Monsanto Threatens to Sue Vermont over GMO Labeling Bill

Two articles:

Monsanto Threatens to Sue Vermont over GMO Labeling Bill

• By Will Allen, Cedar Circle Farm, Vermont, and Ronnie Cummins, Organic Consumers Association 
  April 4, 2012
  Straight to the Source 
  

The world's most hated corporation is at it again, this time in Vermont.

Despite overwhelming public support and support from a clear majority of Vermont's Agriculture Committee, Vermont legislators are dragging their feet on a proposed GMO labeling bill. Why? Because Monsanto has threatened to sue the state if the bill passes.

The popular legislative bill requiring mandatory labels on genetically engineered food (H-722) is languishing in the Vermont House Agriculture Committee, with only four weeks left until the legislature adjourns for the year. Despite thousands of emails and calls from constituents who overwhelmingly support mandatory labeling, despite the fact that a majority (6 to 5) of Agriculture Committee members support passage of the measure, Vermont legislators are holding up the labeling bill and refusing to take a vote.

Instead, they're calling for more public hearings on April 12, in the apparent hope that they can run out the clock until the legislative session ends in early May.

What happened to the formerly staunch legislative champions of Vermont's "right to know" bill? They lost their nerve and abandoned their principles after a Monsanto representative recently threatened a public official that the biotech giant would sue Vermont if they dared to pass the bill. Several legislators have rather unconvincingly argued that the Vermont public has a "low appetite" for any bills, even very popular bills like this one, that might end up in court. Others expressed concern about Vermont being the first state to pass a mandatory GMO labeling bill and then having to "go it alone" against Monsanto in court.

What it really comes down to this: Elected officials are abandoning the public interest and public will in the face of corporate intimidation. 

Monsanto has used lawsuits or threats of lawsuits for 20 years to force unlabeled genetically engineered foods on the public, and to intimidate farmers into buying their genetically engineered seeds and hormones. When Vermont became the first state in the nation in 1994 to require mandatory labels on milk and dairy products derived from cows injected with the controversial genetically engineered Bovine Growth Hormone, Monsanto's minions sued in Federal Court and won on a judge's decision that dairy corporations have the first amendment "right" to remain silent on whether or not they are injecting their cows with rBGH - even though rBGH has been linked to severe health damage in cows and increased cancer risk for humans, and is banned in much of the industrialized world, including Europe and Canada.

Monsanto wields tremendous influence in Washington, DC and most state capitols. The company's stranglehold over politicians and regulatory officials is what has prompted activists in California to bypass the legislature and collect 850,000 signatures to place a citizens' Initiative on the ballot in November 2012. The 2012 California Right to Know Act will force mandatory labeling of GMOs and to ban the routine practice of labeling GMO-tainted food as "natural."

All of Monsanto's fear mongering and intimidation tactics were blatantly on display in the House Agriculture Committee hearings March 15-16. 

During the hearings, the Vermont legislature was deluged with calls, letters, and e-mails urging passage of a GMO labeling bill - more than on any other bill since the fight over Civil Unions in 1999-2000. The legislature heard from pro-labeling witnesses such as Dr. Michael Hansen, an expert on genetic engineering from the Consumers Union, who shredded industry claims that GMOs are safe and that consumers don't need to know if their food is contaminated with them.

On the other side of the fence, Monsanto's lobbyist and Vermont mouthpiece, Margaret Laggis employed inaccurate, unsubstantiated, fear-mongering claims to make Monsanto's case. She warned during the hearings that if this law were passed, there would not be enough corn, canola, and soybean seed for Vermont farmers to plant.

Laggis lied when she said that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) had done exhaustive feeding tests on genetically modified foods. Hansen corrected her, testifying that all of the GMO feeding tests submitted to the FDA were conducted by Monsanto and other GMO corporations and that the FDA had not done any GMO testing of its own.

Laggis lied again when she claimed that a recent Canadian study showing that more than 90% pregnant women had high levels of a genetically modified bacterial pesticide in their blood resulted from them "eating too much organic food" during pregnancy. Again, Hansen refuted this nonsense by pointing out that the Bacillus thuingensis (Bt) bacterium spray used by organic growers is chemically and materially different from the GMO Bt bacterium which showed up in the pregnant women's blood and the umbilical cords of their fetuses. Hanson pointed that the high levels of Monsanto's mutant Bt in the women's blood was due to the widespread cultivation of GMO corn, cotton, soy, and canola.

The committee heard testimony that European Union studies have been conducted which showed that even short-term feeding studies of GMO crops caused 43.5% of male test animals to suffer kidney abnormalities, and 30.8% of female test animals to suffer liver abnormalities. Studies also have shown that the intestinal lining of animals fed GMO food was thickened compared to the control animals. All of these short-term results could become chronic, and thus precursors to cancer.

Studies like these have prompted 50 nations around the world to pass laws requiring mandatory labels on GMO right foods.

In the end, none of the scientific testimony mattered. Monsanto operatives simply reverted to their usual tactics: They openly threatened to sue the state.

Unfortunately, in the US, industry and the government continue to side with Monsanto rather than the 90% of consumers who support labeling. Monsanto's biotech bullying is a classic example of how the 1% control the rest of us, even in Vermont, generally acknowledged as the most progressive state in the nation.

Vermont activists are organizing a protest at the state capital on April 12 to coincide with the next round of hearings on H-722, and are asking residents to write letters, make calls, and e-mail their legislators and the Governor. For more information, please go to the website http://www.vtrighttoknow.org or the Facebook pagehttp://www.facebook.com/vtrighttoknow of the Vermont Right to Know Campaign.

*   *   *

Will Allen is the co-manager of Cedar Circle Farm in East Thetford, Vermont. He is also the Author of The War on Bugs , a history of farm pesticides and fertilizers since 1810. He is on the policy advisory boards of The Organic Consumers Association and Willing Hands. He has attended all of the agriculture committee hearings on H-722, where the testimony referred to above was delivered.

Ronnie Cummins is the National Director of the Organic Consumers Association and its Millions Against Monsanto campaign. He also is a member of the Steering Committee of the California Ballot Initiative to Label Genetically Engineered Foods, and co-author of the book, Genetically Engineered Food: A Self-Defense Guide for Consumers. 

The Great Boycott: Monsanto and the GMA

• By Ronnie Cummins 
  Organic Consumers Association, May 14, 2104 
  

For related articles and information, please visit OCA's Genetic Engineering page, and ourMillions Against Monsanto page.

Defying repeated threats of a lawsuit from Monsanto and the Grocery Manufacturers Association (GMA), on May 8, Peter Shumlin, Governor of Vermont, signed a historic bill requiring food manufacturers to label genetically engineered (GE) foods, and to drop the practice of labeling GE foods as “natural” or “all natural.” 

On May 9, true to its word, the GMA confirmed that it will sue Vermont in federal court to overturn H. 112. 

Vermont is prepared to fight back. The state has already established a “food fight” legal defense fund. Legal analysts sayVermont will likely win. 

Vermont isn’t the only state up against the multi-billion dollar lobbying group. The GMA, whose 300-plus members include Monsanto and Dow, Coca-Cola and General Mills, is pushing a bill in Congress that would preempt all states from passing GMO labeling laws. 

It’s time for consumers in every state to band together to defeat the GMA’s full-on assault, not only on Vermont, not only on consumers’ right to know what’s in our food, but on states’ rights and on our basic freedoms to protect our health and our communities.

