Dr. Mercola Interviews OCA's Ronnie Cummins: The Fight For GMO Labeling In California

By Dr. Mercola
Mercola.com
The largest opportunity to give people the right to know if their food is genetically engineered will occur with the California ballot initiative - officially known as Proposition 37. Your support before the November 6 vote can make all the difference between winning and losing.

The California ballot initiative will require labeling of genetically engineered foods, and end the routine industry practice of labeling and marketing such foods as "natural."

In the interview above, Cummins expands and gives an important update on the status of this extremely important initiative, and the upcoming vote.

Encouraging News from California

     "The ballot initiative to label genetically engineered food - or now the official Proposition 37 - is quickly gathering momentum," Cummins explains. "Earlier this year in May, we turned in a million signatures of California registered voters, which enabled us to get on the ballot. We've raised approximately four million dollars so far in cash and hard pledges from organizations and businesses. We are getting very good coverage in the press, both the alternative media (online social media) and the corporate media."

     The industry is worried; they're starting to pour in more and more money. They haven't yet started their advertising campaign, but we're expecting this TV and radio ad barrage to begin any day now.

      They're starting to panic. They're doing everything they can at the federal level, but the bottom line is that the lobbyists and the large agribusinesses and biotech's' special interest, they don't really have much control over the voters in California. Come November 06, people are going to go into that voting booth. If six or seven million of them vote 'Yes' on Prop 37, this will become a law not only in California, but across the entire United States."

According to Cummins, Canada is watching this issue closely, and if California passes this law for mandatory labeling of genetically engineered food, it looks like Canada will do so as well.

Resistance Grows as Monsanto Invests Heavily in the Sacramento California Region: Proposition 37

By Anne Hart
An expanding network of concerned individuals known as Occupy Monsanto has emerged over the past 8 months staging numerous protests at companies connected to the global trade of genetically engineered foods, also known as GMOs. The network announced on August 27, 2012 in a news release, "Press Release for the Occupy Monsanto Global Week of Action," that on September 17, 2012 protests will begin for an entire week in St. Louis, home of the Monsanto Corporation, and across the US including California where voters will decide if they will label GMOs this election and worldwide in Argentina, Canada, Germany, India, Philippines, and other countries where concern over GMO impact on the environment and human health is growing.

In Sacramento you can check out the website on what's happening in the local area. See, Occupy Monsanto to Gain Support for Proposition 37 in Davis. The Anti-Monsanto Project is looking for help from the public to spread the word, get involved and educated by joining. There is a Facebook site called the Anti-Monsanto Project.

The protests will vary in size and nature but are unified in pushing back GMO food into the lab from which it came.

California Farms Get Testy Over Water Quality

The world's most pervasive groundwater pollution problem - nitrate in drinking water - is under scrutiny in the richest farming region of the United States.

This week, a report for the California Legislature revealed that 250,000 people living in Central California, including four of the top five agricultural counties in the U.S., are currently at risk for nitrate contamination in their drinking water. Many of them are among the poorest Californians.

Nitrate, in this instance, is a byproduct of nitrogen fertilizer. In drinking water, high concentrations of it can interfere with the oxygen-carrying capacity of infants younger than six months, and, if left untreated, may lead to death from "blue baby" syndrome. Some studies suggest that long-term consumption of nitrate in drinking water may increase the risk of Parkinson's disease, Alzheimer's disease, and cancer, including non-Hodgkin's lymphoma.

Europe began tackling the problem in 1991 by designating "vulnerable zones" where the groundwater and streams were polluted with nitrate. Those zones now encompass 40 percent of the landmass in the continent. Today, 27 countries test for nitrate at 31,000 monitoring stations on or near farmland; and, with some overlap, at 27,000 monitoring stations in lakes, streams, and the ocean. Since 1991, reports show, nitrate use has dropped off sharply in Europe.

Whole Foods Refuses to Support GMO-Mandatory Labeling Efforts in California

Recently, our intrepid real food activists and California Label GMO pioneers Pamm Larry and Stacey Hall reached out to Whole Foods Market asking them to allow educational events at their stores and for volunteers to be able to collect signatures from Californians who want mandatory labeling of GMOs--something that over 70% of people polled supported.  Below is their response.  We find it hard to believe that Whole Foods, ostensibly committed to healthy food and real choices, is against truth-in-labeling.  Please visit their Facebook Page https://www.facebook.com/wholefoods or call your local Whole Foods and tell the manager that you would like them to allow signature gathering at their stores.  We have a real chance at victory in this campaign.  Let Whole Foods know they should be with us, not against us.

