Serious erosion of US economic hegemony in two key details

One is that Russia is about to replace the USA as main global wheat exporter. Being an agricultural exporter may seem minor but it is an strategical way to make sure you hold the pan by the handle and that, of course, in case of crisis your state is self-sufficient to feed its own people and maybe also its allies. The USA knows it and that is why agriculture is over-protected, mega-subsidized and systematically exempt from foreign trade agreements. A few decades ago only the USA, Canada and Argentina were global grain exporters. This is changing fast. 

The other one is that Iran is selling oil for euros, not dollars anymore. This is a direct attack against the dollar hegemony and to the ability of the imperial power to finance its own deficit, caused by consumerism and military costs. The US' imperial power heavily depends on the denomination of oil in dollars but sales of oil in US dollars have decayed to just 60% globally. The last one in the OPEC who tried to do that was Saddam Hussein, however Iran is a much bigger and better backed state and therefore invasion is not likely at all.

Mexico: court blocks GMOs

From Volatility:

For Mexico, “Without Corn, There Is No Country”

A Mexican federal judge has ruled that the government may not authorize field trials or commerical planting of genetically modified (GM) maize so long as lawsuits filed by citizens, farmers, and civil society groups are continuing in the courts.

The judge granted the injunction in a case filed by Accion Colectiva (Collective Action), an alliance of farmers and democracy advocates. The case argues that the government has allowed field trials* and is rushing to approve commercialization without having conducted the safety and contamination tests and environmental reviews required by Mexican law and the Mexican constitution, Article 27 of which requires protection of genetic biodiversity as a common good.

[*Corporate field trials and "safety tests" never involve food safety or environmental contamination, but are the bare minimum to confirm that animals gain weight and/or that a plant grows and produces a crop. The extent of the safety confirmed is merely that the animal or plant doesn't immediately drop dead.]

Accion Colectiva lauded the ruling as a critical step in their campaign to protect Mexico as “the birthplace of corn”. The lawsuit is part of the broad political campaign, Sin Maiz, No Hay Maiz : “Without Corn, There is No Country”. One of the leaders of the movement, Father Miguel Concha, said that the ruling helps the campaign toward its goal of preserving “the human right to save and use the agrobiodiversity of native landraces from the threats posed by GMO maize.”

This action, like others which seek the necessary abolition of GMOs, focuses on the socioeconomic injustice and impracticality of patents in seeds which are part of the public heritage and property, and the agricultural and environmental destruction wrought by the inevitable contamination of crops and ecosystems wrought by GMOs.

... continue reading at Volatility.

USA bans food imports from almost half of Japan

Nothing less than 14 Japanese prefectures have been banned from exporting food to the USA. Previously it was just eight. 

The affected area includes: Fukushima, Aomori, Chiba, Gumna [sic - Gunma], Ibaraki, Iwate, Miyagi, Nagano, Niigata, Saitama, Shizuoka, Tochigig [sic - Tochigi], Yamagata and Yamanashi prefectures.

For some reason, two of the the three prefectures of Greater Tokyo (Tokyo and Kanagawa but not Chiba), totally surrounded by the banishment zone, are still allowed to export to the USA. Akita, in NW Honshu, is another pocket inside the red zone. 

Of course, it is very logical and reasonable to ask how can any international level games such as the Olympics be held in such conditions, but even more reasonable is to ask why is there not any plan to evacuate all that zone or at least the most severely affected areas? The children even? I know we are talking of millions but, well, precisely: Holocaust by conscious inaction is not any better than Holocaust by action.

This is the largest trade ban of the many that (very justifiably) plague Japan since the Fukushima nuclear catastrophe. For comparison, South Korea has a ban only on seafood and only affecting eight prefectures, while China and Taiwan ban food from 10 prefectures.

Source: EneNews, citing the FDA and Dong-A Ilbo. The map is my work (CC, as usual).

Basque Country: one arrested on Burger King protests

One person has been arrested today in Iruñea-Pamplona (Navarre) accused of "coercion" in a Burger King restaurant. The exact details are not known yet but the junk food facility has been the target of many anti-Imperialist and anti-Capitalist protests as of late. 

Source: Ateak Ireki[es].

USA: fast food workers on strike

US fast food workers can barely bring food to their families because of the very low salaries ($7.5 per hour) they are paid. Therefore they have gone on strike demanding a 100% pay rise with important demonstrations taking place in all the major cities of the USA.

Source: Webguerrillero[es].

GMOs cause serious stomach and genital problems in pigs, key study demonstrates

The Carman study confirms some previous long-term studies which found indications of toxicity of some commonly used GM crops fed to animals and the non-academic perception by many farmers and veterinarians that these crops were intoxicating their animals.