Here’s how we do it. We boycott every product, including the natural and organic brands, owned by members of the GMA. We flood their Facebook pages, tarnish their brand names. We pressure financial institutions, pension funds and mutual funds to divest from Monsanto and the other GMA companies. 

Our motto for Monsanto and GMA products must become: Don’t buy them. Don’t sell them. Don’t grow them. And don’t let your financial institution, university, church, labor union or pension fund invest in them.

As soon as the GMA files a lawsuit against Vermont, the Organic Consumers Association, joined by a growing coalition of public interest groups, will launch a boycott and divestment campaign directed against all of the 300 GMA companies and their thousands of brand name products—including foods, beverages, seeds, home and garden supplies, pet food, herbicides and pesticides. 

A new balance of power

Monsanto and the GMA have until now successfully blocked popular GMO labeling legislation in over 30 states. They’ve defeated, by a razor-thin margin, two high-profile ballot initiatives, in California (2012) and Washington (2013). And they’ve intimidated Connecticut and Maine into including trigger clauses in those states’ GMO labeling laws, successfully delaying their implementation. 

Funding for this anti-consumer, anti-right-to-know lobbying and advertising effort topped $100 million in 2012-2014, including $12 million in illegally laundered donations to I-522, the Washington State GMO labeling ballot initiative of 2013. All of that money has come from the 300 chemical, seed, supermarket, grain, pharmaceutical and food corporations, including Monsanto and the other Gene Giants, who make up the GMA. 

Until now the GMA colossus has ruled, not only in Washington D.C., but in all 50 states. But now that Vermont has passed a trigger-free GMO labeling law, and Oregon is poised to do the same in November, the balance of power has shifted.

Monsanto, the GMA and their allies are in panic mode. Because they know that when companies are forced to label or remove GMOs, and also are forced to drop the fraudulent practice of labeling GE-tainted foods as “natural” or “all natural,” in one state, they will have to do it in every state. Just as they’ve been forced to do in Europe, where mandatory GMO labeling has been in effect since 1997.

GMA members and corporate agribusiness hate labeling, because it forces them to reveal all of the hazardous GMOs, chemicals and drug residues lurking in the billions of dollars of foods, beverages, seeds, grains and pesticides they sell. It’s no wonder that Monsanto and GMA’s bill in Congress--a bill they’ve named the “Safe and Accurate Food Labeling Act of 2014—has been renamed the “DARK” (Denying Americans the right to know) Act.

Let the boycott begin

We absolutely must defeat the impending GMA lawsuit against Vermont. This will require us to raise money and provide legal help to the state. 

Equally important, we need to intensify our mass education, grassroots lobbying and marketplace pressure so we can defeat Monsanto and the GMA Big Food/Chemical lobby in the court of public opinion, too. If you would like to donate to this effort click here. 

But there are other ways we can use our dollars to defeat the GMA. We can refuse to invest, even indirectly through retirement and mutual funds, in those companies. We can pressure institutional investors like Fidelity, Vanguard and State Street to dump their stock in these companies.

And we can boycott all of the 300 GMA companies and their more than 6,000 brand name products—including foods, beverages, seeds, home and garden supplies, pet food, herbicides, and pesticides.  

Where to start? As part of this Great Boycott, pro-organic consumer groups will put a special emphasis on boycotting the “Traitor Brands,” those organic and so-called “natural” brands owned and marketed by GMA members.

Health-conscious and green-minded consumers often inadvertently support the GMA when they buy brands like Honest Tea, Kashi, Odwalla and others whose parent companies, all members of the GMA, have donated millions to defeat GMO labeling initiatives in California (Prop 37) and Washington State (I-522). (Take the boycott pledge here.) 

These Traitor Brands include, among others: 

PepsiCo ($4.8M) - IZZE, Naked Juice, Simply Frito-Lay, Starbucks Frappucino
Coca-Cola ($3.2M) - Honest Tea, Odwalla
Nestle ($3M) - Gerber Organic, Sweet Leaf tea
Kraft/Mondelez ($2.4M) - Boca Burgers, Green and Black's 
General Mills ($2.1M) - Cascadian Farm, Larabar, Muir Glen
ConAgra Foods ($2M) - Alexia, Pam organic cooking sprays
Kelloggs ($1.1M) - Bear Naked, Gardenburger, Kashi, Morningstar Farms
Campbells ($980k) - Plum Organics, Wolfgang Puck organic soups
Smuckers ($900k) - R.W. Knudsen, Santa Cruz organic, Smuckers Organic
Hershey's ($880k) - Dagoba
Bimbo Bakeries ($560k) - Earthgrains bread
McCormick ($400k) - Simply Asia, Thai Kitchen - See more at: http://salsa3.salsalabs.com/o/50865/p/dia/action3/common/public/?action_KEY=8959#sthash.rJNvUYvM.dpuf

PepsiCo ($4.8M) - IZZE, Naked Juice, Simply Frito-Lay, Starbucks Frappucino
Coca-Cola ($3.2M) - Honest Tea, Odwalla
Nestle ($3M) - Gerber Organic, Sweet Leaf tea
Kraft/Mondelez ($2.4M) - Boca Burgers, Green and Black's 
General Mills ($2.1M) - Cascadian Farm, Larabar, Muir Glen
ConAgra Foods ($2M) - Alexia, Pam organic cooking sprays
Kelloggs ($1.1M) - Bear Naked, Gardenburger, Kashi, Morningstar Farms
Campbells ($980k) - Plum Organics, Wolfgang Puck organic soups
Smuckers ($900k) - R.W. Knudsen, Santa Cruz organic, Smuckers Organic
Hershey's ($880k) - Dagoba
Bimbo Bakeries ($560k) - Earthgrains bread
McCormick ($400k) - Simply Asia, Thai Kitchen - See more at: http://salsa3.salsalabs.com/o/50865/p/dia/action3/common/public/?action_KEY=8959#sthash.rJNvUYvM.dpuf

PepsiCo ($4.8M) - IZZE, Naked Juice, Simply Frito-Lay, Starbucks Frappucino 
Coca-Cola ($3.2M) - Honest Tea, Odwalla 
Nestle ($3M) - Gerber Organic, Sweet Leaf tea 
Kraft/Mondelez ($2.4M) - Boca Burgers, Green and Black's 
General Mills ($2.1M) - Cascadian Farm, Larabar, Muir Glen 
ConAgra Foods ($2M) - Alexia, Pam organic cooking sprays 
Kelloggs ($1.1M) - Bear Naked, Gardenburger, Kashi, Morningstar Farms 
Campbells ($980k) - Plum Organics, Wolfgang Puck organic soups 
Smuckers ($900k) - R.W. Knudsen, Santa Cruz organic, Smuckers Organic Hershey's ($880k) - Dagoba Bimbo Bakeries ($560k) - Earthgrains bread McCormick ($400k) - Simply Asia, Thai Kitchen 

Why not just boycott the conventional GMA parent company brands?

Because those of us who support organics rarely buy products like Coca-Cola, Diet Pepsi, or Kellogg’s Genetically-Modified-Sugar-Coated Frosted Flakes, or a packet of Monsanto seeds or a spray bottle of Roundup or 2, 4-D. The only way to pressure Big Food and the Gene Giants is to get millions of conscious consumers to boycott the brands we actually buy. 

