NewsTrust - Food - Most Recent Stories: Opinion (Mainstream)

The New York Times Discovers It’s Virtually Impossible To Keep Weight Off

Thu, 29 Dec 2011 00:00:00 -0800

Slate - By L. V. Anderson - Dec. 29 (Opinion) - With New Year’s and its attendant resolutions just around the corner, articles about weight loss are cropping up in all the usual places (i.e., everywhere you look). One of the most comprehensive and personal essays on the topic can be found in this week

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Ocean acidification is most urgent threat to marine conservation

Sat, 05 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0700

Seattle Times - By Bill Dewey - Nov. 05 (Opinion) - Guest columnist Bill Dewey writes about a new and serious threat to marine conservation and resource management: ocean acidification. The tools and strategies to reverse this trend that is detrimental to marine life are available, proven and even profitable.

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In Somalia, a failure in 1992 has led to a famine today

Wed, 03 Aug 2011 00:00:00 -0700

Washington Post - By Nuruddin Farah - Aug. 03 (Opinion) - After the United States left Somalia, the rest of the world stood by, leaving the warlords to profit from their criminality. Al-Qaeda strengthened its presence in the country. Foreign vessels entered Somali waters and engaged in illegal fishing, which caused piracy to balloon into an ugly reality. Somalia lived on mortgaged time, leased out to criminals of one sort or another, an ideal world for terrorists to flourish.

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Go Ahead, Eat Chocolate for Breakfast

Wed, 03 Aug 2011 00:00:00 -0700

Slate - By Nadia Arumugam - Aug. 03 (Opinion) - Nutella isn't the breakfast demon that Hohenberg and others make it out to be, certainly not when consumed as advertised.

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Congress should reject proposed trade agreements and insist on better policies

Wed, 27 Jul 2011 00:00:00 -0700

Seattle Times - By Lynne Dodson, Kathleen Ridihalgh - Jul. 27 (Opinion) - The proposed U.S. trade agreements with South Korea, Colombia and Panama would continue to undermine the American economy, write guest columnists Lynne Dodson and Kathleen Ridihalgh. Washington's congressional delegation should reject them in favor of better policies.

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If Our 'Food Stamp Recovery' Persists, Obama Will Lose Big

Fri, 06 May 2011 00:00:00 -0700

Weekly Standard - By Jay Cost - May. 06 (Opinion) - That is a personal reminder of a very serious, yet rarely discussed economic, social, and indeed political problem: the fact that better than one out of seven Americans today requires government help to put food on the table.

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How Goldman Sachs Created the Food Crisis

Sat, 30 Apr 2011 00:00:00 -0700

Foreign Policy - By Frederick Kaufman - Apr. 30 (Opinion) - It took the brilliant minds of Goldman Sachs to realize the simple truth that nothing is more valuable than our daily bread. And where there's value, there's money to be made.

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Droughts, Floods And Food

Mon, 07 Feb 2011 00:00:00 -0800

New York Times - By Paul Krugman - Feb. 07 (Opinion) - World prices of food are surging, and one major factor is the disruption caused by extreme weather.

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Bites Nearby: Zia's Worth a (Wheatgrass) Shot

Thu, 03 Feb 2011 00:00:00 -0800

Towson Patch - By Olivia Obineme - Feb. 03 (Review) - Cafe offers natural smoothies and vegetarian alternatives

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Immaterial Growth

Tue, 11 Jan 2011 00:00:00 -0800

New York Times - By Paul Krugman - Jan. 11 (Opinion) - The point here isn’t that GDP is the sole goal of human existence; it is, rather, that even GDP is a much less mechanical number than many people imagine, that it’s quite possible for measured real GDP to rise even if the physical volume of production doesn’t change much. Alan Greenspan used to give talks about how the GDP was getting lighter; despite the source, he had a point.

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AgJOBS could plant the seed

Mon, 11 Oct 2010 00:00:00 -0700

Los Angeles Times - Oct. 11 (Editorial) - The legislation would create a pilot program to give some legal and undocumented farmworkers the opportunity to obtain a temporary work permit and the possibility of permanent legal residency.

