GENETIC ENGINEERING OF OUR FOOD PRODUCTS...

[lgroves]

If you haven't seen the documentaries "Food, Inc" and "The Future of Food,"  I highly recommend them.  These documentaries nowhere near cover the results of consumption of chemical food additives...if I can find a documentary on this, it would be great...but they show the result of large corporations and politics that allow the patenting of living things.  The grain industry has patented their gentically engineered corn, wheat, soybeans, canola, etc, and if their products cross-polinate, blow into, or otherwise contaminate land where it is not authorized to be grown, the companies that own the patent on these products can sue the farmers found with it in their fields, even though it is there by an act of nature and against their wishes.  Out of fear, these farmers purchase and plant the product to keep from being sued later on the chance their field is accidentally contaminated. 

I found this outrageous.  It seems to me that the farmer should be able to sue the companies for their unwanted product contaminating their fields...not the companies suing farmers for illegally growing their genteically engineered products.  Furthermore, 90% of grain grown in the US is genetically engineered, making it nearly impossible to purchase grain products from the store that are not made with genetically engineered grains.  This brings a whole new outlook on non-organic food products.  I have always chosen carefully based on chemical additives, but before watching these documentaries, I had no idea the magnitude of genetic engineering and the results of it to the consumer. 

Monsanto, the largest corporation of genetic engineering of grains, has many board members or officers in the EPA or some other part of the government, so they are able to continue on receiving patents, and the consumer is kept in the dark.  It was said that they currently have 11,000 patents.  Patents that farmers can be acused of illegally growing just by cross-contamination.  It seems the farming industry of our country has become what it is more out of fear of not "crossing over" moreso than because they need the extra dollar.  In fact, farmers actually lose money, approximately $1 per bushel, and the government then subsidizes their income with taxpayer money to keep them farming these engineered products.  Farmers who may otherwise choose to grow natural or organic are practically being bullied into the world of genetic engineering.  And this is just in the grain industry...this does not include animal production for consumption.

Just a brief on the aforementioned subject...there are 13 slaughterhouses nationwide for the mass slaughtering of meat.  Just 13 across this entire nation.  And only four companies that produce meat.  All cattle, hog, and poultry farmers across the US are raising their livestock for one of only four major companies.  These companies have bought out the smaller companies, becoming large enough to run the meat industry at such a magnitude that it can more-or-less be called a takeover.  The more they control, the less we can.  And, of course, there is zero help from our government.  The EPA, FDA, and even the Supreme Court, have all sided with the large corporations.  All we can do is not purchase their products.  Quite frankly, I'm afraid boycotting all products containing additives or genetic engineering could mean starvation!!  There are very few options in my neck of the woods for buying locally grown...especially in the cold months where there is not a farmer's market. 

Here are links to the trailers of:

The Future of Food

Food, Inc

I found the documentaries on Netflix.  Track them down, they are very eye-opening!

[mandysmom90]

Wow, I'll have to watch those documentaries....that whole meat takeover is freaky! The world really scares me sometimes..

[Mom2Jack04]

Yep I've seen them several times.

The Future of Food is even available to watch anytime FREE on http://www.hulu.com/