California is not barred by the state Constitution from listing a chemical as carcinogenic based solely on a determination of a foreign agency, the Court of Appeal held yesterday, spurning contentions by Monsanto, producer of the herbicide, “Roundup.”

The state Office of Environmental Health Assessment placed that product, in use for more than 40 years, on the list of carcinogens last July, and Monsanto was ordered to place a warning label on the containers by July 1 of this year, as a condition of making sales in California. However, a federal judge on Jan. 26 temporarily blocked enforcement of the labeling order.

In yesterday’s state Court of Appeal decision, Justice Robert L. Dondero of the First District’s Div. One said:

“At the heart of this case is a singular assertion. Appellants believe it is improper for a foreign entity, unaccountable to the citizens of California, to determine what chemicals are known to the state to cause cancer.”

Agency in France

Under Proposition 65, there must be placed on the list any “chemical known to the state to cause cancer,” and any chemical found to be carcinogenic by the International Agency for Research on Cancer—an agency of the World Health Organization, based in Lyon, France—must be included.

Glyphosate, the main ingredient in Roundup, is “probably carcinogenic to humans,” according to a 2015 determination by that agency. The finding has not been substantiated within the United States.

An appeals court ruling said California can list glyphosate, an ingredient in the herbicide Roundup, as a chemical that could cause cancer based on findings by the International Agency for Research on Cancer.

A state appeals court on Thursday backed California’s listing of the widely used herbicide glyphosate as a possible cause of cancer and the state’s prohibition against discharging it into public waterways.

The chemical is the main ingredient in Monsanto’s Roundup weed killer, popular with farmers as well as homeowners. Citing new findings by the International Agency for Research on Cancer, state health officials added glyphosate to their list of potential carcinogens in July 2017 under Proposition 65, a 1986 initiative that requires warnings of exposure to products that pose a risk of cancer or reproductive harm.

Ruling rejects Monsanto's latest attempt to keep consumers in the dark about the hazards of glyphosate

SAN FRANCISCO, CA – Today, a California Appellate Court sided with the State of California and Center for Food Safety (CFS) affirming that Monsanto's glyphosate pesticide can be listed as a probable carcinogen under Proposition 65. Monsanto's lawsuit challenged the 2015 announcement by California's Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment (OEHHA) that it intended to list glyphosate, the active ingredient in Monsanto's herbicide, Roundup, under California's landmark Proposition 65. Proposition 65 requires notification and labeling of all chemicals known to cause cancer, birth defects or other reproductive harm, and prohibits their discharge into drinking waters of the state. CFS intervened in the case, defending the listing of glyphosate as a carcinogen and the public's right to know when it is being exposed to cancer-causing chemicals.

"This is a huge win for all Californians—and a huge loss for Monsanto—as it upholds our right to protect ourselves and our environment from unnecessary and unwanted exposure to the dangerous chemical, glyphosate," said Adam Keats, senior attorney at CFS.

The activities of genes in complex organisms, including humans, may be deeply interrelated.

By knocking out genes three at a time, scientists have painstakingly deduced the web of genetic interactions that keeps a cell alive. Researchers long ago identified essential genes that yeast cells can’t live without, but new work, which appears today in Science, shows that looking only at those gives a skewed picture of what makes cells tick: Many genes that are inessential on their own become crucial as others disappear. The result implies that the true minimum number of genes that yeast — and perhaps, by extension, other complex organisms — need to survive and thrive may be surprisingly large.

Originally published by E&E News.

A disease that kills millions of pigs a year may soon meet its match — if two federal agencies can agree on the idea.

Porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome virus is one of the latest examples of a condition that scientists believe they can beat with genetic engineering, and one that's caught up in a disagreement between the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) over how quickly such methods should be approved, and by whom.

On one side: FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb, whose agency regulates genetically engineered food similarly to a drug. On the other: Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue, pushing for faster approvals of a wide range of biotechnology that could block animal diseases and help cows produce more milk, among other benefits.

