Monday Moaning

Two moans this morning.

Nothing like firing both barrels at the same time.

First up, nasty secretive governments

Fracking campaigners criticise ‘censored’ report on house prices

Government urged to publish sections cut from study into impact of shale gas wells on local communities

Source: TheGuardian Read the article.

Opinion:

It’s high time that governments realised they are elected by the people to serve the needs of the people and not their own twisted agendas.

Governments have lost track of why they are there.

Ideally, they shouldn’t have secret agendas that they don’t want the people to know about; whether militarily or domestically.

The people have a right to know!

Not only know, but know the FULL story, not some censored shit that the government thinks will keep the people quiet.

Generally, it follows that if there’s shit that the government needs to censor, then there’s some shit that is not good nor for the benefit of the people.

Use your vote to get rid of these degenerates!

Second up:

There needs to be more effort in supporting businesses that look to caring for the environment.

“At the moment, one of my supermarkets is out of the paper option, and the girl at the checkout was packing my stuff. Sometimes she would put just two or three items in a bag, I complained bitterly, unpacking and repacking more items to reduce the number of bags. This girl had no idea.” Opening paragraph to a piece on my CTWW of 16th July. Read for the story, it’s further down the post.

Then this week I read a comment:

“I am shocked an employee of Trader Joe’s had no concept of the environmental issues surrounding plastic. Maybe the answer to educating the public is to include it as part of the job training as well. I don’t have a Trader Joe’s near me currently, but will if I relocate. I used to shop there in Arizona but today am concerned with some of their business decisions and may not return to give them my business.”  Comment on Living Simply Free

Opinion:

Companies, retailers, service suppliers, etc need to be taken to task.

Either you care about the environment or I take my business elsewhere!

This means that managers need to add environmental issues to their staff training, as an integral part of same.

That means that YOU need to complain to them. YOU need to make them aware of their shortcomings and deficiencies. If you claim to be green, and don’t, then YOU ARE PART OF THE PROBLEM!

In my case above, I complained, and I got a satisfactory response, the manager agreed with me, he hadn’t thought about the issue before, and promised to look into it. I will be watching!

If and when I see an improvement, I will talk to him again, however, if I don’t see some action I will talk to him again and tell him why he won’t see me in his store again.

Have you got the courage to do this?

 

 

 

Not a CTWW Post – 1st Jan

2013… gone

2014 is here

Happy New year to all my followers and visitors. Your support and comments have made the past year awesome, all is appreciated.

I hope that the New Year brings you all that you have wished for. More, I hope that the New Year brings some important changes in the way we view our green attitudes, that governments come to their senses, and corporations become more responsible.

Only three more weeks until Small is back in the saddle and Wednesdays once again become CTWW.

Change the World Wednesday – 16th Oct

Courtesy of: http://www.blogactionday.org

Click on the banner for the full post

This weeks challenge is a little difference from Small’s normal CTWW challenges, but nevertheless an important one.

This week please consider human rights as it relates to the environment. A good place to start is by reading The Human Right to A Safe and Healthy Environment.

 

THEN …

Leave a comment below or write a post discussing our environmental rights, whether or not they are being realized and how we, as individuals, can help maintain or realize them.

Generally, our human rights are being stiffled by governments and corporations.

My immediate thought on reading the challenge was health and the right to know what we are eating, drinking and putting on our bodies.

Many countries have laws relating to product labelling, just as many countries don’t.

We have the right to know.

To know if:

The food products we buy are made with GMOs so that we can make an informed decision as to whether that product will be a part of our diet, or not

The product contains some form of additive, preservative, sweetener that may or may not be prejudicial to our health.

The product contains some agent or chemical that is considered to be cancer causing or harmful in any other way.

Advertising about products is the truth, and not just something the companies would like us to believe.

Frankly, there is so much bullshit out there that people are confused, and as a result cannot make informed decisions.

The public are bombarded with dubious evidence from company sources, that are seriously at odds with independent assessments.