Let’s be clear. Junk Food and beverage companies who are members of the GMA are gobbling up organic and “natural” brands because they recognize the huge profit potential in the fast-growing organic and natural markets. They want our business. If we stop buying their brands, they know there’s a good chance we’ll find alternative brands. And we might never look back.

Seven ways to fight back

There are about 50 popular organic and natural “Traitor Brands” (owned by GMA members). It’s easy for most of us to boycott those brands. But how do we boycott the entire 6,000-product inventory of GMA member-owned brands, especially those of us who don’t shop for those brands in supermarkets?

Here are seven ways to fight back against Monsanto and all the Corporate Bullies of the Grocery Manufacturers Association.

(1)    Stop buying all non-organic processed foods. Even if they are certified organic, don’t buy any Traitor Brand processed foods or beverages. Ninety percent of the foods Americans buy or consume are heavily processed, deliberately laced with sugar, salt and unhealthy fats, contaminated with dyes, preservatives, pesticides, GMOs, and drug residues. If you want to be healthy, if you want to avoid cancer, heart attacks, or obesity, build your diet around whole foods, especially raw fruits and vegetables, healthy fats, (coconut oil, avocadoes, pastured meat, dairy, and eggs, nuts, and whole grains) and nuts.

(2)    Patronize grocers, coops and community restaurants that serve organic, cooked-from-scratch, local food.
Many restaurants, especially chain restaurants (Chipotlé is a rare exception), sell many of the brands owned by GMA members. 

(3)    Cook at home with healthy organic ingredients.

(4)    Buy only heirloom, open-pollinated, and/or organic seeds.

(5)    Boycott all lawn and garden inputs (chemicals, fertilizers, etc.) unless they are “OMRI Approved,” which means they are allowed in organic production.

(6)    Read the labels on everything you buy. If a GMA member company owns the product, don’t buy it. Given the greed and reckless disregard for public health and the environment typical of GMA corporations, chances are these products aren’t good for you and the environment anyway.

(7)    Download the Buycott app for your smartphone and join OCA's new campaign, "Buy Organic Brands that Support Your Right to Know" so you can scan products before you buy them.

In this age of the Internet and social media, consumer boycotts, divestment campaigns and other forms of marketplace pressure are more powerful than ever. Please join and support the Organic Consumers Association’s “Great Boycott” of Monsanto and the Grocery Manufacturer’s Association today. Let’s show Monsanto and the GMA we mean business.

Ronnie Cummins is the National Director for the Organic Consumers Association.

Antibiotic Resistance Is Now Rife across the Entire Globe

Antibiotic Resistance Is Now Rife across the Entire Globe

A first-ever World Health Organization assessment of the growing problem calls for rapid changes to avoid the misery and deaths of a potential "post-antibiotic era" 

Apr 30, 2014


By Dina Fine Maron

Image: FDA

Dangerous antibiotic-resistant bacteria and other pathogens have now emerged in every part of the world and threaten to roll back a century of medical advances. That’s the message from the World Health Organization in its first global report on this growing problem, which draws on drug-resistance data in 114 countries.

“A post antibiotic-era—in which common infections and minor injuries can kill—far from being an apocalyptic fantasy, is instead a very real possibility for the 21st century,” wrote Keiji Fukuda, WHO’s assistant director general for Health Security, in an introduction to the report. The crisis is the fruit of several decades of overreliance on the drugs and careless prescribing practices as well as routine use of the medicines in the rearing of livestock, the report noted.

Antibiotic resistance is putting patients in peril in both developing and developed countries, as bacteria responsible for an array of dangerous infections evolve resistance to the drugs that once vanquished them.

Gonorrhea, once well treated by antibiotics, is once again a major public health threat due to the emergence of new, resistant strains. Drugs that were once a last resort treatment for the sexually transmitted disease—which can lead to infertility, blindness and increased odds of HIV transmission if left untreated—are now the first-line treatment and are sometimes ineffective among patients in countries such as the U.K., Canada, Australia, France, Japan, Norway, South Africa, Slovenia and Sweden.

Drugs to treat Klebsiella pneumoniae—a common intestinal bacteria that can cause life-threatening infections in intensive care unit patients and newborns—no longer work in more than half of patients in some countries. And fluoroquinolones, drugs used to treat urinary tract infections, are also ineffective in more than half of sufferers in many parts of the world. Efforts to limit the spread of multidrug-resistant tuberculosis, malaria and HIV are also all under threat due to increasing bacterial resistance.

Although the development of resistance is to be expected over time, overuse of the drugs has accelerated the process by supplying additional selective pressure, noted the report, which was authored by an extensive team of researchers with WHO. And there are few drugs to replace the ones that are now ineffective: The last entirely new class of antibacterial drugs was discovered 27 years ago, according to the report.

WHO warns that the situation could have sweeping effects on global medicine, economics and societies unless global actions are taken swiftly. A dearth of effective antibiotics will mean that infected patients will need more extensive care, require longer hospital stays and die in greater numbers.

To tackle the problem, the report calls for global, coordinated actions on the scale of those that nations are taking to mitigate and adapt to climate change.

The report recommends a multipronged approach. In many cases, WHO noted, available diagnostic tests can already be used to help identify the bacteria that fueled an infection—allowing doctors to select more targeted drug treatments instead of resorting to broad-spectrum medications that exacerbate drug resistance. The problem is that such tests take time to run and thus prescribers often forgo the tests and migrate toward those broad-spectrum drugs. Developing faster tests is therefore crucial, according to the report. The agency also proposes renewed focus—and standardized methods—to track resistant strains across the globe. There is currently no global consensus on methodology and data collection in this area.

There are also essential everyday solutions that communities and clinicians should adopt—including better hygiene practices by health care workers, such as washing hands more frequently and vaccinating populations against key diseases to reduce the need for antibiotics in the first place. Patients, too, have a vital part to play by using antibiotics only when they are prescribed, WHO said.

The assessment, collected information on nine particularly troublesome bacteria from 114 countries that track data on at least one of the microorganisms and the antibiotics used to treat them.

Although limited by significant data gaps, the report noted that in the case of many of these bacteria, resistance levels to first-line drugs have reached 50 percent or more in at least half of the countries analyzed. As a result, health care providers must frequently rely on last-resort drugs. “It is terrifying in scope. This is a massive public health problem that is just starting to bubble to the surface,” says Brad Spellberg, associate professor of medicine at the Los Angeles Biomedical Research Institute at Harbor–U.C.L.A. Medical Center. As the global usage of last-resort drugs grows, resistance to these drugs also accelerates, compounding the crisis. With fewer drug options, the WHO report points out, patients who live in poverty or lack health insurance have nowhere to turn for effective treatments.

“We are already seeing this,” says Stuart Levy, director of the Center for Adaptation Genetics and Drug Resistance at Tufts University School of Medicine, who assisted with the WHO report. “For respiratory diseases in Uganda, we had a multidrug-resistant pneumococcus being treated with recommended drugs—but the bacteria were already 90 percent resistant.” Alternative drugs, in that setting, were not readily available.

Walmart's Complete Trashing of Society (the poor, workers, middle class, consumer products) and Now the Food Supply

  FOOD  

AlterNet / By Arun Gupta

Why Walmart Is a Threat to Organic Food

Walmart will turn organic food into another low-cost input that shortchanges consumers, workers and the environment for a fast buck.   

