Terry Etherton’s Blog on Hormones, Biotechnology, and Food Safety

Henry I. Miller and Gregory Conko
Washington Times (February 29, 2008)

European Union officials adamantly refuse to let the World Trade Organization save them from themselves.

Despite a 2005 WTO ruling that some European countries were breaking international trade rules by prohibiting the importation of gene-spliced, or “genetically modified (GM),” crops and foods, Europe remains recalcitrant, unrepentant and on the verge of slaughtering its own livestock industry. Read the rest of this entry »

Socio-Economic Benefits Becoming Evident Among Resource-Poor Farmers

MANILA, PHILIPPINES (Feb. 13, 2008) – After a dozen years of commercialization, biotech crops are still gaining ground with another year of double-digit growth, and new countries joining the list of supporters, according to a report released today by the International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-biotech Applications (ISAAA). In 2007, biotech crop area grew 12 percent or 12.3 million hectares to reach 114.3 million hectares, the second highest area increase in the past five years.In addition to planting more biotech hectares, farmers are quickly adopting varieties with more than one biotech trait. These “trait hectares” grew at a swift 22 percent, or 26 million hectares, to reach 143.7 million hectares – more than double the area increase of 12.3 million hectares. New crops were also added to the list as China reported 250,000 biotech poplar trees planted. The insect-resistant trees can contribute to reforestation efforts. Read the rest of this entry »

Jörn P. W. Scharlemann and William F. Laurance
Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute
Balbao, Ancon, Panama

(Published in Science 319:43-44, 2008)

Global warming and escalating petroleum costs are creating an urgent need to find ecologically friendly fuels. Biofuels–such as ethanol from corn (maize) and sugarcane–have been increasingly heralded as a possible savior (1, 2). But others have argued that biofuels will consume vast swaths of farmland and native habitats, drive up food prices, and result in little reduction in greenhouse-gas emissions (3-5). An innovative study by Zah et al. (6), commissioned by the Swiss government, could help to resolve this debate by providing a detailed assessment of the environmental costs and benefits of different transport biofuels. Read the rest of this entry »

Sherry Bunting
Farmshine February 8, 2008

Don’t ever apologize for what you do: be proud. What you do affects everyone from Main Street to Wall Street,”said Orion Samuelson to more than 600 dairy producers and agribusiness representatives, launching the 2008 Pennsylvania Dairy Summit at the Lancaster Host on Wednesday (Feb. 6). Read the rest of this entry »

By SHERRY BUNTING
Special for Farmshine

LANCASTER, Pa. – “They’ve heard the lies, now it’s time they hear from the farmers,” said Pennsylvania dairyman Tom Krall during the second day of the Dairy Summit here on February 7. Krall-View Farm, Lebanon County, is home to a 100-cow milking herd.

Krall, along with DairyBusiness publisher Joel Hastings presented information about the new producer organization: American Farmers for the Advancement and Conservation of Technology (AFACT). Read the rest of this entry »

Terry D. Etherton

Protect consumer choice:In the marketplace it is important that consumers have the right to buy milk produced by the most efficient, safe and sanitary methods of dairy farm management practices and production technologies that are available,and priced to reflect these efficiencies. Read the rest of this entry »

William Henning, Ph.D.
Professor Emeritus of Meat Science
The Pennsylvania State University

Consumer concerns have once again been raised after 143 million pounds of ground beef was recalled this week from a California firm that manufactures and distributes ground beef to retailers and schools. The problems initially surfaced when a member of a special interest group (The Humane Society of the United States; HSUS) filmed a case of brutal animal handling of a cow that was unable to get up and posted it on YouTube. Normally, this would have been a case of animal cruelty that would have been dealt with by the USDA and the plant in question. Since the USDA Food Safety Inspection Service is responsible for animal welfare in packing plants, this should have been all handled within the regulatory system for animal handling. However, it was apparently revealed later that this non-ambulatory cow was, in fact, harvested and entered the food supply that raised the food safety questions. Since non-ambulatory animals are not considered fit for processing due to the possible relationship with BSE (mad cow disease), it should been prevented from entering the food supply. Read the rest of this entry »

The following podcast features Orion Samuelson of WGN Radio discussing the use of recombinant bovine somatotropn (rbST).

Orion Samuelson is heard on WGN Radio, where he has served as Agribusiness Director since 1960. He and his associate, Max Armstrong, present 15 agricultural/business reports daily on WGN. They also host the hour-long Morning Show and Noon Show, both heard on Saturdays on WGN. Orion is also heard daily on more than 260 radio stations with his syndicated National Farm Report and on 110 stations with his syndicated Samuelson Sez. Orion and Max are seen weekly on rural channel RFD-TV, carried on Dish-TV and DirecTV on This Week in Agribusiness.

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The following podcast is of an interview with Dr. Terry Etherton on WHYY Radio in Philadelphia. This interview took place on January 15, 2008.

Summary from WHYY: The Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture recently ruled that dairies that do not inject their cattle with synthetic growth hormone can no longer label their milk as hormone-free. The decision, which has been put on hold until the beginning of February, raises serious questions for consumers, dairy farmers, and retailers. We talk to TERRY ETHERTON of Penn State University.

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By TERRY D. ETHERTON, Ph.D.
My editorial reply to the Centre Daily Times, State College, PA
(Published in the January 21, 2008 issue of the Centre Daily Times)

Your editorial (Truth is spilled over milk, published on January 3, 2008) overlooked a lot of truths and passed on a few half truths as well.

The biggest overlooked truth is that the controversy over milk labeling has more to do with company profits than with consumer demand. The truth is that milk companies have forced farmers to stop using recombinant bovine somatotropin (rbST) so that the companies can imply through advertising that their milk is better than some other company’s milk. This disingenuous advertising — “hormone free,” “no artificial hormones,” etc. – is fully aimed at customers who cannot be expected to know all the facts about rbST. There is a bothersome fact that undermines this advertising strategy: All milk contains hormones —the same hormones in the same amounts, irrespective of whether the cow has been supplemented with rbST. This includes organic milk and milk from cows not supplemented with rbST. Even vitamin D, which is used to fortify milk, is a hormone. Read the rest of this entry »