"I think Dr. Gottlieb and I have disagreed about FDA's position on that," Perdue said yesterday at a U.S. House of Representatives agriculture appropriations subcommittee hearing.

Perdue said he worries that FDA's regulations on biotech animals could stifle innovation and slow the introduction of animals that could be more productive or resistant to diseases without the use of drugs or hormones. USDA already allows genetic engineering in plants, and Perdue said he sees livestock in a similar way.

The agriculture industry, which hopes Crispr technology will transform the business, faces opponents who call it "GMO 2.0"

EXCERPT: Professor Jennifer Kuzma, co-director of the Genetic Engineering and Society Center at North Carolina State University, says she understands why companies want to stay away from the GMO label, but says referring to the new gene-editing techniques as breeding “seems a little disingenuous”.

“It is a biotech-improved crop,” she says. “Something along those lines would be more honest and is more likely not to come back and bite them in the future if consumers find out it is not really just breeding, it’s something more.”

Cotton bollworm and corn earworm have outsmarted GM Bt and chemical insecticides and have now joined forces

The cotton bollworm and corn earworm are two pests targeted by the Bt toxins engineered into GM Bt insecticidal crops. Both pests have in past years become resistant to these GM Bt toxins. Now a new study has found that the two pests have hybridised, meaning that attempts to kill them with GM or chemical toxins are increasingly likely to fail.

Neither the new study (see abstract, item 3 below) nor press articles about it (items 1-2) talk about GM Bt crops as offering any kind of solution to this problem. The study simply mentions GM Bt crops as a former pest control tactic that has since been made redundant by resistant pests.

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Late Wednesday, a coalition of environmental organizations and farmers represented by the Center for Food Safety (CFS) and Earthjustice filed new legal papers in federal court seeking the reversal of Scott Pruitt and the Trump Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA's) approval of Dow Chemical's toxic pesticide, Enlist Duo. The novel pesticide is a combination of glyphosate and 2,4-D, to be sprayed over the top of corn, cotton, and soybeans that are genetically engineered by Dow with resistance to both pesticides.

"Our filing reveals that EPA approved Enlist Duo despite its significant harms to health, environment, farms, water, and endangered species," said Sylvia Wu, CFS attorney and counsel for the coalition. "EPA's job is protecting the environment, human health, and farmers, not blindly do the bidding of pesticide companies. The court must stop its use."

Via America’s Lawyer: Mike Papantonio and Carol Moore talk about an investigation that found hazardous chemicals in regularly consumed foods and drinks in America.

Transcript:

Mike Papantonio: Monsanto will make more than two billion dollars this year from the sales of Roundup. Their blockbuster weed killer has been the most popular herbicide on the planet and has brought the company billions upon billions of dollars in profits ever since it was first introduced. So it should come as no surprise that the company’s doing everything they can to convince people around the world that their cash cow is perfectly safe but the claims being made by the company about Roundup safety don’t fit in with what science is telling us.

Independent scientific studies have linked exposure to glyphosate a variety of different illnesses including Non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, brain cancer, breast cancer can kidney disease just to name a few. All the while Monsanto has been telling consumers that their product is safe enough to drink straight out of the bottle, though executives have repeatedly refused to demonstrate this when asked by reporters. As lawsuits against the company keep growing, Monsanto is now going to have to take their tired and weak defenses to the courtroom where juries will be soon deciding whether or not consumers can hold the company liable for the diseases that science is blaming on this corrupt company.

As the demand for non-GMO goods and products continues to climb, conventional retailers are devoting more shelf space to the organic and non-GMO brands that appeal to conscientious shoppers.

It seems that the Butterfly is everywhere, and traditional retailers are taking note. Seemingly overnight, natural grocery retailers and co-ops—once the exclusive channels for organic and specialty products—are now sharing the market niche with traditional supermarket chains, big box stores, and discount grocery outlets. And with the purchasing power exhibited by a generation of vigilant moms and circumspect millennials calling for clean food, is it any surprise that predominant retailers and brands across all sectors are joining the charge?

Consumers Demand Non-GMO Options