May 1, 2014 

Only after I decided to pursue freelance journalism fulltime, thereby joining the ranks of low-wage workers, did I enter a Walmart for the first time. It was in Southern California, in the spring of 2012, and I was trying to go easy on my wallet as I crammed my car with supplies before embarking on a cross-country reporting tour.

I reluctantly ventured inside a Walmart near San Diego, but I discovered immediately why its slogan, “Save Money, Live Better,” is a lifeline for the economically distressed. In the average superstore there’s a phenomenal142,000 separate items at astonishingly low prices: button-down shirts for $10, a large bag of potato chips for a buck, a fat tube of toothpaste for two bucks, 25 cents for a metal fork, 10 oranges for a dollar. One former Walmart worker in California told me everyone he knew shopped there because, “Walmart is cheap as shit and it’s convenient.”

So when Walmart announced in April that it was invading organic turf by introducing the Wild Oats food line in 2,000 stores, some food-justice advocates were excited about the possibilities. They believe that Walmart's buying power, which accounts for a 33 percentshare of groceries sold nationwide, will enable it to offer lower prices for consumers, expand the market for organic farmers, and lessen the use of toxic pesticides and global-warming fertilizers. It’s a classic win-win, showing how the free market can solve problems it helped create.

It’s wishful thinking. Alarm bells should be ringing now that Walmart is going organic. One Walmart executive explains it will “disrupt” the organic market by reducing inefficiencies and encouraging consolidation. Lower prices for consumers mean fewer organic farmers, declining farm incomes and agricultural wages, and remaining farmers will be forced to industrialize further to produce more goods at lower prices.

Walmart is so powerful it’s been termed a “monosopy,” meaning it can set prices for vendors. By bringing its practice of hammering suppliers to cut costs, quality and standards to organic it will tempt farmers to bend and break organic rules to pare expenses. If American farmers refuse to accept its dictates, Walmart can outsource production to Mexico, China and Chile as it’s done with manufacturing, and is already happening with organic food. Other retailers will probably take advantage of Walmart’s move by demanding lower prices from organic farmers and pocketing higher profits just because they can. This happened in the California grocery strike in 2003 when Safeway, Kroger and other chains slashed the wages and benefits of 59,000 unionized workers based solely on Walmart’s announcement it was going to build 40 supercenters in the state.

In terms of improving the dismal diet of most Americans, Walmart’s mastery of supply-chain logistics has been implicated as a cause of obesity. Many Wild Oats products are outright junk food or barely nutritious, including tortilla chips, heavily processed “skillet” meals, and cookies. Undercutting other retailers on the price of canned organic vegetables won’t change much. Poor diet is not due to a lack of access as 92 percent of Americans say they have “easy access to fresh affordable produce.” Government data in the mid-'90s found that a paltry 3 percent of Americans got the proper daily intake of vegetables and “at least 1 serving daily of a dark green or orange vegetable,” the most nutritious vegetables. It’s unlikely that dismal number has improved. A recent large-scale survey by Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health found that vegetable consumption actually fell between 1988 and 2002, and another governmentstudy revealed “no significant change” from 2000 to 2009.

So what’s Walmart’s game? It’s hoping to fatten its bottom line, not reduce America’s waistline. In all likelihood Walmart is trying to lure more affluent customers to overcome stagnating sales and win over critics who link its business methods to poor health.

When I walk into a Walmart supercenter anywhere in the country, the fruit and vegetables look ample, the quality passable, and the prices rock-bottom. But fresh foods occupy a postage stamp-sized portion of stores where aisles packed with chips, sweets or colas can stretch 100 feet. The prominent display of fresh produce in a Walmart is like salads on the McDonald’s menu, which amount to a piddling two to three percent of sales in U.S. outlets: They bestow a halo of health on the rest of the store’s offerings.

Peering into the carts of other Walmart shoppers I spot far more five-pound logs of hamburger meat, 36-ounce cartons of corn flakes, stacks of frozen pizza, and gallons of fruit punch than melons or bunches of kale. For dog-tired parents trying to shop while corralling hyper children, processed junk is their lifeline, especially given how many use food stamps. It’s cheap, convenient and the kids like it.

The families will pay with lives shortened by obesity-related diseases. Taxpayers will pick up much of the healthcare tab. And Walmart will laugh all the way to the bank. A study by Charles Courtemanche and Art Carden, “Supersizing Supercenters? The Impact of Walmart Supercenters on Body Mass Index and Obesity,” found Walmart accounted for 10.5 percent of the rise in obesity from 13 percent of the public in 1960 to 34 percent in 2006. According to the authors, Walmart’s “innovations” led to 6.6 million more Americans obese today, based on the company’s “distribution technology that lowers the prices of food and other consumer goods.”

Wal-Mart claims 91 percent of its shoppers “would consider purchasing products from an affordable organic brand at the retailer.” But for five years Walmart’s all-important same-store sales have stagnated, and it admits “our customers are living paycheck to paycheck.” During the early stages of the economic downturn that began in 2007 more affluent shoppers traded down to Walmart, but once their fortunes improved they migrated to Target and Amazon. This indicates that Wild Oats is not aimed at existing customers who are unlikely to buy extra-virgin olive oil, much less an organic version.

One group who won’t be buying Wild Oats is 1 million Walmart store associates, who comprise nearly 1 percent of the U.S. workforce and average $17,800 a year in wages based on a 40-hour week. “Ally,” who asked to remain anonymous, earns $270 a week before taxes because her supercenter in Kentucky defines full time as 34 hours a week. Her husband makes $700 per week assembling machinery, giving them a combined income of $50,000 a year. They earn too much to qualify for government aid, but their income is chewed up by rent, utilities, car, insurance and gas, cell phones, healthcare, and $600 a month in student loans.

Ally says they are so cash-strapped, “We’ve had to go to McDonald’s and take napkins to use as toilet paper…. My shoes fell apart and I had to rubber-band the soles back on.”

For food, Ally said, “For the two of us we spend $50 a week on groceries, sometimes $25. For lunch I’ll bring a Michelina frozen dinner, it costs 98 cents.” Her voice rising in frustration, Ally continued. “I would like to eat healthier, but we can’t afford to eat healthier. Almost everything we eat is a frozen TV dinner or canned food. I can’t afford raw chicken or raw hamburger.”

Those chickens and cows were imprisoned in a fecal hellhole and dosed with antibiotics and hormones during their brief lifespans, but their meat still might be healthier compared to the highly processed foods Ally eats. Those foods are so devoid of life they can sit around a warehouse for years before being consumed.

“Nicole” lives in Kentucky with her mother and the two of them work at different Walmarts. They spend $70 a week on groceries and their meals come out of boxes, cans and freezer bags. Working as a cashier, Nicole claims half her customers use food stamps. For these shoppers a splurge is a gallon of conventional milk for the kids. They are not going to break the bank by shelling out three dollars more for organic milk, the price differential at many Walmart stores. The poor are expert at calculating how many calories they can purchase per dollar, and a sack of fatty, starchy chicken nuggets that fills a lot of bellies is going to beat out a few pounds of carrots and broccoli every time.

This is the Walmart effect that revolutionized goods distribution, and in turn, the U.S. economy. Its supply chain starts with pushing manufacturing jobs overseas by demanding that suppliers continually lower costs, and ends with low-paid part-time workers earning few benefits and fewer rights by enforcing a zero-tolerance policy for unions. Studies show when a new Walmart store opens in a county in America, on average 150 jobs are lost, $1.4 million in retail wages evaporate, pay shrinks in the grocery and merchandise sectors, and poverty rises.

