The GMO labeling debate is a hot one, as it should be. People should care about what they put in their bodies, whether it’s genetically modified, or not. It’s refreshing to see that people are concerned about what they’re eating. It could be the world’s growing obesity problem that sparked the conversation. It could also be the infrequent, but highly publicized food-safety scares. Either way, genetically modified and engineered food is on lots of people’s minds.

To label or not to label?

The latest GMO labeling push largely began with Whole Foods’ decision to label any genetically modified product on its shelves. According to a press release on the company’s website, Whole Foods has pledged that all items will be labeled for GMOs by 2018. This pledge really shook up the food industry.

If you remember, California tried passing an initiative to require GMO labeling, but voters rejected it.  

Though the topic seems popular, there’s always two sides to a story. Cass R. Sunstein, former administrator of the White House Office of Information and Regulator Affairs, wrote in Bloomberg that labeling GMO products would, “confuse, mislead and alarm consumers, potentially causing economic harm, not least to consumers themselves.”

Who are we supposed to trust? What are we supposed to believe? Many pro-label activists cite health effects caused by eating genetically modified food, but the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the American Medical Association have both said that GMOs are safe.

Sunstein mentioned labeling could be confusing for customers. Heck,  it’s confusing enough reading all of the arguments out there.

Fear of the unknown

One story about GMOs really got my attention a few weeks ago. It was the story about golden rice. Have you heard of it?

Golden rice was developed to contain beta-carotene, the source of vitamin A. Millions of people living in Asia and Africa don’t get enough vitamin A. The lack of vitamin A can cause blindness and other health problems. The idea is that poor countries grow the golden rice and provide better nutrition for their people. Sounds like a noble cause, yes?

Some governments are stalling suppling their people with golden rice until more research is done on its safety, according to NPR. What’s more important, feeding your people or spending years studying a product that many scientists say is perfectly safe?

My argument

First of all, I don’t really have a dog in this fight. I’m aware that many of the foods I eat on a daily basis contain genetically modified ingredients. That’s what happens when the majority of the food grown in the U.S. is engineered to resist pests, drought and floods. That’s why farmers use them. In reality, we’ve been fiddling with genetics for decades. Mendel and his peas, for example.

But why not give the consumer a choice? Many of the ingredients found in food are safe to eat, but we still list them on labels, right? That’s what this argument boils down to. Giving consumers the ability to choose for themselves.

According to the International Business Times, 61 countries around the world label genetically modified food. I’d like to see some information on the consumption rate of GMO vs. non-GMO food in those countries.

We detail things like sugar, salt and cholesterol on labels. All of a food’s ingredients must also be labeled, in detail, under a food’s nutritional information. Organic foods have labels, why not GMOs? It’s all part of giving the consumer a choice.

Here’s an idea, instead of labeling GMO food, why not require the labeling of non-GMO food?

The map

I made this map to show the current progress of states to adopt GMO labeling laws. Twenty-two states are currently considering GMO legislation. You can go ahead and click on your state’s marker to learn more about labeling legislation.

If you have any updates on your state’s legislation, please let me know in the comments below.

Please note: This map is a work in progress, changes will be made when more information is available.

View in a larger map

When I was a boy growing up on my grandparents’ farm, I remember a time about this time of year when my grandfather was removing leftover corn seed from the planter and I decided to see what it smelled like.

It was a reddish-purple color (from the protective coating) and I was curious, because I had never seen kernels of corn that color. I looked over the side of the planter box and gave it a whiff, and I remember my nose burning just a bit.

But what I remember most was the way he pushed me from the seeds, yelling at me with some choice words mixed in.

Lessons learned

I smelled the seeds because I was young and curious, and he scolded me because he knew the dangers of inhaling a chemical. I deserved what I got, even though I didn’t know it at the time.

There were times when we’d burn trash on the farm and he wouldn’t let me outdoors, for fear I’d get near the smoke and breathe in something harmful.

Many of the lessons he taught me have stuck with me over the years, and I get apprehensive even today when someone throws a Styrofoam plate onto a campfire or I walk past someone’s trash fire.

I value my lungs, my brain and my health, and the lessons taught to me when I was young are a big reason. But we’ve got a group of people today — a ridiculously large group — that puts more things into their body than I can count.

Whether it’s through inhaling, injecting or eating — they’re putting some of the harshest chemicals that even exist into their body and destroying themselves in the process.

