Calendar

Our calendar posts our Biosand Water Filter Classes, Chocolate Tastings, etc as well as events for some of the organizations (Hour4HourTimeExchange, Northwest EcoBuilding Guild, and Friendly Water for the World) we care about. If an event intrigues you, please come!

34 comments

  1. The Bt is dilluted and spayerd on organic crops well prior to harvesting, and is degraded by the sun and water on the surface of the plant by the time it is harvested, and then people should wash veggies at home. Very little is left on the surface of the veggie by the time you eat it. With GMO’s the Bt genes are in every cell of the plant and cannot be reduced by sunlight or washing; it is very concentrated throughout the plant which is why the EPA regulates it as a pesticide, in addition to the FDA. In 2011 a study was done in Quebec Canada examining blood from pregnant women. According to the companies selling GMO’s the Bt is destroyed by digestion and never enters the blood stream, but this study found that 93% of the women tested had Bt circulating in their blood, and the umbilical cord blood showed that the majority of unborn children had also been exposed. Spraying a diluted form of something on the surface is far less risky, and orders of magnitude different in concentration, from engineering it into every cell of a plant. Kevin is correct that not all gene insertions are done with gene guns; there are several methods. I also have been working with plants for 40 years and believe, along with many other plant people, that tampering with species barriers is really unnecessary. Selective breeding yields great results with far fewer risks to human and environmental health. All the high tech is really more about the patenting of life and ownership of food crops, and the people doing it never ask themselves if they think it would be OK for someone to alter their genetics without their consent for the motive of profit.

  2. Labelling is inrpotamt. Not using GMOs, more inrpotamt.I should think the more than 125,000 suicides of Indian farmers who got caught in the seed nightmare should be a warning to our farmers.I will continue to do all I can to avoid consuming GMOs. It may mean eating only what is produced locally by people I know do not use them and having a very restricted diet. I have several health issues and consider food the most inrpotamt way to make every effort to be as healthy as possible.

  3. You are right about GMO’s Its sad to say that I didn’t know. I only knew they weren’t good and I appreciate the reeivw since I had just a small idea of what GMO’s were.

  4. I didn’t see the Eden movie, but this is almost exlctay how I made my first garden in 1986. I read about it in an old Organic Gardening magazine. When I moved to my current home, I called a top soil guy and he brought me a big truck load. The dirt when down on top of the newspapers and I had a huge pile of fresh compost after cleaning out the barn and hauling in bags of raked leaves. I also add lots of peat moss to my soil. This really is the best way to make new gardening space.

  5. The science gives us evcedine or clues information that can guide future experients or be used by others. Regulators and policy makers (i.e. politicians and politics) control legislation. Some information they use comes from science, much comes from special interests groups.If we believe that the precautionary principle is an important standard, then we, the public need to become familiar with the information (I prefer that which comes from science), critically analyze the implications for our health and the environment, and then unite to pressure our ELECTED officials to do the right thing. If they don’t then we shouldn’t re-elect them.

  6. There is always some sort of irtusdny defender on threads about GMOs. the difference between GMOs modified for Bt and spraying the plants with Bt is vast. Spray will wash off, it will degrade in weather. the Bt gene inserted in the plant cannot be washed off, it does not degrade. In fact in some studies, these BT producing genes were transfered to gut bacteria.Human cells are damaged by Bt toxin in the lab, there is no doubt about that- probably the same lock & key’ you describe here. The same way it damages the stomach cells of insects.We want decisions made by science. Not the Multinational corporations who have a mandate to make a profit, not the government agencies that are composed of irtusdny insiders.All independent tests show organ damage, increases in cancer and infertility in animals fed GMOs. Farmers have increased production, decreases in illness and increases in herd fertility when they switch to NON GMO grains for pigs, chickens and cattle.You will no longer be able to hide behind the FDA and the USDA. There are excellent scientific reasons GMOs are banned in the EU. We are the only industrialized modern nation that does not require labeling of GMOs, and it is coming here sooner or later. Prepare for that.

  7. It’s great to see some responsible eitdorials on GMO’s, however, characterizing Kaiser Permanente as a radical organic health proponent gives the uninformed the wrong idea. GMO’s are made in a laboratory. The actual process is to forcefully shoot the genes on one species (whose gene trait is desired), into the DNA of another, totally unrelated species. Crossing the gene barrier if you will. In more detail it goes like this: The genes of Bacillus thurengiensis (a bacteria used in organic farming as an insecticide) are shot into the DNA of corn. The resulting Frankenfood is then patented as an EPA registered insecticide! Don’t believe me? Google Bt Corn! Every cell of that corn plant produces its own internal poison. When the corn root worm decides it wants a little breakfast, lunch or dinner, and takes a bit, its stomach explodes. Now, does that sound like the musings of a radical anything, or the thoughts of someone concerned about the long term effects of ingesting this foreign food’?61 countries have labels or outright banning of GMO’s. Don’t you think we should have them here?