Judy Carman et al., A long-term toxicology study on pigs fed a combined genetically modified (GM) soy and GM maize diet. Organic Systems 2013. Freely available → LINK (alternative link). [ISSN 1177-4258]

The first link was not available at the time of writing this because of exceeded bandwidth, a clear sign of the massive interest that this study has triggered. In fact the Internet is already full of Biotech-financed defamatory articles, which range in content from such ingenuous remarks as "when pigs fly!" to "hogwash!". At least it is quite funny to watch how mercenary pens feel the need to be creative to fill in the void caused by their otherwise depressive job of systematic lying.

But there are also more seriously concerned articles all around, in fact, once we overcome the first page or two of the search engine's hits, most are concerns and worries about the GMO caused foodpocalypse.

Focusing on the substance of the study, Carman and colleagues first review the scarce literature on the effects of GM-foods on animals, finding that often those studies are too short-term, not considering mid and long term toxicity. Also many of these Biotech-friendly studies, typically financed by the very same GMO companies that produce the crops, used non-mammals (birds, fish), food types not eaten by humans like fermented green fodder (silage) or only measured animal productivity and not health as such.

A few studies however are more throughout. For example Séralini 2011, reviewing past 90-days feeding studies, finding evidence of liver and kidney damage caused by GM-crops, concluding that 90 days was not enough to evaluate the toxicity of these novel bioengineered foodstuff.

Poulter 2012, a two-year length study on NK603 herbicide-tolerant corn, found evidence of higher death rates, more tumors and liver and kidney pathologies being caused by the crop.

Carman et al. therefore aimed to do a long term study of 22.7 weeks in animals whose physiology is similar to humans: pigs. This is almost unprecedented in GMO studies.

They used 168 pigs randomly divided in two groups of 84 each. One was fed GM-modified corn and soy, as is usually done in US farms (specifically the very common Ht soy, and Ht and Bt corn) within a mixed diet, as is usually done in farms. The control group was fed the same kind of diet but with non-GM soy and corn instead.

Upon slaughter, a methodical autopsy found no differences in organ illnesses between both groups with two exceptions: stomach and uterus. GM-fed pigs had stomach inflammation much more commonly than the control group and also quite often more dilated uteruses:

... the median uterus weight of GM-fed pigs, as a proportion of body weight, was 25% higher than that of non-GM-fed pigs, which was statistically significant (p=0.025).

For non-GM-fed pigs, stomach inflammation was concentrated in the mild and moderate range, whereas GM-fed pigs showed much more severe inflammation (p=0.004). GM-fed pigs showed severe stomach inflammation at a rate of 2.6 times that of non-GM-fed pigs (95% confidence interval = 1.29-5.21) (Table 3). This occurred in both male (p=0.041) and female (p=0.034) pigs (Table 4). We found severe stomach inflammation in 22.2% of male pigs fed the GM diet and in 41.7% of female pigs fed the GM diet (compared to 5.6% and 18.9%, respectively, in pigs fed the non-GM diet (Table 4).

Maybe the most striking result of this study is that GM-crops do cause severe stomach inflammation in pigs at rates of 32% vs. 12% with a very high statistical significance: p=0.004!

Therefore if you have stomach problems, you are probably better off not eating any GMOs, something difficult, as they are not labeled as such for human consumption because of the lobby's pressure. 

Coca-Cola: why it dissolves stuff

It is well known "pop science" that there is hardly better emergency product against rust than Coca-Cola. I have known for decades that meat dissolves in the black drink in just hours. 

These are not the only effects: the soda drink also dissolves bones, iron, etc. In fact it is a main cause of osteoporosis among the young because it "steals" calcium from the bones. 

The reason is one of the "secret" ingredients of this extremely popular beverage: phosphoric acid (E338), which has a Ph of just 2.8 (hyper-acidic) and is indeed corrosive. The raw ingredient must be carried in transports holding the warning of dangerous chemical. 

Source: Webguerrillero[es].

Bisphenol A severely disrupts fetal epigenetics

Water bottle containing bisphenol A

The most controversial chemical compound bisphenol A is found in many plastics, including sometimes those used as food or water containers. This study adds to the long list of known harms of this chemical, which nevertheless remains widely allowed.