Costing everyone

The cost to their own life is tremendous, but so is the cost to their family and those they affect.

According to the National Institute on Drug Abuse — abuse of tobacco, alcohol, and illicit drugs costs more than $600 billion annually in costs related to crime, lost work productivity and healthcare.

Many of these drugs cause long-term effects, including addiction, but some of them also cause lifetime damage that cannot be repaired.

I remember very well the public service commercials of the 1980s, when the person would hold up an egg and a skillet, and compare the egg to the human brain on drugs, while it was being fried.

In this particular commercial, the narrator doesn’t fry the egg, but she does do a pretty good job of smashing it, and the dishes and everything around her, as she shows what drugs do not only to one’s self, but one’s family, future, money and job:

When she’s done, she tosses the skillet aside and bluntly asks: “Any questions?”

I don’t believe so. …

Need continues

But when you look at the drug use numbers today, it’s obvious a lot of people still don’t get it. They’re not listening or they’re not following what they’re told, and the cost is tremendous.

In some countries, like Singapore, you can be executed for drug abuse. Maybe that’s extreme, but it also is worth looking at.

I keep hearing from drug control agencies that want more money to fight drug abuse, and help the addicts recover but I can’t understand why it’s as high as it is in the first place — why so many expose themselves to something that, if it doesn’t kill you, you’ll eventually need help getting away from.

More needs done

I understand there are many kinds of drug addictions and some are the side effects of legal prescription drugs.

But we’ve got too many people who abuse the ones they’re not supposed to, and then pass on the cost to everyone else. For so many, they can’t even get a job because they can’t pass the pre-employment drug test.

This is ridiculous and should not have to be paid for by people who know and do better.

Maybe more people need what I got when I was a kid, a good hard lecturing about the dangers of chemicals. Or maybe that skillet that smashes the egg needs used across someone’s duff. A little more gently, but with intent.

We need something that sinks in, something that makes a difference.

]]> http://www.thesocialsilo.com/2013/05/20/corn-seed-lessons-drug/feed/ 0 http://www.thesocialsilo.com/2013/05/18/strawberry-banana-smoothie-ice-pops/ http://www.thesocialsilo.com/2013/05/18/strawberry-banana-smoothie-ice-pops/#comments Sat, 18 May 2013 05:00:52 +0000 Social Silo Kitchen http://www.thesocialsilo.com/?p=9719

Ingredients:

• 1 cup apple juice
• 1 pint strawberries, hulled, sliced and frozen 
• 1 banana, sliced and frozen
• 1 apple, peeled, cored, sliced and frozen 
• 6 ounces vanilla yogurt
• 1 teaspoon vanilla

Directions:

1. Put all ingredients in a blender and process until smooth.
2. Pour into ice pop forms or paper cups.
3. Place ice pop sticks in center and freeze, inverted, for 3 hours or until solid.
4. Keep frozen until ready to serve. 

At first the voices were timid. “Shake, shake, shake!” Then the first-graders started getting into it, and the voices swelled into a yell.

“Shake, shake, shake!

“SHAKE, SHAKE, SHAKE!”

“Is it done yet?” they asked, peering into the small plastic container that held heavy cream and a marble.

“Can you still feel the marble in there when you shake it?” asked the Pymatuning Valley FFA volunteers. “If you can, you need to keep shaking.”

“SHAKE, SHAKE, SHAKE!!”

Finally, each had made their own tiny vial of butter. Real butter. And learned a little about where their food comes from in the fun process.

The Ashtabula County first-graders — all 1,136 of them that day — swarmed the county fairgrounds in Jefferson, Ohio, for the first countywide Ag Day, coordinated by the Ashtabula County Farm Bureau and county office of OSU Extension. The students moved through 12 stations, learning about all the food and farm things produced right there in Ashtabula County.

It took an army of 150 volunteers to man 48 stops (each station had four identical stops to accommodate all those kids!).

Six-year-old Abigail Butcher, of Geneva, Ohio, wasn’t one of the first-graders learning about agriculture, she was helping teach it! She and the nine-day-old pygmy goat were definitely stars of the day.

The massive effort first started in 2012 when OSU Extension Program Assistant Abbey Averill coordinated an ag education effort for 300 first-graders in the Ashtabula City Schools. (One little student looked at the Jersey calf and asked, “Is that a camel?”)

