Food

For a long time, American consumers had it pretty good. They could read a food label or product advertisement and trust that the information it contained was reasonably truthful. That’s because ever since their formation over 100 years ago, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) were there actively to enforce laws against false and misleading marketing schemes.Unfortunately, that is no longer the case. [node:read-more:link]

Some Vermont dairy workers say their wages and living conditions have improved, thanks to an agreement reached last year between the workers and Ben & Jerry's, a division of global consumer products company Unilever. Times are tough on dairy farms around the country, with milk prices declining for the fourth year in a row. But 72 farms that supply Ben & Jerry's earn a little more by agreeing to follow labor and housing standards. [node:read-more:link]

Most any foodstuff sells faster these days, often at a premium, when it’s tagged as being “locally grown.” Christy Bratcher, associate professor of Animal Sciences at Auburn University, wondered what that designation really meant to consumers, and how that understanding differed from what they were getting. In her ongoing research, “A Systems Approach to Improving the Production and Distribution of Local and Regional Foods for a More Secure Food System,” Bratcher and her team researched meat production facilities of all sizes, federally and state-inspected, across the Southeast. [node:read-more:link]

he Kroger Co. has announced plans to source pork only from producers who do not use sow gestation stalls. The nation’s largest supermarket chain specified in its recent sustainability report that it aims to buy 100 percent of its pork from producers using group housing or free-range methods by 2025. [node:read-more:link]

he Food and Drug Administration is poised to weigh in on labeling claims in the organic market after a recent op-ed piece by a former FDA official accused the food industry of deceiving consumers. “I'm going to put out more detailed information on what different terms mean on food packaging, to help consumers best use claims like organic, antibiotic free, etc.,” FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb wrote this week, beginning a series of Tweets on the subject. [node:read-more:link]

In a suburban Minneapolis laboratory, a tiny company that has never turned a profit is poised to beat the world's biggest agriculture firms to market with the next potential breakthrough in genetic engineering - a crop with "edited" DNA. Calyxt Inc, an eight-year-old firm co-founded by a genetics professor, altered the genes of a soybean plant to produce healthier oil using the cutting-edge editing technique rather than conventional genetic modification. [node:read-more:link]

FDA is investigating a potential dietary link between canine dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM) and dogs eating certain pet foods containing legumes like peas or lentils, other legume seeds, or potatoes as main ingredients. We began investigating after FDA‘s Center for Veterinary Medicine (CVM) received a number of reports of DCM in dogs eating these diets. [node:read-more:link]

No one enjoys being called a murderer or likes being shown images of goats being beaten to produce milk, but PETA has never had a problem with those approaches in delineating their message, and has a reputation for such shocking campaign tactics. [node:read-more:link]

Is the death of 188 lab rats justifiable if it spares the lives of millions of cows?That’s the question animating a heated war of words between two organizations that share a core value: saving the lives of animals.On one side is Impossible Foods, the Silicon Valley company behind the Impossible Burger and other meatless products that actually taste like meat. [node:read-more:link]

J.R. Simplot has acquired gene editing licensing rights that could one day be used to help farmers produce more crops and make grocery store offerings such as strawberries, potatoes and avocados stay fresher longer.  Simplot Co. announced the agreement with DowDuPont and the Broad Institute of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard University, developers of the nascent gene editing technology. Simplot is the first agricultural company to receive such a license. [node:read-more:link]