Martha Susiarjo et al., Bisphenol A Exposure Disrupts Genomic Imprinting in the Mouse. PLoS Genetics 2013. Open access → LINK [doi:10.1371/journal.pgen.1003401]

Abstract

Exposure to endocrine disruptors is associated with developmental defects. One compound of concern, to which humans are widely exposed, is bisphenol A (BPA). In model organisms, BPA exposure is linked to metabolic disorders, infertility, cancer, and behavior anomalies. Recently, BPA exposure has been linked to DNA methylation changes, indicating that epigenetic mechanisms may be relevant. We investigated effects of exposure on genomic imprinting in the mouse as imprinted genes are regulated by differential DNA methylation and aberrant imprinting disrupts fetal, placental, and postnatal development. Through allele-specific and quantitative real-time PCR analysis, we demonstrated that maternal BPA exposure during late stages of oocyte development and early stages of embryonic development significantly disrupted imprinted gene expression in embryonic day (E) 9.5 and 12.5 embryos and placentas. The affected genes included Snrpn, Ube3a, Igf2, Kcnq1ot1, Cdkn1c, and Ascl2; mutations and aberrant regulation of these genes are associated with imprinting disorders in humans. Furthermore, the majority of affected genes were expressed abnormally in the placenta. DNA methylation studies showed that BPA exposure significantly altered the methylation levels of differentially methylated regions (DMRs) including the Snrpn imprinting control region (ICR) and Igf2 DMR1. Moreover, exposure significantly reduced genome-wide methylation levels in the placenta, but not the embryo. Histological and immunohistochemical examinations revealed that these epigenetic defects were associated with abnormal placental development. In contrast to this early exposure paradigm, exposure outside of the epigenetic reprogramming window did not cause significant imprinting perturbations. Our data suggest that early exposure to common environmental compounds has the potential to disrupt fetal and postnatal health through epigenetic changes in the embryo and abnormal development of the placenta.

USA: law HR 933 shields transgenic corporations against all liabilities

The US Congress has passed and President Obama signed bill HR 933 which protects GMO corporations against legal challenge. 

The law, popularly know as the Monsanto Protection Act, forbids federal courts from being able to halt the sale of GMOs that are found hazardous, harmful to consumers or whatever other common sense reason. The Monsanto Protection Act was hidden within a larger spending bill in order to avoid debate. 

Sources: IBT, LINyM[es].

Turkey begins testing all food imported from Japan

Every single food product entering Turkey from Japan needs since yesterday a document of approval by the Turkish Atomic Energy Organization (← source).

When will EU? The other day I found Japanese green tea from Fukushima at an ecological shop. The owner assured me that it was produced or imported before the nuclear catastrophe but how do I know if all efforts from Japan are in the direction on conceiting and not revealing radioactive contamination and that EU remains low key on the matter of radioactive control, being necessary only for food produced in certain regions. 

I'm also concerned about non-food products (Japanese radioactive cars or spare parts were blocked at several harbors worldwide for being too radioactive) and about products from the USA and Canada, where the radioactive pollution from Japan had a significant impact (less than in Japan itself, of course, but surely much more than in mainland East Asia).

Warning: EU will allow Japanese food imports since November

So far EU imposed strict controls to the area around Fukushima. Now for no reason at all (the situation is not any better) this is going to end. According to Fukushima Diary (citing Japanese-language sources):

On 10/22/2012, EU is going to lift the regulation of importing food from 11 prefectures in Japan except for Fukushima.

The restriction will be lifted as of 11/1/2012, they will import Japanese alcohol drinks, such as wine, beer, and plum liquor, and seaweed without radiation measurement.

While the import of alcohols can easily be dribbled (because they have a very limited market in Europe), the allowance of seaweed (algae) is most dangerous in my understanding because they are used to make a lot of synthetic foods and a scare can harm local algae production (much like avoidance of unlabeled transgenic maize/soy harms regular maize/soy production, etc.) 

The situation in the region is anything but under control. The Japanese government's criminal policies of hide, extend and pretend (instead of containment) should not be rewarded but punished, and certainly not at our expense.

I must denounce this irresponsible attitude by the EU authorities which opens the gate for even greater flooding of Japanese radioactive foods to our supermarkets, tables and guts (and those of our children too).

I would suggest to raise awareness around ourselves and to write respectful but firm emails or letters to the department of General Health and Consumers of the EU:

Snail mail:

Directorate-General Health & Consumers
B - 1049 Brussels
Belgium

E-mail:

Form at this address.

Telephone:

+32 2 299 11 11

The office right now has no head, so I wonder who is making the decisions. You can contact also your trusted consumers' association an your trusted MEPs, if any.

Fukushima beef exported to the USA

(source)

If you ever though that the Fukushima catastrophe would stay within the Japanese borders, the answer is no. Specially not if no containment measures are being taken but instead a criminal policy of extending the damage on short-sighted economic interests is being implemented instead. 

