tagged w/ PCBs
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A newly released hidden video is available for unrestricted use by the members of media at a new website http://occupy-monsanto.com. Occupy Monsanto is calling for protests on September 17, 2012, at Monsanto facilities across the globe to demand GMO labeling and the elimination of cancer causing toxic chemicals in our food supply.
During a face-to-face encounter caught on hidden video, Monsanto CEO Hugh Grant is challenged on how his company has an "artificial buffer" of acceptance in the consumer marketplace because "people don't know if what they are eating is GMO."
In the video GMO Labeling campaigner Adam Eidinger also speaks before the entire shareholder meeting, urging acceptance of GMO labeling. He decries the agrichemical giant's contribution to the rise of "Superweeds" and "Superpests" that develop resistance to ever more toxic chemicals sprayed on them. Despite the challenge of Monsanto to "reform," no shareholders challenged Eidinger on the facts except for Grant. Eidinger also asks Grant from the podium how much the company will spend fighting GMO labeling efforts in 2012.
When pressed by Eidinger a second time on the labeling issue Grant asserts that Monsanto complies with and supports US laws regarding labeling. He admits, "There is an increasing category of GMO-free as well, so we would support the overarching umbrella of labeling."
Eidinger responded that his question addressed efforts to change the laws to mandate labeling. "Is the Company going to oppose these labeling efforts wherever they take place?" he asks. Grant relents, "We would be absolutely open and willing to engage in a dialog with our broad industry peers," when it comes to the question of labeling GMOs.
Currently, Monsanto faces new lawsuits from organic farmers, while in California a GMO labeling ballot proposition is under review. More than 550,000 people have signed onto the JustLabelit.org citizens' petition to the Food and Drug Administration for GMO labeling and last fall for the first time about 100 people marched in a GMO Right2Know March from New York to the White House to demand President Obama keep his campaign promise to label GMO foods. (Video of the promise can be seen here. )
About Occupy-Monsanto.com
The Monsanto Annual Shareholders' Meeting concluded official activities of the Right2Know March for GMO labeling which was sponsored by the Non-GMO Project and many other organizations and businesses. Some coordinators of last year's march have set their focus on Monsanto. In March of 2012 a new "Occupy Monsanto" campaign will be formally launched to focus on changing Monsanto's business practices and support the principles of the Occupy movement.
More at the linkA newly released hidden video is available for unrestricted use by the members of... more
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If you happened to be walking around Lower Manhattan this morning, you might have noticed the anti-Monsanto chants echoing from Foley Square. In a protesting trifecta, Occupy Wall Street, Occupy Big Food, and Food Democracy Now joined forces to support family farmers as the first phase of their federal court case against food industry giant Monsanto. The crowd of around 200 people included farmers from as far away as Maine as well as local food activists and chefs.
The case against Monsanto (Organic Seed Growers Trade Association et al. v. Monsanto) aims to protect farmers against aggressive lawsuit and crop contamination from Monsanto’s genetically modified seeds. Organic and non-GMO crops can be severely damaged by the introduction of GMO seeds and farmers whose crops have been infiltrated are vulnerable to lawsuits from Monsanto who owns a vast majority of the genetics on commodity crops such as corn, soybeans and cotton.
Farmers’ fear of being sued by the multi-billion dollar company is not unfounded. According to Monsanto, since 1997, it has filed 145 lawsuits against farmers and settled 700 other disputes out of court.
Today in Federal District Court in Manhattan, Judge Naomi Buchwald will hear complaints from farmers and determine whether or not their case against Monsanto will move forward. Protestor and organic farmer Deb Taft of Mobius Fields in Westchester, New York said she was “cautiously optimistic” about the outcome of this morning's hearings.
Many protestors felt it was an accomplishment in itself that the case has made it to Federal District Court. An unnamed protestor and chef at a local private school said he came out to stand with farmers who finally got their day in court. He has been wary of Monsanto since the mid 1980s, when the issues of genetically modified organisms were mostly talk, rather than reality.
While all of the protestors united around their distrust of and frustration with Monsanto, their specific reasons for being there were varied. Some were concerned with the lack of seed choice now that Monsanto has put many local providers out of business while others were concerned with Monsanto’s global presence (Monsanto is currently being sued for biopiracy in India).
Protestors pointed to a long history of infractions on the part of Monsanto, which they demonstrated by creating a human timeline of the company’s history. Monsanto genetically modified its first plant in 1982, but the company’s story goes back to the beginning of the 20th century. John Francis Queeny, a pharmaceutical industry veteran, founded the company in 1901 and in 1902 Monsanto sold its first product to Coca-Cola — saccharin, the artificial sweetener that has been linked to cancer. Protestors this morning also referenced Monsanto's role as one of the companies that manufactured Agent Orange, an herbicide used by the U.S. Army in Vietnam that has been proven to caues severe health damage and birth defects.
But the protestors main focus today was the effect that that GMOs have on biodiversity and farmer livelihood. Andrew Faust, a permaculture teacher and founder of The Center for Bioregional Living in Ellenville, New York, urged consumers to use their buying power to boycott Monsanto products. Currently, advocacy groups working under the slogan “Right to Know” are lobbying for GMO labeling, which is already required in the European Union and China, and which Monsanto is fighting against.
According to a tweet from someone present in the courtroom, the judge will give her ruling on this morning’s hearings, which ended around 11:30 am, by March 31st. Those interested in supporting the farmers' cause can sign Food Democracy Now!’s pledge to support America’s farmers and donate to the Right to Know campaign.
More at the linkIf you happened to be walking around Lower Manhattan this morning, you might have... more
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The verdict as well as closing remarks will be given December 6, 3:30 PM Bangalore India time. That should be around 5AM standard EST here for anyone interested in seeing justice done. I wll report on any other information I get about this.