As with most Extension programs, pre- and post-event surveys were taken to get a good evaluation of the program’s success and weaknesses. She got great evaluations.

You can see more photos from the Ag Day on the Farm and Dairy website.

Teachers loved it, Averill said, because it matched all their state-mandated standards, and both students and teachers loved it because it was interactive and hands-on — a great way to learn something.

Then the phone calls started. “Can you come to our school, too?”

“It was either go big or stick with Ashtabula City Schools,” she said.

Averill said she didn’t see how the volunteer-based program would be able to meet the individual school demands, so she sought and received a grant from the Ohio 4-H Foundation to cover bus transportation costs to bring all the county’s first-graders to the county fairgrounds for an ag education field day. With that cost underwritten, schools were eager to participate.

“It comes down to money,” Averill admitted. “The schools wouldn’t be able to come because of money, if the transportation wasn’t covered.”

Additional sponsors were sought and kicked in money or in-kind donations to cover additional costs. So with the volunteer corps in their bright lime green T-shirts in place early on May 10, the buses started rolling in.

The organized chaos moved the students through the stations — miniature horses, dairy and beef calves, pigs, lambs and goats, poultry, llamas and alpacas, vegetables, fruits, row crops, orchard/vineyard crops, Christmas trees and maple syrup, and others. The first-graders potted a tiny geranium in biodegradable container and colored a card for Mom, for an instant Mother’s Day gift (the plants were grown by the ATECH horticulture students in Jefferson). They made butter and got to milk a life-sized cow. Each class had a class picture taken, and went home with a goodie bag filled with an activity book that mirrored the day’s learning stations.

At Paula Jacobson’s stop in the pig station, the kids wanted to know why the pigs wagged their tails, or why their ears looked like that (notched for identification).

“A lot of them have never seen a pig before,” said Jacobson, who raises pigs in adjacent Lake County. “We’re lucky enough to live on a farm, but unless they go to the county fair, they never see animals.”

She originally just wanted to come and see how the event was organized, in the hopes of bringing the idea back to Lake County. When she learned more about it, she volunteered to help.

At Tina Fowler’s stop in the vegetable station, students could dig potatoes in a galvanized tub filled with dirt (and then the next group would “plant” the potatoes).

Many of the students were surprised to learn the potatoes are underground, and that you could make more things from potatoes than just french fries, said Fowler, a grape grower from Geneva (who confessed she studied up on potatoes and sunflowers the night before for her teaching stint).

“This is an awesome idea!”

Although she’s uncertain whether another grant will be awarded, Averill hopes to be able to continue the program next year, once current sponsors and other businesses or individuals see how important the day’s subject matter is. She’s so confident they’ll be able to get the sponsors, “we already have plans for next year.”

* * *

To learn more, contact Averill at 440-675-0998 or averill.10@cfaes.osu.edu; or the Ashtabula County Farm Bureau, 800-410-4613; nefarmbu@fairpoint.net.

You can see more photos from the Ag Day on the Farm and Dairy website.

In my last post I discussed several recipes for cicadas, those noisy little creatures that crawl out of the ground every 17 years or so. Apparently I’m not the only one interested in eating bugs, the United Nations thinks we should all partake in food of the crawly kind.

Bigger picture

In an effort to fight hunger, global warming and pollution, the U.N. is promoting insects as low-fat, high-protein food for livestock, pets and people.

The organization recently released a report, “Edible insects- Future prospects for food and feed security,” which outlines the benefits of consuming insects as well as the economics of turning bugs into cash crops.

Bugs as meals, oh the possibilities

According to the report, there are more than 1,900 edible insect species consumed around the world.  In case you were wondering, the most commonly consumed insects are beetles and caterpillars. Ants, grasshoppers, locusts and crickets also make the list of edible creepy crawlers. Bees also appear on the list, but many hives are suffering from Colony Collapse Disorder, we’d probably be better off just leaving the bees alone, for now.

Insect farming?

Yes, many of the insects consumed around the world are harvested in the wild, but humans have been farming insects for many years– bees and silkworms come to mind. We also farm things like crickets for fish bait or pet feed. So, where does human consumption come into play?

According to the report, Thailand farms crickets for food. Farmers often raise the crickets in backyard sheds.

Research is still being conducted on rearing insects on a large scale. One study, conducted in the Netherlands, suggests that production of mealworms is still 4.8 times more expensive than producing normal chicken feed.

