Below you'll find a list of all posts that have been tagged as “United States Department of Agriculture”
Whether we shop for sustenance at a chain grocery store, the corner bodega or even at a farmers market, we all share a basic desire—to not get sick from the food that is supposed to nourish us. In fact, much of the time, most of us don’t think twice about the safety of our food. But not all nations have …
Last week President Obama signed the DARK (Deny Americans their Right to Know) Act into law that pre-empts Vermont’s and all other state’s mandatory GMO labeling laws. This bill, passed by Congress two weeks ago, was championed by Senators Debbie Stabenow and Pat Roberts (Ranking Member and Chairman of the Senate Ag committee) along with USDA Secretary of Agriculture Tom …
More than three years after President Barack Obama pledged to be transparent about the United States’ lethal drone program, his administration has finally come forward with an accounting of the numbers of civilian deaths that resulted from drone strikes between Jan. 20, 2009, and Dec. 31, 2015. But they only cover airstrikes “outside areas of active hostilities,” which encompasses Pakistan, …
“Let food be thy medicine and medicine be thy food,” the famous quote attributed to Hippocrates, is probably more important today than ever before as a handful of corporations, dubbed Big Food, gain more control over the food industry. Hippocrates’ statement brings up a very complex question: Is food as ‘healthy’ as it used to be, and can it still effectively protect and heal the …
Denise O’Brien is a farmer and community organizer from Atlantic, Iowa. She has farmed with her husband, Larry Harris, for 40 years. She maintains sixteen acres of organic fruit and vegetable production incorporating high tunnel production. O’Brien also raises turkeys and chickens for meat and egg production. Denise mentors many women who are the next generation of farmers.
Through farming, Denise has had numerous opportunities to work within the agricultural community working on policy development on the state, national and international level and becoming involved in the community of women in agriculture, organic production, local food systems and conservation issues.
Denise has been involved in her community as well as in the agricultural sector. She is the founder of Women Food and Agriculture Network. O’Brien was a Food and Society Fellow, a W.K. Kellogg funded program from 2001 to 2003. She currently serves on the board of the Pest Action Network and the Sustainable Iowa Land Trust. In 2012 O’Brien completed a year assignment with the United States Department of Agriculture as an Agriculture Adviser in Afghanistan.
Baba Ghannouj 3 lg Eggplants, roasted, 1 cup Tahini 2/3 cup lemon juice 2 Tbs. chopped garlic 1 Tbs. cumin 1 ½ t. salt ¼ t. pepper ¼ cup chopped Parsley In a food processor, pulse eggplant until blended. Add remaining ingredients and process until smooth. Add water, and puree until desired consistency.Adjust seasonings for taste. *Garnish with Olive Oil, pine nuts and parsley or pomegranate
Repeat after me: Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats That’s CRISPR, a new GE technology that uses an enzyme, Cas9, to cut, edit or remove genes from targeted region of a plant’s DNA. Because it doesn’t involve transgenics, i.e. inserting genes from foreign species into an animal or plant, foods produced in this manner just received a free pass from …
A few years ago, while clearing dried broccoli stalks from the tired soil of our land at Soul Fire Farm in upstate New York, I received a cold call from Boston. On the other end was a Black woman, unknown to me, who wanted to share her story of trying to make it as a farmer. Through tears, she explained …
For the benefit of those parts of the world where public acceptance of biotechnology is incomplete, a public relations blitz is at full tilt. It concerns an emerging set of methods for altering the DNA of living organisms. “Easy DNA Editing Will Remake the World. Buckle Up“; “We Have the Technology to Destroy All Zika Mosquitoes“; and “CRISPR: gene editing …
Richard Nixon’s agriculture secretary in the early to mid-1970s was Earl Butz, a man best known for advising the nation’s farmers to “get big or get out.” Rural America has been following that advice ever since. Across most of the country, farms continue to grow in acreage and dwindle in number. Every state in the vast agricultural region stretching from …
Organic food demand is so booming that multiple efforts are underway to support the acquisition of organic farmland. Even Cost-Co is getting in on the action by offering to help farmers buy land and farm equipment. People’s huge appetite for organics has been ignored by Big Ag for so long that land to grow food organically in the U.S. is rather scarce. Currently, organic …