I hope this is only a first step to bringing accountability to these purveyors of global toxicity and death.The verdict as well as closing remarks will be given December 6, 3:30 PM Bangalore... more
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When whale biologist and Ocean Alliance founder Roger Payne began his career, the chief threat to whales was commercial whaling.
At that time, in the late 1960s, Payne estimates that 33,000 great whales were killed annually across the globe. That number has dropped significantly, due to the 1986 International Whaling Commission's moratorium on whaling. Although a number of countries continue to hunt whales, including Norway, Iceland and Japan — which many critics say cloaks its whaling practice under the auspice of scientific research — Payne believes that, at least for now, commercial whaling will not bring these cetaceans to the brink of extinction.
Instead, he worries about another threat: Pollution.
Payne bases this concern on Ocean Alliance's own research.
The conservation organization, launched in 1971 — and now, under Iain Kerr as its CEO, looking to move its headquarters to Gloucester on the grounds of a restored and renovated Tarr & Wonson Paint Factory — has been studying whales since its inception. Payne, himself, came into the spotlight when he co-discovered in 1967 that humpback whales "sing"¬ù to each other.
Arguably, the organization's most significant work is its massive, five-year study that measured the baseline levels of contaminants in whales around the world.
"People have known since the early '60s there was a real problem from pollutants," Payne says. "But no one had a global view of it. This was the first global view."
So, from 2000 to 2005, Ocean Alliance's 93-foot vessel, the Odyssey, snaked its way around 21 countries and 118 ports. During that time, Ocean Alliance's team gathered whale and marine life samples across the world, including more than 950 sperm whale biopsy samples.
"We looked at sperm whales because they are living at the same level of the food chain which humans are living at,"¬ù explains Payne. "So what is happening in the sperm whale is probably similar to what is happening with people."
For Ocean Alliance, the results of the survey were alarming.
"We go around the world," says Payne, "We look at sperm whales. We measure the background contaminants in them. And we discover — to our absolute horror — the concentration of a number of things."
Not only were the sperm whales exposed to common pollutants such as lead and mercury and a variety of metals such as gold and silver; they were also exposed to a wide range of chemicals such as DDT, PCBs, and fire retardants.
Moreover, one pollutant proved to be the biggest surprise: chromium.
"It was the most dramatic finding," he continues. "Chromium in its hexavalent form is a terrible carcinogen. It was the subject of the film 'Erin Brockovich.' And that is what we find in sperm whales all around the world."
Kerr, who captained the Odyssey for 10 years and is Ocean Alliance's CEO, says the study demonstrated that marine life is being hit hard on two levels.
"On the left hand, you have these compounds that are naturally occurring, but they have never occurred in the concentrations that we are now experiencing," Kerr says. "And on the right hand ,there are groups of compounds that have never existed naturally. In both cases, animals have no way to deal with them."
Enter Ocean Alliance's new study, sort of a Phase 2. This time, Ocean Alliance is teaming up with John Wise, head of the Wise Laboratory of Environmental and Genetic Toxicology at the University of Southern Maine.
Wise is a known commodity at Ocean Alliance; he and his wife, scientist Sandy Wise, analyzed the sperm whale biopsy samples from the alliance's 2000 to 2005 research.
Ocean Alliance turned to Wise because his lab studies the effects of environmental pollutants on human DNA. So how does that translate to whales?
"Our interest in DNA is that all life is dependent on it," Wise explains. "In humans, if you damage DNA you can get cancer and developmental abnormalities in children. We think in wild animals certainly the same is true, though most species don't live long enough for cancer to be a concern. The concern is pollutants in the environment are damaging DNA. And preventing the ability of the species to reproduce."
The scientists are 14 months into what Wise hopes will be a 10-year investigation. At this turn, they won't be sailing around the globe — they'll be closer to home.
Ocean Alliance and Wise will be honing their scientific eye on humpback whales in the Gulf of Maine, including those off the Gloucester coastline.
Because humpbacks live nearer to shore than sperm whales, they allow for easier and longer observational studies. So over time, for example, the team can note which female whales are reproducing, which are not — and it can answer some specific questions, like:
What are the long-term effects of pollutants on whales? Could pollutants cause developmental abnormalities? And — for a whale species already compromised in numbers — could something like chromium cause serious reproductive disorders?
Already this autumn, Payne, Kerr and Wise have led three expeditions out to Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary searching for humpbacks to biopsy.
The trips have been launched from the Gloucester Marine Railways, where Ocean Alliance's 90-foot boat, the Caribana, is docked. The vessel was donated to the group this past year and is captained by Joe Boreland, who was, coincidentally, a relief captain on the Odyssey expedition and has been working for the nonprofit intermittently since 1995.
It's unclear if Ocean Alliance will be making any more expeditions this season. But both Ocean Alliance and the Wise Laboratory are heading to the Biennial Conference on the Biology of Marine Mammals in Tampa, Fla., later this month.
There, they'll be delivering data on another study they are conducting, this time examining the effects of the 2010 BP oil spill on marine mammals in the Gulf of Mexico.
What exactly do these studies on whales and other marine mammals mean for human health?
Payne stresses that the research cannot be underestimated.
"You can say that it is probably the biggest public health threat that has ever threatened human beings," he says. "About a billion people are dependent on fish as primary source of protein. And this, I would assume, would shorten the lives of these billions of people — the fact they are taking in all these contaminants when they take in such meals."
More at the linkWhen whale biologist and Ocean Alliance founder Roger Payne began his career, the... more
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Warming in the Arctic is causing the release of toxic chemicals long trapped in the region's snow, ice, ocean and soil, according to a new study.