  8. Dear Stephanie: My gasoline, and now my food. There used to be a free and open merakt in these things(with no worries!) and somehow our Grannies and Grandpees survived to old age. But now with all of the manufactured worries(the Earth is warming!, the Earth is warming!) and Somebody engineered my food! I can’t eat an Arby’s without wondering if it’s bad for me. Please you can have smoking, everybody knows that kills you. But lay off my gastank and my dinner table.Would that your energies and concern would be turned to our real enemies!As to a GMO, I simply cannot abide one more three-letter concern. DDT, ABC, NBC, CBS, FAA, DOT, ATF, CNBC, FTC, BBC, AIG, AMC, AC/DC, EPA, DNA, FBI, CIA, DEA, DFW, LAX, NRA, NASA, SAT, IRS,

  9. Wait, you are suggesting that pelope put a GMO Seal of Disapproval on their anti-GMO work. So, the new anti-GMO mascot is disapproving of that work? Usually you put a seal of approval or disapproval on an object as a judgement about its contents. Like I have a Stephen Colbert Award for the Literary Excellence on a few really crappy anti-GMO books I have on my bookshelf, and one creationist book.This could have been thought out a little better. And it certainly doesn’t help the dialogue at all. To be polite, I’ll keep from judging its artistic content.

  10. Jan: 1) The exemptions seem to be the same foods that are cltrenruy exempted from labeling. When you buy a package of meat at the bitcher section of the grocery store, there isn’t nutrition labeling like canned foods have (plus, they aren’t any GMO meats yet!). I just checked a bottle of wine from my pantry and it doesn’t carry nutrition labeling, either.2) Hybridizing plants is not genetic modification, it crossing two strains of the same species. GMO’s are where you are placing the genes of one type of life form into another, completely different life form. For example, the BT corn has has a bacteria that it a pesticide placed inside the corn’s DNA. Now every cell of the corn plant contains pesticide which should kill some of the bugs that eat the corn plants. HOWEVER, when YOU eat that corn, YOU are also eating pesticide in every bite you take. SOME doctors blame this BT corn for all kinds of health problems that have increased since the corn came to market. Monsanto says the corn is safe but hasn’t done long-term testing on it. They say that’s the responsibility of the FDA. The FDA says it is the responsibility of Monsanto to do any testing.3) This may end up costing Monsanto money, as I suspect as people educate themselves they will choose non-GMO foods. If shopping habits change, farmers will respond by growing what people want! But food prices in other countries that have implemented labeling have not seen food price increases as a result. I’m worried about the costs of NOT labeling GMOs. What are the costs of not labeling GMOs if they do cause some of the health problems the study in France says they do?You may not feel the law if perfect, but you and I have a right to know what is in the food we feed ourselves and our families. Monsanto and the other GMO companies are spending $1 million dollars a DAY in their campaign to keep us in the dark. Do you trust them? I don’t

  11. If GE (genetically engineered) as the Prop. 37 refres to GMO food was so healthy, why not label as GE or GMO? Is there something that the manufacturer does not wish the buyer to know? Why are the foodmakers, foodmarkets spending such enormous monies to defeat Prop. 37?I can tell you that when the peanut-butter I purchased and consumed for years suddenly began to concern me because of it’s difference in consistency when I removed it from the refrigerator, (I use the oil-separated kind), I contacted the brand/maker, explained my observation over the past year and asked if GMO peanuts were now being used. The answer was affirmative and I responded why screw-up a fine product you just lost a loyal customer. Seems most brand/makers are on the bandwagon.What no guts to label your product and let the citizen/consumer have a choice as to buy or not buy?

  12. Yes, we should know what’s in our food. However, I have big plbroems with this proposition:1. There are too many odd exemptions. For instance, why is pet food included, but meat for human consumption exempted? This is one of many examples ( why are beer & wine exempted?).2. There needs to be a better definition of what genetically modified means. We’ve been genetically modifying food since Mendel (& probably before). Is it the method? Is it using genes from other organisms? Are some modifications okay and others bad?3. This is costly to businesses at a time when the economy is still not great & may result increased costs to consumers too.We need a better law. This one isn’t it.

  13. Not sure where the prop 37 will cost you $400 a year in additional georcry bills argument came from. Food companies routinely spend money to relabel their products every 6-12 months; prop 37 gives them 18 months to do so and requires no additional expenditure. Prop 37 is inconsistent, with too many exemptions? Again, not so fast. Right now we have nothing, and will continue to have nothing if 37 is defeated, to defend ourselves against some pretty unscrupulous characters who have their profits- not our health- at heart. Prop 37 begins to give us tools to address this problem.