NHK reports:

Cattle farmers in Fukushima Prefecture have resumed beef exports to the United States for the first time in 2 and a half years.

Farmers celebrated the shipment of 3 cattle with a ceremony on Sunday. The leader of a local agricultural cooperative said the resumption is a tailwind for Fukushima farmers who have been suffering from the effects of the nuclear accident.

The 3 cattle will be processed in Japan and the meat will be sold to upscale restaurants in the United States.

Exports of Japanese beef to the US were suspended due to an outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease in southern Japan in 2010. The suspension was lifted in August.

Cattle in Fukushima undergo radiation tests before shipment. But prices of Fukushima beef are 70 to 80 percent of pre-disaster levels.

Livestock farmers hope the resumption of exports will help to erase concerns about radioactive contamination.

Sure: I feel much less concerned, ahem!

Source: EneNews.

The massive no-go zone in Japan

Based on the latest radiation measures by Prof. Hayakawa[jp], I estimated the following "no go" zones in Japan based on the radioactive cesium found in the "black dust" (dirt in the roadside, often hotspots of radiation):

My opinion: the red areas are a no-go zone (but many millions live in them)

No specifics strict terminology can be applied because there is no absolute rule on how radiation affects you considering only on becquerels per kilogram. But based on the notion that Japan considered, prior to the accident, that 100 Bq/kg to be radioactive waste, then I would say that the colors could mean:

• Fukushima: don't go at all: killer zone. The westernmost part of the department would be however in the red zone (still very bad).
• Red Zone: avoid it all you can, bring food and water from the outside, try not to live there, very specially not children nor pregnant women. Roadside hotspots here typically have 1000-10,000 Bq/kg, 10x to 100x what used to be considered nuclear waste, sometimes even much more. In some cases, specially in Greater Tokyo, the measures are almost as high as in Fukushima.
• Orange Zone: less dangerous, with roadside hotspots often above the 100 Bq/kg "nuclear waste" measure but nothing >1000 Bq/kg.
• Yellow areas: some >100 Bq/kg hotspots and often >30 Bq/kg ones but generally within safety levels.
• Not colored: either unknown of clearly low radioactivity.

Special acknowledgement to Ex-SKF (I don't speak Japanese so I could have missed a lot of information without his explanations in English).

Note: at the time of writing this note, I could not open the first map (radiation fallout contours for April 2011), which gave me a 404 error, but here there is another link (3.3 MB, jpg format).

Special warning on Japanese food: while these maps reflect environmental radioactive risk, the Japanese government is applying a criminal policy of forcing people to eat radioactive food, apparently because they just do not want to evacuate Fukushima so they pretend it's all alright (when it's obviously not), and often the origin of products is criminally mislabeled. Hence all Japanese food and products are suspect and potentially dangerous and you may well be unlucky enough to eat the wrong sushi snack and get radiation poisoning, while another dish may be perfectly edible. Personally, in the current conditions of lack of control, I would not eat anything Japanese if I can help it, nor seafood nor mushrooms from anywhere in all the North Pacific basin.

Kawasaki, Japan: students given radioactive meals intently

The sadistic and most twisted nature of many in the Japanese political establishment beats all expectations: The Mayor of Kawasaki, Takao Abe, has forced students in his city to eat radioactive meals "for educational purposes". According to this criminal politician:

Students need to know they live in danger by consuming radioactive school lunch.

They have been serving tangerines which were detected to have 9.1 Bq/kg and canned apples with 1.6 Bq/kg.

Sources: Fukushima Diary, Ex-SKF.

Another food collectivization in Southern Iberia

Some 50 members of La Trastienda Collective and the Platform for the Basic Income in Extremadura have expropriated four trolleys of basic foodstuff in a Carrefour supermarket in Mérida, the regional capital. However police intervened and captured the trolleys at the exit.

Protesters claimed the sharing of wealth and a fairest and egalitarian society. The action was supported ex-post-facto by several high-profile politicians of United Left in Extremadura.

Source: Madriz Rebelde[es].

Argentina: where Monsanto has license to kill

As you may know, pseudo-leftist developist governments like those of Brazil or Argentina are among the ones more corrupted by the bioterrorist business of Monsanto and the other GMO mafiosi.  Their star product is transgenic soy, which has been massively planted through much of Argentina and Brazil. 

This alleged high-production brand bases all its power in a gene that makes it immune to the pesticide Roundup, trade-marked and sold by the North American multinational itself. 

