get it. Look at Dow Chemical and chlorpyrifos, for crying out loud. Chlorpyrifos has an abundance of evidence of harm to small children and their neuro-development, and was set to be banned. And then Dow Chemical waltzes in with a $1 million donation to the Trump inaugural fund and lo and behold, the EPA decides not to ban chlorpyrifos. They’re not even trying to hide the collusion.

What is giving you hope these days?

I see it as a hopeful sign that so many people seem to be paying attention to these issues. We’re seeing at least a slight groundswell of grassroots interest, and education, and outreach and attempts to wake up policymakers and others to try to protect our communities. We’re seeing it more on the local levels where people are urging their school systems to stop spraying the weed-killers on the playgrounds, than we are on the national level. But I do think people are starting to pay attention, so there’s hope in that, maybe?

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

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How Organic Farmers are ‘Gaining Ground’

Fri, 29 Sep 2017 08:59:44 +0000

“I’ve never been comfortable growing lawns and golf courses when there’s a worldwide food shortage,” says Willow Coberly at the beginning of the new documentary “Gaining Ground.” Willow is married to Harry Stalford, a grass-seed farmer from Oregon’s Willamette Valley who, at the start of the film, is as conventional as they come. His transformation into a champion of organic wheat, thanks to his wife’s prodding and persistence, is the moral heart of this stirring film.

Farming in and of itself is a risky profession. “Gaining Ground” tells the stories of three farmers—two from rural Oregon and one from Richmond, California—who take additional risks to transition away from conventional, commodity farming to grow organic food. In the case of Doria Robinson, who returned to her hometown of Richmond to work at Urban Tilth, the mere act of growing sustainably farmed food in a food desert is a deeply courageous act. As she says in the film, “This is the front line, and somebody has to hold it.”

Filmmaker Elaine Velazquez and her wife, the producer and radio documentarian Barbara Bernstein, took five years to shoot and edit the film, which turned out to be a good thing. Just as they were about to wrap the shoot, two issues that had been looming in the background of their farmers’ lives—and their documentary—came front and center: The Chevron refinery in Richmond exploded and genetically modified wheat was found in an Oregon field.

The couple has been showing the film at events around Oregon and at film festivals across the country; it will have its Bay Area theatrical debut this weekend at the Food & Farm Film Festival in San Francisco. (The film will be shown on October 1 at 4 p.m.) Civil Eats spoke to Velazquez and Bernstein about the importance of forging rural-urban connections in the age of Trump, Richmond’s long tradition of farming, and why the next generation sees a future in organic farming.

What was the inspiration for making this film?

Elaine Velazquez: We wanted to do a project together. Barbara, who has done a lot of audio documentaries on the environment, came up with this thing about food and farmers. I’m from New York City, and I was like, “Who would want to be a farmer?”

Barbara Bernstein: And I persisted.

EV: Barbara, as producer, started finding people for me. We went to a couple events, including a food justice conference at the University of Oregon, which gave us some context. That’s where we met Harry MacCormack [the founder of Oregon Tilth, who plays a pivotal role in this film].

BB: Then we connected with farmer Vicki Hertel at Friends of Family Farmers’ annual lobby day in the state capitol. Vicki is so incredible.

EV: Vicki is just like she seems in the film: a plain talker.

Willow Coberly & Harry Stalford, Stalford Seed Farms.

You tell the story of these two rural Oregon farmers—the Hertels of Sun Gold Farm and the Coberly/Stalford family, who run Greenwillow Grains. But you also deftly interweave the story of Doria Robinson and her work at Urban Tilth in Richmond, California. How did you find Doria?

BB: We met her indirectly courtesy of our friend Steve Cohen, who I call the “food czar of Portland.” He had sent me a bunch of links to stories about urban agriculture. I was reading these articles and I got to this incredible quote by Doria Robinson. She was talking about food justice and the importance of teaching young people to grow food. So I tracked her down and we had an amazing conversation. It was so clear she was the person we were looking for.

From left: Jamie Le Jeune (S.F. Cameraman, color correction & mastering), Elaine Velazquez (Director), Doria Robinson (Urban Tilth Executive Director).

Contamination is a central theme of the movie and poses threats to both Urban Tilth and to Greenwillow Grains, who can’t sell to Asian markets for a while. [Japan barred all imports of Northwest wheat for four months.] Did these unanticipated events pose challenges for the film? And how do the farmers protect themselves from contamination to this day?

BB: They had destroy all their crops that summer. And before they felt confident selling their food to the community again, they needed to test their soil for heavy metals—a complicated and expensive test. It took over year to find the money to pay for the test. This process put all their garden activities on hold for a year.

EV: Doria talks about how the Chevon refinery fire was a real testament to regenerative agriculture. That doing these things to the soil—cover cropping, using lots of compost—actually does clean the soil. As far as protecting yourself from GMOs, I think testing the crops is the only way you can be sure. The whole GMO contamination incident made me really cynical.

There are several examples in the film of children returning to their family’s farming roots. For instance, Chris and Stefanie, Vicki’s children, both came back to work on the farm. You don’t see many instances where the younger generation wants to get into farming.

EV: Chris and Stefanie didn’t leave because they didn’t want to farm, but because it was so unprofitable. There was a theme in the film of coming back. Doria coming back to Richmond. Chris and Stefanie returning to Sun Gold. Harry and Willow—their kids are interested in farming, too.

Harry Stalford, the most conventional of farmers, radically changes course. What’s the takeaway for people who are trying to get through to Big Ag? Be persistent?