Researchers from Canada, China and Norway say their work provides the first evidence that some persistent organic pollutants (POPs) are being "remobilized" into the Arctic atmosphere.
"Our results indicate that a wide range of POPs have been remobilized into the Arctic atmosphere over the past two decades as a result of climate change, confirming that Arctic warming could undermine global efforts to reduce environmental and human exposure to these toxic chemicals," write the scientists, whose analysis was published yesterday in the journal Nature Climate Change.
That's of concern because POPs can travel long distances on air currents, persist in food and water supplies, and accumulate in the body fat of humans and other animals. The pollutants also can be passed from mother to fetus and have been linked to serious health problems in humans and other animals.
Co-author Hayley Hung, a scientist with Environment Canada's Air Quality Division who studies toxic organic pollutants in the Arctic, said that in recent years, researchers had posited that warmer conditions would liberate POPs stored in land, ice and ocean reservoirs back into the atmosphere.
"The chemicals are known to be semi-volatile," Hung said. "They have the ability to evaporate out of storage" -- if temperatures are warm enough.
She and her colleagues began to suspect the phenomenon was already under way when they examined 20 years of air monitoring data collected at a high Arctic monitoring site, Zeppelin Mountain Air Monitoring Station in Norway's Svalbard archipelago.
Toxic blasts from the past
Beginning in the mid-2000s, scientists observed higher levels of certain POPs, including hexachlorobenzene and polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), at the Norwegian research station. That stood out, Hung said, because the chemicals' use has been restricted to the point where many POPs are no longer produced. As a result, the level of POPs in Arctic air had been decreasing.
"Stockpiles still exist, but these are limited sources," she said, "and the sources are already known to us. So we were surprised to see concentrations actually coming up at the Svalbard station."
The scientists then examined two decades of monitoring data from the Alert monitoring station in the Canadian province of Nunavut. They saw smaller, though still significant, increases in POPs at the second site.
Hung believes the larger increase at the Svalbard site is caused by its proximity to ocean areas where sea ice has retreated. "This is a sign to us that these chemicals are indeed evaporating out of the ocean," she said.
More at the linkWarming in the Arctic is causing the release of toxic chemicals long trapped in the... more
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In 1967 Gowan’s brief was to offer the union’s members (in those days there were 180,000 of them) advice on legal and financial issues relating to environmental concerns – an increasingly hot topic at the time – when he got the call from the Glanmorgan NFU.
Farmers in the area around Brofiscin and Marndy quarries near Pontypridd were reporting mysterious deaths and abortions among their livestock. Arriving at Brofiscin Farm to investigate, the owner Gwilym Miles took him into a field where he was shown a stricken cow – one of a prize winning herd of 60. The cow was listless, flaccid, and unable to stand. Gowan was then taken to a barn where he was shown an aborted calf – it had no ears, no tail and one leg was a stump.
The local vet confirmed to Gowan that it was one of several similar deaths among the herd and that an autopsy had shown that the dead cattle all had lethargy, an inflammation of the stomach lining and liver. This was confirmed by the ministry vet and led to the local abattoir in Cardiff monitoring cattle from the farm, with a view to condemning those showing such symptoms.
At nearby Maendy Quarry similar deaths and abortions had been occurring in sheep, having also initially shown a loss of muscle control. All were baffled as to what was causing the deaths – it was beyond their experience. While reported symptoms were the same, there was no clear pattern of deaths to indicate disease or mass fatality to suggest one-off poisoning.
Shocked by what he had seen, something else struck Gown – the sickly, sweet smell in the air. He was also alarmed by the foaming yellow and purple liquid he could see streaming from he quarry into the ditches and streams across the land. After consultations at the NFU he was given the go-ahead by the Union to investigate further. He was to concentrate on Brofiscin Quarry and the surrounding area due to the regular cattle deaths, abortions and reproductive problems being experienced on Miles’ farm.
The quarries at Brofiscin and Maendy had become landfill sites in 1965 and 1966 respectively. Planning permission for Brofiscin had been granted against the advice of the local Llantrisant council’s planners, Gowan was to learn, and the go-ahead was only given with a series of conditions to preclude the dumping of wastes that could interfere with the watercourses or groundwater, or the environment. Throughout the Fifties, protection of the increasingly absurd waterways has been an increasingly political hot potato, which led, in 1963, to the passing of The Rivers (Prevention of Pollution) Act 1961.
Monsanto fell foul of this new legislation. The company’s Newpoty plant had been routinely dumping chemical wastes into the River Severn and public waterways and sewers. Internal memos from Monsanto record that at least 3.4lb of PCB wastes were daily being dumped into the sewers. Criticised in the press, and beset by a parallel situation looming large at its now infamous US plant in Anniston, Alabama, Monsanto looked for a new way to deal with its burgeoning waste problem. This was a case of swings and roundabouts for the global company; as its problems at home intensified it ramped up production of PCBs in the UK.
It sought out and employed a local Bridgend haulage company Industrial Waste Disposal South Wales Ltd (IWD) to clear its wastes. IWD, with Monsanto’s assistance, identified the sites at Brofiscin and Maendy, secured planning permission and swung into operation. Despite both quarries being permeable – Brofiscin is limestone and Maendy sandstone – neither was lined nor capped against rainfall. Problems soon materialised.
Within months, the owner of Brofiscin, a reclusive spinster known only as Miss Morgan, told Gowan that she started to receive complaints from villagers in nearby Grosfaen about the strong phenolic smell coming from the quarry. In 1967, when the cattle deaths began to occur, Gwilym Miles had also complained to her of fiery coloured liquids entering the stream on his land. Gowan ascertained that the fresh water shrimp in the stream were dead or dying.
