Sandrolini also known as “Tough Guy” in war on drugs
“Moral Imperative of biotech food”
The new US new Chargé d’Affaires to Barbados and the Eastern Caribbean was part of a US Government initiative to lobby the Vatican about biotech foods.
According to a leaked US Diplomatic cable, Christopher Sandrolini wrote a report in 2005 that detailed how the Vatican’s reluctance to embrace genetically modified foods had to do with a…
“fear that widespread use of GMO food in the developing world would subjugate its farmer population and become a form of economic imperialism simply serving to enrich multi-national corporations.”
Sandrolini then wrote of the diplomatic strategy to move the Vatican to accept GMO…
“However, by focusing on the economic benefits of GMO food for developing-world farmers, safeguards in place to prevent economic exploitation, and ongoing research on non-cash crops such as cassava, Post will continue to engage the Holy See on what we have called the “moral imperative” of biotech food”
That’s interesting to see how the US diplomats push the “moral imperative” of crops that have a licensing fee and often can’t regenerate or grow on their own without special licensed additives, however – suppose Mr. Sandrolini and his colleagues are correct when he says…
“…in several communities in various parts of the developing world, the advent of biotech crops had brought significant economic benefits for developing-world farmers. While seed companies had made some profits, the big losers appeared to have been multi-national pesticide companies….”
Interestingly enough, Mr. Sandralini is also known as a tough guy in the “war on drugs”.
Welcome to Barbados, Mr. Sandralini. If you need some herb, your credit is probably good with any of the Boscobel Gang. They should be able to front you a couple of pocketfuls!
Barbados Free Press 
Well that’s nice to know, another flunky for Monsanto. No doubt he’ll be trying to push their inadequately tested GMO products onto our farmers too. And if you think those that are opposed to the widespread (but not publicised) introduction of GMO products into our food supplies are anti-scientific, technophobic luddites opposing the march of progress, my advice is checkout the link below.
Scientist: GM food safety testing is “woefully inadequate”
According to Judy Carman, Ph.D., very little safety testing is done on genetically modified foods, and when it is done, biotechnology companies conduct minimal testing.
Dr. Carmen says that more extensive independent testing of GM foods is needed to ensure they are safe. Her recommendations seem prophetic in light of a recent Austrian government study that found reduced fertility in mice fed GM corn.
Dr. Carman is director of the Institute of Health and Environmental Research, Inc., a non-profit research institute based in Australia focusing on the safety of genetically modified food. She earned a doctorate degree in medicine from the University of Adelaide in the areas of metabolic regulation, nutritional biochemistry, and cancer. She has investigated outbreaks of disease for an Australian state government.
Ken Roseboro, editor of The Organic & Non-GMO Report, interviewed Dr. Carman during her recent visit to the United States.
Can you tell me a about your research on the health impacts of GM foods?
We are conducting one of the very few first long-term, independent animal feeding studies with GM foods. To date, most of these types of studies have been done by biotechnology companies or scientists associated with biotechnology companies.
Of the few independent studies being done, a study by the Austrian government recently made public found reduced fertility in mice fed GM corn. Another recent study done in Italy showed immune system problems in mice fed GM corn.
The studies done by biotechnology companies tend to show no health problems associated with eating GM food. The independent studies are finding adverse effects.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439×1219701
Also check the links in the comments to the original post at democratic underground for more information on the unethical and immoral methods used by the biggest of the biotech pushers, Monsanto, to force their GM products into the marketplace whether the are wanted or not by us, the consumers.
Note the conflict of interest ineherent in the process of getting these improperly and inadequately tested GMO’s approved through US governemnt regulatory agencies where there is a revolving door between the FDA and Monsanto. Monsanto execs move seamlessly from Monsanto’s (or Monsanto’s lawyers’ offices) to the FDA where they approve the products Monsanto is pushing and/or write the regulations governing their introduction into the marketplace and then go right back to working for Monsanto again.
Take note that this is the democracy the US and its Nato flunkies bombed Iraq for and are bombing Afghanistan and Libya to impose. It is democracy in name only. It should be called a corporatocracy as, in the case of the food supply, a few , mainly US based, agri-business corporations, Monsanto being the chief one, will end up with an almost monopoly control of the worlds’s food supply from the seeds sold to the farmers to the food on your tabletop.
Google “history of Monsanto” for some more enlightening background information
monsanto is raping India: we REALLY don’t know who runs things…
Monsanto’s Roundup linked to deadly diseases and birth defects, most people have no idea
(NaturalNews) A recent report put together by various professors, scholars and researchers affiliated with Earth Open Source, a collaboration group devoted to food issues, cites in great deal the multitude of peer-reviewed scientific studies which show that Monsanto’s Roundup herbicide (glyphosate), which is applied to many genetically-modified (GM) crops, is responsible for causing birth defects, endocrine disruption, DNA damage, reproductive and developmental toxicity, neurotoxicity, and cancer — and yet government agencies around the world continue to ignore this crucial information, and withhold it from the public, as they push for its approval or expanded use.