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Corporate land grabs threaten food security

Wed, 15 Sep 2010 00:00:00 -0700

Christian Science Monitor - By Danielle Nierenberg, Ronit Ridberg - Sep. 15 (Opinion) - Wealthy countries are buying up farm land in poorer countries with global consequences. These controversial land grabs hurt local workers and ecosystems, and dangerously tip the scale of the world's food economy.

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The Dangers of Agricultural Speculation: 'Price Increases Are Costing Millions of People their Health' - SPIEGEL ONLINE - News - International

Thu, 26 Aug 2010 00:00:00 -0700

Der Spiegel - By Joachim Von Braun - Aug. 26 (Interview) - Financial speculators have discovered agricultural commodities, and the result has been skyrocketing prices for wheat, barley and other grains. SPIEGEL spoke with agricultural economist Joachim von Braun about how to curb such speculation and the dangers for the world's poor.

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New Alarm Bells About Chemicals and Cancer

Wed, 05 May 2010 00:00:00 -0700

New York Times - By Nicholas D. Kristof - May. 05 (Opinion) - The President’s Cancer Panel is the Mount Everest of the medical mainstream, so it is astonishing to learn that it is poised to join ranks with the organic food movement and declare: chemicals threaten our bodies. The cancer panel is releasing a landmark 200-page report on Thursday, warning that our lackadaisical approach to regulation may have far-reaching consequences for our health. I’ve read an advance copy of the report, and it’s an extraordinary document. It calls on America to rethink the way we confront cancer, including much more rigorous regulation of chemicals. Traditionally, we reduce cancer risks through regular doctor visits, self-examinations and screenings such as mammograms. The President’s Cancer Panel suggests other eye-opening steps as well, such as giving preference to organic food, checking radon levels in the home and microwaving food in glass containers rather than plastic.

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Fishing in troubled waters

Sun, 14 Mar 2010 00:00:00 -0800

The Guardian - By Sylvia Earle, Susan Lieberman - Mar. 14 (Opinion) - Fish populations once thought to be inexhaustible now face the prospect of extinction if policy changes are not made soon It has been said that if you give a man a fish you feed him for a day, though if you teach a man to fish you feed him for life. But times have changed. Now we know that only if you save species of fish from overexploitation will there be hope of providing food for a lifetime, let alone for generations that follow. Fish and other sea creatures historically valued solely as commodities are critically important to healthy ocean ecosystems, which in turn provide benefits to humankind. Yet the ocean is in deep trouble. Fish populations once thought to be inexhaustible now face the prospect of becoming extinct for any ...

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US begins airdrops of food and water into Haiti

Tue, 19 Jan 2010 00:00:10 -0800

BBC News - Jan. 19 - The US military has begun airdropping water and food into earthquake-hit Haiti, after earlier ruling out such a delivery method as too risky.

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Ethiopian land dirt cheap to giants

Fri, 15 Jan 2010 00:00:00 -0800

The Guardian - By Xan Rice - Jan. 15 - Addis Ababa sells vast fertile swaths to international companies in effort to introduce large-scale commercial agriculture This is a country of the bent back and the silver sickle, where virtually all the crops have felt the calloused fingers of the peasant farmer working his tiny parcel of state-owned land. The ox pulls the plough and the donkey the cart, and fertiliser counts as agricultural technology. Chugging into this picture on a bright green John Deere tractor came Hanumantha Rao, a former sugarcane farmer from India who is at the forefront of a revolution sweeping through Ethiopian farming. He hurried up to a hilltop on his company?s farm in Bako, four hours? drive from the capital, Addis Ababa, and swept out an arm to indicate ...

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Food revolution to seed unused land

Tue, 05 Jan 2010 00:00:00 -0800

The Guardian - By James Meikle - Jan. 05 (Press Release) - • Ministers consider temporary allotments scheme • Fruit and veg plots part of strategy to cut reliance on imports The government plans to launch a "grow your own" revolution by encouraging people to set up temporary allotments or community gardens on land awaiting development or other permanent use. It aims to develop a "meanwhile" lease to formalise such arrangements between landowners and voluntary groups and is considering establishing a "land bank" to broker better links and ensure plots are not left idle. Ministers believe the move could foster community spirit and skills as well as improve physical and mental health. Hilary Benn, the environment and food secretary, will announce the plans tomorrow as a part of a long-awaited ...

