Switching to organic food isn’t always an overnight event. Many people make their first change to organic meats. This reduces the amount of xenoestrogens you consume, implicated as an expanding human health problem derived from the hormones fed animals to encourage faster and plumper growth. Fresh organic vegetables and fruit are also important choices in order to avoid genetically modified genes. You can gradually move to other organic purchases as you deplete the cans or preferably, jars. Glass jar containers allow you to avoid the plastic coatings that now line most food and beverage tins, with the exception of beer. Aluminum from canned foods and cooking pots has been linked for some years to the increase of Alzheimers. Surprisingly, many restaurants still use aluminum pots! The option of lining tins with plastic is still not an ideal solution because plastic residual has been found to leach into the food. Plastic residual in humans is increasingly linked to reproductive disorders, including infertility which ranks highest in North America, where we are nations addicted to fast and easy….often from a tin. As always, it’s about moderation, but knowing about the controversy gives opportunity to limit intake of these questionable food supplies.
A GMO food guide search will bring up options to help you make health-conscious food choices. We find ourselves facing this problem because we didn’t know better and we trusted our food suppliers. Now we have the availability of greater awareness for better choices. When buying vegetables during the summer season, it’s encouraging to know the Green Peace food guide reports that Canada has not embraced GMO foods to the degree that food suppliers have in the USA. The importance of reading labels is becoming more obvious. In Canada, other than one tomato variety listed as GMO, tomatos and most Canadian-grown produce is reported to not be genetically modified.
In addition to concerns over chemicals sprayed on the produce, going organic is more about the unknown side-effects that can only be discovered in the generation of people who become the lab test, the experiment of what happens 10 to 15 years after eating genetically engineered food. Those results are now being tabulated in an array of new infections, contamination of non-GMO food crops where farmers of many generations are put out of business, and unexplainable, emerging diseases currently without a cure by the conventional medical system. It’s well-worth doing your own research around this topic before making your choice.
GM foods contain randomly inserted genes from foreign organisms. These often include genetic elements of viruses and bacteria. According to geneticist Dr Mae-Wan Ho, “The soil bacterium [in GM soya], Agrobacterium sp. (CP4EPSPS) is unlike any other protein that humans have eaten. And there is no reliable method for predicting its allergenic potential. Allergic reactions typically occur only some time after the subject is sensitized by initial exposure to the allergen.”
Dr Suzanne Wuerthele, US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) toxicologist, “This technology is being promoted, in the face of concerns by respectable scientists and in the face of data to the contrary, by the very agencies which are supposed to be protecting human health and the environment. The bottom line in my view is that we are confronted with the most powerful technology the world has ever known, and it is being rapidly deployed with almost no thought whatsoever to its consequences.”
Dr Ian Gibson MP, former Dean of Biology at the University of East Anglia, has called for a ban on GM foods until longer term safety testing has taken place. He has also expressed concern about the inclusion of GM ingredients in school meals: “There is an awful lot unknown about hazards of new [GM food] crops and until it is fully tested we should not be subjecting people to risks, least of all young children.”
Dr Harash Narang, microbiologist and senior research associate at the University of Leeds, who originally pointed to the possible link between mad cow disease (BSE) and CJD in humans, “If you look at the simple principle of genetic modification it spells ecological disaster. There are no ways of quantifying the risks… The solution is simply to ban the use of genetic modification in food.”
Quotes from such specialized educators indicate it’s time to sit up and notice. Your own research will show that foods certified as organic in Canada must be grown in soil that is not genetically modified as well as be from a Non-GMO seed. Going ‘organic’ does not need to entail the expense we sometimes assign to it if we learn to purchase what we need, what we will use and learn to use it wisely. North Americans have become so busy and so used to everything simply being available that we have forgotten how to honour our foods, how to demand accountability of instutitions that govern our lives, and how to respect and protect our environment from the small percentage of mankind that decided he was smarter than nature, and announced ‘genetically mutated’ seeds have arrived.
Options to consider:
1. Get a GMO food guide and read it before grocery shopping. Take it with you.
2. Visit local farmer markets in summer to look for organic products. Learn where your local organic farmers are located.
3. Ask for more organic options in your local grocery store. Demand creates supply.
4. Sign petitions to lobby for government regulations calling for labelled GMO and Non-GMO food choices. Our federal government continues to reject this.
5. Learn new habits to cook and serve foods differently
6. Learn how to maintain your health by doing regular inner cleansing, how to eat healthy and in tandem with how your body functions. Regularity of meals and smaller quantities are best. Good health eliminates cravings for many foods your body doesn’t need and can reduce the amount you want to eat. It also results in a stronger immune system.
For more information, visit:
www.responsibletechnology.com GMO food info and options
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www.whfoods.org …… Whole foods + quick menus
www.greenpeace.org/canada … “Plants, animals, humans and genes
should not be patented”. Also has a GMO food guide available
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