One of the main studies highlighted in the report was published in the August 2010 edition of Chemical Research in Toxicology, and it showed that Roundup causes malformations in frog and chicken embryos at levels much lower than those used on agricultural crops. And since Roundup-ready GM crops are designed to tolerate the herbicide, not resist it, they literally absorb Roundup, which is then passed on in much higher levels to humans that eat the tainted crops.
Another study conducted as part of the Argentine government’s research group CONICET found high rates of the same or similar birth defect in humans living near GM soy crops that were routinely sprayed with Roundup, indicating a clear connection between the chemical and human birth defects. More than half of the growing land in Argentina is now dominated by GM soy, which is sprayed with about 53 millions gallons of Roundup every single year.
Learn more: http://www.naturalnews.com/032920_Roundup_birth_defects.html#ixzz1RRgI3XJd
When I wrote in my earlier post on this thread:
Take note that this is the democracy the US and its Nato flunkies bombed Iraq for and are bombing Afghanistan and Libya to impose. It is democracy in name only. It should be called a corporatocracy as, in the case of the food supply, a few , mainly US based, agri-business corporations, Monsanto being the chief one, will end up with an almost monopoly control of the world’s food supply from the seeds sold to the farmers to the food on your tabletop.
I wasn’t exaggerating
Biopiracy and GMOs: The Fate of Iraq’s Agriculture
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Just before announcing his departure from Iraq and handing “power” to the U.S.-installed band of discredited quislings (the so-called “transfer of [fake] sovereignty”), U.S. proconsul and head of the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA), Paul Bremer issued “100 Orders” to transfer Iraq’s economy and legal ownership of Iraqi resources into the private hands of U.S. corporations. Then, to encourage the looting of Iraq’s wealth and increase the suffering of the Iraqi people, the Bush administration issued an “executive order” to indemnify not only the corporate looters from prosecution, but also provides protection to soldiers and private security guards committing crimes against Iraqis. A closer examination of these “100 Orders” and U.S. policy in Iraq shows that the war on Iraq had nothing to do with WMD, terrorism, “democracy” and “liberation,” but to colonise Iraq and enrich U.S. corporations at the expense of the Iraqi people.
Order 81 deals specifically with Plant Variety Protection (PVP) because it is designed to protect the commercial interests of corporate seed companies. Its aim is to force Iraqi farmers to plant so-called “protected” crop varieties ‘defined as new, distinct uniform and stable’, and most likely genetically modified. This means Iraqi farmers will have one choice; to buy PVP registered seeds. Order 81 opens the way for patenting (ownership) of plant forms, and facilitates the introduction of genetically modified crops or organisms (GMOs) to Iraq. U.S. agricultural biotechnology corporations, such as Monsanto and Syngenta will be the beneficiaries. [4] Iraqi farmers will be forced to buy their seeds from these corporations. GMOs will replace the old tradition of breeding closely related plants, and replace them with organisms composed of DNA from an altogether different species, e.g., bacterium genes into corn. In the long run, there won’t be a big enough gene pool for genetic viability.
Upon purchasing the patented seeds, farmers must sign the company’s technology agreement (Technology User Agreements). This agreement allows the company to control farmers’ practices and conduct property investigation. The farmer becomes the slave of the company. Like U.S. farmers, Iraqi farmers will be “harassed for doing what they have always done.” For example, Iraqi farmers can be sued by Monsanto, if their non-GMO crops are polluted by GMO crops planted in their vicinity. [5] The health and environmental consequences of GMO crops are still unknown. GMO-based agriculture definitely encourages monoculture and genetic pollution. Moreover, this will further increase the already polluted Iraqi environment as a result of tens of thousands of tons of ‘depleted’ uranium dust, napalm, chemical weapons, and phosphorous bombs.
Farmers will also be required to buy fertilisers, herbicides and insecticides, against plants disease. Iraqi farmers will be required to pay royalties for the new seeds and they will be forbidden from saving seeds. In other words, Iraqi farmers will become agricultural producers for export, a recipe for the introduction of hunger in Iraq, not unknown in many developing countries. Unless an independent sovereign Iraqi government repeals these edicts, they will override Iraq’s original patent law of 1970, which, in accordance with the Iraqi constitution, prohibited private ownership of biological resources.
