WHEY TOO MUCH: GREEK YOGURTS DARK SIDE

WHEY TOO MUCH: GREEK YOGURTS DARK SIDE

Greek yogurt is a booming $2 billion a year industry — and it's producing millions of pounds of waste that industry insiders are scrambling to figure out what to do with.

 

By Justin Elliott on May 22, 2013

Twice a day, seven days a week, a tractor trailer carrying 8,000 gallons of watery, cloudy slop rolls past the bucolic countryside, finally arriving at Neil Rejman’s dairy farm in upstate New York. The trucks are coming from the Chobani plant two hours east of Rejman’s Sunnyside Farms, and they’re hauling a distinctive byproduct of the Greek yogurt making process—acid whey.

For every three or four ounces of milk, Chobani and other companies can produce only one ounce of creamy Greek yogurt. The rest becomes acid whey. It’s a thin, runny waste product that can’t simply be dumped. Not only would that be illegal, but whey decomposition is toxic to the natural environment, robbing oxygen from streams and rivers. That could turn a waterway into what one expert calls a “dead sea,” destroying aquatic life over potentially large areas. Spills of cheese whey, a cousin of Greek yogurt whey, have killed tens of thousands of fish around the country in recent years.

The scale of the problem—or opportunity, depending on who you ask—is daunting. The $2 billion Greek yogurt market has become one of the biggest success stories in food over the past few years and total yogurt production in New York nearly tripled between 2007 and 2013. New plants continue to open all over the country. The Northeast alone, led by New York, produced more than 150 million gallons of acid whey last year, according to one estimate.

And as the nation’s hunger grows for strained yogurt, which produces more byproduct than traditional varieties, the issue of its acid runoff becomes more pressing. Greek yogurt companies, food scientists, and state government officials are scrambling not just to figure out uses for whey, but how to make a profit off of it.

A cow munches on feed mixed with acid whey.

Chobani is so desperate to get rid of the whey, they pay farmers to take it off their hands.

Rejman, a blonde-haired 37-year-old, and third-generation dairy farmer with a Cornell animal science degree, started accepting the stuff a few years ago after a Chobani representative called him out of the blue.

Rejman’s workers take the shipments and try to find uses for the whey: mix it with silage to feed to the farm’s 3,300 cows; combine it with manure in a giant pit for fertilizer; and even convert some into biogas to make electricity.

‘How do you handle all the whey without screwing up the environment?’

But it’s not so easy to integrate acid whey into the workings of the farm. The silage Rejman feeds his cows, for example, can only soak up so much before becoming unmanageable slop — “like dropping water on your pizza,” he says. It’s also sort of like feeding your cows candy bars — they like it, but shouldn’t eat too much or it upsets their digestive system. It’s a problem that Rejman admits defies easy solutions. “How do you handle all the whey without screwing up the environment?”

The root of the whey problem is the very process that gives Greek yogurt its high protein content and lush mouthfeel.

Unlike traditional yogurt, Greek yogurt is strained after cultures have been added to milk. In home kitchens, this can be done with a cloth. Greek yogurt companies still throw around the term “strained,” but in reality industrial operations typically remove the whey with mechanical separators that use centrifugal force.

The resulting whey is roughly as acidic as orange juice. It’s almost entirely made up of water, but scientists studying the whey say it contains five to eight percent other materials: mostly lactose, or milk sugar; some minerals; and a very small amount of proteins.

Greek yogurt companies trying to keep up with exploding consumer demand in the last few years didn’t have a good plan to deal with the ocean of whey they were producing. Now they’re racing to find solutions, all the while keeping mum about the results, if there are any: the yogurt industry is highly secretive and competitive.

There are no industry-wide statistics on where all the whey is going, but a typical option is paying to have it hauled to farms near the yogurt factories. There, it is often mixed into feed or fertilizer. Chobani, for example, says more than 70 percent of its whey ends up as a supplement for livestock feed.

***

But there is another possible consumer — babies.

“Because the Greek yogurt production grew so rapidly, no one really had the time to step back and look at the other viable options,” says Dave Barbano, a dairy scientist at Cornell.

State and industry officials reached out to Barbano last year following the first-ever Yogurt Summit, convened by New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo.
Barbano, who specializes in filtration methods for separation and recovery of protein, has his sights set on the tiny amount of protein in acid whey. He believes it might be usable as an infant formula ingredient. But first Barbano has to figure out how to extract the protein in a cost-effective way, and his research is just getting underway.

The concept is roughly modeled on the success that cheese-makers have had selling products derived from their own byproduct — sweet whey. Sweet whey is more valuable and easier to handle than acid whey, as it has a lot more protein, and is easier to dry because it isn’t as acidic as Greek yogurt whey. Cheese-makers have developed a lucrative business selling whey protein for use in body-building supplements and as a food ingredient. And Greek yogurt makers are eager to follow suit.

“There are a lot of people coming in and out of New York state looking at whether this is a good opportunity for investment,” Barbano says.

***

While Barbano focuses on proteins, researchers in Wisconsin are studying how to extract whey’s dominant ingredient: sugar.

Scientists at the Center for Dairy Research at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, have been experimenting for nearly a year on how to get edible-grade lactose out of acid whey. Such lactose is valuable as an ingredient in things like icing and as a browning agent in bread. “It’s kind of like oil refining: from crude oil you get gas and diesel and other products,” says Dean Sommer, a food technologist at the center. “This is the same concept. You figure out what’s in there and how to grab it and get value out of it.”