Governments should be mandating that companies cannot use in-house, biased information for their products, but must be, by law, compelled use to independent testing and reports by specialists that are not chosen by the company.

The use of professionals, doctors, veterinarians, dentists, nutritionists, etc to endorse products needs to be banned. These people will tell you that black is white for money. It’s bullshit! Professionals making claims about any product should be held accountable, struck off, if their views are contrary to independent evidence.

Lobbying should be banned, as it contravenes the basic human right to know the truth.

Companies need to be banned from political donations because some of the biggest are the worst; for example the First World is up in arms over the rate of the morbidly obese, yet one of the greatest culprits is the soda industry, but because they collectively donate billions, governments aren’t interested in the problem and fob it off elsewhere.

Governments have lost sight of the fact that they represent THE PEOPLE, they have become self-serving entities whose only interest is the next election. The people themselves have lost sight and keep putting the same fools into government.

If we want to claim our human rights, we have to change the paradigm, because the current one IS NOT WORKING!

Until we take back control we will continue to be abused by the very people that we have elected to ensure our human rights.

It is our right to know!

Monday Moaning

Whoops… It’s Tuesday already.

Where’d Monday go?

What happened to Monday?

I have a feeling it’s going to be one of those weeks.

Still, we can have a Tuesday Moaning over coffee.

Food

We need it, the world is short of it. Companies and corporations are trying to get rich from it, and they don’t care if it’s healthy or not, just as long as the money rolls in.

They experiment with it; GMOs and the like, they try and control or dominate the market and nobody bleats or raises an eyebrow.

Nearly all the grain in the world is already compromised. I read yesterday of a farmer whose crop was banned because it was contaminated with GMOs, he was exporting to a country that, wisely, doesn’t accept them.

We read about the rush for biofuels creating shortages of the same plants that were once a food crop.

They want to GMOise or farm salmon, then shit happens…

This goes against nature. Nature has it’s protections in place and along comes man and tries to change it.

It won’t be too far in the future when all we can get is GMOised products. The thing that concerns me is that we don’t yet know what GMOs do to us and government organisations are being bought and sold on the idea that this is necessary in order to overcome the global shortages.

The companies and corporations bulldoze ahead, regardless; as long as there is a profit rainbow ahead. The governments don’t say boo, they don’t want to lose their funding from these bastards; they don’t care about you, their bottom line is money.

We, the people, need to stand up to this crap. Hurt these companies where it hurts most, the pocket.

We need to demand GMO labeling, so that we can make informed choices when we buy.

We need to educate the populace, who are kept in the dark through lack of information, or biased advertising.

We, the people have become sheep, we ‘just follow’ the flock, it doesn’t matter if we are pandering to the corporate wolves.

It has to stop!

And only you can stop it.

 

Make you Fink on Friday

Here’s something to make you think!

Are our respective governments trying to kill us?

No, I’m not being silly, seriously!

It would be an ideal solution to the over population problem. Are we looking at a genocide issue? If planned obsolescence is possible for 60 or 70 years without us knowing, any thing in the realm of diabolical is possible.

I ask this because everything I read says GM crops are bad, but the governments insist they are not. Nobody can be that stupid, or could they.

FSA ‘endangering public health’ by ignoring concerns over GM food

French researcher who claimed GM food caused cancers in rats says UK should review food safety and assess long-term toxicity

GM maize, like the one above, and other GM crops should be put through rigorous long-term testing, according to Professor Gilles-Eric Seralini. Photograph: Jean-Pierre Muller/AFP/Getty Images

The French researcher who caused a scientific storm when he claimed to show that some GM food led to tumours and cancers in rats has accused the UK Food Standards Agency (FSA) of “recklessly endangering public health” by not demanding long-term testing of the foods.

In a series of parliamentary and public meetings held this week in London, Edinburgh and Cardiff, Prof Gilles-Eric Séralini has challenged UK politicians and safety authorities to review the way safety is assessed.