Furthermore, Order 81 ignores Iraqi farmers’ old traditions of saving seeds, and using their knowledge to breed and plant their crops. It also brutally disregards the contributions which Iraqi farmers have made over hundreds of generations to the development of important crops like wheat, barley, dates and pulses. If anybody owns those varieties and their unique virtues, it is the families who bred them, even though nobody has described or characterized them in terms of their genetic makeup. If anything, the new law — in allowing old varieties to be genetically manipulated or otherwise modified and then “registered” — involves the theft of inherited intellectual property, the loss of farmers’ freedoms, and the destruction of food sovereignty in Iraq.
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The man who is in charge of dismantling Iraq’s agriculture is Daniel Amstutz, formerly an executive of the Cargill Corporation. Cargill is well known for having the reputation of being one the worst violators of the rights and independence of family farmers throughout the world. Amstutz appointment is designed to undermine Iraqi farmers and destroy Iraq’s ability to produce food to feed its people. His service has been to advance U.S. agribusiness corporations. [8] For his task, Amstutz will be assisted by no others than Cargill, Monsanto, Dow and Texas A & M’s Agriculture Program and its subsidiary the Arizona-based agriculture research firm, World Wide Wheat Company. All are known to have innately unjust records doing business in developing countries and enslaving farmers there.
According to Focus on the Global South and GRAIN report: “Iraq has the potential to feed its people. But instead of developing this capacity, Washington is shaping the future of Iraq’s food and farming to serve the interests of U.S. corporations.” [7] The aim of the U.S. is to undermine Iraq’s food security, and remove all the contributions Iraqi farmers have made to development of agriculture and important crops like wheat, and barley. [9] Iraq’s agriculture will be re-engineered to produce high yields agricultural products for export, and force Iraq to depend on importing food, and on Western “aid.”
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=1447
Wikileaks Memos Reveal U.S. Gov’t Pushing Gene-Altered Crops Worldwide
“The State Department has been mandated and budgeted to push GMOs for several years,” says Jeffery Smith, founder of the Institute for Responsible Technology, a nonprofit devoted to educating the public about the risks of genetically modified crops. “It is a consistent but misguided policy based on false information.”
For instance, in the cable involving the Pakistani official, “the U.S. rep gives completely unscientific and misleading information,” he says. “No drought-tolerant GM crop has ever been commercialized.” That’s likely because the few drought-tolerant crops that have been tested don’t actually perform well in any conditions but droughts, says Hansen. “Under drought conditions, GMO crops do increase yields, but under normal water conditions, it yields less,” he says, which makes GMOs an even harder sell in African nations, where droughts are common and food security is on rocky ground as it is.
As biotech companies are pouring millions of dollars into the development of drought-tolerant crops, nonprofit sustainable-agriculture groups are showing that native varieties of GM crops are a much better solution. Hansen says that CIMMYT, a Mexican nonprofit whose name translates to the International Center for the Improvement of Corn and Wheat, has released 50 native varieties of corn that produce 25 to 50 percent higher yields under drought conditions than GMOs. Other groups, including the International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science and Technology for Development and the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization have recently come out saying that the solution to world hunger isn’t greater reliance on GMOs but on biodiversity and sustainable agriculture systems. “But the private sector is never going to put money in that because there’s no way to privatize it,” Hansen says. “You can’t patent a crop rotation.” (emphasis added /GM)
http://www.rodale.com/genetically-modified-organisms-foods-0?page=0%2C1
The Worlds Largest Human Experiment: GMOs, Roundup And The Monsanto Monstrosity
Informed consent is one of the most basic aspects of patient-physician relations, as well as subject-researcher relations in the case of research studies.
This involves making the patient aware of and verifying that they understand the risks, benefits, facts, and the future implications of the procedure or test they are going to be subjected to.
In the case of genetically modified organisms we have not been made aware of the risks. In fact, the GMO industry has deliberately hidden the real dangers behind the seeds and herbicides they peddle.
snip
So what exactly are the dangers of Roundup? Should you be worried about your food source using it or using “Roundup” ready genetically modified seeds?
To put it simply: yes, in fact you should be very concerned and this article will lay it out so anyone can understand exactly why we need to get active and fight back against the monster that is Monsanto and the gargantuan genetically modified organism market.
First I must describe what a “Roundup ready” genetically modified crop entails. The GM plant has been specially engineered to be able to handle the incredibly toxic herbicide Roundup. It does not resist the herbicide but instead it has been modified so it can uptake the poison and still live.
The Roundup then makes its way into your system, and anyone will tell you that eating a ton of glyphosate is not a good idea.
Roundup is not backed by any impartial, independent, rigorous scientific research. The studies used to back up the claims of governments around the world and especially in the EU are unpublished industry studies. (emphasis added /GM)
The real research shows a very different picture.
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Anyone who has taken a biology course can tell you that the human reproductive cycle is a beautiful, finely tuned, and remarkably elegant system. When this system is upset, say by toxins in the mother’s blood, the results are not pretty.