Sommer wouldn’t describe the filtration process to extract lactose because the industry-financed research is proprietary. But he believes some third-party companies are now considering building plants to convert acid whey into lactose.

Neil Rejman, an Upstate New York dairy farmer, stands before a lagoon of 
manure mixed with acid whey. This slurry has passed through a system called 
an  ‘anaerobic digester,’ which converted some of it into electricity. Meanwhile, 
back at Rejman’s farm in Scipio Center, N.Y., they’re converting the lactose into 
methane that can generate electricity.

When the whey arrives from Chobani, some of it is mixed with the vast quantity of manure the farm produces daily. From the manure pit, the light brown soup (basically a river of shit) flows into a 16-foot-deep underground concrete tank known as an anaerobic digester. An innocent looking expanse of cement in a big, green field dotted with dandelions, there’s a lot going on inside, where a fetid mix of manure and whey percolate.

The material is heated up and kept in the tank for about 20 days, during which time bacteria break up the organic material — the lactose, in the case of whey — and release gases, including methane. The gas is fed into generators that produce electricity to power the farm and to sell to the local utility for use elsewhere.

But the setup, which Rejman and his brother had installed five years ago, required a big capital investment that would be out of reach for small farms. It cost $4.5 million, $1 million of which the Rejmans got back through a state subsidy.

Rejman’s anaerobic digester.

They primarily built the digester for what Rejman calls “odor control” for their neighbors, as digested manure smells much less than the raw stuff (“You ever take a shit in the toilet and leave it in there?” Rejman asks, by way of explanation.) The whey is an afterthought. In any case, just 20 of New York’s the state’s 5,200 dairy farms have an operating digester, according to Curt Gooch, a waste management engineer at Cornell.

And if any of the big yogurt companies have come up with a better whey solution, they’re being cagey about it. “We are currently exploring other options for our whey, but nothing we are ready to discuss at this time,” says Chobani spokeswoman Lindsay Kos. Dannon spokesman Michael Neuwirth says the company is looking at the nutritional possibilities of whey, but “we don’t have any plans to announce at this point.”

Home Greek yogurt makers have experimented with using whey in baking and pickling. But no one expects a bread or pickle factory to be able to absorb tens of millions of gallons of it.

Meanwhile, the tidal wave of acid whey is not slowing down. As one producer said at New York’s Yogurt Summit: “If we can figure out how to handle acid whey, we’ll become a hero.”

Photos by Justin Elliott. Photo illustration by Andy Wright.
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How Coca-Cola's Ruthless Business Tactics Created a Despicable Global Powerhouse

Food  

AlterNet / By Jill Richardson

How Coca-Cola's Ruthless Business Tactics Created a Despicable Global Powerhouse

 

Mark Pendergast's book, "For God, Country, and Coca-Cola" guides readers through decades of shrewd marketing campaigns and the company's ugly history.

 

 

Photo Credit: ronstik/ Shutterstock.com

May 20, 2013  |  

 

 

For God, Country, and Coca-Cola by Mark Pendergast is the definitive history of the product so many see as a symbol of America itself. This impressive tome – recently released as a third edition with added new material – is not a critique of Coca-Cola, nor is it a fan’s tribute, as Pendergast reveals things the Coca-Cola Company doesn’t want you to know. (Yes, it used to contain cocaine.) He even reveals the drink’s original secret formula (which is less exciting than you might think).

Coca-Cola is not fascinating for what it is – colored sugar water with bubbles – but for what it represents. And that’s a point long known by the company’s marketers, with the exception of when they forgot it during the New Coke fiasco in the 1980s. Today, marketing students in business schools everywhere study that famous gaff.

Despite the decades-old slogan, “Delicious and Refreshing,” people do not drink Coca-Cola for the taste. They drink it because they associate it with positive things like friendship, fun, patriotism, and athleticism. Careful to market the drink to all people, everywhere, without alienating anyone, the ads are often vague. “Coke is It!” What is “it”? It’s whatever you want it to be, just as long as it makes you want to buy more Coke!

The book guides readers through the decades of marketing campaigns that built this image, most significantly during World War II, when Coca-Cola was made available to U.S. soldiers everywhere in the world, often at the government’s expense. When sales slumped, the answer was never changing the flagship product; it was a new ad campaign. Remind consumers that Coke = fun (or simpler times, or hope, or whatever feeling they crave) and they will drink more of it.

Because constant, never-ending growth is seen as essential, the other necessity is finding new channels to facilitate more Coke-drinking than ever before. Today, you can be 50 miles from nowhere in any country except Cuba and North Korea and if you crave an ice-cold Coca-Cola, you can get one. Even in places where few have clean drinking water or electricity, both needed to produce ice-cold Coke, some enterprising entrepreneur will have electricity and a cooler and plenty of Coke. The same cannot be said of nearly any other product.

The New Coke failure punctuates this strange phenomenon – that the world loves and guzzles an unhealthy beverage, but not for its good taste. Pepsi showed that in blind taste tests, more people prefer Pepsi over Coke. New Coke was tastier than both Coke and Pepsi in blind taste tests. Surely consumers would love it. Except, they didn’t. They wanted fun, hope, patriotism, and everything else they associated with good, old-fashioned Coca-Cola, not some new, better-tasting concoction.

