Plastics Are Going From Your Clothes To Waterways and Then Right Into Your Food (Video)

There's a hidden toxic cost of synthetic fabrics. Tiny, invisible microplastics are entering our waterways straight from our washing machines. About 2,000 synthetic particles are released from washing a single polyester fleece jacket. All clothing items—including cotton and wool—shed micro-fibers when washed, but the natural fibers biodegrade. Synthetic particles don't degrade and can absorb toxins while traveling through the waterways. If they're eaten by small organisms, such as fish, they can bioaccumulate and end up on our dinner plates.

African Farmers Sold Out by an African Organization — It Seals Secret Deal on Plant Variety Protection

As was widely feared, the contentious protocol on seed was adopted at the regional meeting in Arusha, Tanzania. The protocol’s underlying imperatives are to increase corporate seed imports, reduce breeding activity at the national level, and facilitate the monopoly by foreign companies of local seed systems and the disruption of traditional farming systems.


By Bernard Guri
On 06 July 2015, in Arusha, Tanzania, a Diplomatic Conference held under the auspices of the African Regional Intellectual Property Organization (ARIPO) adopted a harmonized regional legal framework for the protection of plant breeders’ rights—the Arusha Protocol for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants (the ‘Arusha PVP Protocol’).

The Arusha PVP Protocol is a slightly revised version of a previous Draft ARIPO Protocol for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants (the ‘ARIPO PVP Protocol’). The previous Draft has come under consistent and severe attack by the Alliance for Food Sovereignty in Africa (AFSA) because it is based on a Convention known as UPOV 1991—a restrictive and inflexible international legal precept, totally unsuitable for Africa. Crucially, the ARIPO PVP Protocol proposed extremely strong intellectual property rights to breeders while restricting the age-old practices of African farmers freely to save, use, share and sell seeds and/or propagating material. These practices are the backbone of agricultural systems in Sub-Saharan Africa; they have ensured the production and maintenance of a diverse pool of genetic resources by farmers themselves, and have safe-guarded food and nutrition for tens of millions of Africans in the ARIPO region.

The Arusha PVP Protocol is part of the broader thrust in Africa to ensure regionally seamless and expedited trade in commercially bred seed varieties for the benefit, mainly, of the foreign seed industry. Multinational seed companies intend to lay claim to seed varieties as their private possessions and to prevent others from using these varieties without the payment of royalties.

Germplasm developed by farming households over centuries is increasingly under threat of privatization; and ecologically embedded farming practices risk being destabilized and dislodged. The broader modernization thrust of which the Arusha PVP Protocol is an intrinsic part, is designed to facilitate the transformation of African agriculture from peasant-based production to inherently inequitable, inappropriate and ecologically damaging Green Revolution/industrial agriculture. Such a transformation will lead to many farming households being threatened with marginalization or extinction, without alternative options for survival. It is worthwhile to note that a 2002 Food and Agriculture Organization and World Bank study, the International Assessment of Knowledge, Science and Technology (IAASTD), strongly recommended a complete shift away from the Green Revolution’s industrial agriculture to agroecology.

EXCLUSION OF AFRICAN CIVIL SOCIETY

Despite AFSA’s well-established track record of constructive engagement with ARIPO on the Draft ARIPO PVP Protocol, and despite it being a Pan African network of African regional farmers and NGOs, working with millions of African farmers and consumers, AFSA was purposely excluded from the Arusha deliberations. This restriction stands in sharp contrast to inclusion in the deliberations of the UPOV Secretariat, and other foreign entities, including the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) the European Community Plant Variety Office (CPVO) and the French National Seed and Seedling Association (GNIS). The commercial seed industry (e.g. the African Seed Trade Association (AFSTA)) was particularly well represented.

The Arusha PVP Protocol has major implications for national decision-making. AFSA’s exclusion is a violation of the right of farmers to participate in decision-making on matters related to plant genetic resources for food and agriculture (Article 9.2(c ) of the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture (ITPGRFA).

LEAST DEVELOPED COUNTRIES AND SUI GENERIS OPTIONS

Upon adoption, the Arusha PVP Protocol was immediately signed by representatives of the governments of Ghana, Mozambique, Sao Tome and Principe, and the Gambia. Ironically, Mozambique, the Gambia and Sao Tome and Principe are defined as Least Developed Countries (LDCs), along with a further 10 of the 19 members of ARIPO—some of the poorest countries in the world. LDCs are currently not under any international obligation to provide any form of plant variety protection until 2021, let alone one based on UPOV 1991! In any event, all countries have an option to develop sui generis (i.e. unique) plant variety protection systems that cater for their specific conditions. Acceptance of the Arusha PVP Protocol will eliminate this option. Smaller countries are bullied into accepting their subordination to regional bodies that are dominated by more powerful foreign countries and multinational corporate interests.

