OT Frito-Lay Bans GMO's (Genetically Modified Organisms)

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A very small victory in the battle against the brave new world DIS-"order" of corporate Frankenfood PHarming. Frito-Lay announces they will not accept genetically altered corn from its suppliers. Just in time for seed orders right now! PLEASE call the consumer hotline at 1-800-352-4477 to let them know if you are happy with this decision. They now join Gerber and Nestle(Euro division)in the ban on genetics. Let other companies know your thoughts on this matter immediately. America speak up for yourselves NOW while you still can make a change. BEFORE Monsanto's "Round Up Ready" soybeans and "New Leaf" potatoes are planted for Spring 2000 crops. Strike a blow against a massive Clinton/Gore campaign contributor trying to control the White House. And our house. And our options on what we plant and eat. ACT NOW!!! Muchos Gracias

-- Frito Bandito (eatcornchips@ndsalsa.com), February 02, 2000

Answers

There has been much debate on the question of GM (genetically modified) foods in Britain and Europe. The Electronic Telegraph, generally considered a somewhat conservative newspaper, has carried some excellent articles on the subject. ET requires a subscription (free) but I have never been bothered by any spam as a result of my subscription. Well, there WAS one survey--in four years.

You should be able to reach the subscription form here:

Electronic Telegraph

There is an excellent search engine at the site. Do not use the search box you see on any page--that is for that section only. Use the search in the list of links at the bottom of the page. Simply plug in GM Foods.

The BBC also has some information on GM foods and there is a search engine there too. Their site is subscription free:

BBC

The preps forum also has GM Foods discussions in its archives.

-- Old Git (anon@spamproblems.com), February 02, 2000.


Go Frito-Lay! GMO are very dangerous. They have produced some squash that cross pollinates with wild squash and creates super weeds! Another one(can't remember the mechanism) is killing the monarch butterfly. We have a small farm that is exclusively direct marketing, and on the market gardener forums GMOs are definitely the enemy.

-- morgan (bitbybit@eoni.com), February 02, 2000.

I just called Frito-Lay to congratulate them re their corn decision. I also asked if they would also ban GMO for their other food products and ingredients. I talked to Clint, a customer service representative. He didn't know and tried to refer me to another person in the company - who was apparently in a meeting. He took my phone number and e-mail address. I shall report back with what I find out.

-- jeanne (jeanne@hurry.now), February 02, 2000.

Here are two informative articles from ET. (Morgan, if you search on the web for monarch butterflies and genetic, you might come up with the information you want.) ISSUE 1710 Sunday 30 January 2000

Summit agrees to block rogue GM crops as US drops its opposition By David Harrison, Environment Correspondent GENETICALLY modified crops suspected of posing a risk to public health were yesterday banned from being imported into Britain and 166 other countries under an international agreement struck at a summit in Montreal.

The summit overcame opposition from the United States to adopt a protocol giving governments the right to block GM crop imports if there is "reasonable doubt" that they could endanger public health or the environment. Previously imports could only be blocked if there was concrete scientific evidence that GM crops used in food production could be dangerous.

Anti-GM food campaigners last night celebrated "a great victory" at the summit which was attended by 130 government delegations, including Michael Meacher, the environment minister. Opponents of the pact - the United States, (home to most of the world's big GM producers), Canada, Australia, Argentina, Uruguay and Chile - capitulated early yesterday after negotiations through the night.

The "Biosafety Protocol" ends seven years of wrangling over GM crop imports and was welcomed by campaigners as "a very important step forward" in their efforts to control the spread of the crops and so-called "Frankenstein food". Mr Meacher, a strong supporter of the protocol, said the world's attitude to GM foods had changed and that had forced the United States to shift its position.

He said: "The financial markets are changing. The stock rating of Monsanto [an American company developing GM crops] has fallen so much that Deutsche Bank has advised it to get out of biotechnology." He added that the Americans had wanted the minimum impact on free trade but more than 160 nations, led by the EU, had demanded - and won - "the right to say no".

A Greenpeace spokesman said: "This is an historic step towards protecting consumers and the environment from the dangers of genetic engineering. Common sense is starting to prevail. We are happy that the US and other opponents failed to force upon the world this untested and risky technology."

Sarah Finch, of the World Development Movement said: "The precautionary principle has been established after a long hard fight. There are more battles ahead but this an excellent start." Ms Finch said the 10 EU ministers at the summit played "a crucial" part in defeating opponents of the deal.