Readers seeking the dirt on Coca-Cola’s sordid past with Columbian paramilitaries and Guatemalan death squads will find these episodes covered briefly in this book. But the completeness of the company’s history in this book paints a bigger picture, and Coca-Cola’s tangles with death squads fit in as just one piece.

This is a company devoted to, above all else, making as much money as possible and selling as much Coca-Cola as possible. Period. Nazis get thirsty, too, you know. In almost every case, the company tried to please everyone and sell to everyone, without taking sides, unless it had no choice.

It’s no good that Coca-Cola did business with a Guatemalan bottler who allegedly hired death squads to murder employees trying to unionize. But that is all part of a larger pattern, a larger scandal – although there’s no conspiracy at all. The drive to increase profits and sales and market share at all cost is the company’s story, plain and simple. It took us from a 6.5-ounce drink only available at soda fountains to one available everywhere in sizes as large as 64 ounces.

Coca-Cola told us it wanted to teach the world to sing, but it’s far more likely it is giving the world diabetes. Today, a small Coke at McDonalds is 16 ounces. Pendergast, ever the balanced journalist presenting both sides, fails to definitely state that Coca-Cola is unhealthy. He generously points out that Coca-Cola creates jobs and donates to charity, even though he notes the company’s policy of “strategic philanthropy” – i.e. using “charitable” donations to gain access to valuable markets, particularly children.

The book is a long and somewhat exhausting read, but it’s also a captivating history of the development of America’s consumer culture (and terrible dietary habits) and it contains fascinating profiles of the men (yes, mostly men) behind the company, making readers wonder what a psychologist might have to say about these often tyrannical, driven workaholics.

Here are some answers Pendergast gave about his book and the company he wrote about.

Jill Richardson: Why did you choose the title For God, Country, and Coca-Cola? 

Mark Pendergast: Coca-Cola has been a kind of religion to many people, including the inventor, John Pemberton, who died two years after he came up with it, and Asa Candler, who took it over and used to lead the singing of "Onward Christian Soldiers" at his sales meetings.

These were days when the drink was under attack for having cocaine in it and even afterwards for its caffeine content. So they felt like early Christian martyrs in a way, fighting for a just cause. Candler called Coca-Cola "a boon to mankind." Coke employees have always joked that they have Coca-Cola syrup flowing in their veins.

The drink has also become a kind of religion for consumers, a symbol of the American way of life as well. During World War II the drink was deemed an "essential morale booster" for the troops, and it was served in lieu of communion wine during the Battle of the Bulge. When New Coke was introduced in 1985, people wrote anguished letters as if they had killed God. Here is an actual letter I quoted in the book: "There are only two things in my life: God and Coca-Cola. Now you have taken one of those things away from me." I could go on....
JR: Can you explain Coca-Cola's relationship with the two ingredients in its name, coca and kola nuts? How much cocaine was initially in the product and when was it removed? 

MP: Coca-Cola was named for its two principal drug ingredients. Coca leaf from Peru contained cocaine. Kola nut from Ghana contained caffeine. Original Coca-Cola had a very small amount of cocaine in a six-ounce drink, about 4.3 milligrams. The company took out all but a minuscule amount of cocaine in 1903 and the final amount in 1928.

JR: You imply in the book that it's attempted to sugarcoat (no pun intended) this part of its past, saying at some points that the product never contained cocaine. Is that true? Can you elaborate? 

MP: Every time I go to the World of Coca-Cola museum in Atlanta, I ask the guides if Coca-Cola ever contained cocaine. They assure me that it did not. The official company line seems to be that Coca-Cola never contained added cocaine -- i.e., they didn't add white powdered cocaine, which is true. But it did contain fluid extract of coca leaf, which contains cocaine. For years, the company line has also been that the name "Coca-Cola" is just a "euphonious combination of words" -- i.e., it sounds nice. True, but the drink was also named for its two principal drug sources.

JR: How did Coca-Cola use World War II to establish its dominance abroad? And what impact did its role in the war have for their market at home? 

Robert Woodruff, the head of Coca-Cola, declared shortly after the attack on Pearl Harbor that, "We will see that every man in uniform gets a bottle of Coca-Cola for five cents, wherever he is and whatever it costs our company." Coke was subsequently declared an essential product and Coke men called Technical Observers were sent overseas in army uniforms at government expense to establish 64 bottling plants behind the lines. As a result, Coca-Cola was put in position for global expansion in the postwar world.

American soldiers came home with an overwhelming preference for Coca-Cola. In a 1948 poll of veterans, conducted by American Legion Magazine, 63.67 percent specified Coca-Cola as their preferred soft drink, with Pepsi receiving a lame 7.78 percent of the vote.  In the same year, Coke’s gross profit on sales reached a whopping $126 million, as opposed to Pepsi’s $25 million; the contrast in net after-tax income was even more telling, with Coke’s $35.6 million towering over Pepsi’s pathetic $3.2 million.

Soon after the war, when the Army quizzed 650 recruits, 21 had never drunk milk, but only one soldier had never sampled a Coke. As the company’s unpublished history stated, the wartime program “made friends and custo­mers for home consumption of 11,000,000 GIs [and] did [a] sampling and expansion job abroad which would [otherwise] have taken 25 years and millions of dollars.” The war was over, and it appeared, at least for the moment, that Coca-Cola had won it.

JR: The impact when Coca-Cola entered new markets was increased sales for all beverages, not just Coca-Cola -- and less consumption of water and milk. Can you explain that? 

