Genetically Modified Organisms (GMO's) pose a major health threat to the future health and well-being of humanity.
Major biotechnology companies such as Monsanto, Dupont, Bayer, Dow Chemical, AgrEvo, RhonePoulenc, Syngenta, Novartis, and Aventis are harnessing the science of genetic engineering to alter, splice and generally disrupt the genetic blueprints of living plant and animal organisms in order to produce crops, seeds and other products for mass consumption and profit.
The United States, Argentina, China, Canada, South Africa and Australia account for practically all the genetically modified organisms/genetically engineered food grown today in the world.
There are currently more than 4 dozen genetically engineered foods grown or sold within the USA. These unlabeled "frankenfoods" and food ingredients include; soybeans, soy oil, corn (high fructose corn syrup), potatoes, squash, zucchini, canola oil, cottonseed oil, papaya, tomatoes and many dairy products. Worldwide, soybeans and corn account for roughly 80% of all GMO's grown. Together with cotton and rapseed/canola oil, they account for roughly 99% of all GMO's produced. One company- Monsanto- exclusively dominates the commercial GMO market, accounting for roughly 90% of all GMO acerage sown worldwide.
Some of the major health and environmental hazards and risks associated with genetically engineered foods include; increased cancers, increased food allergies and food allergens within humans, damage to food quality and nutrition, genetic and bio-invasion/cross pollination pollution, increased toxins and pesticide residues on crops and in food, damage to soil fertility, the creation of new viruses, pathogens and super-pests, socioeconomic dislocation and an increase in antibiotic resistant diseases.
Yet according to the biotech industry, almost 100% of all US food and fiber will be genetically engineered within 5-10 years. Consumers have now become the involutary "guinea-pigs" of a vast genetic experiment that will most likely have fatal health consequences for a large percentage of the populace in the coming years.
In the United States, the federal regulatory agencies responsible for protecting the public's health, safety and well-being; the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the US Dept of Agriculture (USDA) and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), are largely in lock-step with the biotechnology industry in aggresssively supporting, endorsing and promoting genetically engineered food products and policy. The USDA has reviewed more than 5000 applications for biotech crop field tests denying only a very small percentage of them. In 1994, the FDA eagerly approved the sale of Monsanto's controversial genetically engineered recombinant Bovine Growth Hormone (rBGH) which is injected into cows to force them to produce more milk, translating into more profits for Monsanto. Today, millions of dairy cows in the USA are regularily injected with Monsanto's rBGH. No other industrialized countries have approved and legalized its use, except the nations of Brazil and Israel.
Today, more than 35 countries have laws in place or have announced that they will require the labeling of food containing genetically engineered (GE) ingredients.
In the European Union, a de-facto moratorium on any new genetically engineered product approvals has been in place since 1998, however, as new GE products have over time been approved and accepted within the Community, the moratorium is no longer vaid nor in force.
Worldwide, international markets are generally rejecting GE produced food, food ingredients and animal feed. Virtually the entire European Union food industry has taken a strong stand against gentically engineered food production and products.
Unfortunately, as the stranglehold of the global biotech industry tightens its grip around the levers of world food production, nations are having to cave into the immoral, unethical and ecocidal practices and policies of the international GE food empire.
Steve Jones
P.O. Box 1141
Boulder, Colorado
80306
USA
SOURCES:
1. ***Book- Seeds of Deception
by Jeffery Smith
Yes Books, P.O. Box 469, Fairfield, Iowa 52556 USA
Website: http://www.seedsofdeception.com
2. Greenpeace International
International Genetic Engineering Campaign
Chausseestr 131, 10115 Berlin, Germany, European Union
Website: http://www.greenpeace.org/~geneng
3. ***Book- The Biotech Industry
by Jeremy Rifkin
Foundation for Economic Trends
1660 'L' St- NW, Suite 216
Washington, DC 20036 USA
Website: http://www.foet.org
4. Institute for Food and Development Policy
398 60th St, Oakland, California 94618 USA
Website: http://www.foodfirst.org
13. The Campaign to Label Genetically Engineered Food
P.O. Box 55699, Seattle, Washington 98155 USA
Website: http://www.thecampaign.org
14. True Food Now
2921 Chapman St- Suite 2, Oakland, California 94601 USA
Website: http://www.truefoodnow.org
15. Vananda Shiva
Research Foundation for Science, Technology and Ecology
A-60, Hauz Khas, New Delhi, India 110016
Website: http://www.vshiva.net
16. ***Burning Rage of a Dying Planet
by Craig Rosenbraugh
c/o Lantern Books
One Union Square West
New York, New York 10003 USA
Website: http://www.arissa.org