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This goes into more detail and the threats against Mr. Gowan's life. Unbelievable.In 1967 Gowan’s brief was to offer the union’s members (in those days... more
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thttp://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2011/02/fish-toxins-environment/
Some fish in New York’s Hudson River have become resistant to several of the waterway’s more toxic pollutants. Instead of getting sick from dioxins and related compounds including some polychlorinated biphenyls, Atlantic tomcod harmlessly store these poisons in fat, a new study finds.
But what’s good for this bottom-dwelling species could be bad for those feeding on it, says Isaac Wirgin of the New York University School of Medicine’s Institute of Environmental Medicine in Tuxedo. Each bite of tomcod that a predator takes, he explains, will move a potent dose of toxic chemicals up the food chain — eventually into species that could end up on home dinner tables.
From 1947 to 1976, two General Electric manufacturing plants along the Hudson River produced PCBs for a range of uses, including as insulating fluids in electrical transformers. Over the years, PCB and dioxin levels in the livers of the Hudson’s tomcod rose to become “among the highest known in nature,” Wirgin and his colleagues note online Feb. 17 in Science. Because these fish don’t detoxify PCBs, Wirgin explains, it was a surprise that they could accumulate such hefty contamination without becoming poisoned. His team now reports that the tomcod’s protection traces to a single mutation in one gene. The gene is responsible for producing a protein needed to unleash the pollutants’ toxicity.
All vertebrates contain molecules in their cells that will bind to dioxins and related compounds. Indeed, these proteins — aryl hydrocarbon receptors, or AHRs — are often referred to as dioxin receptors. Once these poisons diffuse into an exposed cell, each molecule can mate with a receptor and together they eventually pick up a third molecule. This trio can then dock with select segments of DNA in the cell’s nucleus to inappropriately turn on genes that can poison the host animal.
The tomcod actually has two types of AHRs, with AHR-2 offering the most effective binding to dioxin-like pollutants. But one naturally occurring AHR-2 variant, the result of a gene mutation, proves a very poor mate, Wirgin’s team has found. It takes five times more of the pollutants to get substantial binding than is needed with the conventional AHR-2.
In local rivers relatively free of dioxins and PCBs, 95 percent of tomcod possess AHR-2 only in the conventional form. But in the PCB-rich Hudson, Wirgin’s group finds, the only kind of AHR-2 protein in 99 percent of tomcod is the poorly binding variant.
The mutant receptor appears to have evolved long ago and to be widely dispersed. But in the Hudson, fish with the gene to make the mutant receptor have thrived, while those without it have died out, Wirgin notes.
Adaptation to resist poisons occurs throughout biology, observes molecular toxicologist John Stegeman of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts. This process explains why some pesticides no longer kill their targets and why some microbes become immune to antibiotics.
Stegeman has been chronicling resistance to toxic PCBs and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in another coastal species, a killifish. “But the mechanism in the killifish has not been uncovered, despite a long effort to determine it,” he says.
Knowing the genetic underpinnings for chemical resistance can help predict the likelihood of that resistance developing, he explains, and can point to “how one might exploit resistance — even understand why chemicals are toxic.” Genetic mechanisms for chemical resistance in wild species are known for some invertebrates, such as bugs. Stegeman says, to his knowledge, this tomcod finding is the first in a vertebrate.thttp://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2011/02/fish-toxins-environment/
Some fish in... more
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We all know that mercury is often found in fish and are hopefully careful about our mercury consumption, but did you know about the presence of pesticides, flame retardants or arsenic in the world's seafood?
2.6 billion people obtain 20 percent of their animal protein from eating seafood. Contaminants leak into the world's water supplies from industrial and municipal waste, storm water runoff and even agricultural practices causing serious environmental, animal and human health issues.
Here's slide show on the next seven poisons in your ocean and in your seafood.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/08/09/toxic-seafood-chemicals-t_n_669105.html#s122172We all know that mercury is often found in fish and are hopefully careful about our... more
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In covering the environmental abuses of Monsanto one who is cognizant of the special relationship we have with the Earth cannot help but be repulsed by them. There is not one redeeming quality about them. They are arrogant, heartless, greedy, manipulative power brokers that use people, governments, organizations, consumers, and anyone else who gets in their way of domination. It is a domination of the global seed and pesticide market that is now bringing our Earth to a biodiversity and pollution crisis and a climate change precipice.
They have destroyed and defiled the environment with impunity, contaminated natural seeds with unstable toxic bacteria seeds, deforested our planet to make corn for gas tanks and GM soy that brings poverty and disease to places such as Paraguay, Argentina, Mexico, India, etc., (where farmers have been committing suicides in massive numbers due to economic ruin brought on by BT cotton.)
They toxified our water with PCBS, Dioxin, and Round Up, strong armed organic farmers, deceived consumers through collusion with the FDA to keep our food with GMO ingredients unlabelled, intimidated scientists who sought answers and who disseminated the answers when they found about just what their GMOs are made of and their effects, and then claim to be part of the "sustainable agriculture" movement that is looking to feed the world. It is one of the greatest and most sinister hoaxes perpetrated upon the world.
In the more than one hundred years they have been in business, Monsanto has not made one product that has benefitted the Earth. From saccharin, to aspartame, to Agent Orange, to PCBs, to genetically modified organisms, there has been one and only one motive: profit at any cost. And where we stand now that cost is the biodiversity of our planet and control of the very seeds and water that give us life. It is a control we cannot give up as it would then mean the loss not only of food sovereignty but our very freedom as human beings.