BB: It takes passion, courage, and persistence to make meaningful change and the challenge is huge. When we first interviewed Willow [his wife], the conventionals were subsidizing the organics, and when we finished the film, organic was really leading the farm.

Watch the trailer for “Gaining Ground” below:

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Top photo: Vicki and Charlie Hertel picking Strawberries at Sun Gold Farm.

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Seed Saving is the Original Sharing Economy

Fri, 28 Jul 2017 09:00:38 +0000

At first glance, the three women hunched over tomato starts in a garden behind St. Stephen’s Church in the Northern California town of Sebastopol don’t look like revolutionaries. They’re not bearded and stoic like Che Guevara. They’re not bespectacled with a dramatic flair for oration like Malcolm X. And they’re not rousing a crowd of thousands at the People’s Climate March like Bill McKibben or Naomi Klein.

But, take a closer look and you’ll see that these women are engaged in a quiet, often unrecognized, form of revolution: the act of propagating and preserving locally grown and adapted seeds with an eye towards food security for the surrounding community and future generations.

“We’re like the grandmothers, protecting the seed,” says Sara McCamant, who in her early 50s is the youngest of the three. McCamant is one of 10 core volunteers at the Community Seed Exchange, an all-volunteer organization dedicated to growing and giving away locally grown, open-pollinated seeds. Seeds, these grassroots activists say, are an overlooked link to building a resilient local food system.

For the last eight years, the seed exchange has steadily grown both as a repository of seed and a seed-saving network. They do this through work parties, workshops, and a library that offers—for free—about 200 varieties of 100 percent locally grown, open-pollinated seeds.

Sarah McCamant (left) and Liz Brown (right), founding volunteers with the Community Seed Exchange. (Photo credit: Michelle Feileacan)

On a recent visit, the shelves of the seed library are filled with jars of flower, vegetable, legume, and grain seeds, from bachelor’s buttons to barley. “These are all free?” one visitor asks, eyes flush with excitement as they portion palmfuls of Mayan lettuce and fennel seeds into small envelopes. It’s so against the norm in America—where anything that can be sold usually is—as to seem unreal.

“All free. This is the real sharing economy,” says McCamant.

The only requirement is that you take only what you need and leave behind plenty for the next person. It doesn’t surprise McCamant—or, for that matter, any other seed savers who’ve been at this for a long time—that free seeds astonish amateur backyard gardeners who’ve become accustomed to buying pretty seed packets from the store.

“We believe that seed is part of the commons,” says McCamant, taking down a jar of quinoa. “This quinoa is not something that I grew and is mine. This quinoa goes back 7,000 years and was developed by people in Peru and Bolivia. It’s not something I have any right to own.”

Everything grown in the seed garden is open-pollinated: Cascadia Sugar Snap Peas, Red Venture Celery, Detroit Red Beets, Cascade Corn, Ruby Valentine lettuce, Sonora White Wheat. The plants are selected for a host of reasons. The celery is a good producer and comes from Frank Morton, a famous Pacific Northwest plant breeder and staunch advocate for open-pollinated seeds and open-source seeds; the wheat is the oldest in California and grown for its historical significance; the lettuce is a heirloom sold by one small seed company and it stands a good chance of being lost if not cultivated. Eventually, these seeds will be harvested, sorted, cleaned, and added to the library’s inventory.

The one thing you won’t find in the Community Seed Garden are hybrid seeds. These are the seeds favored by Monsanto and other big agri-businesses in which one plant is crossed with another to create a whole new organism. Hybrids may guarantee higher yields and hardy plants for one season, but good luck saving the seed and planting them again next year. The seed will revert back to the traits of its parents, meaning you have no idea what you’re going to get or how it’s going to taste. In this way, the big seed companies have become more like landlords of seeds, renting to farmers and other growers year after year, and making billions in profit.

“If we really care about our local food system, then we really need to look at where our seed is coming from,” says McCamant. “If it’s being controlled by large corporations that are growing seed all over the world, then it’s like the food link to the food system is really missing. The question becomes: How do we localize it?”

That question is finding some answers with Steve Peters, a research and outreach associate for the Organic Seed Alliance (OSA), a Port Townsend, Washington-based nonprofit that is working to develop and improve seed production and marketing opportunities for seed growers. In the past, Peters has consulted with Bohemian Seeds, a small open-source seed business out of Occidental (you can find their seeds at the Sebastopol Farmers’ Market) and Eric George, a young farmer in Petaluma.

OSA recently launched a pilot project in California to build local seed hubs—for cleaning, processing, and storing seeds, and where growers can connect with commercial farmers. U.S. backyard gardeners, with their varied choices, are going to be okay, according to Peters. The true challenge lies in finding good quality, open source seeds that are worthy of the physical traits and germination needs desired by commercial growers.

“The goal is bring seed back to the forefront in agriculture because it’s been, in many ways, forgotten about,” says Peters. “A hundred years ago most farmers saved their seed and now very few do because it’s become a very specialized part of agriculture. That’s fine when you have a lot of choices and accessibility to material, but in the last 10 to 15 years, the industry has really consolidated. Very few people are actually growing seed. There are a lot of seed savers, but the commercial market is almost completely dominated by a few major players.”

With consolidation comes less choice. Plus, since the business model is to own the material you sell, severe patent restrictions have been placed on the products, meaning farmers can’t legally save seed and they definitely can’t use patented varieties to develop their own locally adapted versions. Still, modern hybrid varieties draw farmers in with their high, reliable yields. The problem arrives when they aren’t adapted to changing conditions and those record yields turn to nothing. “You’re really in trouble then,” says Peters.

