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Once a word that most reporters could not pronounce, “glyphosate” is now a common household word, with new studies popping up monthly on the harms of this ingredient that is the most widely used herbicide in the world.

A new report by Friends of the Earth shares that U.S. food retail sector faces $219 billion risk from pesticides. Three new studies show why this is happening.

From our friends at Center for Food Safety:

Court Ruling Holds 2020 Regulations Exempting Most GE Crops from Oversight Contradicted the Agency's Own Prior Conclusions and Are Unsupported by Science.

SAN FRANCISCO—In a precedential victory for food and environmental safety, a federal district court ruled today that genetically engineered (GE) organisms must be regulated. The Court's ruling overturns the 2020 rule overhaul by the first Trump administration that had eliminated most government oversight over GE crops, trees, and grasses.

"This is a critical victory on behalf of farmers, the planet, and scientific integrity," said George Kimbrell, legal director for the lead plaintiff Center for Food Safety, and counsel in the case. "USDA tried to hand over its job to Monsanto and the pesticide industry and the Court held that capitulation contrary to both law and science."

The ruling is a rebuke of the first Trump administration's efforts to practically eliminate oversight of novel GE technology and instead let industry self-regulate. Previously, nearly all GE plants went through agency approval before experimental planting and again before any commercial use. Center for Food Safety and allies sued USDA in 2021 to reverse this rollback, arguing that the rule change violated numerous environmental laws, including the Endangered Species Act, the National Environmental Policy Act, and the Plant Protection Act. Today, the Court held that the regulations violate the Plant Protection Act and the Administrative Procedure Act.

The Court's decision sharply criticized the defendant federal agency for its abrupt reversal after more than a decade of recognizing the harms of novel GE technology. The Court at various points held the agency decision was in "direct conflict with the conclusion of its own experts," and was based on "perception and beliefs" that are merely "asserted as fiat untethered to a clear and sound analysis." Despite USDA's repeated admissions of the need for stronger—not lesser—regulations, the rule unlawfully ignored these concerns of GE crops' risks.

As such, the Court found that the rule did not address "a single one of these issues" that the agency itself previously raised. The Court also found that the exemption of GE crops was "repudiated" by the "scientific evidence in the record," specifically the conclusions and recommendations from the National Academies of Science. Finally, concluding that the agency's errors were "significant," the Court struck down the rules based on those violations alone, determining it unnecessary to yet reach the Endangered Species Act and National Environmental Policy Act claims.

The plaintiffs in the case are the National Family Farm Coalition, Friends of the Earth, Pesticide Action Network, Center for Environmental Health, Center for Biological Diversity, and Center for Food Safety, all represented by counsel from the Center for Food Safety.

Additional Background

Now in commercial production for several decades, GE crop systems are well known to cause several significant agricultural and environmental harms. Such harms include organic and conventional crop contamination from GE crops and market closures, significant increase in pesticide use, and the proliferation of pesticide-resistant "superweeds." Because the vast majority of GMOs are engineered to be resistant to weed-killing pesticides, they have dramatically increased the amount of these chemicals sprayed in U.S. agriculture.

These GE herbicide-resistant crop systems have triggered an epidemic of herbicide-immune weeds, which now infest 120 million acres, leading to a toxic spiral of weeds immune to ever more herbicides, and increased spraying of toxic chemical cocktails to kill them. Genetically engineered crops, including rice to alfalfa to corn and many others, have caused farmers billions of dollars in market losses from transgenic contamination of conventional または organic crops, as food companies and foreign markets reject tainted supplies.

USDA has repeatedly acknowledged the need for stronger GE crop regulations since 2000, when Congress enacted the Plant Protection Act, giving the agency broad new authority to prevent agricultural, economic, and environmental harms. After several false starts to implement this new authority beginning in 2004, nearly a decade-and-a-half later, in 2020, the USDA—under the prior Trump administration— reversed course and dramatically weakened its oversight of GE organisms. Instead of strengthening rules that were already anemic, the 2020 revisions either exempts most GE crops from any regulation or subjects them to cursory reviews that sidestep serious analysis of their actual harms.

Statements from Other Plaintiffs on the Decision

"A growing body of science shows that GE crops dramatically escalate toxic herbicide use, causing harm to farmers, rural communities, and biodiversity. USDA needs to urgently prioritize a high standard of oversight for GE organisms to evaluate real risks for people and the environment," said Dana Perls, program manager of Food and Technology at Friends of the Earth, a plaintiff in this case. 

"For the past few decades, America's family farms have struggled under the control of the corporate agrochemical industry, making it nearly impossible for farmers to find anything other than patented-GE seed and pesticide technologies," said Jim Goodman, Board President of plaintiff National Family Farm Coalition, a plaintiff in the case. "Today's Court decision is a victory for family farms, consumers, and the environment. If the agrochemical industry is allowed to determine the approval of their patented products, farmers will have no measure of fairness in the seed market."

"This victory is an important step in making sure the GE crops triggering escalating use of harmful pesticides across millions of acres are actually regulated," said Lori Ann Burd, environmental health director at the Center for Biological Diversity, a plaintiff in the case. "We know GE crops engineered to withstand what would otherwise be a fatal dousing of pesticides are playing a major role in driving endangered species like rusty patched bumblebees toward extinction. The extensive harm to wildlife and plants caused by these poisons must be properly studied so we can get adequate protections in place before it's too late."  

