Is Tyson Foods’ Chicken Empire A ‘Meat Racket’? by Dan Charles February 19, 2014 3:44 AM Listen to the interview, Morning Edition Christopher Leonard’s new exposé on the chicken industry, The Meat Racket, doesn’t devote much ink to the physical object on our plate, the chicken meat itself. Instead, he focuses on the economic machinery…

Fake-food scandal revealed as tests show third of products mislabeled Consumers are being sold drinks with banned flame-retardant additives, pork in beef, and fake cheese, laboratory tests show Felicity Lawrence | The Guardian, Friday 7 February 2014 Some ham tested contained ‘meat emulsion’ (meat ground with additives so fat can be put through it) or…

Vandana Shiva: “Seed, Food, Guts” from MAD on Vimeo. Vandana Shiva: “Seed, Food, Guts” In her presentation at MAD3, author and seed activist Vandana Shiva described how decades ago she had the gut feeling to leave the world of physics (she has a PhD in quantum theory) and go fight against industrialized and commodified food…

Livestock interests fighting themselves over COOL rule By Ken Root The livestock industry came out against the 2014 farm bill legislation because of what it did not contain: repeal of Country of Origin Labeling for red meat. My quandary is why American meat producers are opposed to recognition of their product as born, raised and…

The least of your problems Alan Guebert | Farm and Food File for the week beginning Sunday, Feb. 16, 2014 Early February was not a good time to be an American carnivore. First, on Saturday, Feb. 8, Rancho Feeding Co. of Petaluma, CA, announced it was recalling 8.7 million pounds of beef carcasses and cuts….

Former USDA official named to sustainability post By Rita Jane Gabbett on 2/14/2014 The George Washington University has named Kathleen A. Merrigan, the former deputy secretary of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the university’s first executive director of the Sustainability Institute. During her four-year tenure at the USDA, Merrigan oversaw the daily operations of agency,…

FOCUS: Matt Taibbi | The Most Devious Bank Scam Yet Matt Taibbi, Rolling Stone Taibbi writes: "Allowing one company to control the supply of crucial physical commodities, and also trade in the financial products that might be related to those markets, is an open invitation to commit mass manipulation." READ MORE

Rancho recalls a year’s worth of meat By Christopher Peak | 02/13/2014 After nearly a century in business, the Bay Area’s last major slaughterhouse facility has once again closed its doors, for the second time in less than a month.Following a massive recall of 8.7 million pounds of beef and the launch of an investigation…

Wendy’s Demands Progress Reports on Elimination of Pig Crates Public News Service – MO | February 2014 | Download audio PHOTO: Fast-food giant Wendy’s is demanding quarterly reports from pork suppliers about their ability to provide pork produced without the use of gestation crates. Photo credit: Humane Society of the United States. February 13, 2014…

How Obama-Monsanto’s Food Act Destroys Small Farms By Rady Ananda| Food Freedom News • 08Feb2014 On par with Stalin’s farm collectivization program of the 1930s, Monsanto’s push (to the tune of $8.8 million in lobby bribes in 2008 alone) for the Food Safety Modernization Act is already achieving the nightmares of its worst critics. Introduced…