And yet, locally adapted and resilient plant material are integral to handling a changing climate and the resulting floods, droughts, salinization, and viruses that are already happening or soon to arrive. “Many times, it’s the older varieties that have been held by communities for millennia,” says Peters. “Open-pollinated breeding allows the whole population to intermix so that you can choose the best, most resilient individuals out of the progeny. It really focuses on the future, on each subsequent generation, and continues to improve.”

In Petaluma, seedsman and farmer Eric George has been growing produce for projects that support the Open Source Seed Initiative (OSSI), a national organization dedicated to the cause of “freeing the seeds.” Originally developed for computer software, the open source model makes intellectual property— whether computer code or seeds—freely available for use and provides a way for that material to stay freely available in perpetuity.

Seed breeders that sign the OSSI pledge vow to keep their seeds free of patents, licenses, and other restrictions on freedom of use. OSSI stores a database of crop varieties that have been pledged as what they call “freed seed” and provides links on its website to where those seeds can be purchased, whether from seed companies or individual breeders and seed growers. They also build awareness of the importance of keeping seeds unencumbered from legal restrictions and free to be used, shared, saved, bred, and sold.

In 2015, George was invited to join OSSI’s partnership committee. At the age of 28, he’s the committee’s youngest member. Recently, George launched a new seed company, Coast Range Seeds. He first started thinking seriously about the power of seeds after reading First the Seed: The Political Economy of Plant Biotechnology by Jack Kloppenburg. Inspired by the U.C. Berkeley agroecology program and from campesino field days in 2011 and 2012 with seedsmen in Nicaragua, he moved north to train in western Oregon, a modern epicenter for organic and open-source seed. He enrolled in the Rogue Farm Corps, apprenticed with seed producers, and in 2013 helped form the Southern Oregon Seed Growers Association.

Two years ago, George returned to the North Bay and dove into the consumer end of the supply chain, selling vegetables as a floor worker at Good Earth Natural Foods in Marin. He says it was a chance to observe the workings of the organic vegetable trade, tune in to what resonates with customers, and soak up the experience of a veteran produce team. He also began to notice opportunities to bring OSSI seeds and produce sales together. Now, as a seedsman, he’s working to bridge the two. Last year, he and Bolinas farmer Caymin Ackerman of Big Mesa Farm grew and delivered OSSI varieties “Candystick Dessert Delicata” and “Magma” mustard, to Good Earth, which, in turn, represented these crops to their customers.

George adds that doing a good job selling OSSI produce doesn’t just mean using the food as a vehicle for seeds awareness and education. Going full circle with “seed-to-shelf” produce asks how—without reinventing our normal food economy and shopping patterns—more food dollars might strengthen the economic viability of seed growing and breeding. “Done right, these breeders can continue to invest themselves in their work, and hopefully our region can create the kind of opportunities that attract and sustain the next generation, too.”

Back at the Community Seed Exchange, the biggest goal is to get home gardeners to think about where their seeds come from. On the last Saturday of the month, the volunteers open up the seed library to the public. They also host a work party in the seed garden, which offers an opportunity to get your hands dirty, and they offer free classes monthly on topics like seedsaving basics, wet and dry seed processing, and how to grow milkweed and nectar plants to lure monarchs to your garden. They’re always looking for more volunteers to spread the word about locally pollinated seeds versus their globe-trotting industrially farmed hybrid cousins.

“We tend to go in and look at a rack of packets in the store and say, ‘Oh, that looks cool!’ without thinking of the footprint of the seed,” says Sara McCamant. “If it’s not organic, then it’s been grown with tons of chemicals—seeds don’t have the same rules as food crops. Most likely they’ve been in the ground longer and double-dosed with chemicals. And you really don’t know where they’re coming from. If conventional, then probably the international market. Sometimes from Monsanto, which owns one of the biggest vegetable seed companies in the world. People don’t realize seed has its own footprint.”

This article originally appeared in Made Local Magazine and is reprinted with permission. All photos © Michelle Feileacan.

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The Match.com of Seed Saving

Wed, 26 Apr 2017 09:00:09 +0000

The global effort to sustain seed diversity has been an uphill battle for a generation. Worldwide, 75 percent of seed varieties have disappeared since the dawn of the 20th Century, and the vast majority of what remains now rests in the hands of companies like Monsanto and Syngenta.

For the last 20 years, the Center for Food Safety (CFS) has been part of that fight, and today it launches a new tool it hopes will help farmers sidestep the chemical giants: the Global Seed Network, an online tool where small growers can “meet” to swap diverse, rare, and heirloom seeds, and in the process, propagate and expand seed diversity around the world.

Seed-sharing groups, of course, are nothing new. Seed Savers Exchange, for one, has been around since the mid-‘70s and is going strong online. But CFS hopes that their new site, developed by the same company that created match.com, will appeal to Millennial farmers who are beginning to understand the value of non-commercial seed sourcing.

“We wanted to target a younger generation that relies on the internet to connect with people,” said Rebecca Spector, west coast director of CFS and the site’s project coordinator. Spector says that a lot of the early interest in the site has come from the under-35 set, who might otherwise buy their seed from large national non-GMO outlets like High Mowing and Johnny’s Selected.

One section of the Global Seed Network website. (Click photo for larger version.)

Users can fully access the network without paying a membership fee, which Spector says is an important difference from how existing sites work. It also allows users to create profiles; rate their interactions with one other; and search for seeds by cross-referencing for needs like frost tolerance and mildew resistance, or by hyper-specific regional attributes (temperate highland or tropical rainforest, say).

