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Sat Jan 24, 2009 at 07:53:43 AM PST
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This caught my attention:
WASHINGTON - The U.S. food supply is at risk of being invaded by unapproved imports of genetically modified crops and livestock, a USDA internal audit report released Wednesday said.
The report, released by the U.S. Agriculture Department's Office of Inspector General, said the USDA does not have an import control policy to regulate imported GMO animals.
Its policy for GM crops, though adequate now, could become outdated as other nations boost production of their own GM crops, the report added.
So let me get this straight (to paraphrase our host here): USDA's own auditor, the Office of Inspector General (OIG) has sounded the alarm and wrote: "Unless international developments in transgenic plants and animals are closely monitored, USDA could be unaware of potential threats that particular new transgenic plants or animal might pose to the nation's food supply"
WYF? So it's ok to export GM foodstuffs to other countries but it MIGHT pose a problem if it reaches the USA? |
| Asinus Asinum Fricat :: USDA is Unable to Check GM Imports! |
| THe OIG expects the number of GM crops and the number of countries producing them to DOUBLE by 2015. China, India, Brazil and a few others are exploding with new research and now we know that China is about to introduce the world's first GM rice (not yet approved by the USDA for the simple reason that they have obviously dropped the ball thus would be wholly unprepared to test or even identify it should it sneak into US supply).
Let's not forget that in 2006 the World Trade Organization ruled in favor of the US arguing that the European Union's stringent (yes, we are "nasty" when it comes to GM produce) regulations on GM crops were, you guessed it, anti-free trade!
And this little tidbit here does not inspire confidence, does it?
Monsanto Co. has claimed responsibility and pledged "to take appropriate actions," to prevent experimental cotton and cottonseed from entering the marketplace as either fiber, livestock feed or oil products.
Ty Witten, biotech cotton trait development lead for Monsanto, said about two-tenths of an acre of experimental cotton was mistakenly harvested in Dawson County, Texas, in late October, co-mingled with other cotton and that a small part of that was ginned and some seed may have been processed.
The U.S. government said no food or feed safety concerns resulted from the incident in which the small amount of an experimental genetically engineered (GE) cotton line was harvested with about 55 acres of commercial cotton.
Approximately 60 tons of cottonseed was harvested, of which less than 0.5 percent was from the unauthorized GE cotton. |
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