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Some Who Feed New York’s Hungry Prefer Cash Over Cans

Mon, 14 Dec 2009 00:00:00 -0800

New York Times - By Susan Dominus - Dec. 14 (Opinion) - Ann Kansfield, who runs a weekly food pantry at the Greenpoint Reformed Church in Brooklyn, cannot bring herself to tell you this, so I will: She doesn’t want your cans. As uncharitable as it sounds, she doesn’t want your holiday food drives.

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Hunger in California

Mon, 14 Dec 2009 00:00:00 -0800

Los Angeles Times - Dec. 14 (Editorial) - California is a bad place to be hungry. While the demand for food stamps is increasing across the nation, people who are eligible for the program are less likely to be enrolled in it here than in any other state but Wyoming. The percentage of low-income children who eat free breakfasts at school here is also lower than the national average.

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The cost of adapting to climate change

Thu, 26 Nov 2009 00:00:00 -0800

The Guardian - By Anne Perkins - Nov. 26 (Opinion) - Farmers in developing countries are already feeling the effects of climate change. What is needed to help them cope is an almost unprecedented shift of resources from north to south. The gap between rhetoric and reality, the developed and developing worlds, is cruelly illustrated by the huge promises and meagre results of successive global gatherings on providing funds to help less developed countries adapt to the changing climate. On Tuesday, Farm-Africa , one of the Guardian?s partners in the Katine project , helped launch Climate Frontline , a collection of African voices reflecting on how their climate has already changed, and how they are adapting to it. It is full of practical ideas – new ways of making liquid compost from animal droppings, or growing maize in pits where moisture is better retained, to name just two. But unless Copenhagen sets in train a colossal effort to cut greenhouse gas emissions, many African communities are going to have to do much more than ...

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Big Food vs. Big Insurance

Wed, 09 Sep 2009 00:00:00 -0700

New York Times - By Michael Pollan - Sep. 09 (Opinion) - The American way of eating has become the elephant in the room in the debate over health care.

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Why there are pathogens such as MRSA in our pork

Wed, 25 Mar 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Seattle Times - By Nicholas D. Kristof - Mar. 25 (Opinion) - Five out of 90 samples of retail pork in Louisiana tested positive for MRSA — an antibiotic-resistant staph infection — according to a peer-reviewed study published in Applied and Environmental Microbiology last year. Regardless of whether the bacteria came from the pigs or from humans who handled the meat, the results should sound an alarm bell, for MRSA already kills more than 18,000 Americans annually, more than AIDS does.

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Pathogens in Our Pork

Sat, 14 Mar 2009 00:00:00 -0700

New York Times - By Nicholas D. Kristof - Mar. 14 (Opinion) - Seventy percent of all antibiotics in the United States go to healthy livestock, according to a careful study by the Union of Concerned Scientists — and that’s one reason we’re seeing the rise of pathogens that defy antibiotics.

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Corn as a Health Issue

Sun, 08 Mar 2009 00:00:00 -0800

Washington Post - By George F. Will - Mar. 08 (Opinion) - Tom Vilsack, Iowa's former governor, calls his "the most important department in government," noting that the Agriculture Department serves education through school nutrition programs and serves diplomacy by trying to wean Afghanistan from a poppy-based (meaning heroin-based) economy. But Vilsack's department matters most because of the health costs of the American diet. If Michael Pollan is right, the problem is rooted in politics and, in a sense, Iowa. Pollan, author of "The Omnivore's Dilemma" and "In Defense of Food," says that after World War II, the government had a huge surplus of ammonium nitrate, an ingredient of explosives -- and fertilizer. Furthermore, pesticides could be made from ingredients of poison gases. Since 1945, the food supply has increased faster than America's population -- faster even than Americans can increase their feasting.

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