Bay Area farmer Carli Castagnola, who beta-tested the site, says the climate search is its most “intriguing” feature. “Getting to know regional climates where similar things will grow is really interesting to me, and something you don’t usually get when you’re looking for seeds,” she said.

While Castagnola thinks online connections are increasingly vital to achieving wide-reaching diversity, she admits she prefers in-person seed and plant swaps. And, in fact, Spector sees facilitating in-person meet-ups as not-at-all antithetical to the network’s overall mission. Once the site is up and running, it will also begin listing face-to-face opportunities searchable by ZIP code.

Taking Seed Sharing to the Next Level

Two other resources on the site hint at the broader challenges farmers face when trying to make true strides in the realm of biodiversity. The first concerns the range of state-level seed-sharing laws, which Spector and her team have outlined as rigorously as possible—despite a significant amount of opacity in the way these laws are written. Longtime seed crusaders say there’s a need to get such state seed laws clarified. (CFS, working in conjunction with the Sustainable Economies Law Center and other groups, had recent success legalizing seed swapping in California.)

The site also advises users to familiarize themselves with federal quarantine and noxious weeds lists, as well as other regulations. As Civil Eats has previously reported, one of the biggest obstacles to seed-sharing is that the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Federal Seed Act mandates that any activity involving non-commercial distribution of seed be labeled, permitted, and tested according to industrial regulations.

“We’ve got a lot of work to do to get diversity back up,” said Bill McDorman, executive director of the Rocky Mountain Seed Alliance and a long-time seed steward (he was also an early reviewer of CFS’s network). But he added that policy change is just one of many issues—including corporate ownership of seeds and a need to build local communities of like-minded growers—that sustainable farmers and gardeners face. “What do you work on first, when all fire alarms are going off at once?”

He’s also eager to see the Global Seed Network encourage young farmers to learn seed-saving methods. The site offers a primer on this, and provides a link to Rocky Mountain’s own treatise on seed saving.

The other resource concerns the site’s promise to tap into a global community—possibly the offering with the greatest appeal. Castagnola, who says she favors open-pollinated seeds for highly nutritive food varieties, hopes to use the network as a means to garner more international connections, especially in the Andes region, which she says is similar to the Bay Area for growing purposes.

But, said Spector, “It’s complicated.” Currently, USDA regulations allow the importing of 50 or fewer seeds of any one taxon with a Small Lots of Seed Permit. But a number of restrictions still apply and might prove confusing for some new growers to navigate.

Even more daunting is the fact that many potential users in countries like India have limited or no access to computers. “They rely on their phones intensely, so for international users, we’ll need to have a mobile site,” said Spector. That’ll mean eventually seeking more funding to build out a mobile platform; the original site was supported by a grant from citizens’ action NGO Avaaz.

No matter how successful the Global Seed Network grows to be, neither Spector nor CFS’s fellow stakeholders consider it a stand-alone solution to the many troubles plaguing farm diversity. Spector herself calls the network a complement, rather than competition, to organizations like Seed Savers Exchange.

McDorman sees it as just one of many necessary components in a larger-scale strategy to achieve seed diversity. He maintains that everyone who cares about reversing the trend toward monocropping needs to band together before the opportunities to do so disappear.

“I’ve never been more hopeful that with a combination of grassroots people, national policy organizations, and databases, we’ve finally got a chance to do this,” he said. “But we need it all.”

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Monsanto’s Driverless Car: Is CRISPR Gene Editing Driving Seed Consolidation?

Mon, 10 Apr 2017 09:00:08 +0000

When the CEOs of both Monsanto and Bayer met with Donald Trump to talk about their potential merger just three days before the inauguration, they made some big promises. If the union between the world’s largest seed company and the German multinational chemical, pharmaceutical, and life-sciences company is blessed by antitrust regulators, the companies have pledged to add 3,000 high-tech American jobs and to combine—rather than consolidate and trim—their R&D budgets to the tune of $16 billion over the next six years, or $2.7 billion a year.

The two companies have been locked in a dance since May 2016, when Monsanto rejected Bayer’s initial $62 billion offer. Then, last fall, the merger reappeared in the news in a noteworthy chain of events.

On September 14, Bayer upped its offer to $66 billion and Monsanto accepted, putting a third major seed company merger on the table, beside ChemChina’s $43 billion takeover of Syngenta and Dow Chemical’s intended merger with DuPont. On the day it was announced, the Washington Post called the Bayer-Monsanto deal the “mega-deal that could reshape [the] world’s food supply.”

Less than a week later, spokespeople for the companies behind all three mergers were asked to testify before the senate judiciary committee, on what senator Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) called a “merger tsunami.” Then, just two days later, Monsanto announced it had licensed the rights to use CRISPR/Cas9 gene editing—a technology that has been called the “Model T of genetics” for its power to change the way we live.

This rapid-fire timing may have been a coincidence, but it also may be a sign of what’s to come. And it’s just one of many indications that CRISPR/Cas9 and other next-generation gene editing technologies will likely be at the forefront of the seed industry in the years ahead. Some even see gene editing, which is said to be simpler, less expensive, and more consumer-friendly than traditional genetic engineering, as one factor driving the mergers. And while that’s up for debate, it’s clearly an important part of the strategy for companies looking to control, and profit from, the world’s seeds.

Last week the European Union cleared the way for the ChemChina–Syngenta takeover, suggesting the other two mergers may be imminent. If that happens, the resulting three companies would control nearly 60 percent of global seedstocks (including as much as 80 percent of U.S. corn seeds) and 70 percent of the global pesticide market. And these companies are also making a bid to control much more than seeds and pesticides. Monsanto, for example, is already making a play to control many other facets of modern agriculture—including tools for precision planting and high-tech weather prediction.

