Category Archives: Agriculture

Local and organic food in Lowndes County

You find local and organic food without pesticides in Lowndes County.

Some of the researchers who established that prenatal pesticide exposure reduces IQ in children also remarked:

They also said that consumers should thoroughly wash fruits and vegetables; go beyond a quick rinse and use a soft brush, if practical. Consumers could also consider buying organic produce when possible as a way to reduce pesticide exposure from food, they said.
“I’m concerned about people not eating right based on the results of this study,” said Eskenazi. “Most people already are not getting enough fruits and vegetables in their diet, which is linked to serious health problems in the United States. People, especially those who are pregnant, need to eat a diet rich in fruits and vegetables.”

Fortunately, you can buy local and organic food around here, at Fiveash Grocery in Hahira and at Whisk in Valdosta.

Hahira has a summer Farmer’s Market every Saturday in June and July. Valdosta’s new Farm Days start May 7th. There’s even an online farmer’s market. Ask the farmers what pesticides they use.

You can even buy organic at Publix. So there is local and organic food in Lowndes County and area.

-jsq

Pesticides lower IQ in children

ScienceDaily wrote 22 April 2011, Prenatal Pesticide Exposure Tied to Lower IQ in Children, Study Finds

In a new study suggesting pesticides may be associated with the health and development of children, researchers at the University of California, Berkeley’s School of Public Health have found that prenatal exposure to organophosphate pesticides — widely used on food crops — is related to lower intelligence scores at age 7.

Continue reading →

Beef: Grass-fed versus Grain-fed

Kim Cross writes in Cooking Light about Grass-Fed Beef versus Grain-Fed Beef:

Could a grass-fed cut, with its lower-fat content, rival a grain-fed cut? Yes: It was succulent, buttery, and robust, with a perfectly caramelized crust. The juices formed a simple, rich sauce.

Well, I guess if you’re used to the taste of CAFO beef. To me, who was raised on beef from cows in the field, grass-fed beef tastes like beef, and CAFO beef tastes like cardboard.

Is it better for you?

Grass-fed beef is lower in calories, contains more healthy omega-3 fats, more vitamins A and E, higher levels of antioxidants, and up to seven times the beta-carotene.

Does it cost more? Yes, but in my experience I don’t need to eat a lot of it to feel full and get the taste. Your experience may vary.

Perhaps the most interesting part is that this article is in a mass-market magazine. Which also gives tips on how to source your own local grass-fed beef. And has a facebook page.

Or come to Valdosta Farm Days and get your local beef there.

-jsq

PS: This post owed to Lindsey.

GM crops cause organ disruptions —multiple studies

It’s not just the pesticides, it’s the crops themselves.

Gilles-Eric Séralini and colleagues surveyed the state of research and found GMOs Linked to Organ Disruption in 19 Studies, as Jeffrey Smith reports for the Institute for Responsible Technology.

…consuming genetically modified (GM) corn or soybeans leads to significant organ disruptions in rats and mice, particularly in livers and kidneys. …9% of the measured parameters, including blood and urine biochemistry, organ weights, and microscopic analyses (histopathology), were significantly disrupted in the GM-fed animals. The kidneys of males fared the worst, with 43.5% of all the changes. The liver of females followed, with 30.8%. The report, published in Environmental Sciences Europe on March 1, 2011, confirms that “several convergent data appear to indicate liver and kidney problems as end points of GMO diet effects.” The authors point out that livers and kidneys “are the major reactive organs” in cases of chronic food toxicity.

And these were the corn and soybeans that people eat.

Here’s the study.

Why didn’t we know about this long ago? Continue reading →

How many raw milk drinkers?

A lot more than most people think, or that the CDC has said much about.

Steve Bemis digs into the Population Survey Atlas of Exposures, 2006-2007

It was huge, conducting telephone interviews with 17,372 interviewees representing a population of 45,883,553 people in the listed ten states, from May 2006 to April 2007.

So, how many raw milk drinkers? Continue reading →

Via Campesina: locavores worldwide

Claimed to be “the largest social movement in the world, with more than 400 million members,” it’s Via Campesina:

Enterremos el sistema alimentario industrial!
La agricultura campesina puede alimentar al mundo!

Bury the corporate food system!
Peasant agriculture can feed the world!

Peasant agriculture as in local agriculture. It’s a global movement of locavores!

They’re planning an International day of Peasant’s Struggles on 17 April 2011: Continue reading →

Factory Chickens

We were just driving and these were in front of us:

Where are we going?

I recognized them from Food, Inc. They get them out of the chicken houses at night. It was maybe around 8 o’clock in the morning. (7:51 according to the timestamp.) According to Food, Inc., they’re put in the cages as little babies, and they put the sides down. These chickens have probably never seen daylight before: Continue reading →

Genetic engineering based on obsolete science and regulatory capture –peer-reviewed research

Here is peer-reviewed evidence that we are the guinea pigs for worldwide experimentation on the food supply using fatally-flawed science. Experimentation that isn’t needed because we already know how to do it right.

We already knew Monsanto is blocking independent GMO research in the U.S. (L.A. Times op-ed) and there are numerous examples of Monsanto gaming regulatory systems. Now Ken Rosenboro of The Organic and Non-GMO Report tells us there’s peer-reviewed research that says:

…the technology is based on obsolete science, that biotechnology companies such as Monsanto have too much influence on government regulators and “public” universities, and that university scientists are ignoring the health and environmental risks of GM crops.

The research is published as two papers by Don Lotter in the International Journal of the Sociology of Agriculture and Food:

Part 1: The Development of a Flawed Enterprise

Part 2: Academic Capitalism and the Loss of Scientific Integrity

In a 7 August 2009 article in FoodFirst, The Genetic Engineering of Food and the Failure of Science, Don Lotter explains what’s in those two papers: Continue reading →

Corn snake

Gretchen was very amused to see me do the snake dance. This corn snake was lying in the path at the edge of the field, and I almost stepped on it. Probably it was sunning itself to get warm.

It’s harmless, except to small rodents that live in corn fields. Elaphe guttata is a constrictor. This one was 3 or 4 feet long. They’re native to the U.S. southeast from New Jersey to Texas. I did not know until that day that corn snakes can climb trees.

Here he is stretched out: Continue reading →

The case against agrochemicals

Some people didn’t like the source of a recent post about the toxic effects of agrochemicals and GM plants on the environment, plants, animals, and people. There are plenty of other sources, including:

What you can do

Things you can do yourself to replace poisoned food with local and organic food.
Especially vote at the checkout counter. If you don’t know it’s local and non-GMO, don’t buy it. There may be no labelling laws, but local supermarkets know what’s local.
Protests worked in India.

Canopy Roads of South Georgia

Outside the city; off the main roads.