Yes. As Coca-Cola and subsequently other competing soda companies increased marketing and other campaigns to out-do one another, that's what expanded the total soda market. When the market for soft drinks expanded, it helped competitors such as Pepsi, and when people are paying attention to the cola wars, they are less focused on water or milk.

JR: Coca-Cola's history practically reads like a marketing textbook. Can you tell us about its revelation of the little girl's Pooh bear? Why do Coke-drinkers love Coke so much? 

Archie Lee, who was the ad man behind "The Pause That Refreshes" slogan during the Depression, noticed during a beach vacation, that his four-year-old daughter lavished such attention on her Pooh bear that other children fought over it, though other toys appeared more attractive. Lee took the incident as a parable. “It isn’t what a product is,” he wrote to Robert Woodruff, “but what it does that interests us”—and set out to plant the proper thoughts about Coca-Cola, which he wanted to make as popular and well-loved as the Pooh bear.

Coke lovers care so much about the drink for many reasons -- not least the ubiquitous, effective advertising that associates the drink with youth, energy, happiness. But many people also really do associate the drink with some of the best times in their lives.

JR: How has soda consumption changed in the U.S. from the drink's introduction over a century ago, back when a serving was 6.5 ounces? Was there ever a "turning point" when Americans switched from more modest per capita soda consumption to the amount they drink today, or has it been a gradual change over time? 

MP: Amazingly, Coca-Cola was served in 6.5 ounce bottles for a nickel until 1955, when King-Size Coke was finally introduced. (“King-Size” drinks were 10 and 12 ounces, smaller than a McDonald’s small today.) Since then, the sizes grew steadily larger, and PET bottles meant they wouldn't break and weren't too heavy. Super-size me, indeed. But over the last decade, concern over the obesity epidemic has made Coca-Cola back off a bit, and now the company has introduced smaller mini-cans, along with the huge containers.

JR: Over the years, Coca-Cola has dealt with Nazis, dictators, South Africa's apartheid government, and even allegedly Guatemalan death squads. Should consumers hold Coke accountable for this dark part of its history, or is it all water under the bridge? Do you agree with Coke's position that it doesn't play politics, it just sells soda? 

MP: Of course, the company, like any other business, should be held accountable for its actions, although as you suggest, many of these episodes are safely in the past. The Guatemalan death squads were in the late 1970s. Paramilitaries in Colombia killed union employees in similar fashion in Coke bottling plants in the 1990s.

Quite recently, human rights violations have once again occurred against Guatemalan bottling employees. The Coca-Cola Company has usually attempted to distance itself from such violence, saying that it doesn't control its bottlers, but that seems disingenuous, since the bottlers rely on Coca-Cola syrup from Big Coke.

On the other hand, let me point out that while Coke did business inside South Africa during the apartheid regime, it left the country for a while and then was very instrumental in helping to ease a peaceful transition to black rule under Nelson Mandela.

JR: The past decade has ushered in an enormous change in Coca-Cola's product portfolio. How has it changed and why? Do you think the day will come when Coca-Cola's flagship product is no longer its top seller? 
MP: Coca-Cola has diversified in the face of increased competition from other types of beverages and in response to concern over the obesity epidemic. It purchased Glaceau, maker of Vitaminwater, for $4.1 billion, for instance, in 2007. Today the Coca-Cola Company sells 3,500 beverages worldwide, and about a quarter of them are low- or no-calorie.

The future is hard to predict, but I don't think that Coca-Cola will lose its place as the flagship product in the foreseeable future -- but I do predict that the combined sales of Diet Coke and Coca-Cola Zero will eventually surpass sales of regular sugary Coca-Cola.

Jill Richardson is the founder of the blog La Vida Locavore and a member of the Organic Consumers Association policy advisory board. She is the author of Recipe for America: Why Our Food System Is Broken and What We Can Do to Fix It..

12 Ways You Can Avoid Toxic Chemicals

Environment  

Bill Moyers / By Lauren Feeney

 

Bill Moyers: 12 Ways You Can Avoid Toxic Chemicals

 

Lead, flame retardants, and BPA are everywhere, but you can limit your exposure.

 

 

 

Photo Credit: Wikimedia

May 19, 2013  |  

 

 

After watching this week’s interview with Gerald Markowitz and David Rosner, you’ll probably be wondering what you can do to protect yourself and your family from toxic chemicals. Perhaps the most important thing you can do is become politically involved – join the fight against both chemicals in our environment and money in our political system. In today’s world, it’s virtually impossible to avoid dangerous chemicals, even in your own home, but here are a few simple steps you can take to limit your exposure to known toxins like lead, flame retardants and BPA.
Lead

If you think that lead poisoning is a problem of the past, or one that only affects the urban poor, think again. While it’s true that lead paint has been illegal since the 70s and leaded gasoline was phased out in the 80s, the highly toxic substance still lurks in old homes, parking lots, water pipes, and in products imported from countries that don’t have the same regulations. And while lead poisoning no longer the killer it once was, miniscule amounts of lead can cause neurological damage and behavioral problems in children. According to the CDC, there are currently half a million children with elevated levels of lead in their blood. Here’s what you can do to protect your family from lead poisoning:

1) Find out if there’s lead in your water. A good place to start is with your local government. website. At NYC.gov, for example, you can order a free testing kit. You can also try contacting your local water company, your landlord or a private lab. You may also want to install an NSF-certified water filter on your water tap. Though the EPA has mandated that water systems be tested for lead since 1991, your home’s own internal plumbing could still contain lead, particularly if you live in an older building.