Would you rear insects for food?

Let’s assume the cost of rearing insects lowers to a comparable price to raising other types of protein. Would you take the step towards insect farming? What do you think of cultures who regularly consume insects? Do you think the U.N. is just being ridiculous? Let me know!

Ingredients:

• 2 cups rhubarb diced
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 egg
• 2 teaspoons flour
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1 unbaked pie shell

Topping:

• cup flour
• cup brown sugar
• 1/3 cup margarine

Directions:

1. In a medium bowl, mix rhubarb, sugar, egg, flour and vanilla until well blended.
2. Put rhubarb mixture into unbaked pie shell.
3. In a small bowl, mix topping ingredients until crumbly.
4. Cover rhubarb mixture with topping.
5. Bake at 400 degrees for 10 minutes.
6. Reduce heat to 350 degrees and bake 30 minutes or until done.

By Katie Fisher,
OSU ag communications student

COLUMBUS — In the Ohio FFA Trade Show at the 84th Ohio State FFA Convention, there were many booths and venders stationed in the building, giving out free samples of products and handouts to members, advisers and guests.

A long line began from one particular booth to the entrance of the trade show, giving free samples of BBQ pork, roast beef, ham and beans as well as shredded chicken.

“It is good to see the kids enjoy what they are getting. If they really like it they will want to sell it,” said Gene Brinkman, of Brinkman’s Canned Meats.

Brinkman said three schools (Arlington, Riverdale, Winford) had doubled their sales from previous years and want to continue selling the canned meat.

Another option

The product is unique and can be beneficial to raise money for FFA chapters statewide. Canned meat has a shelf life of two-three years, whereas fruit only has a week to a week-and-a-half.

The canned meat is hand selected choice cuts of natural meat that is minimally processed with no refrigeration required. Brinkman’s also offer having a “no salt” option.

This Ohio made agricultural product has earned FFA chapters more than $2,000 in profits. Chapters have the option to sell cans individually or in sets of three.

“I really enjoyed FFA myself and want to give back,” Brinkman said.

Brinkman’s Canned Meats are located in Findley, Ohio.

Get in your vehicle and take a drive. Every direction you go, you see something related to the shale play. Whether it is pipelines, well pads, active drilling or even just equipment being moved, you are probably going to find in the Farm and Dairy region.

I traveled to Washington County last week for a story and I couldn’t help but notice a couple of things.

The traffic

First of all, the traffic on the roads. The number of brand new excavators I passed. And of course, as I traveled down the back roads, the number of gas drilling equipment either on the roadways or parked waiting for their next project.

I think the traffic caught my eye because I have heard the complaints here in Columbiana County already. And the thing that went through my mind is that we have no reason for complaints, it is nothing like Washington County.

The other thing that caught my eye was the number of brand new excavators, trucks were hauling. We all know these aren’t new machines and for me to pass a handful just on Interstate 79 means there is a lot of work going on in the area.

Pipelines

Now, here in Columbiana County, a short drive in almost any direction and you will see the construction of pipelines. Go north and the land has survey ribbons and pipelines line the roadways. Go west and they are everywhere in Kensington as construction moves fast on the M3 Midstream gas collection/processing plant. And now additional plans for other pipelines are being released.

As you drive around the region, it’s obvious to see the different stages that different areas of the Marcellus and Utica plays are in.

Production?

The real news, most regional residents want to know is what the wells are really capable of producing.

Many landowners, landmen, speculators and others are anxiously awaiting the well production report that is yet to be released from the Ohio Department of Natural Resources and others are even speculating as to why the results haven’t been released. All oil and gas well drillers had to produce their well results by a March 31 deadline. Yet, the results have not been issued publicly by the ODNR.

However, Gulfport Energy which has wells in Harrison and Guernsey Counties released their first quarter production results this week. The results give us a vision of what maybe under the ground and awaiting exploration.

The Utica

In the Utica Shale, Gulfport spud 10 gross wells during the first quarter of 2013, according to the first quarter results. At the end of the first quarter, Gulfport had one gross well waiting on completion, three gross wells being drilled by horizontal rigs, five gross wells with their vertical sections completed and waiting on a horizontal rig, and one gross well being drilled with a top-hole rig. Gulfport is currently operating four horizontal rigs and two top-hole rigs in the Utica Shale.