Walmart manufactures low-income workers who are dependent on the processed junk it sells because the one place workers like Ally and Nicole can easily trim household costs is the food budget. This is true for most Americans as we spend a smaller portion of our household budget on food than any other country in the world. That low cost is directly linked to farmers' shrinking share of the food dollar. As of 2008, farmers received less than 16 cents of every dollar spend on food in America. The problem is not that food is too expensive it’s too cheap. If Walmart becomes a major player, the entire organic sector will suffer.

Case in point is Horizon Milk, which controls 40 percent of the organic milk market and crowds the shelves of many Walmarts. For nearly a decade the Wisconsin-based Cornucopia Institute has been filing formal complaints against Horizon’s parent company, Dean Foods, charging it with running huge concentrated animal feeding operations that violate federal organic standards, using conventionally raised heifers in its operations, and adding illegal additives to its milk. These practices allegedly enable it to undersell small organic milk producers, pushing them out of business. Just two months ago, in February, Cornucopia accused the USDA of abdicating responsibility by not cracking down on Dean Foods. The watchdog states Dean Foods has used its flush coffers to lobby for protection in Washington, becoming the organic version of the too-big-to-fail banks. Cornucopia claims one study showed that Horizon milk has lower levels of beneficial nutrients than nearly all of its other organic competitors.

It’s not just Walmart. As organic has passed the $30 billion mark in revenue in the United States, big food interests are successfully watering down the standards such as by allowing moresynthetic ingredients in organic food. Food justice advocates fear that Walmart will intensify that pressure, adapting organic food to its needs as another low-cost input that shortchanges consumers, workers and the environment for a fast buck. And they will probably turn out to be right.

Arun Gupta is a co-founder of The Indypendent and the Occupied Wall Street Journal. He is writing a book on the decline of America empire for Haymarket books.

Why Rural Oregon Is a National Flashpoint in the Corporate GMO Food Wars

  FOOD  

AlterNet / By Steven Rosenfeld

Why Rural Oregon Is a National Flashpoint in the Corporate GMO Food Wars

Oregon’s Rogue Valley will vote in May on banning GMO plants.

Photo Credit: Our Family Farms Coalition

April 23, 2014  |  

It was a performance worthy of a political Oscar. Jordan punctuated his hour-long presentation with endless disclaimers that he wasn’t a GMO expert and his figures were best guesses. But then he declared that Measure 115-19 on May’s ballot would cost his cash-strapped county $260,000 to set up in its first year, and could cost up to $1.7 million to clean up every 20 acres of tainted soil after that. It could require police seize marijuana plants to test whether growers were using a gene-altering spray, he said, which made headlines as Oregon voters are expected to legalize pot this fall. And it even could require the sheriff to send a GMO swat team to Home Depot to remove fresh flowers.Danny Jordan doesn’t look like a hitman for corporate agriculture. But in mid-March, the linebacker-sized county administrator in southwest Oregon delivered his analysis of the costs of a proposed countywide ballot measure banning genetically modified organisms to Jackson County’s governing Board of Commissioners.

“How do you minimize contamination if we are removing carnations from Home Depot,” Jordan said in full seriousness, telling the stone-faced commissioners that the flowers can come from GMO seeds. “I don’t know that it can’t contaminate something. It’s hard for me to give us a cost estimate until we have someone present us with a case.” 

Jordan’s parade of purported horribles was seized by the measure’s opponents for their first wave of exaggeration-filled political ads. Banning GMO plants would impose cuts on the police and library budgets, they began, before making other distorted claims of government overreach. Needless to say, Jordan’s figures, which he inflated by adding items such as the $40,000 cost of the already-scheduled May election and $90,000 for unspecified administrative charges, were about as trustworthy as the name of the opposition PAC behind the ads: Good Neighbor Farmers.

That PAC, which had $536,000 in the bank as of April 15, according to campaign finance records, compared to about $31,000 for the measure’s backers, is hardly homegrown. Six agribusiness and biotech giants creating and selling GMO products—Bayer, BASF, Dow, DuPont, Monsanto and Syngenta—donated more than $450,000 to it in 2014. The GMO-heavy sugar beet and corn industries were the next biggest givers, topping $90,000, with a half-dozen state Farm Bureau chapters from the Great Plains also chipping in.

“Oh God, it’s such garbage information,” said Chris Hardy, reacting to Jordan’s analysis and the negative ads based on it. “It’s misinformation to confuse voters.”

Hardy, who grows herbs, vegetables and seeds, helped draft the proposed GMO ban. He said that the attorneys who wrote it paid careful attention to legal precedents to ensure it would be low-impact and low-cost. It’s similar to a GMO ban adopted in Marin County, Calif., in 2004, where Deputy Agricultural Commissioner Stefan Parnay said this week that the law has cost very little. It’s also based on an existing Jackson County ordinance requiring fruit orchard owners to get rid of pests that could spread and harm other trees. In most cases, the county sends a notice to a landowner as a last resort, which is exactly the opposite of the opposition’s shrill messaging.

“The measure will divert taxpayer dollars away from public safety, libraries, extension programs and other county services,” their website declared, echoing their broadcast ads. “Farmers would be subject to complaints, inspections and legal fees, even if they do not grow GMO crops… Finally, the measure could also prohibit certain ornamental flowers, nursery plants, lawn seed and even some strains of medical marijuana.”

In short, southwestern Oregon’s Rogue Valley has become the latest frontier in Big Ag’s brazen efforts to extinguish any citizen uprising that rejects biotech-based farming. 

“We’re at a fork in the road,” said Hardy, who’s not naïve about the stakes in this fight. “We either have to chose multinational corporations as the future of agriculture, or we have to show up in May and choose Measure 15-119 as the future of agriculture in the region. They are non-compatible.”

Capitalism Versus Democracy

Oregon’s Jackson County, with the small cities of Medford and Ashland, verdant Rogue Valley and a total population of 204,000, is on agribusiness’ radar for a simple reason. If the GMO plant ban wins, it could become a crack in the legal armor protecting its profits.

Across the nation, there have been many ballot initiatives and legislation to require food makers using GMO-based ingredients to say so in their labeling. Most of these measures have not beenapproved by voters after massive, industry-led disinformation campaigns, such as in Washington and California in 2013. Labeling laws passed by state legislatures, such as in Vermont over hormones injected into cows to increase milk yields, have been thrown out by conservative federal judges who have ruled that such pro-consumer labeling infringes on corporate speech rights. That is the same legal reasoning that has kept graphic images off cigarette boxes. But 15-119 takes a different tack by trying to ban the GMO plants.

Jackson County’s measure was drafted, Hardy said, because the region was at a fork in the road. On one side, it was increasingly growing organic produce and plants. On the other side was the introduction of GMO sugar beets on several dozen parcels leased to Syngenta, a Swiss company that has been planting the seeds in the fall, letting them flower in the spring, and uprooting the young plants for resale across the U.S., said Brian Comnes, who co-wrote the GMO ban with Hardy. “Syngenta has said those plants are worth $55 million to them,” he said. “They charge $160 per plant.” 

The problem is organic crops can be imperiled by GMO pollen. That’s because a plant’s pollen—GMO or not—is carried by the wind and can taint other plant’s genetics. A well-known caseoccurred last year in Oregon with GMO wheat. That’s also the fear with sugar beets, Hardy said, which are related to chard, a leafy organic vegetable. A handful of local organic growers won’t even plant chard varieties any more, he said, fearing they would no longer be certified as organic.

