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Photo courtesy of  David Kamm Photoworks . GMO contamination of masa harina consumer products EATING BIOFUEL CORN IN YOUR NEXT TORTILLA? – A CALL TO ACTION! Devon G. Peña | Seattle, WA | April 14, 2017 In September 2000, Kraft, Inc. had to recall taco shells after admitting that they contained a genetically engineered corn that was not approved for human consumption. The case was a serious breach of biosafety and posed a significant health risk for persons with allergies to the proteins produced by the transgenic corn mistakenly added to the processed flour destined for the tortilla shells (see the original New York Times report). Now, we have a new incident involving the likely contamination of masa harina (cornmeal flour) by transgenic corn in what is supposed to be a GMO-free product used to make tamales and tortillas. According to a report posted to the Huffington Post , the transgenic corn (Enogen) may have been behind a mysterious incident in California involving bad masa ha...

Ban on genetically engineered crops stands as Federal court approves settlement YEARS OF EFFORTS BY LOCAL FARMERS AND CITIZENS YIELD VICTORY Moderator’s Note: More good news on the legal front of the movement to ban genetically engineered crops. Followers and readers of this blog know that organic farmers and food sovereignty activists in Jackson County, Oregon managed in May 2014 to pass an ordinance through a countywide election that banned GEOs (a.k.a. GMOs). The ordinance was challenged by GE crop growers backed by Monsanto, Syngenta, and other biotechnology corporations and their armies of lawyers and lobbyists. In a second Federal Court ruling, the novel ordinance has been upheld with the approval of a crucial settlement agreement that will allow current growers of GE crops (alfalfa) in Jackson County to continue their current GE production cycle until the GE crop is replaced in the next crop rotation. These growers would then have to comply with the current ordinance and switc...

La colectiva del maíz prevails in four rulings against Monsanto, DuPont MORE ADMINISTRATIVE REVIEWS REMAIN ON CHALLENGES TO PRECAUTIONARY MEASURES Devon G. Peña | Seattle, WA | March 19, 2015 The legal battles over the existing ban on the planting of transgenic maize in Mexico continue to unfold with a string of four important court victories by anti-GMO activists. On February 28, 2015, the collective of social movement organizations known as Acción Colectiva del Maíz announced that they had secured four more favorable court decisions involving amparo (shelter) corporate challenges seeking to end the GMO corn ban in Mexico. These are pivotal victories but the group explains that more administrative and judicial reviews remain to be adjudicated, including five by Monsanto and Syngenta against the use of precautionary measures to manage the biosafety risks posed by transgenic corn. I last reported in 2014 how these decisions reveal a very significant shift in Mexico’s federal civil law ...

  Moderator’s note: In 2005, in a widely-noted move, Monsanto acquired Seminis , a seed company that at the time controlled 40 percent of the U.S. vegetable seed market and 20 percent of the world market. Reports from the Organic Seed Alliance at the time found that this acquisition gave the Gene Giant control of 55 percent of the lettuce on U.S. supermarket shelves, 75 percent of the tomatoes, and 85 percent of the peppers, with strong holdings in beans, cucumbers, squash, melons, broccoli, cabbage, spinach and peas. In a more recent report issued last year by the Center for Food Safety and Save Our Seeds ( 2013:2 ), the top three agricultural biotechnology corporations – Monsanto, DuPont, and Syngenta – were found to control 53 percent of the global commercial seed market. This is the agricultural equivalent of a monopoly in biopower. It is worth noting that the proponents of GE crops champion adoption of the technology as an economic panacea for all that ails the profit-hungry i...