"Farmers do not want their farming choices to be limited to the reliance on an ever increasing volume of chemical applications onto crops that corporations have engineered precisely for the purpose of locking in the sale of their patented seeds and proprietary pesticides," said Rob Faux, Iowa Farmer and Communications Manager at Pesticide Action & Agroecology Network (PAN) and a plaintiff in the case. "This ruling restores the basic oversight necessary to protect our water, soil, air, and communities from the corporate-driven cycle of pesticide dependence, weed resistance, pest resurgence, and  reliance on ever more hazardous pesticides. That failed corporate model traps farmers on a treadmill that is catastrophic for biodiversity and human health, and it's high time we got off it."

Letter from our Founding Executive Director

To our supporters:

The impact of our work has never been more clear: Make America Healthy Again is a dominating narrative in the national conversation. A federal bill, the Safe School Meals Act of 2024 Has been introduced as a direct result of your support! My personal goal has been to create a future of health and freedom. The new administration's two biggest priorities? Health and ending censorship - freedom of speech. It does not matter what party is championing these issues. I am just extremely happy for the possibility of real change. In the report, I will review some of the ways your support and your partnership have brought this conversation to a presidential platform--and now a new administration. All you need to do is look at social media and even mainstream news to see examples of how America is finally focused on health. Many Americans are now focusing on removing pesticides, fluoride from the water, artificial food dyes, industrial chemicals, seed oils, and toxins in our food. Decades of work from thousands of people is coming to fruition.

From our friends at the 100 Year Lifestyle

What if Thanksgiving was the start of the new year? Imagine this: Instead of the new year kicking off on 1月 1, we shift the calendar, and the new year begins with Thanksgiving. The holiday season would take on an entirely new vibe. It would transform the way we approach the end of the year, our resolutions, and the celebrations that follow. What would this shift mean for our mindset, traditions, and priorities? Let’s take a look.

Do ingredients and contaminants in fast food contribute to violence?

Most people know that fast food is not a harbinger of health. While tantalizingly easy, fast, cheap, and tasty, fast food comes with considerable risks. Award-winning researchers such as Barbara Reed Stitt, author of Food and Behavior a Natural Connection, showed nearly three decades ago, that the low nutrient density of fast food was connected to a low level of Vitamin B and acts of violence in prisoners, serial killers, parolees, and high school dropouts. The science is clear, simply the lack of nutrition in fast food contributes to violence.

There is currently a huge disparity between opinions on the result of the election. No matter how you voted, we invite you to look forward to the future. Moms Across America has been focused on creating healthy communities for 12 years. For those of you who are disappointed with our enthusiasm about the path before us, consider that ignoring a Presidential campaign’s commitment to Make America Healthy Again would be a violation of our integrity, no matter what political party was speaking the words. Poison is not partisan, Cancer is not choosy. No matter what political party you are in we hope you can, as many of us have, set aside your angst, distrust, and fear about Trump and see the opportunity before us.

The opportunity is immense. When confirmed, we will finally have a head of Health and Human Services, the most important role in the new administration besides the President, committed to creating a healthy country and a new future. This week, Robert F. Kennedy’s appointment has put us over the beautiful supermoon! If Kennedy can do what he has promised to do - and we know him, as our advisor for years, to be a man of his word - then many of us will no longer need to go to doctors because we won’t be sick, whether we can afford organic or not. We won’t be eating poisoned foods and be forced to get harmful injections or take contaminated medications, and the stronghold of Big Pharma and Big Ag on our lives will disappear. We will, when not exposed to toxins, feel better, sleep better, perform better at school, work, and dare I say, even in bed (endocrine-disrupting chemicals contribute to ED, gentlemen), and we will be able to live up to our fullest potentials in our long lives.

From Friends of the Earth

Friends of the Earth analysis shows cancer-linked glyphosate remains and is joined by new, more dangerous chemicals on 50th anniversary of Roundup.

WASHINGTON — On the fiftieth anniversary of the controversial weedkiller’s release, a Friends of the Earth analysis – New Roundup, New Risks – finds that residential Roundup products are more toxic to consumers and the environment than ever before. Not only has manufacturer Bayer [OTCMKTS: BAYRY] failed to remove glyphosate from all Roundup products, as promised, but new formulations of Roundup are 45 times more toxic to human health, on average, following long-term, chronic exposure. They also pose greater risks to the environment.

Reprinted from Children's Health Defense:

Testing commissioned by Spotlight on America and conducted by the Health Research Institute (HRI), an accredited independent lab in Iowa, detected 38 different pesticides in just one elementary school lunch.

by Lisa Fletcher, Andrea Nejman, and Nathan Aaron - ABC News On Your Side

WASHINGTON (7News) — Kids rely on school meals every day, but almost nothing is known about what's really in school lunches, including invisible ingredients that could harm developing bodies and brains. In a months-long investigation, we tested school lunches and found concerning results, just like the ones that are currently gaining the attention of Congress.

In America’s schools, 30 million lunches are served every day. There are standards in place for things like calories, sodium, and added sugar. The USDA asserts that lunches consumed from schools are the most nutritious.

https://www.rcpath.org/discover-pathology/news/fact-sheets/histopathology.htmlReposted from GMWatch

New rat feeding study is further proof that GM soy isn’t substantially equivalent to non-GM soy. Report: Claire Robinson

A diet containing GM soybean oil damaged the liver and kidney of rats in a new 90-day feeding study conducted by Iranian scientists. The study provides further proof that GM soy is not substantially equivalent to non-GM soy, meaning that regulatory authorisations given on the assumption of equivalence are invalid.

The study, by Horyie Taheri of Tabriz University of Medical Sciences and colleagues, was conducted on 18 male rats in three different groups (6 rats per group). One group was fed a diet containing 10% GM soybean oil for 90 days, while the other two groups served as control groups, receiving either non-GM soybean oil or a standard lab diet, respectively.