They further reveal, “The delay in the cell cycle could be induced using increasing glyphosate concentrations (1-10 mM) in the presence of a subthreshold concentration of Roundup 0.2%, while glyphosate alone was ineffective, thus indicating synergy between glyphosate and Roundup formulation products.” While the effects of the toxin were “not lethal,” it still induced “a delay into M-phase of the cell cycle.”
CDK1 and cyclin B universally regulate the cell’s M-phase, and Roundup delayed the activation of these compounds in vivo. Furthermore, “Roundup inhibited also the global protein synthetic rate” and “affects cell cycle regulation by delaying activation of the CDK1/cyclin B complex” which leads to the ominous conclusion: “our results question the safety of glyphosate and Roundup on human health.”
Why is this not headline news? Why are the people of the world not up in arms about these toxins being present in our foods, possibly affecting the embryonic development of our children?
Shockingly, this is not the only scientific study published in the prestigious journal Chemical Research in Toxicology. In 2009, two French researchers at the University of Caen in France out of the Laboratory for Estrogens and Reproduction in the Institute of Biology published Glyphosate Formulations Induce Apoptosis and Necrosis in Human Umbilical, Embryonic, and Placental Cells.
snip
Anyone who has taken a biology course can tell you that the human reproductive cycle is a beautiful, finely tuned, and remarkably elegant system. When this system is upset, say by toxins in the mother’s blood, the results are not pretty.
They further reveal, “The delay in the cell cycle could be induced using increasing glyphosate concentrations (1-10 mM) in the presence of a subthreshold concentration of Roundup 0.2%, while glyphosate alone was ineffective, thus indicating synergy between glyphosate and Roundup formulation products.” While the effects of the toxin were “not lethal,” it still induced “a delay into M-phase of the cell cycle.”
CDK1 and cyclin B universally regulate the cell’s M-phase, and Roundup delayed the activation of these compounds in vivo. Furthermore, “Roundup inhibited also the global protein synthetic rate” and “affects cell cycle regulation by delaying activation of the CDK1/cyclin B complex” which leads to the ominous conclusion: “our results question the safety of glyphosate and Roundup on human health.”
Why is this not headline news? Why are the people of the world not up in arms about these toxins being present in our foods, possibly affecting the embryonic development of our children?
Shockingly, this is not the only scientific study published in the prestigious journal Chemical Research in Toxicology. In 2009, two French researchers at the University of Caen in France out of the Laboratory for Estrogens and Reproduction in the Institute of Biology published Glyphosate Formulations Induce Apoptosis and Necrosis in Human Umbilical, Embryonic, and Placental Cells.
snip
To make the study even more scientifically rigorous, they tested it on three distinct human cell types, embryonic, placental, and umbilical as well as testing both glyphosate alone and the Roundup formula.
Unlike glyphosate alone, all of the heavily diluted Roundup formations caused total cell death within twenty four hours through necrosis. It was also found that Roundup induces apoptosis, causing DNA fragmentation, shrinkage of the nucleus, and fragmentation of the nucleus.
As I briefly outlined above, apoptosis is a necessary part of the human development process, however, when it is artificially induced, danger arises.
While Roundup induced complete cell death, glyphosate alone induced only apoptosis. They found conclusive evidence that the Roundup adjuvants (an agent that modifies the behavior and activity of another agent, while having few effects on its own) change the permeability of the three human cells studied.
This amplifies the toxicity already induced via glyphosate, proving that the adjuvants in Roundup are not inert.
They conclude the abstract of the paper with the following ominous sentence,
“Moreover, the proprietary mixtures available on the market could cause cell damage and even death around residual levels to be expected, especially in food and feed derived from [Roundup] formulation-treated crops.”
snip
When more people around the world start demanding that their food be properly labeled with warnings just like cigarettes or alcohol, some real change can occur. If we continue to sit back and hope our governments will actually represent us instead of their corporate interests, we will continue to be subjected to the largest human experiment in history, in which you never have to give informed consent.
http://theintelhub.com/2011/07/10/the-worlds-largest-human-experiment-gmos-roundup-and-the-monsanto-monstrosity/
Notice how just about everyone, BFP included, goes into paroxysms of outrage, disgust and twisting of knickers at a news flash about another food product from China found to have been purposely or accidentally tainted with a contaminant harmful to human health. On the other hand, the every day, capitalistic, profit driven, wide spread contamination of a significant portion of the world’s food supply and the almost “mad-scientist” like tinkering around with mankind’s genetic inheritance (nurtured and formed over thousands of years) in the seeds used to grow the food we put into our mouths every day of the week by the likes of immensely wealthy and powerful multinational corporations is apparently greeted with a yawn. /GM