“It effects us all,” Hardy said. “You have to know what it is to have pollen from a multi-national corporation trespass across your land, and then have your market broker call you up and say that he can’t sell it—they’d just tested it and they don’t want to deal with you anymore. There already is a chilling effect here in the Rogue Valley with our non-GMO farmers… Mother Nature will do what Mother Nature does. You can’t stop it.”   

Big Ag and biotech giants know how farmers like Hardy feel and have been very busy trying to stop their no-GMO efforts. Last year, industry lobbyists were almost entirely successful in ensuring that Oregon did not follow California and Washington with anti-GMO laws. The Legislature passed Senate Bill 863, an “emergency” bill, which barred every local government jurisdictions from enacting GMO laws. The explanation given was such an important issue needed to be regulated on a statewide basis. But Jackson County’s no-GMO ordinance predated S.B. 863, so it could still be put to a vote. On the other hand, similar but newer anti-GMO measures in a handful of other counties are in legal limbo as a result of S.B. 863, such as in nearby Lake County.

The industry-led disinformation campaign against the proposed GMO plant ban has been as predictable as it is cynical. Beyond all the fiscal fear-mongering, it’s worth noting who would really be affected by a GMO ban—besides the several dozen parcels leased to Syngenta for its beet seedlings.

This is where the full bluster, hyperbole, misinformation and stakes come into clear view. According to the most recent U.S. Census reports, there are slightly under 2,000 farms in Jackson County. Most are backyard hobby operations. Only 274 earn more than $20,000 a year; 120 earn more than $50,000; 22 earn more than $500,000, Census reported.

Hardy said he has been talking to farmers for years about GMOs and that he only knows of four local farmers who admit to using GMO seeds—not leasing land. One grows corn, which is not a big local crop. One grows sugar beets, he said, and two others grow alfalfa grass. That means out of the 120 farmers making $50,000 through farming, only 3.3 percent appear to be impacted by the proposed ban. If you add those farms to the four-dozen leased-land sugar-beet operations, that makes an estimated 52 property owners out of county’s 1,976 farm parcels (according to the Census), or 2.6 percent.

“I don’t think people know that,” Hardy said, speaking of how few people are making money from GMO plants in Jackson County. “How would people know that? There are no statistics on it. You know who would know? Monsanto, Syngenta, that’s who. They make you sign contracts when they buy their seeds. They won’t tell you.”

But if less than 4 percent of Jackson County’s farms are using GMO seeds, the political coalition defending GMOs has 94 percent of the available cash to use for political ads in the final weeks of the election, according to reports filed with the Secretary of State as of April 15. The opponents have $536,000 in cash on hand, while the proponents have about $31,000—a 17-to-1 ratio. This disparity perfectly illustrates how big money can distort elections, especially at the local level, giving more power and a bigger microphone to a much smaller but far wealthier faction.

Deeper Ironies

Like any well-financed political campaign, the opposition is seasoned enough to have a local face. Lee Bradshaw is a cattle rancher who opposes the GMO measure and helped create the Good Neighbor Farmers PAC. When reached by phone, he confirmed that the only local GMO crops are sugar beets and alfalfa—where seeds are modified to make the hay grass resistant to a common pesticide.

Bradshaw complained about the proposed ordinance’s costs, citing County Administrator Danny Jordan’s report as the authoritative source. “We laid off 12 or 13 sheriffs, cut 4-H, shut our libraries,” he said, saying the county could not afford to police GMO plants.

Actually, voters in May will be considering two other ballot measures, one that would create a dedicated funding stream for libraries and another that would do the same for agricultural education. There’s also a hot county sheriff’s race—which underscores why Jordan’s inclusion of the election’s cost in his analysis of the GMO measure’s costs was not exactly honest. Moreover, Hardy said those measure’s authors support banning GMO plants, and have said that the GMO ordinance would not impact their future funding.

Bradshaw also did not choose to see the apparent contradiction that GMO pollen was already infringing on others’ land—even as he said his top issue was property rights.

“It’s kind of being pushed on us,” he said. “It’s an invasion of property rights. My family has been here since 1856. My biggest deal is private property rights. I don’t even farm. I raise livestock. I think the next thing will be crop controls.”

Bradshaw wouldn’t say what political messaging was coming before the May 20vote. But it will likely be a mix of television and radio ads, and mailers and newspaper inserts. City dwellers will likely be told they can’t buy lawn seeds, footnoted by Jordan’s report. Rural residents will hear about potential land grabs and legal invasions, if the “Myth vs. Fact” page on the opposition’s website is a guide.   

The proponents will be using their grassroots network of neighbor-to-neighbor contacts, leaving brochures on doors and other low-budget messaging. “We can continue to do what we are doing,” Hardy said, “which is asking what the future of agriculture and the future of food looks like in the Rogue Valley.” 

It’s also an open question if the county’s voters will hear about the experience of other counties that have banned GMO plants and found that doing so hasn’t cost very much. That’s been the case in both Marin and Santa Cruz counties, according to senior agricultural officials in those California locales.

“Most of our ranchers and other producers are sustainably minded; three-quarters of the dairies are organic,” said Stefan Parnay, Marin’s Deputy Agricultural Commissioner. “We’re fortunate in that sense. In Marin County, because of how it farms, it hasn’t been an issue for us.”

Santa Cruz County Agriculture Commissioner Mary Lou Nicoletti said her county grows mostly fruits and vegetables, not GMO plants such as canola, corn, “or any of the crops that are grown with genetically modified organisms.”

“To be honest, there’s a lot of [biotech] research going on with fruits and vegetables, but nothing that I know of is being marketed,” she said. “Right now, we aren’t having any cost to enforce this. Five to 10 years from now, that could be different.” 

Turning Point

As Hardy said, Jackson County is at a fork in the road, with one path pointing to organic farming and smaller-scale production, and another pointing to the GMO-based door that big ag and biotech corporations want to push open. That’s why hundreds of thousands of dollars have poured into the county to fight the GMO plant ban. That’s why the county’s conservative Board of Commissioners generated an official report they knew would delight big industry and fuel its exaggeration- and distortion-filled political ads. 

“It’s a complete misinformation campaign,” Hardy said. “There is no way for the voters to stay informed in what the truth is. They’re flooding the airwaves with all kinds of misinformation. You’ve got to do your own homework on it.”

But there still may be a ray of hope for the no-GMO side. According to Chris Walker, the county clerk and election director, the public is paying attention and the political money being spent is not the only local record that may be broken. She expects voter turnout will exceed 50 percent, compared to past primaries where it has hovered around 37 percent.

In other words, Jackson County’s voters might just take a hard look at all the corporate-sponsored propaganda and side with most local farmers, saying no to GMO.

Steven Rosenfeld covers national political issues for AlterNet, including America's retirement crisis, the low-wage economy, democracy and voting rights, and campaigns and elections. He is the author of "Count My Vote: A Citizen's Guide to Voting" (AlterNet Books, 2008).

The Miracle of Tea Tree Oil: 80 Amazing Uses for Survival

Activist Post

Interrupt Your Regularly Scheduled Programming

The Miracle of Tea Tree Oil: 80 Amazing Uses for Survival

Gaye Levy

Activist Post

Essential oils have been used for healing and medicinal purposes for centuries and most certainly long before we had pills, capsules and big pharma to take care of our medical woes. And while there is a place for manufactured pharmaceuticals in our survival medicine kit, there exists the possibility that none will be available or that they will be in such scarce supply that they should be reserved for only the most dire of circumstances.