Gulfport stated in a press release the company is currently planning to accelerate its 2013 drilling program, increasing its Utica Shale operated horizontal rig count to seven rigs by the end of June 2013. During 2013, Gulfport has budgeted $494 million to $504 million to drill approximately 55 to 60 gross (49 to 54 net) wells in the Utica Shale .

Gulfport ended the first quarter of 2013 with three gross wells producing. Subsequent to the first quarter, Gulfport began flowing an additional six gross wells into sales pipelines. Gulfport also anticipates an additional four gross wells to begin flowing into sales pipelines by mid-June.

According to the release, Gulfport recently tested its Lyon 1-27H and Lyon 2-27H wells in the Utica Shale in Harrison County. The Lyon 1-27H was drilled to a true vertical depth of 7,466 feet with a 6,694 foot horizontal lateral.

Following a 45-day resting period, the well tested at a gross peak rate of 1,087 barrels of condensate per day and 2.5 MMCF per day of natural gas.

The Stout 2-28H well in Harrison County was drilled to a true vertical depth of 8,093 feet with a 6,914 foot horizontal lateral. Following a 40-day resting period, the well was placed on production at a gross 24-hour peak sales rate of 413 barrels of condensate per day and 3.3 MMCF per day of natural gas.

The Utica shale looks very promising after the wells they have drilled.

However, a graph shows that the Wagner well followed by the boy scout wells in Harrison County continue to lead Gulfport’s production.

Gas (MMcf) Oil (Bbls)
Wagner 1-28H 10.1 108
Boy Scout 1-33 1.5 449
Boy Scout 5-33H 1.3 205
Ryser 1-25H 2.7 312
Shugert 1-1H 14.9 83
Shugert 1-12H 16.3 109
BK Stephens 1-16H 3.6 390
Stout 1-28H 4.2 443
Stout 2-28H 3.3 413

When the production report is released by the ODNR, it will be interesting to see which wells in which counties are leading the way. No matter what, it is clear that the landscape in Ohio, Pennsylvania and West Virginia will forever be changed by shale production.

 Visit the makers of the infographic, Wells Poultry Housing & Equipment.

In case you’ve been living under a rock, I’ll catch you up on this year’s cicada swarm.

This year’s brood II has spent 17 years underground just waiting for the perfect moment to emerge and begin making large amounts of noise and baby cicadas.

Most of the cicada’s will be inhabiting large swaths of the East Coast. According to Popular Mechanics, as many as a million insects could sprout from a vegetated area the size of a football field. That’s a lot of bugs.

We’re not expected to get the noisy little buggers here in Ohio, but that didn’t stop me from consuming as much cicada media as possible. But, to my surprise, I didn’t just find scientific facts about cicadas, no, I found something entirely unexpected: recipes.

Bizarre foods

I’m not stranger to strange food. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t host my own television show about my weird food exploits, I just enjoy trying new things. I’ve tried several foods some people would consider out of the ordinary.

I’ve eaten snake, octopus, rabbit, moose, alligator, escargot, caviar, sea urchin and a variety of vegetarian dishes ( I ate plenty of those in college). Yet, I’ve never taken the dive into insects.

It’s not that I wouldn’t try them, I’d like to, but there aren’t a lot of vendors or restaurants in my area offering bugs as a meal.

What would you do for a bug kabob?

New York Daily News writer, Sasha Goldstein, covered the cicada snack topic rather well. The first step to eating cicadas? Harvesting.

The best time to harvest the creatures is when they’re newly hatched, before their exoskeletons harden. Newly hatched cicadas, called tenerals, are found in the early morning. They should be white and soft.

According to one source, the insects have a ‘mild and nutty like peanut butter’ flavor. Of course, I can’t confirm or deny that claim, I’ve never eaten one.

Recipes

• Clermont College offers a few cicada recipes including: A cicada-portobello quiche, cicada cheese wontons, curried cicadas and chickpeas and cicada granola chews.

• A blog dedicated to tracking the cicada brood, Cicada Invasion, offers a cicada taco recipe.

• How about a whole cicada cookbook? Jenna Jadin of the University of Maryland wrote this cicada cookbook. The book includes a brief lesson on cicadas before it delves into the culinary creations, 14 in all.

Let me hear it

What do you think about eating cicada? I’ve heard they’re packed with protein and vitamins, but is it worth the gross-out factor? Have you ever eaten anything strange, or know someone who has? Let me know in the comments below.