If you’ve ever found yourself arguing about whether eating meat is healthy for you and the planet and, if so, which meat
to eat, you now have some answers. The Environmental Working Group (EWG), which brought us the “Dirty Dozen,” a list of the 12 most pesticide-ridden fruits and vegetables, released a report today showcasing the carbon footprint of 20 conventionally grown popular protein sources, from lentils to lamb.
To come up with the carbon impact, the EWG looked at the food’s full “lifecycle”—including the water and fertilizer to grow feed crops, transportation of the food and even the amount of food that’s wasted.
The biggest take-away: eat less meat and avoid wasting it (20% of edible meat ends up being tossed). Why should you care? The implications of this report are twofold—environmental and personal health. On the environmental side, the United Nations recently determined that livestock is one of the top contributors to the world’s most serious environmental problems. Going meatless can reduce water pollution, waste and greenhouse gases, and save energy, land and water. As for personal health, science shows that eliminating or cutting back on meat may improve blood pressure, decrease your risk of heart disease, lower cholesterol and help better manage your weight.
The EWG’s full list of 20 “meats and other protein” sources includes vegetables like broccoli and tomatoes that, while having a low carbon footprint also deliver very little protein (around 1 to 2 grams per serving). (To find out what ranked best, worst and in between on the full list of 20 protein choices, click here.)
Source Article :
The #1 best protein for your health (and the worst to avoid) by the editors of Eating Well Magazine
Environmental Working Group Organization
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Arsenic in chicken raised in factory farms 
The U.S. FDA has announced that Pfizer will stop the sale of the animal drug 3-Nitro. The drug is used in chicken feed, but an agency analysis detected inorganic arsenic in the livers of chickens treated with the drug. 3-Nitro is used to help control coccidiosis, a parasitic disease that affects the intestinal tracts of animals, and also so that the chickens will gain more weight.
The Wall Street Journal reports: on June 8, 2011
“The agency said it recently conducted a study of 100 broiler chickens that detected inorganic arsenic at higher levels in the livers of chickens treated with 3-Nitro compared with untreated chickens … Pfizer said sale of 3-Nitro would be stopped by early July in order to allow animal producers to transition to other treatments.”
For more on this matter read Dr Mercola’s article.
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Pesticides are killing Honeybee population worldwide.
A new generation of pesticides could be to blame for Britain’s vanishing honeybees, a study has shown. The chemicals, which are routinely used on farms and garden centers, attack the central systems of insects and make bee colonies more vulnerable to disease and pests, researchers say. The new study, led by Dr Jeffrey Pettis, one of the U.S.’s top bee experts, found that exposure to a class of pesticides called neo-nicotinoids makes bees more susceptible to infection – even at doses too low to be detected in the creature’s bodies.
Neo-nicotinoids, which were introduced in the 1990s, are applied to seeds and are found in low levels throughout a growing plant – including in its pollen and nectar. They were introduced to replace the controversial organo phosphates because they appeared to be harmless to mammals and people. Neo-nicotinoids is used on a large scale on plantation crops of rape seed oil, wheat and sugar and in garden center plants. The U.S. research has yet to be published, but it is discussed in a new documentary film called ‘The Strange Disappearance of The Bees’ and ‘The Vanishing of The Bees’.
Source: www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech…
In California, honeybees are essential in the almond season, with a 40 billion bee team needed to pollinate about 60 million tress in the Central Valley. They then get driven on to the apple orchards of Washington before pollinating the pumpkins and cranberries of New England and, finally, the blueberries of Maine. Honeybees are definitely busy as they are crucial to keeping about 130 different food crops alive. But their hard work is getting harder and harder as their numbers drop. Pesticides and GMOs are not the sole reason for colony collapse disorder. There are thoughts that overworking bees, coupled with traditional deception of the colonies into thinking it is a warm season year round, are also to blame. Because bees on organic farms have survived the collapse, it has become quite clear pesticides and GM crops are culprits. And beekeepers everywhere are accusing governments and scientists of siding with chemical companies like Bayer. Bees are essential players in our ecological balance so what can you do to help keep the bees alive?
- Beware of applying pesticides in your garden. Never use neonicotinoids on blooming plants if honeybees are around.
- Plant sources of nectar for the bees.
- Buy local honey
- Support organic farmers by shopping organic
- Buy a hive for your own garden and host the bees
- Share this message with all your friends
Source: www.celsias.com/article/busy-bees…
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USDA finds in favor of grass-fed cows
A study by USDA scientists finds that raising cows on grass, instead of in factory farms, produces fewer greenhouse-gas
emissions and other pollutants.
Perhaps a study conducted by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), entitled “Putting Dairy Cows Out to Pasture—An Environmental Plus,” won’t put an end to the controversy over whether cows raised outdoors on grass are better for the environment than cows raised on grain in confinement. But the USDA’s findings on the matter are all the more remarkable considering that it’s only in recent years that the agency has acknowledged there’s a type of agriculture besides industrial agriculture, and it’s called sustainable.
Source: Rodale Institute
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North Carolina state uses more antibiotics on livestock than the entire U.S. on humans.
Thirty-one people in Europe recently died from a little-known strain of E. coli. It is far from the first time such a 
thing has happened. In the United States, each year 325,000 people are hospitalized, and 5,000 die, as a consequence of food-borne illness.
However, this fact has still not generated any basic food-safety legislation. The lobbyists of the industrial farming system have blocked most initiatives to make food safer.
As a result, antibiotics can be recklessly given to healthy animals to make them grow faster — the state of North Carolina uses more antibiotics for livestock than the entire United States uses for humans — creating a perfect breeding ground for antibiotic-resistant bacteria.
According to the New York Times:
“We need more comprehensive inspections in the food system, more testing for additional strains of E. coli, and more public education (always wash your hands after touching raw meat, and don’t use the same cutting board for meat and vegetables). A great place to start reforms would be by banning the feeding of antibiotics to healthy livestock.”
Sources: The New York Times June 11, 2011
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FDA is taking away our freedom to buy the healthiest milk of all.
This is about the FDA ban on the interstate sale of raw milk for human consumption — milk that has not been pasteurized.
The ban began in 1987, but the FDA didn’t really begin enforcing it seriously until 2006 — when the government began sting operations and armed raids of dairy farmers and their willing customers.
The New American reports:
“Even if the FDA were correct in its assertions about the dangers of raw milk, its prohibition on interstate raw milk sales would still be, ‘an unconstitutional misapplication of the commerce clause for legislative ends’ …
The “Food Safety Modernization Act” that was enacted earlier this year gives the FDA almost unlimited authority to decide if food is harmful, even without credible evidence. But farmers who have been persecuted by the FDA for selling raw milk, like Amish Farmer Dan Allgyer, are not backing down. Allgyer’s case is going to court.
Citizens are irate that the FDA allows damaging junk food, but prevents people from making an educated, informed food choice in purchasing raw grass-fed milk.
Sources: The New American May 20, 2011 and The Washington Times May 25, 2011
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