Séralini, a molecular biologist at Caen University, said: “Our research found severe toxicity from GM maize and [Monsanto pesticide] Roundup. The British Food Standards Agency has uncritically accepted the European Food Safety Authority’s dismissal of the study, even though many of EFSA’s experts have been exposed as having conflicts of interest with the GM industry. At the very least, the British government should demand long-term mandatory safety testing on all GM foods before they are released onto the market,” he said.

“The British scientific authorities are deliberately misleading their government and are recklessly endangering public health in ignoring the findings of our research.”

Séralini’s study found that rats developed much higher levels of cancers and died earlier than controls when fed a diet of Monsanto’s Roundup-tolerant GM maize NK603 for two years, or were exposed to Roundup over the same period. The usual industry tests last for 90 days.

The former member of two French government committees assessing the safety of GM foods suggested that the results could be explained by the endocrine-disrupting effects of the pesticide Roundup, and over-expression of the transgene in the genetically modified organism (GMO).

Read more

Opinion:

The prevalence of GM around the world is growing to catastrophic proportions. flying in the face of nearly everything we know; and nearly everything we DO know tells us it’s bad for us. So why do governments accept it?

Is there some diabolical plan?

“The British scientific authorities are deliberately misleading their government and are recklessly endangering public health in ignoring the findings of our research.”

This statement alone, makes me question the status quo; sending a red flag shivering up my spine. It should be doing the same to you.

Maybe we should be asking questions, demanding answers.

 

 

Why do we do this?

How indigenous people are turned off their lands

Hundreds of thousands in Cambodia, Vietnam and Thailand are said to have been displaced

A protester faces riot police in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, in a demonstration against the eviction of lakeside dwellers. Photograph: Tang Chhin Sothy/AFP/Getty Images

 

Cambodia

More than 400,000 people have been forcibly evicted from their lands since 2003, often without compensation, as the nation sells off its territory to sugar and rubber barons and property developers. Villagers who protest have been beaten, imprisoned and murdered – such as the environmental campaigner Chut Wutty, who was killed last year – as more than one-tenth of land has been transferred in the past few years from small-scale farmers to agribusiness, rights groups claim. A recent Global Witness report – and investigation by the Guardian – found that Deutsche Bank and the International Finance Corporation were bankrolling massive government-sponsored land grabs in both Cambodia and Laos through two Vietnamese companies, HAGL and VRG, which had been granted recent economic land concessions. Villagers claimed they had little food to eat and no chance of jobs, as hardly any positions were offered by the companies.

Vietnam

The state can take land away from citizens for economic development, national security or defence reasons, or in the public interest. But in recent years the government has grabbed land to make way for eco-parks, resorts and golf courses, much to the anger of the public. Last year, around 3,000 security forces were deployed in the northern Hung Yen province after villagers protested against a 70-hectare land grab to make way for an “eco-urban township”. Around the same time, a family of four fish farmers protested against a state eviction squad armed with homemade shotguns and land mines – a bold move in this one-party nation. While the prime minister declared the fish farmers’ eviction illegal, a court recently handed down a five-year jail sentence to those involved in the protest for making a “bad impact on the social order … [of] the country as a whole”.

Thailand

The sea gypsies in the southern resort island of Phuket are facing eviction after living on and around the beaches of Rawai for the past 200 years. Thai landowners claim they want the land back to build houses and a “sea gypsy village” in which tourists can buy fish and see how this once nomadic seafaring tribe now lives on land. The sea gypsy communities have so far refused to move, but could be forcibly evicted if no resolution is reached. Sea gypsies in neighbouring areas, such as Khao Lak, have also been forced off their land by resorts and hotels over past decades, while Burmese sea gypsies around the Mergui islands are reportedly being moved out by authorities keen to develop the area for tourism.

More cases of greedy corporations and governments.

You can’t make money from a native village, but build a resort or a golf course for the billionaires and you can make a lot of money!

It matters not that you are destroying lives.