Pete Riley, of Friends of the Earth's Real Food Campaign, said: "It's great news that the world's governments are finally starting to take control in this very sensitive area by introducing the precautionary principle we have been campaigning for. Until today the agenda had been dictated by giant companies, mostly American, but now the American view has been marginalised by the weight of public opinion."

The United States-led group, known as the Miami Group, blocked the proposal last February arguing that it would be an unfair obstacle to free trade. The US now agrees to the principle but cannot sign the protocol at the moment.

Crop imports lacking sufficient scientific data to convince governments that they pose no threat to the public or the environment will not be allowed in to any of the countries adopting the protocol.

ISSUE 1699 Wednesday 19 January 2000

Crop changes cut number of larks by 75pc By Charles Clover Environment Editor

SKYLARKS declined by three-quarters on farmland between the Seventies and the Nineties because of the change from spring-sown to autumn-sown cereals, according to a study published yesterday.

Spring-sown cereals allow the stubble of the previous crop to be left unploughed over the winter, providing food and cover for the birds. This change, rather than the use of pesticides, is the main reason for the bird's decline, according to the research funded by Tesco, the skylark's corporate sponsor under the Government's Biodiversity Action Plan. Researchers found twice the density of skylarks in spring cereals compared to autumn crops in the three-year study in East Anglia, Oxfordshire and Dorset.

Spring-sown crops also provide safer nesting sites and allow skylarks to make more breeding attempts as the growing crop remains shorter for longer, according to the study co-authored by the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds.

-- Old Git (anon@spamproblems.com), February 02, 2000.


Congratulations to all for this campaign continuation. Keep on keeping on.

"Cotton is the first GM crop to be grown commercially in Australia" - Parliamentary Standing Committee, 1999

WEB SITE

The use of new pesticides in this industry has seen downstream pollution and reported fish kills. This is an issue about gene technology and genetic contamination. Evidence about growing resistance among target pests is creating super pests that are contained with ever more potent chemicals and so on. The cotton industry is a heavy user of such chemicals. This is monocrop agriculture on a grand scale.

-- Pieter (zaadz@icisp.net.au), February 02, 2000.



Correct Website Link



-- Pieter (zaadz@icisp.net.au), February 02, 2000.


The short-version summary of the whole GM fracas looks like 'greed is GOOD'. It's not quite that simple.

We have seen massive consolidation among the companies that produce foodstuffs. Vertical integration is another very operative way to look at recent years' mergers, acquisitions, and so on. The idea is to control as much of the food production industry as you can, making money at each step along the way. Why? Those of you holding stock, let alone playing those companies, have smething to do with it. So do those of you whose pension plans are in the stock market.

Regarding seed, I hesitate to tell you all that quite a bit of the seed that will be planted in a few months has already been ordered, paid for, and is in farmers' barns. It's true.

The farmer, or agribusiness(person) if you wish, is at the bottom of the pole. Last year, if memory serves, something like just over 50% of the field corn produced in the U.S. was GM, and over 60% of the soybeans produced were of GM varieties. The farmer has been getting the hard sell from the companies, bigtime -- I get the major farm publications, and I know. Combine that hard sell with the lowest prices seen since the early eighties for the primary cash grains (corn and soybeans). Combine that with seed (excuse me, supplier) companies selling seed and herbicides to, for example, South America, for much less than we have to pay here. Oh, almost forgot the EPA gone manic. Want to know one of the highest suicide-rate job categories in this country? You guessed it.

My point is simply this: farmers will produce what they can sell, with the (very expensive) lines of equipment they already have. They are by nature pretty conservative -- the survivors of the eighties farm depressions and of the nineties wild swings, that is. They (the farmers) are typically stewards of their soils -- they literally have to be!

I suspect that many other farmers have, like me, looked very hard at going organic. The problem is how to get 'there' from 'here'. BTW, my 'here' involves using chemicals as sparingly as I can -- which is why I do not do no-till. Getting 'there', for me, looks like it will mean a 3 to 5 year period of accepting a 30% - 60% yield drop in each field I farm until I can get that field used to the new order of things, and until I can get that field certified organic. Only then can I sell the products from that field for the premiums organically-produced products can bring. Will I make a lot more at the end of that period? Not likely -- under organic farming, the price per unit goes up a good bit, but your yield per acre drops very significantly, especially in the early years.

