globalbriefs


News and resources to inspire concerned citizens to work together in building a healthier, stronger society that benefits all.


Ground Control Down-to-Earth Climate Change Strategy


The Center for Food Safety’s Cool Foods Campaign report Soil & Carbon: Soil Solutions to Climate Problems maintains that it’s possible to take atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2


) that fuels climate


change and put it back into the soil, where much of it was once a solid mineral. There’s too much carbon in the atmosphere and the oceans, but not


soil structure allows it to act like a sponge. The report concludes, “Rebuilding soil carbon is a zero-risk, low-cost propo-


sition. It has universal application and we already know how to do it.” Download the report at Tinyurl.com/CFS-Climate-Report.


Bee Kind The Good Fight for Honeybees


A U.S. federal appeals court has blocked the use of the pesticide sulfoxaflor over concerns about its effect on honeybees, which have been disappearing through- out the country in recent years. “Initial studies showed sulfoxaflor was highly toxic to honeybees, and the U.S. Envi- ronmental Protection Agency (EPA) was required to get further tests,” says Circuit Judge Mary Schroeder. “Given the precariousness of bee populations, leaving the EPA’s registration of sulfoxaflor in place risks more potential environmental harm than vacating it.” The product, sold in the U.S. as Transform or Closer, must be pulled from store shelves by October 18. Paul Towers, a spokesperson for the nonprofit advocacy group Pesticide Action


Network, comments, “This is [an example of] the classic pesticide industry shell game. As more science underscores the harms of a pesticide, they shift to newer, less-studied products, and it takes regulators years to catch up.” On another front, an insect form of Alzheimer’s disease caused by aluminum contamination from pesticides is another suspected contributing cause of the well- documented widespread bee colony collapse, according to a study published in the journal PLOS ONE. Honeybees studied had levels of aluminum in their bodies equivalent to those that could cause brain damage in humans.


26 Long Island Edition www.NaturalAwakeningsLI.com


enough stable carbon in the ground supporting healthy soils. Cultivated soils globally have lost 50 to 70 percent of their original carbon content through paving, converting grasslands to cropland and agricultural prac- tices that rob soil of organic matter and its ability to store carbon, making it more susceptible to flooding and erosion. Healthy soils—fed through organic agriculture practices like polycultures, cover crops and compost—give soil microbes the abil- ity to store more CO2


and withstand drought and floods better, because revitalized


DARK Act Defeated Senate Vote Reflects Citizen Demands


The Deny Americans the Right to Know, or DARK Act, was defeated in the U.S. Senate in March, representing a major victory for consumers. The nonprofit Environmental Working Group (EWG) spearheaded the large-scale citizen oppo- sition to a bill that would have outlawed all state-level labeling laws of genetically modified (GmO) food ingredients nation- wide; it was intended to keep consumers in the dark about the genetically engi- neered content of their food. Scott Faber, EWG senior vice


president for government affairs, says, “Consumers have made their voices heard to their elected representatives in the Senate and they said clearly, ‘We want the right to know more about our food.’ We remain hopeful that congressional leaders can craft a nation- al mandatory compromise that works for consumers and the food industry.” The development is evidence that


the EWG Just Label It campaign is on the right track, and the group plans to support the recently introduced Bio- technology Food Labeling Uniformity Act targeting a national mandatory stan- dard for GmO labeling. Jean Halloran, director of food policy initiatives for Consumers Union, explains, “This bill finds a way to set a national standard and avoid a patchwork of state label- ing laws, while still giving consumers the information they want and deserve about what’s in their food.”


Sources: Natural News, Environmental Working Group


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