from Center for Food Safety
date Wed, Feb 24, 2010 at 11:05 AM
subject Tell Congress to Hold USDA Accountable!
Call your Senators and Representative today and say
USDA must not approve GE alfalfa!
Monsanto wants to sell its genetically engineered (GE) alfalfa
and wants the USDA to approve its permit application,
but consumers, farmers, dairies, and food companies
dont want GE alfalfa plants and seeds released into the environment.
USDA's Draft Environmental Impact Statement (DEIS) admits
that if GE alfalfa is approved:
* GE Contamination of non-GE and organic alfalfa crops will occur
* GE contamination will economically impact small and family farmers
* Foreign export markets will be at risk due to rejection of GE contaminated products
* Farmers will be forced to use more toxic herbicides to remove old stands of alfalfa
Yet, unbelievably, USDA has decided that these impacts are insignificant!
And, USDA intends to approve Monsanto's Roundup Ready GE alfalfa anyway.
Call your Congressional Representatives today
and ask them to hold USDA accountable
by contacting Secretary of Agriculture Vilsack
and urging him to deny approval of Monsanto's GE alfalfa!
Tell them that you DO NOT support the deregulation of GE alfalfa,
for the following reasons:
* GE contamination of non-GE and organic crops would be inevitable
* You won't buy products that are GE-contaminated
* Alfalfa is a major food source for livestock
and GE alfalfa would destroy the integrity of organic dairy products
* You support the rights of farmers to grow the crops of their choice,
and GE contamination makes that impossible
* Ask your Representative and Senators to contact Secretary Vilsack
and urge him to deny USDA approval of Monsanto's GE alfalfa
Then email us at info@truefoodnow.org
and tell us who you called
and let us know what kind of response you got!
Background
In 2006, the Center for Food Safety (CFS)
sued the Department of Agriculture (USDA)
for its illegal approval of Monsanto's
genetically engineered (GE) Roundup Ready alfalfa.
USDA failed to conduct an environmental impact statement (EIS)
before deregulating the crop, as required by law.
An EIS is a rigorous analysis of the potential significant
environmental, health, and economic impacts of a federal decision,
mandated under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA).
The federal courts sided with CFS
and banned GE alfalfa until the USDA fully analyzed
the impacts of the GE plant on the environment, farmers, and the public
in an EIS.
USDA released its draft EIS on December 14, 2009.
A 75-day comment period is now open until 3 March, 2010.
CFS has begun analyzing the EIS
and it is clear that the USDA,
in its recommendation to approve GE alfalfa,
has not taken into consideration the concerns of
non-GE alfalfa farmers, dairies, exporters, retailers or consumers ...
In fact, their [current] EIS states that consumers
don't care if their organic food is GE contaminated
and neither do organic farmers,
as long as farmers employ the organic practices required
under the Organic Foods Production Act (OFPA).
Obviously, this is not true
and we need to push our Congressional representatives
to call upon USDA to deny the approval of GE alfalfa.
. review the EIS and other documents .
USDA must not approve GE alfalfa Tell-a-friend!
2.24: web.health/alfalfa/toxins that could get worse under gmo?:
. one of the hazards when gmo's involve gene shifting
is that the toxins and allergens already in the plant
can become more potent or effectively administered .
. natural toxins from alfalfa include medicarpin and Canavanine .
. medicarpin is useful for reducing plant population densities;
it's found in soils of the mature plant .
. Canavanine, an arginine analog,
is practically found only in the seed currently .
2.25: pol/gmo/gm-alfalfa invading organics:
. instead of beating the dead horse of anti-gmo,
we should push organics toward adopting
greenhouse technology,
both as a way of controling insects physically,
and for protecting crop genetics by
filtering out pollen vectors .
2.26: co.pol/gmo/linkedin.com/gm-alfalfa invading organics:
"(
If you want to avoid GMO's in Canada and USA)
you need to buy organic since we don't label them here.
There are lobby groups trying to get the government to
label food products as GMO
but the companies against it have stronger lobby boards
that argue it will cause unnecessary fear among citizens.
my reply:
. If you want to avoid GMO's you need to buy organic ?
that won't work in the usa soon:
they are now approving GE alfalfa
(see Center for Food Safety)
. this is sure [to] end organic meats
unless organic turns to air-filtered greenhousing
[2.28: or gmo can be considered organic].
2.28: pol/gmo/organic meat is not grassfed:
. organic meat is not worth fighting gmo's about
because really healthy meat should be
completely grass fed,
whereas organics can be grain-feed .
. grassfed will not be an economic reality until
the entire world downsizes population -- faght chance --
so, instead of worrying about gmo silage,
the health-conscious among us
should instead be resigned to a meatless future;
(see legumes offering complete protein
-- black beans and kidney beans);
however, as with solar energy,
the production of eggs is within the grasp of homeowners,
and we should structure locals law so as to
encourage the production of homegrown grassfed eggs .
. most homes are far away from the industrial farmers
where most of the gmo silage usage will be contracted,
therefore, they are the best place to raise healthy eggs .
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