Food First/Institute for Food and Development Policy - Institute for Food and Development Policy

Task Force on Childhood Obesity: Requests your input by March 26, 2010

admin — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 17:48:02 -0400

Why are 1/3 of America's children overweight? And what are your suggestions for how to improve the health of our nation's children?

Do we want our children to die at an earlier age than we do?

Your input is important to shaping national policy and regulations on food.

Go here and leave a comment by March 26.

http://www.regulations.gov/search/Regs/home.html#documentDetail?R=090000...

Fixing School Food

admin — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 17:42:23 -0500

By Janet Poppendieck, professor of sociology at Hunter College, City University of New York. She is the author of Sweet Charity? Emergency Food and the End of Entitlement and Breadlines Knee-Deep in Wheat: Food Assistance in the Great Depression.
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Every successive decade has left its mark on school food.

Aftershocks: Psuedo-Tsunamis and food insecurity in Hawai'i

rjonasse — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 17:32:35 -0500

They 'stood fixated on the flat screens, drinks in hand' as real time images of Chilean destruction were quickly followed by an official tsunami warning and a barrage of historic Hawaiian newsreel footage documenting the devastating tidal wave that hit Hilo back in 1947. After ordering an evacuation of coastal areas, the government advised people to stock up on a weeks worth of food.

Democratic Choice

rjonasse — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 16:45:05 -0500

Biotech technicians neither have the knowledge of gene ecology nor the expertise in multiple disciplines.

After the minister of environment Jairam Ramesh announced a moratorium on Bt brinjal, article after article in the media has denounced the decision, saying such decisions should be left to ‘scientists.’ The issue is however not science vs anti-science. It is reductionist science vs systems science. The moratorium took into account the best of science.

Via Campesina North America calls first public hearing to prepare the presentation of the GM Maize case before international courts

admin — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 15:47:38 -0500

Delegation (Mexico, United States, Canada) of La Via Campesina, North America Region, upon the occasion of the FAO Conference on Agricultural Biotechnologies in Developing Countries.

Small Family Farms in Tropics Can Feed the Hungry and Preserve Biodiversity

admin — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 14:02:10 -0500

ScienceDaily (Feb. 24, 2010) — Conventional wisdom among many ecologists is that industrial-scale agriculture is the best way to produce lots of food while preserving biodiversity in the world's remaining tropical forests. But two University of Michigan researchers reject that idea and argue that small, family-owned farms may provide a better way to meet both goals.

U.S. energy policy fuels the “Brazilian-ization” of African agriculture

rjonasse — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 16:48:17 -0500

Tanya Kerssen and Rick Jonasse (Cliquez ici pour lire en français)

Hard lobbying by U.S. corn ethanol and soy biodiesel corporations paid off earlier this month when the Obama administration announced its plan to boost the country's production and consumption of biofuels. The strategy offers little in the way of "change". Rather, it recommits the country to the goal mandated by Congress in 2007 to implement a 36 billion gallon renewable fuel mandate by 2022-more than three times what the U.S. currently produces.