  14. Well, if it’s oraginc, then USDA oraginc labeling rules require that the soy lecithin be listed as oraginc on the label (at least according to the USDA’s file which I linked to in the post). Since it isn’t listed on the label as oraginc soy lecithin , I’m not inclined to believe that it’s oraginc. Either they’re breaking the law by mislabeling the ingredients, or the person answering isn’t telling the truth. I don’t think they’re intentionally dishonest, just ignorant.I remember a few years ago when I first realized that most soy lecithin was probably GMO and that it was an ingredient in all my favorite chocolates. I called a couple of different oraginc chocolate companies, and only one (Rapunzel) had someone answer the phone who really knew what she was talking about. With all the others, I had to be *very* specific in my questions and talk to someone higher up in the company before I could get to truth. In most cases the truth was simple: they couldn’t tell me whether or not the soy lecithin was GMO or not because of how it’s processed. Getting conventionally-raised, non-GMO soy turned into soy lecithin is difficult because almost all non-oraginc soy is grouped together when sold downstream. No one separates out the non-GMO crops unless they’re a very exclusive producer marketing to a very exclusive manufacturer under a third party certification program like the Non-GMO Project (and note: Green Black’s isn’t part of that project). The only way to really ensure the soy lecithin is non-GMO is to use oraginc soy lecithin or a certified GMO-free soy lecithin.

  15. Thank you so much for this website and to my hubby for fniidng it for our gmo-free portland facebook readers. We have a guide for Portland area on our site under the button gmo-proof your home and G&B isn’t on it because 1. We don’t trust Kraft and 2. We don’t list industrial food even if they have an organic brand because they are the ones doing the exploitation of organic by degrading the standards while buying up all the companies with hostile takeover techniques. When General Mills bought Cascadian Farms years ago they kept their membership in the Organic Trade Association. The most heinous example to me is fair-trade. To make a fairly traded brand knowing the alternative is actual slaves (see positivefoodinc.com to read about shackled children dying in chocolate farms) and then use unfairly traded cocoa beans also is disgusting! But oddly, Kraft organic brands (which again we don’t buy or list online in our guide) is supporting the GMO-labeling campaign which means they’ve realized the market advantage they would have if they can get pure sources before everyone else after we get a few medical studies and the exodus begins. I don’t support industrial food but it sounds like talking to Kraft about these things would pay off potentially. Another odd thing- their back-to-nature brand supporting labeling also touts the wonderfulness of GMOs online! ?? So weird!

  16. The best hot chocolate mix I have found, hands down, is Penzeys Hot Chocolate Mix from Penzeys Spices. The irinedgents are: sugar, natural cocoa, ceylon cinnamon, real vanilla beans. I realize now, after reading your post, that the sugar might possibly be GMO sugar and Penzeys does not make any claims against GMO. On the other hand, I have found all of their seasoning mixes to be fairly free of bad irinedgents. This GMO battle is really making me weary. It makes it hard to find anything to eat sometimes. Most of the time, really. I am very vigilant about some things, but then sometimes I wonder how is a little GMO soy lecithin once in a while really going to hurt me or my children? *sigh* ANYWAY we have found that we love the Nourishing Traditions Raw Milk Warmer the best it is basically a hot chocolate recipe with some odd irinedgents. We just use a high quality cocoa (Penzeys high fat dutch process), organic vanilla, organic maple syrup, and our raw milk plus some extra cream. Sometimes it is so rich and creamy we almost can’t finish it! But somehow we manage!

  17. You know what you should see if you can find? Long ago, when I vsietid a friend in St. Lucia, his family made me a cocoa stick from some cocoa seed they got in the jungle. It was basically what this stuff is supposed to be, only ungrated. Pure cocoa, with spices and such from the area. They called what they made with it cocoa tea and it was delicious. The stick lasts forever, and you don’t need very much to flavor drinks. It lasted longer than I could keep track of it, actually. At the time (’94 or so) this (and other wonderful natural foods) were sold in the local market. I’d be surprised if it’s impossible to find them online today.

  18. Wow that one flew right past me, I have been eating those candy bars for years and I even bouhgt one yesterday, and even read the ingredients just to make sure nothing changed and I did not notice the word organic was missing before the stated Soy Lecithin. UHG. Just put a disappointing post on their FB page.I also want to thank you for the blog on Hidden MSG in products, I can’t eat hardly anything any more. Now I know why I’ll have symptoms some days when I was sure I had eaten foods that I thought was not tainted with toxic ingredients.

