News From the Hill

Archive for January, 2009

I love this story which I found on TreeHugger, a site that I check out every now and again, I like the fact that you get good news stories there, there are enough of the other kind (like my last post for instance!).

This story is about a young fella in the USA who got so frustrated at what he saw happening around him that he had to take action. Apparently GWB, the almost EX-president of over-there (how I love saying almost ex) decided in his unlimited unwisdom to sell off the leases on thousands of acres of Utah wildland – “After receiving complaints from the National Park Service, The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) had dropped half of the initially proposed 359,000 acres from the sale” – wow, did someone notice the sellout? This young fella went along to the auction to protest and, understandably, got carried away…

Read the story here for yourself, it’s worth the click…

Tonight I was watching a regular program on one of our national tv channels, the program Ear To The Ground focuses on rural and agricultural issues and tonight the featured discussion was on genetically modified food crops.

Sadly I didn’t find it a balanced piece, i thought that it was slanted in favour of GM, not in any obvious way rather ina very subtle way. There was so much which was not said, things which I would think would be really obvious and basic information in such a discussion.

Irish Seed Savers in Scarriff, Co Clare were interviewed as part of the program, they had the opportunity to talk about what they do and why it is so important. Part of the interview was about GM and I am truly amazed that there was no comment aired about the fact that Monsanto, probably the worlds largest and most powerful GM company, have been buying up seed companies, including seed companies that sell organic and heritage seed. This means that the GM company which has been busy patenting plant seed; producing plants which give infertile seed and thus forcing farmers to buy the seed each year from Monsanto rather than collecting seed from their own plants; this same company now owns many of the worlds seed companies. I find this really really frightening! I find it particularly strange that when Seed Savers were interviewed this fact did not get aired.

The only highly emotional language in the program was from a woman who works for Irish grain and animal foodstuffs importers. She became quite excited and claimed that the anti-gm lobby was responsible for Irish farmers having to pay more for their grain than they should. This is strange – seeing as how over 90% of the grain is already gm and therefore cheaper than non-gm grain, she didn’t actually make much sense with that comment.

There was a scientist interviewed who needs to update his information. He claimed that gm crops would reduce the amounts of pesticides used in agriculture – back in February last year a report was published which denies this - GENETICALLY MODIFIED (GM) CROPS INCREASE PESTICIDE USE AND FAIL TO ALLEVIATE POVERTY, REVEALS NEW REPORT. You can read the full report by clicking here.

I did agree with him that we need full and open debate on this matter, it is too important to be ignored. Before this program aired how many people in Ireland even knew  that the majority of animal fodder is from gm crop?  It seems that this has been the case in Ireland for many years now and we really do not know whether eating meat from animals raised eating gm foods is a healthy practise.

The program ended with a piece about growing potatoes, it focused on blight and how often potato farmers have to spray the crop to prevent blight, also about new forms of blight which are resistant to the sprays. It  then went on to interview scientists working for Teagasc, a government body which is resposible for agricultural research & development and discussed the efforts to develop a gm potato which they hope would be blight resistant. I think that it is sad that this was the last word.

Here are a few websites which might interest you

Irish Doctors Environmental Association have some disturbing news – Foods containing genetically modified (GM) ingredients are on sale in Irish shops. In a survey of soya based foods undertaken by the Food Safety Authority of Ireland in 2002, over a half of the products tested contained genetically modified ingredients. Such products included baby foods and soya desserts.

Irish Organic Traders eMagazine

Irish Anti-GM group – GM Free Ireland seems to have lost it’s website which used to be gmfreeireland.org

Welsh Anti-GM group

It is easy to find many interesting articles on growing gm crops, here are a few -

Monsanto Tried to Block Austrian Government Funded Research Showing GE Corn Causes Infertility

Bee Learning Behavior Affected by Eating Toxin from GE Corn

Study Finds GM Corn Disturbs Immune System of Mice

D.C. Circuit Court says “No” to Scotts and Monsanto on Biotech Grasses

If you are interested in reading these articles you may also enjoy having a look at the archived articles on the Organic Consumers email newsletter by clicking here.

