A guest blog from Dr. Charles Benbrook, ED, Heartland Health Research Alliance

We live in tumultuous times. Long-held alliances have been tested and some severed, but a renewal of diplomacy and partnership between the US and EU is as inevitable as the coming spring after this darkest of winters.

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Hopefully, EU commissioners and farm leaders paid little attention to the former US Secretary of Agriculture when he predicted doom and deprivation for EU citizens and farmers if the continent rejects ‘modern agriculture’ technology.

I laughed out loud when I read about Secretary Purdue’s assertion that European farmers will fall behind in the race to feed the world if they do not adopt US-style GMO seeds and the associated pesticide-intensive cropping systems. These are the very farming systems that are eroding the economic and environmental sustainability of US commodity farms. The list of damage done includes driving up farmer costs, eroding soil health, and degrading food nutritional quality and food safety.