A farmer is seen holding Monsanto’s Roundup Ready soybean seeds at his family farm. (photo: Dan Gill/AP) Monsanto Has Created the World’s Largest GMO Monopoly By Ethan A. Huff, Natural News 12 April 13 pparently discontent with its more than $13.5 billion-plus in annual sales, genetic modification kingpin Monsanto has been trying for the past…

Caviness Beef Packers to buy San Angelo Packing By Meatingplace Editors on 4/12/2013 San Angelo Packing stopped slaughtering cattle two weeks ago and laid off most of its plant workers, but has recently entered an agreement to sell the company to Hereford, Texas-based Caviness Beef Packers, officials from both companies told Meatingplace. Caviness Beef Packers…

New post on Organization for Competitive Markets OCM Files Demand for Inspector General Records by Mike Callicrate OCM Files Demand for Inspector General Records PRESS RELEASE Organization for Competitive Markets P.O. Box 6486 Lincoln, NE 68506 callicrate April 11, 2013 Group Wants Answers to Questionable Audit Report The Organization for Competitive Markets (OCM) announced today…

Euro agency weighs in on mechanically separated meat safety By Rita Jane Gabbett on 4/11/2013 High pressure production processes can increase the microbial hazards associated with mechanically separated meat products, according to the European Food Safety Authority. Microbiological and chemical hazards associated with mechanically separated meat derived from poultry and swine are similar to those…

NOTE: Any size livestock operation in which even one animal is confined can be designated a CAFO by EPA. The industrial sized CAFOs, where the owner of the livestock is typically somewhere else, and there is little consideration for the well-being of workers, animals, community, or the environment, is the real subject of the following…

Pandora’s Lunchbox: How Processed Food Took Over the American Meal About the Book PANDORA’S LUNCHBOX tells the story of what happens to processed foods before they reach our plates (or are handed to us through a car window.) With packaged foods and fast foods so ubiquitous – comprising roughly 70 percent of the calories we…

More than 35,000 Consumers and Farmers Urge USDA to Protect Country-of-Origin Labels Widespread Public Support for USDA Proposed Rule as Comment Period Concludes Washington, D.C.-Consumers and farmers overwhelmingly support strengthened Country-of-Origin-Labeling (COOL) rules, as demonstrated by more than 35,600 petition signatures sent to the U.S. Department of Agriculture demanding that the integrity of COOL be…

Legislative promotion by ALEC. And the American Farm Bureau. Taping of Farm Cruelty Is Becoming the Crime Richard Oppel Jr., The New York Times Oppel reports: "One of the group’s model bills, ‘The Animal and Ecological Terrorism Act,’ prohibits filming or taking pictures on livestock farms…Violators would be placed on a ‘terrorist registry.’" READ MORE

R-CALF USA Calls OIG Checkoff Audit a Colossal Whitewash Billings, Mont. – In a formal complaint sent Friday to U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack and U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Inspector General Phyllis Fong, R-CALF USA charged that the audit report released last week by the USDA Office of Inspector General (OIG) concerning the beef…

The National Cattlemen’s Assn. appointed a task force in late 1988 to conduct a year-long study of concentration in the beef industry. The study was published in October. Its top recommendation was that "no more mergers or acquisitions of beef slaughter facilities by the Big Three packers be allowed." And then the National Cattlemen’s Association…