Sadly we, humans, do not have the immunity gene and are getting sick, literally poisoned as collateral damage, by the agricultural mafiosi, their godfather Monsanto and their facilitator President Cristina Fernández and her populist Justicialist Party (Peronist). 

Since the infamous agrobusiness began, more and more people are getting sick because of the pollution caused by the Roundup pesticide, which is sprayed from airplanes without consideration for anyone.  The citizens get malformations, cancers, leukemia, lupus, spontaneous abortions, cleft palate, etc. as result of the contamination, the ranchers, Monsanto and the Kirchnerist opportunist caste get the money. 

Protest in Córdoba against GMO farming

But of course the conflict does not only cause poisoning, it also kills in more direct ways, with bullets and other brutal methods. Ranchers' death squads have murdered the following people only in the last years:

• Javier Chocobar, shot down by corrupt police officers at the service of a businessman wanting to appropriate a quarry inside communal lands, October 12th 2009 in Chuchagasta (Tucumán).
  
• Sandra Juárez, 33, mother of two, killed by a bulldozer in a civil resistance action on March 13th 2010 in San Nicolás (Santiago del Estero).
• Roberto López, member of the Potae Napocna Navogoh community (La Primavera, Formosa), shot down by policemen on November 23rd 2010.
• Cristian Ferreyra, 23, activist of the Movimiento Campesino Santiago del Estero, murdered on Novemeber 16th 2011 at San Antonio.

Personally I try not to eat any soy nor maize not certified as organic, I carefully read ingredient labels when buying foodstuff like sausages, which are typically made of soy, but it's obviously not enough.

Source: La Voz[es].

USA still imports probably radioactive fish products from Japan

From Fukushima Diary:

US keeps importing fishery food from Japan even after 311

Some of the east Asian countries are rejecting Japanese products to import, such as fishery products or dairy products. (cf. JP exports of dairy products dropped half since 311, HK Gov to conduct medical check for infants)

However, US is still importing fishery products from Japan as before. In May, they measured cesium even from their local bluefin tuna. It seems like fish is easier to enter America than human beings. (cf. Cesium from tuna fished in west coast of America)

The exporting charts are like below. Fishery products consist of living, and frozen products. The source is the trade statistics of Japan by Ministry of finance. [Link] (cf. Cesium from 60% of fishery products in Fukushima)

... full story with graphs at Fukushima Diary. 

What is not wrong in this picture?!

What?!

What's worst in it: the farmers in protective gear (a very rudimentary protection in the best case), the fact that the rice being planted is meant to be eaten or the fact that they have been forced to remove the most fertile top layer of soil because it was too contaminated even for the sick minds allowing this to happen?

All is sooo wrong!

Source: Fukushima Diary.

Sea Shepherd's Watson to be extradited to Costa Rica on false charges of "murder attempt"

Capt. Paul Watson

Environmentalist hero Paul Watson of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society was arrested in Germany by  police forces who want to defend the mafia of shark extinction. 

In the relevant incident in 2002, Captain Paul Watson ordered the Costa Rican ship Varadero to stop murdering sharks for their fins on account that the practice was illegal in Guatemalan waters, where the incident happened. However then the Guatemalan and Costa Rican authorities attempted to arrest Watson and confiscate the ship on the fabricated pretext of "murder attempt", something that the relevant videos show to be false. 

Sharks are often mutilated while still alive

The German police arrested Watson, who has Canadian passport, in Frankfurt while in transit towards France and pretend to extradite him to Costa Rica, a state that promotes the extermination of sharks for commercial purposes. 

Watson has the support of two French environmentalist notables: Daniel Cohn-Bendit (vice-president of the European Parliament) and José Bové (MEP). 

 

Don't forget to boycott every Chinese restaurant unless they sell no shark fin soup and demand the European authorities to forbid the biocidal dish within the boundaries of the European Union. Every day hundreds of sharks are tortured and murdered only for that silly soup, bringing the millenarian fish near extinction.

Sources: Sea Shepherd, The Sydney Morning Herald.

Radioactive cesium found in fish from Japan, which are anyhow sold in South Korea

Reported by EXSKF:

South Korea's Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry, Fisheries and Food announced on March 8 that an increasing number of marine products imported to South Korea from Japan have been found with radioactive cesium. 

... 

In most cases, the radioactive density was 7 becquerels/kg or less. The maximum was 97.9 becquerels/kg. Since they are all below the safety limit of South Korea, they have been sold in the market.

A becquerel is a unit of disintegrations per second and it's equivalent to 60 disintegrations per minute (a unit often used by Geiger counters).