The Amish, an insular people in the United States for nearly 200 years, avoid modern technologies such as telephones, automobile, and even zippers. Many people think the Amish must also eschew genetically modified crops and pesticides. In addition, Amish are healthier than the rest of the US population. Their cancer rates are very low. So the anti-pesticides and anti-GMO…
In Canada, General Mills, owner of the Honey Nut Cheerios trademark, has decided to put away their bee-mascot from packaging for some weeks. This way, they aim to make their customers be aware of the massive bee death. They offer free wildflowers seeds to every Canadian to bring back the bees. Have a look to #bringbackthebees (in English) or…
In this article, Andrew R. Kniss, University of Wyoming (USA), Associate Professor, Weed Biology & Ecology, “introduces when bilanaphos enters the plant, about half of the molecule is quickly chopped off, leaving behind a smaller molecule – phosphinothricin”, which is an herbicide. So…
The Guardian, a British daily, publishes “Produced but never eaten: a visual guide to food waste” which is a global analysis of the food waste (“intentional”), but also of losses which are uninentional. “Each year 1.3bn tonnes of food, about a third of all that is produced, is wasted.” “In developing countries there are high levels of what…
Upon this title, Henry Miller, Biomedical scientist, FDA drug regulator and scholar at the Hoover Institution, argues mainly on the fact that pesticides residues issue is not a real issue and on the difficulties to implement an effective control of the organic chain, for regulatory reasons. That leads cheating. There is nothing in the article about agronomy or…
Upon this title, Tamar Haspel, writer, demonstrates that the “unbreachable divide between advocates of modern conventional agriculture and, essentially, everyone else, from the mainstream (organic, local, anti-GMO) to the less-so (biodynamics, permaculture, agroforestry)” is not only partisan, but also misleading, “for the simple reason that food and philosophy don’t mix”. According to T Haspel, agriculture is a matter of…
COLEACP-PIP is an initiative for the search of Plant Protection solutions for ACP (Africa-Caribbean-Pacific) countries . In this article (in English), COLEACP, which pilot this initiative, explains the work in progress for a better knowledge of biocontrol solutions. COLEACP notes : « Minor crops (including fruit, vegetables, and herbs) face a global shortage of plant protection products PPPs). The…
IR-4 is an USA program dedicated to the minor uses issue in the USA: Since 1963, it has been “the major resource for supplying pest management tools for specialty crop growers by developing research data to support new EPA tolerances and labeled product uses.” Read the 2014 IR-4 Year End Summary to understand what is the IR-4 program….