But even in the midst of all of this there are some bright spots. A federal court in California upheld a ban on the planting of their GM alfalfa seeds due to its being deregulated by APHIS without a proper EIS, and the planting of BT brinjal in India was denied by their environmental minister. There have been other bright spots as well from Ireland, to Poland, to even Haiti, where a seed shipment sent by Monsanto was protested with a symbolic burning of their seeds taking place just this month. Farmers all over the globe have seen the empty promises, high costs, environmental effects and deceptions of Monsanto and GMOs and are now reacting. Even farmers in our own country are speaking out against their tactics and calling for a return to sustainable agriculture in response to a Department of Justice investigation of Monsanto and seed monopolies and their business practices.
And yesterday, the USSC in a ruling being spun by Monsanto, while reversing the Federal court ban on GM alfalfa did uphold it could not be planted until deregulation and a full EIS was completed, and also acknowledged that farmers have the right to challenge "gene flow" (transgenic contamination) from GM crops to their organic crops if they can show harm. That is truly precedent setting.
So the question is, will this set a precedent for review of their other "seeds" such as BT corn, GM soy, BT cotton, sugarbeets, canola, etc.? We can only hope.
Hopeful signs that more are waking up to the deceptions and doing the necessary research to become aware of what they are eating and modifying their habits to be more healthy. The one organization that is helping tremendously in that is the Institute for Responsible Technology headed by Jeffrey Smith, a world renowned GMO activist. They have just put together a Non GMO website that gives you top information on how to avoid GMOs and eat more healthy thus perpetuating the 5% of American consumers it will take to get to a tipping point of awareness to begin turning the tide against Monsanto and all other companies using GMOs as a profit motive while compromising our food safety in the process. This is the one true way we can all be activists: through the wallet.
http://www.responsibletechnology.org
Of course, I have no illusions about the clout they carry as well regarding the DOJ investigation nor the court cases coming up involving Monsanto's link to PCB poisoning. A recent trial regarding PCB contamination of Anniston Alabama and the ensuing deaths and disease from it wound up in Monsanto's favor with those sickened left with little justice for their suffering. The major clout Monsanto carries with Washington DC even now under the Obama administration and the Vilsack USDA and their company's known methods of bribery leaves one wary of such attempts to hold them accountable for their many crimes against humanity and their agricultural and environmental terrorism.
After all, it was the FDA under the auspices of the last four administrations that gave them free reign over our environment and health by determining that their organisms were the same (principle of substantial equivalence) as all other food in order for them to circumvent labeling, when as we now see that is far from the truth. It was the USSC that gave them the patent to life itself thus opening the door to Intellectual Property Rights that now challenge indigenous peoples and the natural breeding of seeds for climate change tolerance which they can now purchase in biopiracy scams. In simple terms, our planet has been sold to the highest bidder in determining what we will plant, and what we will eat without our consent. That is not only undemocratic, that is immoral and criminal.
However, as with any crisis we are now in regarding our planet we have one hope: ourselves. Our consciences, our morals, our reasoning, our logic, our love for our families, our love for the Earth, our sense of justice, and yes, even our spirituality that tells us in line with the scientific facts as presented to us that we in large numbers have the ability to take back our food, our planet, and our futures. So even in the face of what Monsanto has been able to accomplish I remain hopeful of the global food movement having major victories in the coming year. But we must remain focused, cohesive, determined, and yes, even angry. We must remain so for the following:
For the farmers of India and their families, especially the widows of those whose lives were cut short by BT cotton.
For the American farmers whose farms and livelihoods are under threat from Monsanto's strong arm tactics in their desire to control all seed.
For the deforested lands of South America stripped to create a monoculture that has left many poor farmers poorer and sicker in the wake of greed over sustainability, and exacerbated a climate crisis no cap and trade scheme can heal.
For the soil of our Earth, its skin, that cries out for help to us as it is eroded, stripped, abused, and toxified for profit.
For our water, polluted, toxic, acidic, filled with pesticides and run off as the cost of industrial agriculture.
For our children, who deserve a cleaner, safer, more natural world to live in.
Let this next year be the year to truly hold Monsanto as an example of all of those things to be the first step in our moral imperative to save this planet and in turn the human species and all others we have so cavalierly dismissed in our desire to be masters of the universe.
More to come.In covering the environmental abuses of Monsanto one who is cognizant of the special... more
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Dolphins are getting sick from eating the same fish we do.
That's the disturbing conclusion of the latest round of federal research at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration offices at Fort Johnson, among other sites.
Studies of dolphins in coastal Georgia discovered some of the highest levels of PCBs ever found in the fat of a marine mammal, 30 years after the use of the toxic industrial insulating compound was banned.
"Some of these (dolphins) are living on the edge," said Lori Schwacke, principal scientist at the NOAA Oceans and Human Health Center of Excellence at Fort Johnson. Their immune systems have been suppressed to the point where the outbreak of a single virus could result in mass kills, she said.
Dolphins first were studied in an area around Brunswick, Ga., the location of four federal Superfund contamination sites. But when researchers moved to an estuarine research reserve some 30 miles away, expecting to find healthy dolphin to use as a control population, they found PCB levels just as high.
Because dolphins tend not to roam, the finding suggests that they were getting the chemical from fish they ate; the fish do roam.
"The contaminants aren't settling in the sediment or moving out in the ocean. They're actually moving into the coastal food web," Schwacke said. "And the levels we're seeing in these animals is just incredibly high."
Dolphins eat far more fish than people do, but "with people we care about much lower levels and effects" of contamination.
"We don't want to tell people to stop eating seafood; there are health benefits to eating seafood. It's definitely enough of worry to prompt additional study," she said.