  19. I feel the same way about processed orangic foods and soy-lecithin always gets me because it’s in just about everything anymore and it’s hardly ever stated as orangic. I understand that USDA orangic only has to be 70% orangic but Whole Foods SWEARS up and down, left and right, that if it has the orangic label, it CANNOT contain GMO’S..period. In other words, it can be in the 30% conventional ingredients but it cannot have GMO’s. The USDA Organic website even claims the same thing. Who knows. If GMO’s are so fantastic, why aren’t the products carrying them labeled? It’s all very sad.

  20. I went to their FB page and they responded back qkuicly with this statement.& Black’s USA Tawnya, thank you for your post. It is important for us to hear from our Fans. All GREEN & BLACK’S products are certified by the CCOF (California Certified Organic Farmers) and comply with the USDA NOP (United States Department of Agriculture Natural Organic Program) organic standards. This ensures no genetically modified ingredients are used in their production, including the soy lecithin we use in our products. Please let us know if you have further questions!Thursday at 6:57pm b7

  21. I love Green & Blacks here is a link which states that a Spokesperson from Green & Blacks cireonmfd the use of organic soy lecithin I would email again, it once took me three emails and contacts with their facebook page to get a reply to a query but I did get a a310.00 voucher as well that made up for it a little.Thank you for posting I’ll try emailing from the UK and let you know what they say.

  22. Portia Unfortunately, I have first hand experience to the conrtary. Before Rapunzel switched to GMO-free soy lecithin, they were USDA certified organic but used GM soy. This was a couple years ago, but I remember calling in to their offices and speaking with a very helpful lady who told me this and encouraged me to not give up because they’d be switching to GMO-free soy lecithin soon.

  23. For a single-ingredient food, if it’s laeelbd organic it is definitely non-GMO. So, for example, organic corn can not be GMO corn. Organic sugar can not come from GMO sugar beets. The only trick comes when a food has multiple ingredients. Then, depending on the exact wording of the label, the food can possibly contain some amounts of GMOs.

  24. Funny you posted thisi was just in shop this week in spain and a frined was going to purchase this chocolate until i informed her that there was soya in the product and its a good chance its gmo from monsanto I only buy the brand Montezuma’s its made with organic soya lecithin and its also some of the best chocolate ive ever tasted Adam

  25. Fantastic blog! I shouldn’t be ovrely surprised about this, but it is disappointing that you think you are doing the right thing buying organic for yourself and companies still screw you over. Note to any Aussie readers, I checked and our green and blacks states its GMO free as well. Thanks for the eye opener food renegade!

  26. – So funny that you just posted this! I just came sfciipecally to your site to see if you had recommended reading before I headed to the library today! I checked out the following books: Prescription for nutritional healing, Glutathione (GSH), The Unhealthy Truth, In defense of food, and a few others not on your list. Now if I can just find some time to get through these! I’d love to see a sample weekly menu to get an idea of how your family is now eating. I need some ideas. Thank you for all the information you have put out there for other families. I am so happy to see that your family is now healthy!

  27. JenniferNovember 9, 2012I so appreciate your conecrn, support and suggestions. I have been many of the roads you have spoke of. I do deal with leaky gut and my diet is primarily grain free. The grains I do eat are in a rotation diet that I find does help. I will absolutely investigate the suggestions you gave. Always looking to learn more about living healthily with this disease. As you know going undiagnosed for so long causes many problems. Hoping here with all the info we can start to change that for some in the future.Much thanksBe WellJennifer

  28. nicole dossey – Just waetnd to leave you a note of encouragement. You are so brave and are fighting an amazing fight for your family’s health. It is such a blessing that you are willing to share your story and blog, it will change lives for sure. You example is convicting me that we have to get the toxic junk out of our lives too. I need the 12 steps to a heathy home series. It is overwhelming to know where to start. I start having anxiety just thinking about where to start with our family.

  29. Great point Sofia! They probably will lose money at first. However if prop. 37 paesss, I think we will see a lot of companies that stop using GMOs rather than have it there for all the world to see on the label. Then they will probably use the fact that their food is GMO free to market it and profit from it. I think it will all balance out in the end. That happened when labeling of trans fats were first introduced and many companies adapted and used it to their advantage.

  30. Rahul, Drought resistant varieties and large tomatoes have noting to do with GMO crops. Drought resistance can be achieved through crossing varieties to make hybrids. And tomatoes as of now are yet to be genetically modified in a mass scale.

  31. Specifically, consume and consume additional fruit. Not just will you be boosting your water consumption for the day but you’ll be incorporating vital nutritional vitamins for your eating plan that will nourish all of you (as well as your pores and skin.)

  32. Other ConsiderationsYou’ll discover that there are other and in some cases a great deal more desperate techniques of slimming down and eliminating that undesirable unwanted fat. You’ll find crash diets you’re able to take, liposuction and other surgical strategies. Ahead of endeavor any of these other strategies,it is best to speak to your qualified physician and ask his viewpoint.

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