So while much of the media coverage of gene editing has pointed to its potential to break molds and change the genetic playing field, when it comes to agriculture, it will likely follow a more familiar path: CRISPR and other similar technology will most likely be used by scientists mainly to continue developing seeds that withstand consistent doses of pesticides on large, industrialized farms.

“Monsanto has been conducting research with genome-editing techniques for years, and we are excited to be integrating additional technology from licensing partners in to this body of work,” Tom Adams, biotechnology lead for Monsanto, said in an email. Over the past year, the company has announced several licensing agreements that will allow it to access gene-editing technologies, such as CRISPR/Cas9 and CRISPR-Cpf1 (which is said to be more precise), as well as a tool from Dow AgroScience called EXZACT™ Precision Technology^® Platform, among others.

Although Adams said this work is still in its early days, he added, “we believe that genome-editing techniques have great potential to improve and unlock capabilities across our leading germplasm and genome libraries to enable a wide variety of improvements across crop systems.” However, he added, “We do not view it as a replacement for plant biotechnology.”

SEED: The Untold Story will premiere on the PBS series Independent Lens on April 17, 2017 at 10PM. Learn more.

Gene Editing vs. Genetic Engineering

Since 1996, Monsanto has released a series of genetically engineered herbicide-resistant seeds, beginning with Roundup Ready soybeans in 1996, and moving on to corn, cotton, sugar beets, canola, and more. Today, Roundup Ready crops account for over 94 percent of the soybeans and 89 percent of the corn grown in the United States.

As these products have come to dominate the farm landscape, weeds have also become resistant to Roundup. According to the Weed Science Society of America, “overreliance on herbicides with a single mechanism of action to control certain weeds has led to the selection of weeds resistant to that mechanism of action.” Similarly, incidents of pesticide resistance have also been on the rise.

Photo credit: Mike Mozart

As a result, farmers often find themselves on what critics call a pesticide treadmill, where each new form of resistance requires a more powerful solution. Companies have spent the last several years working on seeds with “stacked traits,” which combine two or more genes of interest into a single plant. In the case of Monsanto, that has meant, for instance, breeding seeds that tolerate both glyphosate and a second herbicide called dicamba.

The main difference between gene editing and classical genetic engineering is that the former allows scientists to manipulate the genetic makeup of an organism—by changing or “knocking out” the function of a gene—without introducing genes from other organisms. This last part is key, because it’s often the combination of parts of various organisms—such as genes from bacteria added to corn to create herbicide resistance or genes from an arctic flounder added to strawberries to make them able to withstand cold weather—that has made the public wary of GMOs in their food.

But the image of CRISPR/Cas9 and other gene editing tools as an “entirely pristine” technology that rules out all foreign DNA isn’t entirely accurate, says Maywa Montenegro, a Ph.D. candidate in Environmental Science, Policy, and Management at University of California, Berkeley.

“They aren’t wrong in saying CRISPR doesn’t need to introduce foreign DNA, but it absolutely can. That’s what it’s very good at,” she said. “But it’s also important for people to understand that you can create huge, impactful changes in a plant’s functioning without introducing anything foreign.” De-activating, or knocking out, a gene function, can significantly change the plants and animals involved.

In the case of the mildew-resistant wheat developed in China, for instance, scientists were able to introduce “targeted mutations” using CRISPR/Cas9 without inserting new genes. In another example, Cibus, a San Diego-based startup, has produced (and commercialized) an herbicide-resistant canola using another early gene-editing technique called Rapid Trait Development System (RTDS).

The company also says it has other crops, such as herbicide-resistant rice and flax seeds, in the pipeline. DuPont is also working with the Berkeley-based start-up Caribou Biosciences (founded by Jennifer Doudna, one of the founders and patent-holders of CRISPR/Cas9 technology) to develop gene-edited, drought-resistant corn and wheat varieties.

The most widely discussed food produced using gene editing today is a non-browning mushroom developed using CRISPR/Cas9 at Pennsylvania State University. The mushroom received a great deal of media attention last spring, when the Penn State scientists received a letter from the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) informing them that the agency would not be regulating its field testing.

At the time, a number of media outlets reported that the mushroom had “escaped regulation,” suggesting that gene editing was not only remarkably different than tradition genetic engineering in crucial ways, but that it also might be the key to avoiding government oversight. But on both accounts, the reality may be less cut and dried.

Will Gene-Edited Seeds be Regulated?

Doug Gurian-Sherman, director of sustainable agriculture and senior scientist for the Center for Food Safety (CFS), says the letter USDA sent to Penn State about the non-browning mushroom was just one of over 30 that went out at that time in response to requests by a variety of entities working with gene-editing technology.

While the USDA did clearly mention the fact that the mushroom didn’t contain any foreign DNA in its response, that wasn’t the only reason it abdicated its regulatory authority. Just as important, it seems, is the fact that the mushroom was not in any way considered a “plant pest.”

You see, when it comes to regulating GMO crops, plant pests have been at the heart of the USDA’s regulation approach; all other genetically engineered products fall under the auspices of either the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) or the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). (A document from the Pew Charitable Trusts includes a handy chart detailing which agency is supposed to regulate what types of organisms.)

In fact, the letter sent to Penn State concluded with this sentence: “Please be advised that the white button mushroom variety described in your letter may still be subject to other regulatory authorities such as the FDA or EPA.”