2) Replace old windows. Though lead paint has been illegal since 1978 and has largely been removed from old buildings, in some cases, it was seen as too costly to replace the windows. To have your windows replaced (or to do any sort of renovation on a building that may still contain lead paint), contact an EPA-certified renovator who has been trained to follow lead safety practices. In some cases, your local government may cover the costs.

3) Throw out colorfully-painted toys that were made outside the U.S. or Europe. They may look innocent, but toys, crayons, ceramic and jewelry, particularly those manufactured in China or Mexico, may contain lead, and as any parent knows, children are likely to put these things in their mouths.

4) Dust or vacuum regularly. Even without any obvious source of lead in your home, there may still be lead in the air, particularly if you live in an industrial area or if a neighbor has been renovating an old home. Dust particles containing lead are especially dangerous to babies who crawl around on the floor. It’s also important to keep toys and hands clean.

5) Test the soil. Urban and suburban yards can still contain contaminants from the days when lead paint and gasoline were widespread. Before planting a garden or even letting your kids run around in the yard, make sure the soil is lead-free. Your local public health department may offer free testing; you can also contact a private or university-run lab.

Flame Retardants

The hazards of flame retardants have been known for some time — brominated tris was banned from children’s pajamas back in 1977. And yet, similar chemicals can still be found in everything from couch cushions to television sets. Studies have linked one group of flame retardants, polybrominated diphenyl ethers, or PBDEs, to lower IQs, behavioral problems, early puberty and fertility issues. And the fire-safety benefits of these chemicals are debatable. Here’s what you can to keep toxic flame retardants out of your home:

1) Check the labels on your furniture. The California Furniture Flammability Standard essentially requires that cushioned furniture, children’s car seats, diaper-changing tables and other products containing polyurethane foam are dipped in toxic chemicals. (Don’t breathe a sigh of relief just because you live in one of the other 49 states — because of California’s size, most mass-produced furniture is designed to meet California’s standard). Check the tags for the familiar notice: This article meets the flammability requirements of California Bureau of Home Furnishings Technical Bulletin 117. (The tag is not required though, so just because you don’t see it doesn’t mean it’s safe.) Fortunately, California has proposed changing the rule; until that happens, you can look for products made with wool, cotton or polyester filling instead of polyurethane foam. And if you can’t afford all new eco-friendly furniture, be sure to dust, vacuum and wash your hands regularly — most of the toxins enter the body by swallowing contaminated dust.

2) Check the labels on electronics, too. Flame retardants have long been used in electronic equipment like computers and television sets. Thankfully, that’s slowly changing. As of 2008, the following companies had committed to phasing out all brominated flame retardants: Acer, Apple, Eizo Nanao, LG Electronics, Lenovo, Matsushita, Microsoft, Nokia, Phillips, Samsung, Sharp, Sony-Ericsson, and Toshiba. To find flame retardant-free versions of everything from refrigerators to nose-hair clippers, check this list created by ChemSec, an environmental non-profit based in Sweden.

3) Beware of fleece pajamas. Though one flame retardant, brominated tris, was banned from children’s pajamas, some sleepwear is still treated with another flame retardant called PROBAN which has been linked to genetic abnormalities and cancer. Check the label — children’s pajamas that DO NOT contain flame retardants must have a tag that reads: “For child’s safety, garment should fit snugly” (the snug fit limits the flow of oxygen in order to prevent fire from spreading, an approved alternative to chemical flame retardants). Cotton and polyester products rarely contain flame retardants, but look out for those cozy fleece footed pajamas — they usually do.
BPA

Bisphenol A, or BPA, has been linked to cancer,asthma, obesity and reproductive issues. And yet, until recently, the chemical was found in, among other things, baby bottles. The FDA finally banned the use of BPA in baby bottles and children’s sippy cups in 2012 — three years after major manufacturers had voluntarily stopped using it. But BPA is still found in other hard plastic containers, the lining of metal cans and the paper that receipts are printed on. It’s difficult to completely avoid BPA — 90 percent of Americans have traces of the chemical in their urine. But here are some things you can do to limit your exposure:

1) When purchasing plastic products — particularly those that come into contact with your food, such as food storage containers, plastic plates and cups, look for those that are clearly marked BPA free. Thanks to vocal consumers, many companies are now manufacturing BPA-free products and marketing them as such.

2) Avoid food containers marked with recycling codes 3 or 7, which may be made with BPA. If your food does come in a container marked 3 or 7, don’t microwave it in that container – chemicals are more likely to leak into your food at high temperatures.

3) Limit your consumption of canned foods, or look for cans marked BPA free — they are rare, but do exist. Eden Organic cans have been BPA free since 1999.

4) BPA is often used in the thermal paper that receipts are printed on. Since it’s impossible to know whether or the receipt you’re being handed has contains BPA, don’t take receipts that you don’t need. If you operate a business that uses receipts, switch to a BPA-free paper manufacturer, such as Appleton Paper, which went BPA-free in 2006.

Lauren Feeney is an award-winning documentary filmmaker and multimedia journalist.

