Herself's Recipes » food

Are you eating antibiotic resistant vegetables?

Linda MacPhee-Cobb — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 11:00:32 +0000

When genetically modified cells are injected into a plant it is difficult to say whether or not they have taken. So genetic engineers early on used antibiotic resistant genes as markers. These genes give antibiotic resistance to kanamycin and neomycin, another is resistant to ampicillin. These markers would be attached to the genes being inserted and used as a way to check to see if the insertion was successful. These markers should have no effect on the plant. These genes can be found in most genetically engineered food today.

Antibiotic resistant markers are turned off when added to the plant however, Genes that are transfered to plants might be turned off and on in the plant and the plant’s future generations.

It is possible that eating these foods could reduce antibiotic effectiveness in people. DNA is not fragmented in the intestine as had been previously thought. It can be excreted or passed into the blood of the person eating the food. The rise of antibiotic resistance coincides with the rise of this genetic marker being released into the food supply. But these tests were done in a lab, not a human and what happens in the labs does not always work the same way in the real world.

In Europe the use of npt11 in commercial products is being phased out. I could not find information on US phase out of these markers.

Ethanol production drives up food costs

Linda MacPhee-Cobb — Thu, 15 Nov 2007 11:00:40 +0000

The 2005 Energy Policy Act requires that 5% of US gasoline needs come from renewable fuels by 2012. We now have 116 working ethanol plants and 79 plants in various stages of construction. Ethanol production is expected to double to 11 billion gallons by year end.

Ethanol plants are expected to use 139 million tons of corn from the ’08 crop. Farmers have produced the third largest crop ever, 10.7 billion bushels. 20% of last year’s crop went to ethanol production making up 1% of the US fuel needs. Corn fields are now replacing other crops as corn becomes more profitable rising to $4.20/bushel double what it was earlier this year, but still behind 1996′s $5/bushel. This has allowed farm subsidies to drop from 20 billion in ’06 to an expected 13 billion in ’07.

Corn production is expected to rise 8% this year with an additional 85 million acres to be planted. The rising prices are pushing out the planting of other crops, soybean prices have already risen 41% and meat prices are expected to rise at least 6% to cover loses being sustained now.

The US food supply was made up of 15% corn products in the 1950s and 1960s. This dropped to 11% in the 1970s and then rose to 17% in the 1980s and to 22% in the 1990s.

An average American spends 10% of his/her income on food down from 15% in the 1970s, 20% in the 1950s, and 25% in the 1930s. Costs are expected to climb. Also the rising price of fuel will be added to the cost of shipping food and ultimately to the consumer.

NY Times Sunday Magazine Food Article

Linda MacPhee-Cobb — Mon, 29 Jan 2007 03:38:00 +0000

Unhappy Meals The first paragraph sums up the entire article “Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.”, but it is worth the read to understand how food science got so broken.

The article ends with easy to follow, excellent recommendations:
1) Eat food
2) Avoid food products making health claims
3) Don’t buy food whose ingredients you don’t recognise
4) Buy food outside the supermarket, farm stands etc.
5) Pay more, eat less
6) Eat mostly plants
7) Eat a less Americanized diet
Do your own cooking
9) Diversify your diet

But you already knew that right?