 

Monday Moaning

Milk Scare Hits Dairy Power New Zealand

Low levels of dicyandiamide-also called DCD-have been found in New Zealand milk. The chemical, which farmers apply to pastures to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions, is toxic to humans in high doses

WELLINGTON—A toxic substance has been found in New Zealand milk, in a potential blow to the nation’s dairy exports, which are valued at 11.5 billion New Zealand dollars (US$9.7 billion) annually.

The country’s two biggest fertilizer companies, Ravensdown Ltd. and Ballance Agri-Nutrients Ltd., have suspended sales of dicyandiamide, or DCD, after low levels were found in dairy products. Farmers apply DCD to pastures to prevent nitrate, a fertilizer byproduct that can also cause health problems, from getting into rivers and lakes.

Though there are no international standards for the acceptable level of DCD in food products, in high doses the substance is toxic to humans.

Government officials Thursday expressed concern about the potential damage to the image of an industry that accounts for nearly a third of the nation’s exports.

“New Zealand’s reputation is based on the high quality of food we produce,” said Carol Barnao, deputy director of general standards at New Zealand’s primary industries ministry, which is responsible for exports and protecting the nation from biological risks. A government study of DCD use is now under way.

Wall Street Journal

and this…

Fonterra CEO plays down milk worries

The CEO of dairy giant Fonterra has described reaction to trace findings of nitrate inhibitor in milk as “way out of proportion”.

Co-op chief Theo Spierings said he could assure consumers worldwide that Fonterra products were safe to consume.

“We know some of our customers and regulators have questions. We need to answer them, and that’s exactly what we are doing,” he said.

“We have strong science and we are providing assurances about the safety of our products. Our testing has found only minute traces of DCD in samples of some of our products. It is important to remember that the minute traces detected were around 100 times lower than acceptable levels under European food safety limits. ”

On Friday Fonterra issued a press release saying it supported moves by New Zealand’s two main fertiliser suppliers to voluntarily suspend sales and use of Dicyandiamide (DCD) treatment on farm land until further notice.

DCD is used to inhibit nitrate leaching into waterways from fertiliser treatments and to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

The decision followed a finding in September that traces of DCD had appeared in milk tested by Fonterra. Spierings said talks with fertiliser companies Ravensdown and Ballnce agri-nutrients about withdrawing DCD from the market had begun at that time.

Todd Muller, managing director of co-operative affairs at Fonterra, said the problem with DCD use was that although Europe had standards for DCD traces, most countries didn’t, which meant the issue could create barriers to Fonterra’s exports.

“Because farmers were looking to DCD as a tool to mitigate farm environmental impacts,” he said, “we could see a potential problem in future.”

The press conference followed media headlines in the United States and China drawing attention to the DCD finding and questioning the safety of New Zealand milk.

Spierings said his concern was not about milk safety but about consumers being concerned by rumours rather than facts. “The whole industry is affected, based on rumours,” he said.

The potential impact was enough to make sure the government was kept fully informed, said Spierings.

“We have a 100 per cent open line [to the government] every day, because it’s a New Zealand issue,” he said.

Source: Stuff.co.nz

Opinion:

Point 1 :: I would trust nothing any CEO says.

Point 2 :: Ditto for governments.

Question, why has Dicyandiamide (DCD) been immediately withdrawn from the market?

I suspect because there IS a problem!

Is this another case of companies, corporations and governments pulling the wool over our eyes?

Profits and GDP are more important than people!

Further reading:

Don’t blame me, I just eat grass – image: 3news

Now, look where it’s made

But Ministry for Primary Industries director-general Wayne McNee said in a statement the amount of small DCD residues found posed no food safety risk.

“DCD is not melamine. It is a different chemical and has none of the toxicity that melamine has.” – 3news Read more:

DCD is also used in the production of melamine, the compound which left Chinese babies sick and some dead, after they drank milk powder contaminated with melamine. – RadioNZNews Read more: