Rebel With a Fork Blog

Posts Tagged ‘food safety’

Have you been enjoying all the sweet, cool delicious fruits and great vegetables and salads, and farmers markets this summer?

Again, Big industry is enlisting the help of Congress to try to take that away from us. The Leafy Green Agreement (what a joke that is…) is open for public comment. If you care, you need to speak up.

I just took action, telling Secretary Vilsack and the USDA to stop letting Big Ag write rules that harm family farmers that grow our local and organic food. It’s time that the Obama administration stood up for family farmers and the growing local food movement.

Today the USDA and Big Ag are conspiring to implement a set of rules that favor giant industrial growers while placing small, diversified farms at risk. Known as the National Leafy Green Marketing Agreement, this set of rules was designed by industrial growers to protect their market share while harming their main competition, the growing local and organic food movement. The Leafy Green agreement, drafted by the largest vegetable growers’ lobbyists in an effort to whitewash their growing food safety problems, would implement draconian practices that saddle farmers with one-size-fits-all rules and would drive local and organic farmers out of business with expensive regulations.

Tell Secretary Vilsack that it’s time to protect family farmers and stop letting Big Ag write the rules.

http://action.fooddemocracynow.org/sign/leafygreens/?referring_akid=.97349.p_hBUT&source=taf

How Safe is your food? Think about this… 

Were you alive in 1970?

How many obese people did you know?

Pretty much the fat lady at the circus, and Mama Cass, right? You were hard pressed to find any clothing larger than a size 16.

How many people had diabetes?

It was old age diabetes back then.

Did you know anyone with cancer?

Did people in their 30s or 40s have high blood pressure?

It wasn’t until people started eating all this garbage chemically filled fake food that all these problems started.

Now, you can’t buy a piece of regular chicken without getting some sort of chemicals. Even if you buy hormone and anti-biotic free, they’ve still been fed pesticide resistant feed.

And your government – the people elected to serve and protect you want to make it so that the only food available to you will come from commercial farms.

Where do most of the problems come from?

Commercial farms.

Have you seen any of the videos? I think it’s a crime to let anyone eat food that comes from these conditions.

Yet, your government says that this is the best way to make food safe.

All they see is the ability to make more food faster and cheaper. But what is the true cost?

Cancer

Obesity

Diabetes

Heart Disease

ADD

Arthritis

Depression

All of these are skyrocketing – and it no longer just affects the elderly.

What can you do?

First – hop over right now and take action to let your Senators know that you are against this.

Second – Stop Feeding Your Family This Crap!

This is a public service message from Rebel With a Fork.

Pass it on

I was talking with someone tonight who is really not interested in healthy eating. This alone makes me sad. To protect their identity, I can’t go into any more than that.

During the course of the conversation, the movie Food Inc. was brought up. Well, I hadn’t seen the movie, so I set out to find it.

The first thing I found was an interview with Director Robert Kenner on PBS. He called the movie “a civilized horror movie for people who appreciate food.” Wow.  You can watch the interview here – (opens in a new window)

Intrigued, I had to find the movie. But it seems it’s been pulled off of every free site for copyright infringement. But, I was able to find the official trailer – Food Inc. trailer

I found that I could rent it at Amazon for $2.99

I checked my local library. They have 3 copies, but all of them are checked out. This is a pretty popular movie I guess.

So I went back to Amazon and rented it – and I was crying by the end of it. This movie delivers the big picture. Believe me, I will be putting even more thought into the food I buy and put on my table.

I’m going to ask you to find a way to watch it before Wednesday. This Wednesday is Ash Wednesday. What better way to make our voice heard than to give up these foods for 6 weeks?

Not only can we change what’s happening, but in the meantime -

You’ll feel better

You’ll have more energy

And you’ll lose weight.

Are you willing to make a real difference this Lent?

As the one farmer says -

“Why not make it policy to have such nutritionally dense food, that the peodple who ate it felt better, had more energy, and weren’t sick as much? Now see, that’s a noble goal”

I agree. That’s what this site is all about.

Please spread the word!

(How can you survive without all the packaged and fast foods? Login to the members area and find some great new things to try!)

Related articles by Zemanta

• Live Chat With Director Robert Kenner (takepart.com)

 

That’s right. The USDA concluded that the possibility of contamination of organic fields is of no concern, since consumers won’t care if their organic food or milk contains genetically engineered components.

In other parts of the world, there has been public outcry, revolts, and boycotts. But in the US, barely a whimper.

Maybe its true. Maybe you don’t care.

Or maybe you don’t realize the full impact of what’s going on. If you’re not informed – go ahead and scroll down to read the recent posts here, and watch the videos I’ve provided for you – while you still can.

If you do care, your voice needs to be heard, and it needs to be heard NOW!

There is a ready made letter that you can click and send by clicking here –

I’ve doctored up my response. Here a copy of my doctored up letter. Feel free to use it if you like.

———————————————————————-

I am writing in regard to Docket APHIS-2007-0044, and I demand that the USDA reject Monsanto’s application to market genetically engineered alfalfa. The USDA may not believe it matters if GE alfalfa contaminates organic and other non-GE crops, but I certainly do. I just threw out a bag of sugar when I found out it was from genetically modified sugar beets – not sugar cane.

Consumers must be able to avoid genetically engineered products. Farmers must be free of the threat of contamination and the USDA must not put organic farmers’ livelihoods at risk. The USDA admits that approval of GE alfalfa will make transgenic contamination inevitable. This is already happening around the world with corn and soybean crops. Once the crops are contaminated, the farmers owe royalties to Monsanto. This is unacceptable. With your help, soon Monsanto will own rights to every crop in the world.

We have no way of measuring the long term health effects of ingesting inbred pesticides, and by the time we do – there will be no crop on earth that is safe to eat.

Therefore, I urge you to reject not only Monsanto’s application to sell genetically engineered alfalfa, but all genetically engineered foods.

I leave you with one last thought – how will this affect your grandchildren? I would think long and hard about that.

Respectfully submitted,

————————————-

You vote everyday – whether it’s by silence, or by the products you buy to feed yourself and your family. What will your vote be today?

Members – Login and pick some delicious non-gmo dinner ideas for tonight!

With spring around the corner, I’ve been thinking about planting my garden. But the research I’ve been doing has woken me up to a scary reality. It’s nearly impossible to get a seed that has not been genetically modified. As I read through the gardening catalogs, I realize that practically every description contains something that the plant is resistant to. That may seem like a good thing on the surface, but think about the fact that the seed has pesticides and herbicides built right in.

You can’t wash it off. It lives inside your body.

Is it too late to have access to truly healthy food? When you can’t get a seed that is not genetically modified, your entire food supply is contaminated.

There was a good reason in the beginning – to make more food. It is not possible to produce enough food to feed everyone. But it’s gone too far, wouldn’t you say?

When it becomes impossible for the people who are motivated to eat real foods to obtain those foods, we have a problem. If the herd chooses to eat whatever is put in front of them without question, so be it. But those of us who are trying to maintain our health, and the health of our families by making smarter choices are finding it increasingly diffiuclt.

If, as this video claims – Monsanto owns most seeds – we are doomed. And if the control of our food supply is now a legal issue – where are the anti-trust laws? Who is monitoring Monsanto? Seems like they’ve been given a blank ticket to do whatever they want, doesn’t it?

Don’t give up the fight!

If you know of a company that sells heritage seeds – please post it here in the comments. We need to show our full support for the companies that provide the foods we need to stay healthy.

Related articles by Zemanta

• Court Rules for Monsanto, Antitrust Case Remains (abcnews.go.com)
• Organ Damage In Rats From Monsanto GMO Corn (science.slashdot.org)
• Antitrust Questions for Monsanto (nytimes.com)
• Monsanto’s GMO Corn Linked To Organ Failure, Study Reveals (huffingtonpost.com)
• Engineered maize toxicity claims roundly rebuffed (newscientist.com)
• Three Approved GMO’s Linked to Organ Damage (angryindian.blogspot.com)
• GM potato secretly planted in British farm (blisstree.com)
• GMOs & Pesticides (chefann.com)