Pesticides Harm Kids Health and Intelligence, Study Finds

Truthout

Pesticides Harm Kids Health and Intelligence, Study Finds

Thursday, 11 October 2012 11:00 By Viji Sundaram, New American Media | Report 

 

San Francisco – Exposure to pesticides is one key reason why children today are more likely to have a wide range of such diseases and disorders as cancer, autism, birth defects and asthma than children of a generation ago, according a study released yesterday.

'We have waited much, much too long to make the health of our children our national priority," lamented Kristin Schafer, a mother of two, and lead author of the report, "A Generation in Jeopardy," by the Pesticide Action Network of North America (PANNA).

Schafer, PANNA's senior policy strategist and a veteran policy research analyst, pointed out that a raft of studies has shown that between 400,000 to 600,000 of the 4 million children born each year in the United States, are affected by a developmental disorder. Scientists, she said, are calling it "a silent pandemic."
Schafer and her team of researchers studied the link between pesticide exposure and developmental disorders in children for more than 10 months, reviewing more than 200 scientific studies and government data that tracked them.
What they learned was "quite startling," she said citing figures that show that more than 10,000 kids are diagnosed with cancer each year and more than 7 million kids have asthma. There's been a spike in the incidence of leukemia and brain cancer, she said.
"This generation is less likely to reach its full potential" Schafer said, but quickly pointed out that pesticides are not the only drivers of an increase in developmental disorders, and that genetic and environmental factors can also play a role.
The report highlights the innovative policies communities across the country have adopted to protect children from pesticides where they live, learn and play. In California, for instance, the San Francisco Unified School District (SFUSD) has replaced the use of harmful pesticides in its schools with so-called integrated pest management practices.
Willie Green, SFUSD's director for custodial services, said its schools use the least amount of toxic chemicals or none at all to address their pest problems, thanks to the city's 1996 integrated pest management ordinance.
SFUSD contracts with a pest control agency to make sure that any pest problems its schools face are addressed with the least use of harmful chemicals. For instance, better door sweeps have prevented rodents from entering buildings.
"If a problem can be addressed without using pesticides, that's the way we go," Green asserted.
Schafer pointed out that some schools in the Central Valley, which has a strong agricultural base, have protective buffer zones for schools and neighborhoods to keep children out of harm's way. Pesticide-free schools exists in such states as Connecticut, as well, she said.
Tracey Woodruff, a professor at UCSF's School of Medicine, pointed out why children are especially vulnerable to the harms of pesticide exposure. She said they have "quickly growing" bodies that take in more of everything.
"They eat and drink more, pound for pound, than adults," Woodruff said, noting that children's "physiological systems undergo rapid changes from the womb through adolescence.
"Anything that interrupts the processes, like pesticides and industrial chemicals even at very low levels, can lead to significant health harms," she said.
San Francisco's bold Integrated Pest Management (IPM) program should be emulated by other cities to protect the health of its citizenry, said Chris Geiger, manager of the IPM program at the San Francisco Department of the Environment.
Geiger acknowledged that while the city ordinance was only a small step because it applied only to city property, it was an important step nevertheless. Local communities should not depend on federal regulations because enforcing them fully takes a long time.
The report points to the need for such reforms to reduce pesticide use as:

• Introduction of policies that allow enforcement agencies to act quickly to pull pesticides off the market, when independent studies indicate they are harmful.
• Support innovative farmers as they transition away from pesticide use.
• Track national pesticide use reduction goals, with a focus on those pesticides that studies indicate are harmful to children.
• Withdraw harmful pesticide products from use in homes, daycare centers and schools.
• Establish pesticide-free zones around schools, daycare centers and neighborhoods in agricultural areas to protect children from harmful exposures, especially pesticide drifts.

The report was released in 10 cities nationwide yesterday. Here, in the city, it was released at the Sunset Elementary School where teaching time is set aside to show children how to maintain an organic vegetable garden.

This piece was reprinted by Truthout with permission or license. It may not be reproduced in any form without permission or license from the source.

Viji Sundaram

Viji Sundaram is the Health Editor for New America Media. Before joining NAM in 2006 Viji was a general assignment reporter with India-West, a national weekly published in San Leandro, CA. While there, Viji won eight journalism awards, five from the South Asian Journalism Association and three from New California Media.

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The Politics of Pesticides (Video)

By , Free Speech TV | Video Interview

Should Childhood Vaccination be Mandatory?

Should Childhood Vaccination be Mandatory?

Validated Independent News Jan 21, 2013
 
In Great Britain there has been almost twice the number of measles cases in England and Wales in the first six months of this year compared with the same period last year. The figure from the Health Protection Agency (HPA) has seen cases rise from 497 to 964. This is a staggering number and the HPA are urging parents to take action. Dr Mary Ramsay, head of immunisation said, “Although uptake of the MMR has improved in recent years some children who do not get vaccinated on time and some older children, who missed out when uptake was lower, have not had a chance to catch-up. Therefore, there are still enough people who are not protected to allow some outbreaks to occur among unvaccinated individuals. the current debate is about whether vaccinating your children should be mandatory. The rush is due to the fact that measles are on the rise.

However, Childhood vaccines killed or injured 2,699 children last year in America, the US government has admitted – and 101 children developed autism after vaccination, even though researchers continue to insist that no link exists. Parents received $110m in damages.