For that reason, many preppers and individuals seeking self-reliance are learning to use essential oils to manage the both routine and not-so-routine maladies that occur in daily life. There are about a dozen or so essential oils that belong in every survival kit including tea tree, peppermint, lavender, clove, rosemary and lemon among others. All of these essential oils have healing properties but today I would like to focus on just one, tea tree oil.

A Brief History Of Tea Tree Oil

It is believed that the Aborigines of Australia have been using the leaves of the indigenous Malaleuca Tree (whose leaves are used to make tea tree oil) in their medications for centuries. They inhaled the oils from the crushed leaves to treat coughs and colds, sprinkled crushed leaves on their wounds and used an infusion of soaked leaves to treat sore throats or skin ailments.

Use of the oil itself, as opposed to the un-extracted plant material, did not become common practice until researcher Arthur Penfold published the first reports of its antimicrobial activity in a series of papers in the 1920s and 1930s. In evaluating the antimicrobial activity, he found that tea tree oil was 11 times more active than phenol.

The commercial tea tree oil industry was born shortly thereafter although interest in tea tree oil ebbed after World War II, presumably due to the development of effective antibiotics and the waning image of natural products. Interest was rekindled in the 1970s as part of the general renaissance of interest in natural products.

80 USES OF TEA TREE OIL FOR SURVIVAL

For thousands of years, the derivatives of the Malaleuca Tree have been effective in treating a wide variety of ailments. Here are 80 reasons why you should use it, too!

Abrasions & Minor Cuts: After cleaning the area well, apply a few drops of the oil directly. If a bandage is needed, allow a few drops of the oil to penetrate a cotton ball, then lay it face down on the wound with a bandage on top.

Acne: Add a drop to your normal cleansing routine or dab a very small amount on acne breakouts. You can also add 20 – 40 drops of the oil to your regular face wash.

Air Freshener: Keep a supply of cotton balls soaked in tea tree oil packed away in a plastic bag or tin. When confronted with foul smells from cooking, musty orders from dampness or even the medicinal smell in a sick room, take a few out the freshen the air and remove the nasty smell.

Allergies: Use topically by massaging into the chest, abdomen or the reflex points of the feet.

Arthritis: To help reduce pain associated with the swelling of arthritis, add 20 drops of tea tree oil to 2 ounces of grapeseed or other carrier oil. Massage into affected area 2-3 times a day.

Asthma: Add a few drops of oil to a pan of water and heat on stove. When cooling, drape a towel over head and breath in for a few minutes.

Athletes Foot: Clean feet thoroughly, especially between toes. Add oil directly to feet every two weeks, dusting with corn starch after. Or add 10 drops oil to 1 tbsp of grapeseed or other carrier oil and massage on feet and between toes daily.

Baby Care: Keep your diaper pail clean and fresh with a spray of tea tree oil mixed with water.

Bacterial Infections: Use topically, either massaging into the reflex points of the feet, adding several drops to a bath or cautiously applying over an infected site.

Bad Breath: Rinse with 1 ounce water and 1 drop oil. Do not swallow!

Bladder Infection: In a shallow bath, add 10 – 15 drops of oil. Sit and wash area carefully.

Blisters: Wash area carefully, then apply as for cuts and wounds.

Boils: Apply a warm washcloth for a few minutes. Then apply a drop or two of oil to the area – the infection should rise to surface and eventually be released.

Bronchial Congestion: Use as directed for Asthma. Add 5 – 10 drops to 1 ounce of carrier oil, and massage into chest and throat 2 – 3 times daily.

Bronchitis: Add 1-2 drops to a pan of hot water and breath in the steam, or massage the oil over the chest.

Bruises: After icing, apply oil as directed for Arthritis.

Bunions: Massage area with 5 drops oil to 1 tbsp. of carrier oil.

Burns: Run icy cold water on area. After a few minutes, add a mix of 5 drops oil with 1 tsp. raw honey. Repeat 3 – 5 times daily.

Calluses & Corns: Massage area with 5 drops oil to 1 tbsp. of carrier oil. Repeat 2 times daily. Once the corn or calluses have become soft use tweezers to remove, and apply a few drops of tea tree oil and cover with bandage.

Canker Sores: Apply a drop or two of oil directly to infected area with a cotton swab, 2 times daily. Also, rinse as directed for bad breath.

Carbuncles: Add a drop or two of oil to cotton swab and apply directly to carbuncle. Repeat twice daily.

Chapped Lips: Add 1 or 2 drops of oil to lip balm. Apply to lips as necessary.

Chicken Pox: Apply a drop of oil directly to blisters. Allow to dry, then dust with corn starch. Repeat every few hours or until blisters disappear.

Chigger Bites: Apply a drop of oil directly to bites.

Cold Sores: Apply a drop or two of oil directly to the sore with a cotton swab. Re-apply 2 – 3 times daily.

Coughs: Use as directed for bronchial infections. For a vaporizer, add 10 drops to steamer and leave on 5 – 10 minutes.

Dandruff: Add 20 – 30 drops oil to any shampoo. Apply a few drops to scalp and massage after washing.

Dermatitis: Add 10 drops oil to 1 tbsp of grapeseed or other oil and massage into affected areas. Repeat 2-3 times daily.

Dry Skin: Add 5 drops oil to 1 tbsp sweet almond oil. Massage into skin.

Earache and Infection: Add 2 – 3 drops of oil to 2 tbsp warm olive oil. With a dropper, drop a small amount into aching ear, tilting head to one side for a moment. Use cotton swab to absorb oil. Repeat 2 – 3 times daily.

Eczema: Add 10 drops oil to 1 tbsp grapeseed oil or coconut oil and massage into affected areas. Repeat 2-3 times daily. Also can be applied undiluted.

Emphysema: Use as directed for bronchial infections. For a vaporizer, add 10 drops to steamer and leave on 5 – 10 minutes.

Flea Bites: Apply a drop of oil directly to bites.

Gout: Add 10 drops of oil to 2 tbsp of carrier oil; massage into affected area 2-3 times a day.

Gum Disease: Create a mouthwash with purified water, 1 drop of peppermint oil and 1 drop of tea tree oil.

Head Lice: Add 20 drops of oil to 2 tbsp shampoo. Massage into scalp and hair, leave on for 10 minutes. Rinse. Repeat 3 – 4 times daily, until eggs are gone.

Hives: Add 10 drops of oil to 4 tbsp of witch hazel. Apply with cotton ball. Or, mix with coconut oil (which is naturally healing and soothing itself) and gently apply to the infected areas.

Homemade Mouthwash: Make a simple homemade mouthwash with purified water and tea tree oil.

Household Cleaning: Can be used aromatically or added to homemade cleaners to kill germs and prevent the spread of colds and flus. You can make a general tea tree cleaner by combining 2 teaspoons of tea tree oil with 2 cups of water in a spray bottle. Shake to blend and use for household cleaning tasks. This is especially good in the bathroom and in toilets.

Immune System: To stimulate the immune system, diffuse through the air on a regular basis, massage into the soles of the feet to increase your immune response.

Infected Wounds: Adding the oil to steaming water, hold the infected area over the steam. Or dilute 1 drop of tea tree with 1 cup of water and rinse the infected area 1-2 times a day, as needed.