So gene editing was by no means the only factor at hand. “As soon as they put genes in from any plant pest they would immediately become regulated by USDA,” said Gurian-Sherman.

Of course, exactly how the FDA plans to regulate gene editing is yet to be seen. Since January, the agency has been seeking public input on the topic in both medical research and agriculture. One core question at hand is whether gene editing will be considered “genetic engineering.” And at a time when a growing number of consumers want to know exactly what’s in their food—and around 90 percent of Americans say they want to see genetically engineered ingredients in food labeled—this is as much a question of consumer demand as it is a question of regulation.

“We already see lots of people who are supportive of genetic engineering, calling [gene editing] ‘advanced breeding,’” said Gurian-Sherman. But, he added, “In terms of most of the legal definitions of genetic engineering that are out there right now, it applies. I think it is a legitimate area for argument whether this is generally safer or not or more acceptable, but they clearly don’t want to label it genetic engineering.”

According to Michael Hansen, senior staff scientist at Consumers Union, “the FDA’s documents now clearly say their definition of bioengineering is the same as the definition of modern biotechnology held by Codex Alimentarius.” That’s the “Food Code” established by the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization and the World Health Organization. The Codex definition refers to any organism made using “the application of in vitro nucleic acid techniques.” And since gene editing does precisely that, Hansen believes the answer is clear: Gene editing should be seen as genetic engineering.

But not everyone agrees. In an editorial last January, for instance, the editors of Nature endorsed “the principle of transparency in the production of genome-edited crops and livestock…with no further need for regulation or distinction of these goods from the products of traditional breeding.”

U.C. Berkeley’s Montenegro describes CRISPR/Cas9 as a kind of Swiss army knife with the potential to be paradigm-shifting. But, she adds that, for that reason, it calls for a lot more scrutiny and regulatory oversight

Hansen agrees. Using gene editing, he said, “You can identify a key sequence you want to cut. But wherever that sequence occurs in the genome, you would get a cut. And you will also get a cut at sequences that look similar.”

Hansen also points to the fact that scientists have experienced at least some off-target effects with most gene editing technology to date. He points to the case of an effort to destroy the HIV virus with CRISPR/Cas9. Although scientists engineered T-cells with CRISPR to recognize and destroy HIV, he said, “it took the HIV just a couple of weeks to evolve resistance to CRISPR.”

And in a recent effort to artificially synthesize a new genome for E. coli, a group of scientists decided not to use gene editing because, they wrote, “these strategies…likely would introduce off-target mutations.”

Despite these concerns, CFS’s Gurian-Sherman says there are big questions about how regulatory bodies under the Trump administration will choose to respond to the technology. For one, he says, gene editing could be much harder to test for.

“Detecting [transgenic] engineered changes, for a molecular biologist is really, really easy,” he said. But some of these [gene edits] are not going to leave much of a fingerprint, if at all, and they’re going to be very hard to trace,” he said. “So something like the kind of testing the Non-GMO Project does probably wouldn’t be possible in foods edited with CRISPR.”

Ultimately, Monsanto appears to be preparing for the possibility of regulation. When Lux Research, an independent technology research and advisory firm, looked into the Monsanto-Bayer merger in December, they surmised that gene editing was an important part of Monsanto’s appeal to Bayer, but that it was by no means the only technology they’re banking on.

“Monsanto’s advantage in the space is that they’re super diverse and they have their hands in all the cookie jars,” said Laura Lee, the author of Lux’s report. “So they’d be able to advance traits using CRISPR, or if the regulatory bodies step in and decide to classify CRISPR as genetic modification or put a harmful label on it, they’ll have of other options.”

“More Accessible” Technology

While CRISPR and other gene editing tools are seen as more affordable and more efficient, they’re also being touted as more accessible than traditional genetic engineering—and they are already being used in small private laboratories.

“We think the fact that this science is accessible to and being explored by many researchers across the public and private sectors is exciting—and will only improve the types of products that will ultimately be accessible to farmers,” said Monsanto’s Tom Adams.

Indeed, most traditional genetically engineered traits take years and cost millions to produce (an average of $136 million to be exact). So bringing that number down could bring more constituents into the fold, despite the consolidation at the top.

But seeds produced this way will still be subject to strict intellectual property fines, says Gurian-Sherman. “[CRISPR] won’t be as controllable by the big companies, but the patenting (or lack thereof) could really be a limiting factor for smaller companies,” he said. Case in point, a non-exclusive license to use CRISPR/Cas9 is valued at $265 million.

Of course, if that license is used to create a handful of seed traits, it could be more than worth the investment for a company like Monsanto—particularly if it can deliver on sought-after traits such as drought tolerance. And it might lead one to deduce that a newly merged company such as Monsanto-Bayer would use gene editing to bring down its overall R&D budget.

But that’s not necessarily the case, says Montenegro. In addition to facing pressure from the Trump Administration to spend mightily in the U.S., she points to an economic phenomenon called Jevons paradox, wherein technology makes a process more efficient, but that efficiency ends up leading to increasing demand. (Jevon first observed the phenomenon while observing the coal industry of the 19th Century.)

Another important question is whether this more accessible technology will be put to use to create seeds designed for alternative or more sustainable farming systems.

Montenegro says she has heard from one plant breeder at the University of Minnesota who was interested in using CRISPR/Cas9 for participatory plant breeding—a tactic involving farmers that is often used in the developing world—and to breed plants that could be amenable to diversified organic farming systems. But she says it’s not likely that a wider playing field will change the basic premise of the bulk of the work done using gene-editing technology—which is to engineer seeds used on large-scale industrial farms.

“While I don’t want to foreclose the possibility of using CRISPR for agroecology, [companies and institutions] are underinvesting and undercutting basic agroecology research to such a large degree that even the lower-hanging fruit hasn’t yet been picked,” Montenegro said. This “massive asymmetry” makes her doubtful that the technology will help researchers tread new paths when it comes to sustainable practices.

Gurian-Sherman is no more optimistic. “There are ways you can breed or adapt crops for sustainable agricultural systems that don’t rely on inputs like fertilizers and pesticides as much,” he said. “You can breed crops that attract natural enemies, or take advantage of the slower release of organic nutrients from cover crops and manure. I can go on and on about traits that are valuable to sustainable farming. But that’s not going to be of interest to these companies because they’re actually antithetical to their business models.”

Consumers Union’s Hansen says the current excitement about gene editing reminds him of the very early days or genetic engineering. “In the late 80s and early 90s, they were saying they’d be able to do everything with GE. Thirty years later, all you have is herbicide-tolerant plants and Bt plants. Or that’s the vast majority.”

This story was created in partnership with ITVS.

The post Monsanto’s Driverless Car: Is CRISPR Gene Editing Driving Seed Consolidation? appeared first on Civil Eats.

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Our Best Environment Stories from 2016

Thu, 22 Dec 2016 09:00:12 +0000

From pesticides to climate change, we published a number of strong stories about the environment in 2016. Here are our top picks for the year.

FDA to Start Testing for Glyphosate in Food
By Carey Gillam
The federal agency already tests for residues of many agricultural chemicals on food. Now it will include the widely used weed killer linked to cancer.

California’s Grand Plan to Fight Climate Change on the Farm
By Ariana Reguzzoni
California lawmakers move toward paying farmers to adopt climate-smart practices.

The EPA Says 3 Common Pesticides Could Harm Nearly All Endangered Species
By Elizabeth Grossman
The agency says 97 percent of the plants and animals listed under the Endangered Species Act are likely to be harmed by chlorpyrifos, diazinon, and malathion.

North Carolina’s Factory Farms Produce 15,000 Olympic Pools Worth of Waste Each Year
By Christina Cooke
CAFOs are often hidden in plain sight. A new mapping project reveals the locations and impacts of the state’s 6,500 industrial hog and chicken farms.

Calculating the Hidden Cost of Industrial Farming
By Dan Mitchell
This preliminary, first-of-its kind data puts numbers behind the externalized costs and invisible benefits of several types of farming systems.

Meet the Bee Heroes Working On the Front Lines to Save Pollinators
By Nancy Matsumoto
Can these scientists help our pollinators before it’s too late?

Wrangling the Climate Impact of California Dairy
By Susie Cagle
Could new methane emissions regulations tend a greener California, or sour the state’s dairy industry?

A New Sperm Bank for Honeybees Could Save Agriculture
By Taryn Phaneuf
How cryopreservation techniques might sustain a threatened species, and us in the process.

Saving Crop Diversity From Inside a Frozen Mountain
By Lela Nargi
With American climate policy now highly uncertain, the founder of the Svalbard Global Seed Vault talks about his efforts to protect our agricultural future.

Why Seed Company Mergers Matter in a Warming World
By Doug Gurian-Sherman
Consolidation in the seed industry would further reduce agriculture’s ability to respond to climate change. Instead, we need to support the original “crowdsourcing”—the genetic diversity of crops developed on millions of small farms.

Invasive Lionfish Coming to a Menu Near You
By Sarah Shemkus
The Monterey Bay Aquarium’s Seafood Watch Program has given it a green light for consumers and chefs, and Whole Foods announced it will begin selling the invasive fish.

How Carbon Farming Could Reverse Climate Change
By Vera Chang
Eric Toensmeier’s new book explores carbon sequestration through carbon farming as a way to cool the planet.

The Woman Fighting to Make Sustainability Part of the American Diet
By Andy Bellatti
Dr. Miriam Nelson was a key figure behind the effort to work sustainability into the nation’s 2015 dietary guidelines. And she has hope for the future.

For Beginning Farmers in the West, Finding the Water to Grow Food is a Constant Gamble
By Ariana Reguzzoni
According to a new report, beginning farmers are bearing the brunt of climate change and drought, but they might also hold the key to surviving it.

The post Our Best Environment Stories from 2016 appeared first on Civil Eats.

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Will Our Food be Safe Under Trump?

Thu, 17 Nov 2016 09:00:26 +0000

On the campaign trail, Donald Trump railed against what he called the “FDA food police” and “inspection overkill.” He has said he’d dramatically overhaul and limit federal government regulations. Now, big questions have arisen about how far he’ll go to scale back the incremental work done in recent years to keep pesticides, GMOs, and harmful additives out of the food supply.

Cabinet posts have not yet been announced, but Michael Torrey* is reportedly leading the Trump transition on agriculture. Torrey is an agricultural chemical industry and food manufacturing lobbyist whose firm has worked on behalf of many large food and beverage trade associations and companies that range from the American Beverage Association, to the Illinois Soybean Association, Dean Foods, and Little Caesars Pizza.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) transition is reportedly being led by climate change denier Myron Ebell of the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI), which is known for its anti-regulatory and anti-environmental protection positions. CEI maintains a website devoted to downplaying the health hazards of a range of chemicals including pesticides.

As president, Trump will be working with a House and Senate controlled by Republicans, whose party platform included opposition to GMO labeling, restaurant menu nutrition labels, and the Obama administration’s regulation of agriculture.