Finding those levels of PCB after 30 years suggests "the things we're doing to our coast now are going to be around for decades."
The National Center for Environmental Health is studying contamination levels and the health of people who live along that coast.Dolphins are getting sick from eating the same fish we do.
That's the... more
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Rapidly melting Arctic sea ice is changing the world's weather, releasing contaminants into the food chain and threatening the survival of whales and polar bears, a massive international study on climate change has found.
Some 300 scientists from 27 countries spent months on an icebreaker in 2009 studying the effect of climate change in the Arctic and they released their preliminary results Friday at a youth summit in Winnipeg.
David Barber, one of the world's top Arctic researchers, said the rapid sea-ice melt is affecting everything from polar bears to micro-organisms.
"We know we're losing sea ice. The world is all aware of that," said Barber, who holds the Canada research chair in Arctic science at the University of Manitoba. "What you're not aware of is that it has impacts on everything else that goes on in this system. We're just starting to understand that from a scientific perspective."
The expedition discovered there is more open water than ever before in the Arctic, he said. That is creating more cyclones - Arctic storms, characterized by snow and high winds.
The storms further erode the sea ice crucial to the region's ecosystem.
"Those storms are having a very dramatic impact on the sea ice - they are melting the ice from underneath," Barber said. "The other thing the cyclones do is they bring winds with them. Those winds remove snow from the surface but they also break up the ice as well."
Scientists found the loss of that sea ice has both far-reaching and immediate consequences, from boosting temperatures further south to threatening whales and releasing toxic contaminants.
Steve Ferguson, who studied marine mammals on the expedition, said the melting ice has removed a barrier that once kept killer whales and other predators from entering the Arctic. Now there are more killer whales in the region and the loss of ice means there are fewer safe havens from the predator, he said.
Polar bears and other species who live on the ice are running out of room, he added.
"I think we will have ice for a long time, at least for part of the year, but it may only be located in a certain area in the world," said Ferguson, a biologist at the University of Manitoba. "These species are going to be crowded into a small area so that's going to be challenging."
The eroding ice is also threatening mammals in another way - by releasing contaminants into the Arctic food chain. Gary Stern, who studied the level of PCBs and mercury on the expedition, said the contaminants latch on to the increased carbon in the surface water, which is drawn downwards.
The contaminants are then consumed by zooplankton, fish and, eventually, beluga whales.Rapidly melting Arctic sea ice is changing the world's weather, releasing... more
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At a recent sea life gala in Anchorage, Alaska, Jean Michel-Cousteau, the ocean conservationist and son of well-known ocean explorer Jacques Cousteau, reignited the issue of ocean pollutants causing cancer among beluga whales. The problem was first reported on in the 1980s when scientists discovered that the beluga whale population in the St. Lawrence rivers and runoffs in Canada were declining at an alarming rate due to what scientists speculated to be caused by pollution.
According to a 1988 article from The New York Times, “pollution from industrial activity along the St. Lawrence River and its tributaries, including the Great Lakes, is causing disease, premature death and a declining birth rate among the white beluga whales.”
Scientists had thoroughly investigated the beluga whale population in the St. Lawrence area, but today, the beluga whale population is at an all time low again and they still suffer from toxins and the onset of cancers. A New York Times national briefing reported in January that “the number of beluga whales in Cook Inlet is again declining.” According to the article, the beluga whales were put on the Endangered Species Act in 2009 because of the possibility of extinction, but that “the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration report shows the numbers have slipped again to 321 animals, down from an estimated 375 in 2007 and 2008.”
Similar pollutions among other various ocean mammals have been discovered in recent years as well. In Norway, for example, whale meat was found to contain dangerously high levels of toxins. CNN reported that a “study by the International Whaling Commission determined levels of contamination among some marine mammals are so high that the animals would be classified as hazardous waste sites if they were on land.”
Science Daily also reported that orcas and killer whales around the world, especially in Canada, where a recent study was conducted, may face major health issues and endangerment over the next several years due to contamination with polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs).
Scientists have speculated that due to chemical and other pollution runoffs, there is a list of at least ten ocean mammals that are at an increasing risk for developing pollution-related illnesses including cancers. The list includes the following:
Sea Lions
Polar Bears
Bottlenose dolphins
Beluga Whales
Orca
Risso’s dolphins
Harbor Seals
Common dolphins
Gray Seal
Mediterranean monk seals
While there are several grassroots organizations working on a small scale to reduce the number of pollutants in the ocean, the issue remains that a large-scale movement must be initiated. Some, including Cousteau, are attempting to bring attention to the issue in hopes that by highlighting the problem, a solution can be found. “The message is the fact that we are using the ocean as a garbage can by dumping things we don’t see — such as chemicals and heavy metals — into the environment,” reported Cousteau in a recent Q&A with Time magazine.At a recent sea life gala in Anchorage, Alaska, Jean Michel-Cousteau, the ocean... more
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This leaves no doubt about how immoral business is. I can't even quote all of the blatant PR written in this piece, but have been busy spreading a bit of knowledge there. There was no mention of farmer lawsuits, patent law forcing the buying of seeds, pushing out NON GMO farmers, intimidation of scientists, transgenic contamination, test results regarding their BT crops, Indian farmer suicides, deforestation of the Amazon, farmers in Latin America being pushed off their land for soy monocultures, Monsanto in Iraq and Afghanistan, Plan Colombia, government bribes, revolving Washington DC policy, nor pending lawsuits regarding PCBs and the Supreme Court. Just one big wet kiss for Monsanto. I am actually nauseated after reading it. So if you are so inclined, make a visit over there and read what Forbes had to say in their fluff piece. This is what billions in profits gotten from the blood and biodiversity of this planet will buy you. Oh, and of course, no sugary sweet ad would be complete unless those who actually know the science and who care about the planet were called "enemies."
excerpt:
"The enemies haven't disappeared entirely. A 2009 Union of Concerned Scientists study calculated that only 14% of recent corn-crop yield increases are due to genetically engineered Bt corn. Roundup-ready corn and soy seeds don't increase crop yield at all, it found. Genetic engineering of crops "is inherently risky," says Greenpeace Policy Director Marco Contiero. "We cannot recall crops that are released into the environment." He says Monsanto's dominance decreases seed biodiversity."
