Fri Jul. 8, 2011 12:23 PM PDT
It's a hoary bureaucratic trick, making a controversial announcement on the Friday afternoon before a long weekend, when most people are daydreaming about what beer to buy on the way home from work, or are checking movie times online. But that's precisely what the US Department of Agriculture pulled last Friday.
In an innocuous-sounding press release titled "USDA Responds to Regulation Requests Regarding Kentucky Bluegrass," agency officials announced their decision not to regulate a "Roundup Ready" strain of Kentucky bluegrass—that is, a strain genetically engineered to withstand glyphosate, Monsanto's widely used herbicide, which we know as Roundup. The maker of the novel grass seed, Scotts Miracle Gro, is now free to sell it far and wide. So you'll no doubt be seeing Roundup Ready bluegrass blanketing lawns and golf courses near you—and watching anal neighbors and groundskeepers literally dousing the grass in weed killer without fear of harming a single precious blade.
Which is worrisome enough. But even more worrisome is the way this particular product was approved. According to Doug Gurian-Sherman, senior scientist at the Union of Concerned Scientists' Food and Environment Program, the documents released by the USDA's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) along with the announcement portend a major change in how the feds will deal with genetically modified crops.
Notably, given the already-lax regulatory regime governing GMOs (genetically modified organisms, click here for a primer), APHIS seems to be ramping down oversight to the point where it is essentially meaningless. The new regime corresponding with the bluegrass announcement would "drastically weaken USDA’s regulation," Gurian-Sherman told me. "This is perhaps the most serious change in US regs for [genetically modified] crops for many years."
is there no limit to what "they" must take
from us?
Will we have no where to sit without
the touch of something effected by
mad science?
is there nothing to be left Sacred?
I am reprinted this from
the New Plant Your Dream Blog.
Written today.
Kids at the Hillcrest Farmers' Market with Keep The Beet Media Star
The World's First Talking Beet Plant. I gave the kids some BioSmart containers
to grow organic wheat berry grass seeds.
If Washington left us alone, according to my ally Mel Lyons of the Wild Willow Education Center,
San Diego could model a sustainable city for the nation.
I will likely go to Baltimore for the Natural Product Expo East,
and possibly Washington, to take up this issue in last September.
Educating Washington on Real Food Safety is on my Radar once again.
Grass growing in a BioSmart Packaging
Sugar Cane Bagasse container
4 oz sample cup, normally for sauces.
Start your own education project
to make sure we do not lose
the future of green grass.
We need to raise up kids now
you know as much about Apples growing
on trees as they know about Apple Computers.
Get Organic Wheat berries.
These grew to the size of the photo in one week!
These are from Sun Grown Organic Sprouts
of San Diego and available each week at the
Hillcrest Farmers' Market.
THIS IS PART OF THE
NEW SACRED FOOD PROJECT
"Every blade of grass
sings poetry to God without
ulterior motives or alien thoughts--
without consideration of reward.
How good and lovely it is,
then, when one is able to hear the song
of the grasses. It is therefore a precious thing
to conduct oneself with pietry when one is
strolling among them."
Quote from
Nachman of Bratslav (1772-1810)
THIS IS ONE OF THE MOST UPSETTING
OF THE NEW DIRECTIONS,
THE LACK OF REGULATION
OF GMO INVASION ON GRASS
THE DEREGULATION OF COMMON LAWN GRASS
I have not had time to fully explore on the Plant Your Dream Blog
the recent announcement that the USDA,
our United States Department of Agriculture,
that they would be giving free reign to Scott Miracle Gro company
to have their way with the grasses of America.
The implications of this event
is profound and far reaching.
I had a check in with my old ally Mel Lyons
on Sunday at the Hillcrest Farmers' Market.
His position is that if Washington would just
leave us alone to create a sustainable food
system in San Diego and other cities, we could
do it. The truth is now, Washington is not
leaving us alone either by actions they are taking
our inactions.
Check out this quote from Mike Adams
on Natural News:
"Scotts Miracle-Gro is now moving full speed ahead on its GMO yard grass product, which could theoretically be introduced into the marketplace as early as 2012. This is a home consumer yard grass seed which, of course, resists glyphosate (RoundUp), and its introduction into the marketplace would almost certainly result in millions of homeowners across America planting these seeds in their yard and then spraying RoundUp across their entire lawn as a "treatment" for eliminating weeds.
RoundUp, in other words, may be coming soon to a neighborhood near you. And it's not just the lawns, either: This combination of Scotts GMO grass and RoundUp chemicals could be used on playgrounds, schoolyards, community centers and parks. Once this goes into production, there will be virtually no place your family can go in America that isn't contaminated with genetically modified grass seeds and toxic glyphosate chemicals."
This really hurts my spirit this morning
as I write this.
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