NATIONAL SOVEREIGNTY AND SLIGHT CHANGES

During the deliberations in Arusha, several delegations raised serious concerns that the Draft ARIPO PVP Protocol eroded national sovereignty because of the extensive decision-making powers vested in the ARIPO Plant Breeders Rights Office (PBRO), which operates at a regional level. The government of Malawi, in particular, said that this would “have a demeaning and nullifying effect”. Consequently, after long hours of negotiation, changes were made that now give Contracting States an explicit right to object to any Plant Breeders’ Right (PBR)—as granted by the ARIPO PBRO, regionally—in which event the PBR will not be awarded national protection. Further, Contracting States and not the ARIPO PBRO will have the right to issue compulsory licenses in the public interest. Notwithstanding these changes, a centralized regional PVP approval system will be established and the ARIPO PBRO will have full authority to grant and administer breeders’ rights on behalf of all Contracting States (e.g. to decide whether or not to grant protection, nullify or cancel PBRs, etc.). These regionally granted PBRs will have a uniform effect in all Contracting States. Expediently, Contracting States will be required to put scarce public resources at the disposal of breeders to enforce breeders’ rights at the national level.

RATIFICATIONS AND JOINING UPOV 1991—SHIRKING THE ITPGRFA

The Arusha PVP Protocol will come into force when four member states of ARIPO ratify it. In April 2014 the UPOV Council, at the cost of breaking its own rules, verified that the Draft ARIPO PVP Protocol conformed to the 1991 Act of the UPOV Convention, allowing ARIPO itself as well as ARIPO Members that ratify the Protocol, to become a Party to the 1991 UPOV Convention. With the new changes, to become a member of UPOV 1991, ARIPO will have to re-submit the Arusha PVP Protocol to the UPOV Council, to reassess its conformity with the 1991 Act.

AFSA calls on UPOV members to reject the Arusha PVP Protocol. On numerous occasions AFSA has challenged the legitimacy of the whole process—leading up to and culminating in the adoption of the Arusha PVP Protocol.

AFSA has also indicated, in many public statements during discussions on the Protocol, that UPOV 1991 restricts farmers’ rights to save, exchange and sell farm-saved-seed and/or the propagating material of protected varieties in their possession. Farmers’ rights are recognised in the ITPGRFA yet this has been ignored by the fourteen member states of ARIPO that are also Parties to the ITPGRFA. By adopting the Arusha PVP Protocol these countries have placed the rights of plant breeders ahead of farmers’ rights.

AFSA VOWS TO CONTINUE STRUGGLE FOR SEED SOVEREIGNTY

AFSA is vehemently opposed to the Arusha PVP Protocol. This Protocol’s underlying imperatives are to increase corporate seed imports, reduce breeding activity at the national level, and facilitate the monopoly by foreign companies of local seed systems and the disruption of traditional farming systems. AFSA remains committed to ensuring that farmers, as breeders and users, remain at the centre of localised seed production systems and continue to exercise their rights freely to save, use, exchange, replant, improve, distribute and sell all the seed in their seed systems.


_____________
CONTACT
Bernard Guri, Chair of AFSA Board: Email:guribern@gmail.com

NOTES TO EDITOR:

1. Eighteen Member States of the Organization were represented at the Diplomatic Conference namely; Botswana, The Gambia, Ghana, Kenya, Liberia, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, Rwanda, São Tomé and Príncipe, Sierra Leone, Sudan, Swaziland, United Republic of Tanzania, Uganda Zambia and Zimbabwe.
2. International Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants (UPOV).
3. For more information on AFSA’s detailed position on the Draft ARIPO PVP Protocol, please click here. .
4. UPOV breaking its own rules to tie-in African countrieshttp://www.apbrebes.org/press-release/upov-breaking-its-own-rules-tie-african-countries.

Reprinted with permission from Pambazuka News.

How We Got Duped into Believing Milk is Necessary for Healthy Bones — Another Marketing Scam by the Food Industry

By Julia Belluz
Several years ago, Alissa Hamilton investigated America's love affair with orange juice in her book Squeezed. She uncovered all sorts of misconceptions about the breakfast staple's virtuousness (most of the health claims about orange juice and vitamin C are inflated) and its origins (most OJ actually comes from Brazil, not Florida).

Now Hamilton has trained her sight on another much-loved beverage: milk. In Got Milked? she argues that milk is not the healthy bone-builder governments and the dairy industry have led us to believe. I spoke with her about our big milk misconceptions, how milk became such a pervasive commodity, and whether there are better places to get calcium.

Julia Belluz: First you waged war on the orange juice industry in Squeezed. Now you're suggesting we're getting bilked by the milk industry. Why did you look at milk?

Alissa Hamilton: The book started to take shape when my best friend growing up was visiting in the summer with her mom and two-and-a-half-year-old son. Neither of us grew up in households where milk was essential with breakfast, lunch, and dinner. We didn’t have parents who pushed milk on us.

