Archive for the 'Food' Category
America’s Worst Graveyard Shift Is Grinding Up Workers
December 30th, 2017Via: Bloomberg: Cleanup at the slaughterhouse is as dangerous as it is repulsive, and the immigrants who do the work are under pressure to complete it faster than ever.
Plastic Found in Mussels from Arctic to China
December 20th, 2017Via: Reuters: Tiny bits of plastic are contaminating mussels from the European Arctic to China in a sign of the global spread of ocean pollution that can end up on people’s dinner plates. Mussels in apparently pristine Arctic waters had most plastic of any tested along the Norwegian coast, according to a study this month […]
Food Insecurity in Silicon Valley
December 12th, 2017Via: Guardian: In a region famed for its foodie culture, where the well-heeled can dine on gold-flecked steaks, $500 tasting menus and $29 loaves of bread, hunger is alarmingly widespread, according to a new study shared exclusively with the Guardian. One in four people in Silicon Valley are at risk of hunger, researchers at the […]
America’s Farmers Killing Themselves in Record Numbers
December 8th, 2017Via: Guardian: Last year, a study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) found that people working in agriculture – including farmers, farm laborers, ranchers, fishers, and lumber harvesters – take their lives at a rate higher than any other occupation. The data suggested that the suicide rate for agricultural workers in 17 […]
Californians Tainted by ‘Roundup’ Herbicide Chemical
November 2nd, 2017In other news, Pesticide-Covered Food May Be Linked to Infertility. Via: Health Day: Levels of the herbicide Roundup in human urine have increased dramatically among California residents in the past two decades, a new study reports. Roundup (glyphosate) is used to protect genetically modified corn and soy crops from weeds and also is used on […]
Robotic Farm Completes 1st Fully Autonomous Harvest
October 8th, 2017Via: LiveScience: It’s harvest season in many parts of the world, but on one farm in the United Kingdom, robots — not humans — are doing all the heavy lifting. At Hands Free Hectare, an experimental farm run by researchers from Harper Adams University, in the village of Edgmond in the U.K., about 5 tons […]
New Zealand: Polluted Paradise
September 7th, 2017Update: Part 2: Government Backing Policies Destroying Water Resources — Via: Al Jazeera: I also discovered that the country is harbouring a disturbing secret, little known to the rest of the world: its freshwater is in severe crisis. Two-thirds of New Zealand’s rivers are too polluted to swim in and half its lakes are irreversibly […]
Plastic Fibres Found in Tap Water Around the World
September 6th, 2017The ground up plastic is turning up in sea salt that people are eating now. Via: Guardian: Microplastic contamination has been found in tap water in countries around the world, leading to calls from scientists for urgent research on the implications for health. Scores of tap water samples from more than a dozen nations were […]
Bill Gates and Richard Branson Back Startup That Grows ‘Clean Meat’
August 23rd, 2017haha oh sure! Via: Bloomberg: Cargill Inc., one of the largest global agricultural companies, has joined Bill Gates and other business giants to invest in a nascent technology to make meat from self-producing animal cells amid rising consumer demand for protein that’s less reliant on feed, land and water. Memphis Meats, which produces beef, chicken […]
Monsanto’s Weed Killer Crisis
August 9th, 2017Via: Reuters: As the U.S. growing season entered its peak this summer, farmers began posting startling pictures on social media: fields of beans, peach orchards and vegetable gardens withering away. The photographs served as early warnings of a crisis that has damaged millions of acres of farmland. New versions of the herbicide dicamba developed by […]