Paul Offit writes that In a better world, vaccine mandates wouldn’t be necessary. Parents would educate themselves about the diseases that vaccines prevent and learn that measles causes pneumonia and brain damage, mumps causes deafness and sterility, rubella causes severe birth defects, pertussis causes suffocation, and human papillomavirus (HPV) causes cervical, oropharyngeal, and anal cancers. They would learn about the remarkable safety and effectiveness of vaccines. And they would learn that although vaccines are not free of risk, their benefits clearly outweigh their risks. Mostly, they would learn that vaccines stand on a mountain of scientific evidence. Well informed: the choice to vaccinate their children would be an easy one.

Arguing against government control is Professor David Salisbury with the Department of Health, he says, “compulsion would be unenforceable, unnecessary, and its use would probably do more harm than good.”

Sources Independent, September 2, 2012.
Title: Should We make Childhood Vaccinations Compulsory
Author: Watts, Lisa. “Should We Make Childhood Vaccinations Compulsory?” The
Independent. September 2, 2012.
http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2012/09/02/should-we-make-childhood-vaccinations-compulsory/
Title: Should childhood vaccination be mandatory?
Authors : Paul Offit and Davud Salsbury
Source: BMJ May 15, 2012
http://www.bmj.com/content/344/bmj.e2434
SAFE” VACCINES KILL: 2,699 Children in a Year – US Government Admits and Hides Autism Links / The Hoax Of modern Medicine: 7 Facts You Need To Know http://truedemocracyparty.net/2012/01/us-admits-safe-vaccines-kill/
Student Researcher: Alison Clarke, Sonoma State University.
Faculty Advisor: James Dean, Sonoma State University.

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Campaign to Fluoridate America

Campaign to Fluoridate America

Validated Independent News Jul 18, 2012


 


Corporate media obscure an ongoing battle over water fluoridation in the U.S.  While a recent New York Times editorial cites the Center for Disease Control’s claim that fluoridation is one of the top accomplishments in public health over the past century, [1] James Tracy reports that fluoridating the nation’s water supply appears to have been a carefully coordinated plan designed to shield major aluminum and steel producers from liabilities for the substantial fluorine pollution their plants generated. Thus American industrial interests, supported by public relations firms, have been the chief forces behind water fluoridation.

Sodium fluoride is a dangerous poison and has been a primary active ingredient in a wide variety of insecticides and fungicides.[2] Today silicofluorides, a by-product of the phosphate fertilizer industry, is the primary stand-in for sodium fluoride, given its relative low-cost.[3]  In 2001 researchers found that silicofluorides may cause both a higher absorption of lead in children and decreases in cholinesterase, an enzyme necessary for the regulation of neurotransmitters. To date, neither the Environmental Protection Agency, the Food and Drug Administration nor any other regulatory agency has researched the long-term effects of consuming fluorisilic acid.

Tracy describes the fluoridation campaign as “a textbook case of social engineering,” and shows how it demonstrates the “tremendous capacity of powerful interests to reshape the social environment, thereby prompting individuals to unwarily think and act in ways that are often harmful to themselves and their loved ones.”

Source:  James F. Tracy, “Poison is Treatment: The Campaign to Fluoridate America,” Global Research, June 23, 2012, http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=31568

Notes:

[1] New York Times, “Fluoridation Debate Redux,” 18 March, 2012,
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/18/opinion/sunday/fluoridation-debate-redux.html?_r=1. See also Jane E. Brody, “Dental Exam Went Well? Thank Fluoride,” New York Times, January 23, 2012, http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/01/23/dental-exam-went-well-thank-fluoride/
[2] Scorecard: The Pollution Information Website, Chemical Profiles: Sodium Fluoride, n.d., GoodGuide, http://scorecard.goodguide.com/chemical-profiles/pesticides.tcl?edf_substance_id=7681-49-4
[3] Washington’s Blog, “Untested Type of Fluoride Used in the Overwhelming Majority of U.S. Water Supplies,” Centre for Research on Globalization, January 10, 2011, http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=22707

Student Researcher: Anthony Meyers (Santa Rosa Junior College)

Faculty Evaluator: SusanRahman (Santa Rosa Junior College)

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Mother Jones / By Tom Philpott

7 Dangerous Food Practices Banned in Europe But Just Fine in America

Want some arsenic with your sandwich?

 

 

 

 

 

May 9, 2013  |  

 

The following article first appeared on Mother Jones. For more great content, click here to subscribe to Mother Jones magazine. 

Last week, the European Commission voted to place a two-year moratorium on most uses of neonicotinoid pesticides, on the suspicion that they're contributing to the global crisis in honeybee health (a topic I've touched on here, here, here, and here). Since then, several people have asked me whether Europe's move might inspire the US Environmental Protection Agency to make a similar move—currently, neonics are widely used in several of our most prevalent crops, including corn, soy, cotton, and wheat.

The answer is no. As I reported recently, an agency press officer told me the EU move will have no bearing on the EPA's own reviews of the pesticides, which aren't scheduled for release until 2016 at the earliest.

All of which got me thinking about other food-related substances and practices that are banned in Europe but green-lighted here. Turns out there are lots. Aren't you glad you don't live under the Old World regulatory jackboot, where the authorities deny people's freedom to quaff  atrazine-laced drinking water, etc., etc.? Let me know in comments if I'm missing any.

1. Atrazine

Why it's a problem: A "potent endocrine disruptor," Syngenta's popular corn herbicide has been linked to a range of reproductive problems at extremely low doses in both amphibiansand humans, and it commonly leaches out of farm fields and into people's drinking water.
What Europe did: Banned it in 2003.