Hi Marci,
Thanks for getting back to us.  We are disappointed that Whole Foods is not interested in some of our suggestions.   And just to be clear, because it was not specifically addressed, we need to know whether Whole Foods will allow us to gather signatures in front of your stores in the Fall of 2011 for the California Genetically Engineered Food Labeling Act of 2012?  Signature gathering is expected to start in October so we need to know your answer by Friday, September 23rd at 5pm.  If we do not receive a response, we will assume that Whole Foods will not support signature gathering in front of your stores.  While we appreciate your strategy, polls show that consumers want mandatory labeling of genetically modified ingredients.  We hope that you will choose to support what your customers have repeatedly requested which is mandatory labeling.

Upcoming Northern California Millions Against Monsanto Events

As part of OCA's Millions Against MonsantoTruth-in-Labeling Campaign we are encouraging activists in our network to plantheir own campaign events with others in their area. This email is to informyou that there is an upcoming event near you, organized by grassroots organizerswho care about the GE-labeling issue as much as you do.

Food Activist Pamm Larry, who is spearheading the effort to get GMO Labeling onthe California Ballot in 2012 (labelGMOs.org), is speaking at a series ofinformational events in your area. The goal is to pass a voterinitiative on the November 2012 ballot that would require all foods containingGMOs to be labeled.

These meetings are for activists to come together to learn about theinitiative, how we suggest being activists in your community and organizinginto a new cohesive group. We will be asking for folks to think aboutcommittees they want to be on and assign a point person.

 

California Prescription Pot Industry Looks to Self-Regulate for Orgainc Production

By Donna Jones
WATSONVILLE -- Want to buy organic carrots? No problem. Organic strawberries? Widely available. Organic honey? Try your local grocery store. But organic medicinal marijuana? Doesn't exist - at least not in any official sense.

Organic crops and products are certified by private agencies through the United States Department of Agriculture - a program developed after decades of advocacy by organic farmers and their allies. Pot - medicinal or otherwise - need not apply.

"What the USDA doesn't recognize as a legal crop we can't certify because we're certifying to their standards," said Jane Wade, development specialist at Santa Cruz-based California Certified Organic Farmers, the largest organic certification agency in the country. "That leaves medical marijuana out in the cold." It also leaves consumers interested in making sure they're not ingesting pesticides or other toxins along with their chosen pain reliever in a quandary.

Wade, who gets calls about organic marijuana certification "a few times a month," said people are frustrated by her response.

"They ask 'why can't you fix this,'" she said.

Wade said California Certified Organic Farmers worked for nearly three decades to get the USDA program in place. She suggested the medical marijuana community can take action as well.

"The path is already trodden," Wade said. "As long as they don't call it organic, there's no reason they can't adopt the rules already in place." 

Republicans, Agribusiness & Wall Street Trying to Stop California from Reducing Greenhouse Gas Pollution

Darren Goode reported yesterday at The Hill's Energy Blog that, "California  has become the primary battleground for environmental activists this election cycle thanks to a ballot initiative that would stymie a first-in-the-nation cap on greenhouse gas emissions.

"The Proposition 23 measure would suspend California's global warming law - which calls for a reduction in emissions back to 1990 levels by 2020 - unless the state's unemployment rate drops below 5.5 percent. Currently, the state's unemployment rate is 12.4 percent, the third highest in the nation."

The Wall Street Journal editorial board indicated in today's paper that, "Proposition 23 is the number one national target of the green movement this election year. With the failure of cap and tax in Congress, the greens are trying to hold onto this remnant of their anticarbon crusade. Both sides are spending heavily, and the polls show a close vote."

The Journal editorial concluded by saying, "Proposition 23 faces an uphill fight against green moneyed interests, but its passage would give California a regulatory reprieve and save tens of thousands of jobs. If it fails, Nevadans and Chinese will rejoice."

The New York Times editorial board noted today that, "Former Vice President Dick Cheney has to be smiling. With one exception, none of the Republicans running for the Senate - including the 20 or so with a serious chance of winning - accept the scientific consensus that humans are largely responsible for global warming.

"The candidates are not simply rejecting solutions, like putting a price on carbon, though these, too, are demonized. They are re-running the strategy of denial perfected by Mr. Cheney a decade ago, repudiating years of peer-reviewed findings about global warming and creating an alternative reality in which climate change is a hoax or conspiracy."

The Times added that, "Nowadays, it is almost impossible to recall that in 2000, George W. Bush promised to cap carbon dioxide, encouraging some to believe that he would break through the partisan divide on global warming. Until the end of the 1990s, Republicans could be counted on to join bipartisan solutions to environmental problems. Now they've disappeared in a fog of disinformation, an entire political party parroting the Cheney line."