I just had to post about this – is the new emperor (elect) wearing the same suit of clothes? The following paragraph is an excerpt from a email newsletter from the OCA, an American Organic Consumers Association -

Over the past month, the Organic Consumers Association (OCA) has been alerting our nationwide network about Obama’s proposed appointment of Monsanto ally and former Iowa Governor Tom Vilsack to the position of Secretary of Agriculture. Far from representing the “Change” which Obama has promised, Vilsack has a disappointing record of promoting controversial genetically engineered foods, biopharm crops, and animal cloning, as well as cheerleading for unsustainable biofuels derived from corn and soybeans. In addition Vilsack has come under fire for aiding and abetting chemical and energy-intensive industrial agriculture, including Iowa’s infamous Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs).

Sign OCA’s Petition to the US Senate Now!

Is is a case of the same old story? A lot of people are holding a lot of hope for Obama’s new term in office. Personally I tend to be a little cynical about political parties and most politicians, I have stopped expecting great things from politicians quite some time ago.

I expect that many of the people involved in politics may have high hopes and ideals when they startes in politics, then comes compromise, concessions, a little give here, a little take there.

Personally I believe in each of us taking responsibility, not leaving it up to the politicians, I don’t mean to let them off the hook and do their jobs for them, neither do I mean that we should accept shoddiness from them. I think we should lead from the bottom up, we should let them know what we expect of them by doing what we feel should be done, not waiting for the powers that be to make it happen.

Let me give one example of what I mean – if we believe that the government should encourage and enable us to use renewable energy on a domestic level and sell the excess to the grid then we should not wait until they give us grants or enact legislation to make this happen easily, we can start by installing our own systems and doing the best that we can in our own homes. Eventually the government will catch up with us and make it easier for others to follow suit.

Why should we take the hard road?

Why not wait until it is made easier?

Be the change you want to see in the world…

Blian Núa Shona Dhuit – Happy New Year to you and those you love. My global wish (hey, why not be ambitious?) is that we all learn to prioritise the truly important things in life and concentrate less on the superficial and commercial.

I had a lovely break over the Christmas, didn’t even check my email for nine days straight!!!

I hope that you all, my two lovely readers   had a beautiful Christmas, as I did, spent some time with loved ones in my family, had lots of great food, some great walks, some great sitting and watching classic b+w films and some great chats.

As for New Year’s Eve – I have to admit that I have never been really interested in all the fuss that accompanies it, even in my younger and wilder partying days I was never into the N.Y.Eve parties, the resolutions that everyone assumed would not last past February, singing and hugging complete strangers etc. Somehow it all seemed a little exaggerated, superficial and unreal.

When I was younger I was not quite sure why I felt like this, it’s not as though I didn’t enjoy partying as much as the next young wild one and I wouldn’t have known a grounded, living-in-the-moment person if I bumped into one, which wasn’t likely actually in the places I hung out! It makes more sense now that my life has changed quite a bit and I have stopped floating through life in a smoky and busy haze, taken the time to challenge some of what I was running away from, dealt with some of the baggage that I was dragging around.

The concept of living in the moment was a difficult one for me to grasp, obviously I knew what it meant intellectually but it was a while before my heart caught up. No surprise there, my head was nearly always in the way. I still struggle with that  but now when I speak of getting out of my head it’s a very different out of my head experience than that of the eighties! Now it’s about taking the time to listen to my heart, taking time out of the rush and hustle of life to slow down and really listen to what it is that I need, what it is that I feel.

For me this is not as easy as it sounds, I really have to remind myself to do it and sometimes I have hearing problems – it can take quite some time before I can clearly hear myself. I suppose that this is sustainable living for me – in order to live a real and healthy life and to have healthy relationships I need to do this, I need to take time out to listen to what is really going on for me.

For me the Winter Solstice was a special time, a time for reflection, to acknowledge the year gone past and a new beginning, the days becoming longer, the sun coming back to us, growth starting slowly under the protection of the soil, promise and optimism.

I hope that this new year brings with it many wondrous and joyful experiences for us all…