US status: EPA: "Atrazine will begin registration review, EPA's periodic reevaluation program for existing pesticides, in mid-2013."

2. Arsenic in chicken, turkey, and pig feed

Why it's a problem: Arsenic is beloved of industrial-scale livestock producers because it makes animals grow faster and turns their meat a rosy pink. It enters feed in organic form, which isn't harmful to humans. Trouble is, in animals guts, it quickly goes inorganic, and thus becomes poisonous. Several studies, including one by the FDA, have found heightened levels of inorganic arsenic in supermarket chicken, and it also ends up in manure, where it can move into tap water. Fertilizing rice fields with arsenic-laced manure may be partially responsible for heightened arsenic levels in US rice. 

What Europe did: According to the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy, arsenic-based compounds "were never approved as safe for animal feed in the European Union, Japan, and many other countries."

US status: The drug giant Pfizer "voluntarily" stopped marketing the arsenical feed additive Roxarsone back in 2011. But there are still several arsenicals on the market. On May 1, a coalition of enviro groups including the Center for Food Safety, the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy, and the Center for Biological Diversity filed a lawsuit demanding that the FDA ban them from feed.

3. "Poultry litter" in cow feed

Why it's a problem: You know how arsenic goes inorganic—and thus poisonous—in chickens' guts? Consider that their arsenic-laced manure is then commonly used as a feed for cows. According to Consumers Union, the stuff "consists primarily of manure, feathers, spilled feed, and bedding material that accumulate on the floors of the buildings that house chickens and turkeys." The "spilled feed" part is of special concern, because chickens are often fed "meat and bone meal from dead cattle," CU reported, and that stuff can spill into the litter and be fed back to cows, raising mad cow disease concerns.

What Europe did: Banned all forms of animal protein, including chicken litter, in cow feed in 2001.

US status: The practice remains unrestricted. US cattle consume about 2 billion pounds of it annually, Consumers Union's Michael Hansen told me last year.

4. Chlorine washes for poultry carcasses

Why it's a problem: As the US chicken industry has sped up kill lines in recent years, it has resorted to heavier use of chlorine-based washes to "decrease microbial loads on carcasses," the Washington Post recently reported, quoting a previously unreleased USDA document. As I've noted, the USDA is preparing to release new rules that would speed up kill lines still more as well as allow companies to douse every carcass that comes down the line with antimicrobial sprays, "whether they are contaminated or not." According to the Post, poultry workers face a "range of ailments" to the practice, including "asthma and other severe respiratory problems, burns, rashes, irritated eyes, and sinus ulcers and other sinus problems."

What Europe did: The EU not only bans the practice, but refuses to accept US poultry that has been treated with antimicrobial sprays.

US status: As stated above, the USDA is preparing to roll out new rules that will increase the practice.

5. Antibiotics as growth promoters on livestock farms

Why they're a problem: Antibiotic use has surged on US animal farms in recent years—and now accounts for 80 percent of all antibiotic use. Meanwhile, meat sold in US supermarkets is rife with antibiotic-resistant bacteria.

What Europe did: In the EU, all antibiotics used in human medicines are banned on farms—and no antibiotics can be used on farms for "nonmedical purposes," i.e., growth promotion.

US status: The FDA is floating new rules that would ban antibiotics as growth promoters—but the regulation would be voluntary.

6. Ractopomine and other pharmaceutical growth enhancers in animal feed

Why it's a problem: Fed to an estimated 60 to 80 percent of US hogs, ractopomine makes animals grow fast while also staying lean. Unfortunately, it does so by mimicking stress hormones, making animals miserable. The excellent food safety reporter Helena Bottemiller looked at FDA documents and found that between its introduction in 1999 and 2011, the drug had killed 210,000 pigs—"more than any other animal drug on the market." Pigs treated with it, she found, suffer from ailments ranging from hyperactivity and trembling to broken limbs and the inability to walk. (Beef cows are fed similar drugs, as are turkeys.) Traces of these pharmaceuticals routinely end up in our meat—and according to Bottemiller, their effects on humans are little-studied.

What Europe did: Europe not only bars its own producers from using ractopamine, it alsorefuses to allow imports of meat from animals treated with it—as do China and Russia.

US status: Rather than trying to rein in ractopamine use, the Obama administration isactively seeking to force Europe and other nations to accept our ractopamine-treated pork.

7. Gestation crates

Why it's a problem: The sows that breed the hogs confined in US factory farms spend nearly their entire lives stuffed into crates "so small the animals can't even turn around or take more than a step forward or backward," the Humane Society of the United States reported. An undercover HSUS investigation of a sow facility run by pork giant Smithfield in 2010 found, among other horrors, this:

The animals engaged in stereotypic behaviors such as biting the bars of crates, indicating poor well-being in the extreme confinement conditions. Some had bitten their bars so incessantly that blood from their mouths coated the fronts of their crates. The breeding pigs also suffered injuries from sharp crate protrusions and open pressure sores that developed from their unyielding confinement.

What Europe did: Banned them, effective this year.

US status: Pork giants Smithfield, Cargill, and Hormel have pledged to phase them out; several fast-food chains including McDonald's, Burger King, Wendy's, and Subway havepromised to stop buying from suppliers who use the crates; and nine states have banned the practice, HSUS reported. But the practice remains widespread, and as industry flack Rick Berman recently put it, a large swath of the pork industry "has no plans to stop using standard sow housing."

Tom Philpott is the food and ag blogger for Mother Jones.