Enemies? Shame on you, Forbes.This leaves no doubt about how immoral business is. I can't even quote all of the... more
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Monsanto Co. and Cornell-Dubilier Electronics, Inc., which manufacture pesticides and electrical capacitors, respectively, have been linked to PCB contamination at three privately-owned properties in the Parker Street neighborhood near Keith Middle School, according to court documents the City of New Bedford filed Thursday in Bristol County Superior Court.
As part of an ongoing lawsuit brought by neighborhood residents against the city, city attorneys are suing Monsanto and Cornell-Dubilier, in addition to other persons and entities, for more than $5 million related to site assessment, clean-up costs, consulting fees, the purchase of private property and future remediation costs, according to court documents.
The "smoking gun" that connects the companies to PCB contamination in the neighborhood is photographs of PCB-containing electrical capacitors marked with the Cornell-Dubilier name, said City Solicitor Irene B. Schall.
The yellowish, 3-inch capacitors, which resemble mini bread pans, were found in a test pit the city dug at 102 Greenwood St. after purchasing the property last fall.
The pit was dug "for the purpose of identifying responsible parties," Schall said.
Asked how the city knew where to dig, Schall answered, "We have a good expert." When zinc, lead and PCBs are found together, they may indicate the presence of capacitors, she said.
Monsanto Co. and additional defendants Pharmacia Corporation and Solutia, Inc. are foreign corporations that manufactured PCBs, lead, zinc, oil and other hazardous materials, which were "manufactured, sold, distributed, stored or disposed of in New Bedford," according to the complaint.
PCB manufacturer
Court documents indicate that from 1935 to 1971, Monsanto Co. and its predecessor Monsanto Chemical Company were the exclusive manufacturer of PCBs in the United States.
In the complaint, the city claims that the two Monsanto companies "knew PCBs were hazardous but manufactured and profited from them for more than 40 years with conscious disregard for the rights of others."
Cornell-Dubilier, a foreign corporation with facilities in New Bedford, manufactured capacitors containing PCBs, lead, zinc, oil or other hazardous materials, which were "sold, manufactured, distributed, stored or disposed of in New Bedford," according to the complaint.
In 1940, Cornell-Dubilier opened a manufacturing plant in New Bedford's South End. By 1950, the company had become "the largest maker of AC, high voltage, mica and aluminum electrolytic capacitors," according to the company's Web site.
The manufacture of PCBs, which are linked to cancer and other health problems, was banned by the Environmental Protection Agency in 1979.
Monsanto Co. in St. Louis, Mo. issued the following statement related to the city's complaint: "We have not seen this lawsuit, so we cannot comment specifically on the facts in the case until we have had a chance to review it."
Victor Whitworth, chief financial officer of Cornell-Dubilier, said from his office in Liberty, S.C. that he was "not aware" of the lawsuit and had no comment.Monsanto Co. and Cornell-Dubilier Electronics, Inc., which manufacture pesticides and... more
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Anation FREE
of its CAGE
Twenty years ago this week, the people of one of the least happy countries on the planet were forced to build a new existence from the powder of a shattered barrier and the foam of a half-formed dream.
They were farmers and factory hands, scholars and schoolteachers, the drones of the Deutsche Demokratische Republic. Few of them had had anything to do with the construction — or the rupture — of the Berlin Wall that, since 1961, had mummified them against the liberty and licentiousness of the West. If they were old enough, by 1989 they had endured (or endorsed) Hitler and had lost their brothers and fathers in the war. If they were young enough, walled in since childhood, they could see no further than the grey cement certainties of Stalinism.
“You already knew when you were five years old how life would be when you were 50,” a daughter of East Germany told me this week. “You would have kids, two or three of them, and no career to speak of, unless you wanted to be involved with the regime. Your life would just go by, and you knew already that when you were a child.”
Imagine, then, these automatic lives suddenly fractured in mid-sentence, and millions compelled to emigrate to a strange new country without leaving their homes. See page 25 http://digital.nationalpost.com/epaper/viewer.aspxAnation FREE
of its CAGE
Twenty years ago this week, the people of one of the least... more
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A fisherman at the Pier in New York is having a successful day fishing, when a stranger asks for a fish. The fisherman obliges but shortly thereafter feels regret for not teaching this Fishmoocher how to avoid the toxic pollutants in the fish caught around New York City. Through reality TV style interviews both the fisherman and Fishmoocher explain some of the health risks and how to avoid them. If you give a man a fish he will eat for a day, if you teach a man to fish he will eat for a lifetime, but make sure it is a long and healthy life by knowing how to avoid the pollutants in the fish we catch. http://www.goingcoastal.orgA fisherman at the Pier in New York is having a successful day fishing, when a... more
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By LIBBY QUAID (AP)
WASHINGTON — Hundreds of school buildings across the United States have caulk around windows and doors containing potentially cancer-causing PCBs, the Environmental Protection Agency says.
The danger to students is uncertain, and EPA does not know for sure how many schools could be affected. But the agency is telling schools that they should test old caulk and remove it if PCBs turn up in significant amounts.
EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson said PCBs remain in schools and many other buildings built before the chemicals were banned in the late 1970s.
"We're concerned about the potential risks associated with exposure to these PCBs, and we're recommending practical, common sense steps to reduce this exposure as we improve our understanding of the science," Jackson said in a news release issued Friday.
The agency said it would conduct new research into the link between PCBs in caulk and in the air, which it said is not well understood. Studies in European countries have shown that PCBs in caulk contribute to dust and air inside schools and other buildings.
EPA now recommends testing for PCBs in peeling, brittle, cracking or deteriorating caulk in schools and other buildings that were built or renovated between 1950 and 1978. The caulk should be removed if PCBs are found at significant levels, the agency said. The agency also will conduct its own tests on PCBs in schools.
The law already requires that building owners remove caulk if they discover very high levels of PCBs. But proper removal is very expensive.
"It's a huge disincentive for building owners," said Robert Herrick of Harvard's School of Public Health. "If you look for it and find it, you have to report it to the EPA and remove it, so why would you look for it in the first place?"
He said Berkshire Community College in Massachusetts saw an approximately $2 million project for window replacement and renovation increase to $5 million after engineers tested caulk and found PCBs.
Earlier this month, a Bronx, N.Y., mother sued New York City over PCBs in caulk at her daughter's public school.
New York City schools spokeswoman Ann Forte declined to comment on the lawsuit, but said the school system is "engaged in positive and productive discussions with EPA to develop and agree on a plan to address PCBs in New York City schools."
Federal officials said the issue was serious but should not be cause for alarm. The agency recommended these steps for buildings of that age:
_Don't sweep with dry brooms or use dusters in places near caulk that might contain PCBs, and clean frequently with a wet or damp cloth.
_Clean air ducts, improve ventilation by opening windows and use exhaust fans and vacuums with high-efficiency air filters.
_Wash hands with soap and water often, especially before eating or drinking, and wash children's toys often.
The agency also set up a PCBs in caulk hot line, 1-888-835-5372, and Web site, http://www.epa.gov/pcbsincaulk/.
PCBs, known formally as polychlorinated biphenyls, are chemicals that were widely used in construction and electrical materials — they made caulk more flexible — before they were banned 30 years ago. PCBs can hurt the immune, reproductive, nervous and endocrine systems and can cause cancer if they build up in the body over long periods of time.
Hundreds of the 80,000 public school buildings across the country were built between 1950 and 1978, though it is difficult to say exactly how many.
A decade-old Education Department report said the average building was 40 years old, and the Rebuild America's Schools coalition says that two-thirds of schools have an environmental problem such as the presence of cancer-causing asbestos or radon gas, lead in water and paint, leaking underground storage tanks or cancer-causing radon gas.By LIBBY QUAID (AP)
WASHINGTON — Hundreds of school buildings across the... more
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Dumping of toxic wastes is contributing to cancer among wildlife, a new report says.
Scientists say that tumors on beluga whales, sea lions and other animals are a warning signal. They call these animals “sensitive sentinels of disturbed environments.”
The report, "Wildlife Cancer: a Conservation Perspective," published in the July edition of the cancer research journal Nature Reviews Cancer, cites growing evidence from around the world that pesticides, coolants and other toxic chemicals are causing a variety of severe tumors in animals.
For example, the sea lions that are a major tourist attraction at San Francisco’s Pier 49 are being diagnosed with deadly tumors around their rear flippers and anuses. Frances Gulland, director of veterinary science at the Marine Mammal Center in nearby Sausalito, told Newsweek her center periodically gets calls from the pier reporting sea lions crippled by horrible swellings. Gulland said 17 percent of the sea lions brought to the center from the pier die of renal failure or paralysis caused by tumors that travel up the genital tract and push against the kidney and spine.
According to the journal article, sea lions that died of genital carcinoma had an 85 percent higher concentration of toxic PCBs in their system than other sea lions. PCBs, polychlorinated biphenyls, are chemicals used in coolants and electrical transformers.
Gulland said that blubber samples of sea lions who died of cancer also show high concentrations of the pesticide DDT. Many sea lions are born near the Channel Islands, where 1,700 tons of DDT were dumped before it was banned in 1972.
In Canada’s St. Lawrence Estuary, cancer was found to be the second leading cause of death among dead beluga whales that were found beached or drifting out to sea. The Saguenay River, which flows into the estuary, is lined with aluminum smelters. The smelters are heavy producers of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), proven carcinogens for humans as well as animals.
Belugas feed from the bottom of the estuary, eating creatures like the blue mussel. Blue mussels in the Sanguenay River area had PAH concentrations 200 times higher than in adjacent areas.
It’s not just the whales. Smelter workers there have shown high rates of lung cancer, while people in the area who drank from taps supplied with surface water developed stomach and intestinal cancer.
"The more we contaminate the environment, the more we will see problems," Gulland told Newsweek. "If you dump a pollutant, it doesn't just go away."
The report’s authors, biologists Denise McAloose and Alisa L. Newton, work for the Wildlife Conservation Society’s Global Health Program.
McAloose, like many other scientists, sees a connection between the environmental role in cancer among wild animals and cancer prevention among humans. "We need collaboration and cooperation across conservation organizations, public-health communities, as well as governments to make changes that have positive outcomes for animals and the planet," she told Newsweek. "Because that will have positive impacts on the human population."Dumping of toxic wastes is contributing to cancer among wildlife, a new report says.... more
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Specialized manufacturer and designer of Prototype Printed Circuit Boards at affordable cost anywhere in the world.Specialized manufacturer and designer of Prototype Printed Circuit Boards at... more
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