None of this bodes well for regulations designed to protect the food supply. Questions remain on how far the incoming president can go when it comes undermining or dismantling the existing rules and regulations. And food safety advocates are taking stock of what aspects of our food system are likely to be most in jeopardy.

Civil Eats spoke with policy and food safety experts to find out what may be in store. Here’s what we learned.

Can the president simply abolish a federal agency like the EPA?

The short answer is probably not. As Center for Biological Diversity senior attorney Stephanie Parent explained, the president cannot unilaterally abolish a federal agency. Under the Reorganization Act of 1977, as amended in 1984, “the president first needs to seek authority from Congress to ‘reorganize’ the executive branch.” That, she explained, “does not allow elimination or creation of agencies.” Any reorganization carried out under that law also requires the president to submit a plan and have it approved by Congress. The implication is that this is unlikely to happen.

Why? When it comes to what the EPA does, said Center for Progressive Reform executive director Matthew Shudtz, “Reliable polling over the years shows that the Clean Air Act and Clean Water Act, are pretty popular with people across the political spectrum. There are differences of opinion on how these laws are implemented, but no public support for things suggested in the campaign like abolishing the EPA.”

Yet, he explained, “Congress can—and very likely will try to—starve the agency by cutting resources drastically, including shifting them away from enforcement.”

This may also be the short-term fate of with the FDA oversight of food safety. Yet even if Congress guts enforcement budgets, “that doesn’t mean businesses don’t need to comply with a law like the Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA),” Andrew Rosenberg, Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS)’ Center for Science and Democracy director, told Civil Eats. Designed to prevent food contamination throughout the food supply chain, the FSMA was signed by President Obama in 2011. The FDA calls it “the most sweeping reform of our food safety laws in more than 70 years” and it is indeed a big, complex law with many rules, some just now going into effect.

Can the president simply do away with food laws, rules, and regulations?

Despite Trump’s promises, Rosenberg says, “A president or an agency administrator can’t wave their hands and eliminate a rule.” Undoing—or redoing—an existing rule or regulation requires a full scientific analysis and a proposed alternative to what’s being revised, Rosenberg explained.

This process includes public comment periods and opportunities to legally challenge improper processes. “The only way to undo a rule is the same way it was made—through rulemaking,” explained Earthjustice managing attorney Patti Goldman.

That said, executive orders—actions by the president that did not go through a legislative or agency rule-making process, such as the Executive Order Combatting Antibiotic-Resistant Bacteria—can be easily undone. Also vulnerable to actual undoing are unfinished agency rules and regulations.

And that includes “anything that was unfinished by USDA, FDA, or EPA at the end of the Obama administration—which is a pretty substantial list,” said Food & Water Watch assistant director Patty Lovera. Among what she’s concerned about are rules on animal welfare, organic food, and new GMO approvals.

Michael Jacobson, president of the Center for Science in the Public Interest, pointed to the work FDA has been doing to set new sodium limits for food: “It’s the biggest single health problem in the food supply. It could save as many as 100,000 lives a year if we cut sodium levels in half.”

Voluntary limits were proposed in June, but, said Jacobson, “A new administration could just revoke those or say they have to restudy it.” Jacobson is also concerned that the FDA under a Trump administration would do even less than the agency currently does when it comes to regulating food additives and chemicals used in livestock production. (Case in point: after over 40 years of recognizing the dangers of growth-promoting antibiotics in meat production, the FDA’s antibiotic regulations are still voluntary.)

What does the election mean for pesticide use?

“While it remains to be seen exactly what a Trump administration will do, it’s very clear that corporate interests will be firmly in the driver’s seat at EPA,” Pesticide Action Network policy director Kristin Schafer told Civil Eats. “When it comes to how we produce our food, this is very bad news.”

“We’ve seen the heavy hand of the pesticide and biotech corporations influencing the agency for years,” said Schafer. As one recent example, she points to the fact that Monsanto recently put pressure on the EPA to make its Scientific Advisory Panel more industry-friendly before reviewing the carcinogenicity of glyphosate (the active ingredient in Roundup).

In addition to EPA’s ongoing review of glyphosate, the agency is also in the process of re-evaluating two other widely used pesticides, chlorpyrifos and atrazine. “There’s strong science on their adverse health impacts—and big commercial interest in these products, so we know they’re going to be controversial,” Schafer said. It’s possible that the EPA under Trump could slow or alter progress on these both.

Environmental advocates are also keeping an eye on the current ongoing federal interagency process for approval of new GE crops. This too is in progress so it’s vulnerable to change under the new administration.

How can people get involved?

Amidst the general pessimism and overwhelming concern about the fate of environmental protection and food safety regulation under the Trump administration, Environmental Working Group vice president of governmental affairs Scott Faber noted, “It’s important to remember that healthy food, safe food, and clearly labeled food are American values—not Republican or Democratic values.” And he pointed out, “The common sense progress made in recent years on these issues was usually the result of bipartisan legislation.”

“One difference from eight years ago, is that the pool of people making more choices about their food and wanting more information about their food is bigger,” said Food and Water Watch’s Lovera. What happens next, she said, “Will depend on whether people get engaged politically or just hunker down with their shopping lists.”

Union of Concerned Scientists’ Rosenberg agreed. “This is a time when people will really need to speak up and be heard,” he said.

*Michael Torrey & Associates said it could not “comment” and was “not at liberty” to confirm Torrey’s role, if any, in the transition and referred Civil Eats to the Trump transition team, which has not yet responded. It’s still too soon to tell how the so-called lobbying ban put into place on Wednesday will impact Torrey’s role.

The post Will Our Food be Safe Under Trump? appeared first on Civil Eats.

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