Has Obama Ever Met an Industrial Food Shill He Didn’t Appoint?
October 9th, 2010Via: Grist:
Earlier this month, Congress approved Obama’s nomination of Catherine Woteki, the USDA’s undersecretary for research, education, and economics. The appointment drew little attention in the press, including the sustainable-food blogosphere. That’s surprising, because Woteki comes to her new position after a five-year stint as global director of scientific affairs for Mars, Inc., the multinational junk-food giant.
In her new role, Woteki will direct the U.S. government’s entire agricultural research budget. That means she will supervise Roger Beachy, head of the National Institute of Food and Agriculture, who oversees the USDA’s billion-dollar-a-year competitive grants program. Beachy is a genetic scientist with strong ties to GM seed giant Monsanto; he is openly hostile to organic agriculture. At a time when U.S. farms desperately need to move toward more sustainable methods, federally supported agriculture research has fallen into the hands of a Monsanto man answering to a junk-food exec.
Research Credit: JF
No, I can’t seem to think of anyone not AGAINST organic farming associated with the Obama Administration.
Monsanto money rules. I GUESS.
More than enough reason to stock up on Holy Basil, Biokult, Vitamin D3 and SEEDS!
Is the Mars, Inc. mentioned here the same that owns Seeds of Change?
Just wondering. Anyone know? Just wondering. And getting myself prepared to use a barf bag.