Oh, some among you are itching to remind me of federal farm programs subsidizing farmers? A popular name for the current program is 'Freedom To Fail'. Am I in it? No. Why? That was my chance to get free of most of the morass or paperwork, bureaucrats, inspections, and so on like you wouldn't believe. The FDA says that 99% of the elegible farmers are 'in the program'. I know quite a few farmers -- and I believe that only one will admit to being in that program. Can you say 'credibility'?

OK, you the consumers in the U.S. are now discovering that GM-based foods may not be as safe or as well-tested as you want. Well, in another 10 years you may find out that NutraSweet falls under that same heading. It'll be a heck of a scandal, but that's another editorial.

I am just a part-timer. Nonetheless, I can make this statement: We in agriculture will try to produce what goes into what you want to eat and are willing to pay for. We will produce what we would want our loved ones to consume. Whether we can produce it and sell it at a reasonable price, let alone shift gears as quickly as you want, is a whole 'nother question.

-- Redeye in Ohio (cannot@work.com), February 02, 2000.


Redeye, 4th generation Irish-American sodbuster from McLean County, llinois farmstock. The biggest corn producing county in the state. Not a stranger to no-till practice as it was pioneered by a distant cousin Jim Kinsella of Lexington,Illinois. Yes, am fully aware of the suicide rate, agridomination, freedom to fail and all the above pain. Sorry farmer, you were sold a bill of goods as all farmers have since post-WWII "ag science" was preached to the children of the dustbowl at farm "college". Read Ploughman's Folly, was long, long before the Silent Spring. Noone says go totally organic. Damn near impossible. What we are saying is BOYCOTT MONSANTO and that means NUTRASWEET TOO! If the FAA doesn't want the pilots to drink it because of possible seizure effects, then not in my house either. Urge your brethren farmers to consider the corporate slavery of vertical integration of farming from lysine in the hog feed to the gm seed to the grain elevator to the meat processing plant. You've already seen this movie and you know the only thing they don't own yet is the land under your feet and that is next. Hang on and hang in there. Our lives depend upon it. Don't give up or give in. OK! Having you on this website as a valued and honored participant is HALF THE BATTLE. Spread the word! go back to "regular" hybrids, if not for this years planting, then maybe next year. Believe me, I've watched in horror what is happening to America's last 2 million farm families. This is a death struggle. Good luck to all of ye.

-- Frito Bandito (eatcornchips@andsalsa.com), February 02, 2000.

Frito, while driving back to the farm from the day job, I realized (again) that this forum attracts a worldwide audience. I should have phrased my comments as such.

Now, regarding seed, been using non-GM all along. Used public-variety beans all along, and my math at my yields (upper 30's to low 40's) hereabouts says stay with that program. Never did the GM corn.

I've read quite a bit about Jim Kinsella over the years. The idea of building my soils is sure attractive, and what he and others say about earthworm populations under no-till seems true. Ditto compaction. My hesitance is because only when the weather is perfect (if such a thing exists) does the burndown result in acceptable season-long weed control. Since I already use (on beans, that is) a post application, doing mulch till lets me usually stay with only the post treatment.

I have been passing the word as occasions permit. What has gotten some folks hereabouts thinking is that I was hammering them on GM seed side-effects, and asking about yields and costs, and was telling them about the anti-GM backlash building in Europe and the Far East. What I was telling them two years ago (based on info from the good old 'net) is now becoming extremely evident. Witness the change by Frito that you reported. What I am watching for is markets to become a little more dependable in my area so that I can try some acres of, e.g., specialty beans -- and know I have a market I can depend upon. I've gotta find something else we can do on our little place besides corn, beans and horse hay!

A friend told me a little tale recently that you may appreciate. Seems someone he knows likes to run his beef cattle into the stalks during the winter. The cows love the non-GM (refuge) part of the fields -- and they will not touch the stalks in the GM part of the field!

Thank you for your response, Mr. Frito. Kindof nice to know I'm not alone!

-- Redeye in Ohio (cannot@work.com), February 03, 2000.


Thanks for the "dirt-under-the-fingernails" viewpoints, all.

Will have to phone Frito-Lay tomorrow and voice approval. Meanwhile, I support my local Farmer's Market and purchase the organically grown foods sold each week.

Diane

-- Diane J. Squire (sacredspaces@yahoo.com), February 03, 2000.



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