So I was really surprised when she said, "I haven’t given Oscar milk yet, and he’s two and a half now. What do I do?" She had this uncharacteristic desperation in her voice. When I looked at her funny and reminded her that we didn’t have glasses of milk growing up, she seemed kind of confused. On an academic level, she knows nobody needs milk to be healthy and grow tall and strong. But she seemed to have bought into this idea that if you don’t drink milk, you’re missing something.

JB: What common themes did you find underlie our misconceptions about these beverages?

AH: Marketing. Both [orange juice and milk] have been marketed as these healthy products that people don’t even really question. With orange juice, it’s [marketed as] an essential part of a balanced breakfast. With milk, it’s an essential part of a balanced diet. We've bought into all of that marketing.

JB: How did milk win its staple status in our food universe?

AH: We've had school milk programs and milk in schools since the beginning of the century. During World War II, we needed to boost milk production in order to make processed dairy products to send to soldiers overseas. But farmers weren’t producing enough to meet this demand because they weren’t getting paid enough. So the government decided, "Great, we’ll create demand for milk by giving milk to our kids, and that way we’ll have a demand for the fluid milk and we can make the processed products we need for soldiers."

So war was part of it. Convenience is also part of it. As people moved to the city and women started working away from home, cow’s milk became seen as a convenient way to give babies nutrition if women weren’t able to be home breastfeeding all the time. And as the dairy industry grows, farmers have an incentive to try to boost demand with government subsidies of dairy.

I can’t say which one of these many different forces did it, but it’s just a combination that has led to this health halo around milk. I think what’s more troubling is how deeply ingrained the idea has become and how inaccurate many of our assumptions about milk are.

JB: What are our most inaccurate assumptions about milk?

AH: Milk is the only food that makes up an entire food group. If you look at it logically, it doesn’t deserve that special status any more than pumpkin seeds deserve that just because they’re high in magnesium — which is an essential nutrient Americans are low in.

Even the dairy industry recognizes that milk is not essential to health. They can’t counter that fact. Their comeback is that milk and milk products are the most convenient form of calcium. But that argument doesn’t hold anymore.

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Diet Soda Drinkers Gained Almost Triple the Amount of Belly Fat than Non-Drinkers — According to 10-Year Study

Photo by globochem3x1minus1.

By RTT
You are wrong if you thought diet soda was healthier as they use artificial sweeteners. A new study found that people who regularly drink diet soda gain about triple the abdominal fat compared to non-drinkers.

According to a study published in the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society, people who daily drank diet soda for about 10 years gained almost triple the abdominal fat than those who did not drink diet soda.

The waist circumferences of diet soda drinkers gained about 2.11 centimeters, while non-users gained 0.77 centimeters around the waist. Daily consumers gained a whopping 3.04 centimeters, while occasional users' waist increased 1.76 cm.

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In the Age of Extinction, Which Species Can We Least Afford to Lose?

Top species on the extinction list: "Birds". (Screen capture from
YouTube video)

By Tracy McVeigh
The threatened extinction of the tiger in India, the perilous existence of the orangutan in Indonesia, the plight of the panda: these are wildlife emergencies with which we have become familiar. They are well-loved animals that no one wants to see disappear. But now scientists fear the real impact of declining wildlife could be closer to home, with the threat to creatures such as ladybirds posing the harshest danger to biodiversity.

Climate change, declining numbers of animals, rising numbers of humans and the rapid rate of species extinction mean a growing number of scientists now declare us to be in the Anthropocene – the geological age of extinction when humans finally dominate the ecosystems.

Last week a report from WWF, the Living Planet Index 2014, seemed to confirm that grim picture with statistics on the world's wildlife population which showed a dramatic reduction in numbers across countless species. The LPI showed the number of vertebrates had declined by 52% over four decades. Biodiversity loss has now reached "critical levels". Some populations of mammals, birds, reptiles and amphibians have suffered even bigger losses, with freshwater species declining by 76% over the same period. But it's the creatures that provide the most "natural capital" or "ecosystem services" that are getting many scientists really worried. Three quarters of the world's food production is thought to depend on bees and other pollinators such as hoverflies. Never mind how cute a panda is or how stunning a tiger, it's worms that are grinding up our waste and taking it deep into the soil to turn into nutrients, bats that are catching mosquitoes and keeping malaria rates down. A study in North America has valued the loss of pest control from ongoing bat declines at more than $22bn in lost agricultural productivity.

"It's the loss of the common species that will impact on people. Not so much the rarer creatures, because by the very nature of their rarity we're not reliant on them in such an obvious way," said Dr Nick Isaac, a macroecologist at the NERC Centre for Ecology & Hydrology in Oxfordshire. He says that recent work he and colleagues have been doing suggests that Britain's insects and other invertebrates are declining just as fast as vertebrates, with "serious consequences for humanity". "The really interesting thing about this work is that we are learning that it's not just about the numbers of species going extinct, but the actual numbers in a population; that's the beginning of a fundamental shift in our understanding," he says.

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