Inflammation: Massage over the inflamed areas, gently and always toward the heart, or diffuse and inhale the tea tree oil directly or indirectly.

Ingrown Hairs: Add 1 – 2 drops of oil directly to area. Repeat every 2 hours or until signs of infection disappear.

Insect Repellant: Add 15 drops to a quart of water and use as an effective insect repellent.

Jock Itch: Apply 10 – 15 drops of oil to 2 tbsp of carrier oil. Apply 2 times daily. Dust with corn starch, to reduce chapping.

Laryngitis: Add 5 – 10 drops of oil and pinch of sea salt to 1 cup of warm water, gargle 2-3 times a day. Do not swallow!

Laundry Helper: Add 1/2 teaspoon tea tree oil to your laundry for towels and other fabric prone to getting moldy.

Mildew and Mold Remover: Spray an all-purpose cleaner made with 2 teaspoons of tea tree oil and 2 cups of water on growing mold and mildew. Shake well before using and do not rinse.

Mosquito Bites: Apply a drop of oil directly to bites.

Muscle Aches and Pains: Add 10-15 drops of oil to half cup Epsom salts, and dissolve in bath. Add 10 drops of oil to 2 tbsp of carrier oil. Massage well.

Mumps: Massage over the body and into the feet, and diffuse through the home.

Nail Fungus: Add 1 – 2 drops of oil directly to nail and the surrounding tissue. Allow to dry completely on hands before touching anything. Repeat morning and night for a week.

Pest Control: Household ants and other pests dislike Tea Tree Oil, so a few drops put at the point of entry will deter them. Wipe cupboards out with an oil and water solution to keep ants away.

Plantar Warts: Apply oil undiluted to affected area 2-3 times daily.

Psoriasis: Add 10 drops oil to 1 tbsp carrier oil and massage into affected areas. Repeat 2-3 times daily. Also can be applied undiluted.

Rashes: Mix with coconut oil and massage over the affected areas.

Rheumatism: To help reduce pain associated with rheumatism, add 20 drops of tea tree oil to 2 ounces of carrier oil. Massage into affected are 2-3 times a day.

Ringworm: Apply a drop or two of oil undiluted, repeat 2 times daily. Can also mix 1 drop of tea tree oil with 1 drop of lavender oil for added benefit.

Rubella: Dilute as needed and massage into the affected areas.

Scabies: Apply 1 – 2 drops of oil directly to area in the morning and at night.

Sciatica: Add 10 drops oil to 1 tbsp carrier oil and massage into affected areas. Repeat 2-3 times daily. Also can be applied undiluted.

Seborrhea: For skin: Add 10 drops oil to 1 tbsp of carrier oil and massage into affected areas. Repeat 2-3 times daily. For scalp: Add 10 drops of oil to 2 tbsp shampoo. Massage into scalp and hair, leave on for 10 minutes. Rinse. Repeat 3 – 4 times daily. Bath: Add 10-15 drops of oil to bath.

Shingles: Add 10-15 drops of oil to half cup Epsom salts, and dissolve in bath. Add 10 drops of oil to 2 tbsp of grapeseed oil or coconut oil and massage well.

Shock: Massage tea tree oil into the soles of the feet as needed.

Sinusitis: Use as directed for bronchial infections. For a vaporizer, add 10 drops to steamer and leave on 5 – 10 minutes. Also add 2 drops to a neti pot.

Sore muscles: Fill your bathtub with warm water. Add a few drops of tea tree oil to the water to relax tight muscles.

Sore Throat: Add 2 drops of oil to 1 cup of warm water with pinch of sea salt, gargle 2-3 times a day. Do not swallow!

Staph Infection: Best used topically, rubbed into the soles of the feet to increase the immune response and fight infection.

Stye: Add 5 drops oil to a pan of steaming water. Drape towel overhead and steam 5 minutes. Apply warm compresses directly to stye.

Sunburn: Mix 1 TB coconut oil with 1 drop of tea tree and 1 drop of lavender and gently apply to to sunburned areas.

Tattoos: Apply after tattoos to avoid infection. Use undiluted, diluted with coconut oil or as a spray with purified water.

Thrush: Gargle with sea salt, warm water and 1 drop of tea tree.

Ticks: Apply a drop or two directly to the tick and the surrounding area.

Toenail fungus: Rub the tea tree oil directly onto the affected toenail and underneath the tip of the nail. Apply 1 to 2 drops of tea tree oil. Apply the oil once a day, preferably at bedtime.

Toothbrush Cleaner: Apply oil directly to toothbrush 1-2 times a week to kill bacteria.

Tonsillitis: Inhale from steaming water with tea tree, gargle, and massage into neck and soles of feet.

Vaginal Infection: Add several drops to the bath water.

Viral Infections: Diffuse tea tree oil throughout the home or inhale from steaming water.

Warts: Apply undiluted directly to wart. Use morning and night, until wart begins to disappear. Dilute if necessary for sensitive skin.

Wounds: Soak wounded area in water with tea tree oil, or spritz from a bottle of water with several drops of oil. Depending on the wound and your own sensitivity you may be able to apply directly.

A NOTE ABOUT CARRIER OILS

In order to effectively use essential oils – not just tea tree oil – it is often necessary to dilute the essential oil in another oil so that it can be easily spread or massaged on the affected area. These oils are called “carrier” oils. Common carrier oils include coconut oil, grapeseed oil, sweet almond oil, jojoba oil, olive oil and others.

Fractionated coconut oil [remains liquid] and grapeseed oil are favorites because they are odorless and in the case of fractionated coconut oil, immune to rancidity. In practical use, any oil can be used if you do not have one of these more therapeutic oils on hand.

The properties of the various carrier oils is beyond the scope of this article but my favorite? Easy. Fractionated coconut oil. Is is relatively inexpensive, odorless and has a long shelf life making it perfect for the survival kit.

THE FINAL WORD

My first experience with tea tree oil occurred in the '80s when I was faced with a nail fungus that would not go away. The pharmaceutical solutions at the time (and for all I know, even now) were harsh and required frequent monitoring of liver enzymes. For a simple, non-life threatening nail fungus, I chose to pass. After using a topical application of tea tree oil for three months, the fungus was all but gone.

I then became interested in aromatherapy (which uses essential oils). I read every book I could get my hands on and dabbled at creating synergies (a combination of two or more oils that create a chemical compound that is greater than the sum of its individual components). My bible then, and even now, is The Complete Book of Essential Oils and Aromatherapy by Valerie Ann Worwood.

Since then I have used essential oils off and on for a variety of woes and have never been disappointed. My recommendation is that you pick up a few essential oils – and especially some tea tree oil – and start to use them now to supplement any other remedies that you are using to keep your family and your home in tip top shape.

Read other articles by Gaye Levy here.

Enjoy your next adventure through common sense and thoughtful preparation!

Gaye started Backdoor Survival to share her angst and concern about our deteriorating economy and its impact on ordinary, middle-class folks. She also wanted to become a prepper of the highest order and to share her knowledge as she learned it along the way. She considers her sharing of knowledge her way of giving back and as always, we at Activist Post are grateful for her contributions.

If you would like to read more from Gaye Levy, check out her blog at http://www.backdoorsurvival.com/.  You can also visit her Facebook page or sign up for updates by email by clicking on Backdoor Survival Updates.