Grist.org, By: Tom Laskawy, 06/07/2013

If you’re Monsanto, you’re probably really proud of your genetically modified (GMO) sugar beets. Introduced in 2008, the beets are the company’s most recent Roundup Ready product genetically engineered to withstand the direct application of the herbicide glyphosate. Immediately successful, they took over the sugar beet market within two years. By 2010, 95 percent of the sugar beets grown in the U.S. were Monsanto’s genetically modified variety.

This matters to us all because about 50 percent of white sugar sold here is made from sugar beets. In other words, unless that bag of sugar you just bought is labeled “Certified Organic” or “100 percent cane sugar,” it almost certainly contains sugar made from GMO crops.

For more on this story visit www.grist.org

NYtimes, By: Stephanie Strom, 06/20/2013

The Agriculture Department has approved a label for meat and liquid egg products that includes a claim about the absence of genetically engineered products. It is the first time that the department, which regulates meat and poultry processing, has approved a non-G.M.O. label claim, which attests that meat certified by the Non-GMO Project came from animals that never ate feed containing genetically engineered ingredients like corn, soy and alfalfa.

The U.S.D.A.’s Food Safety Inspection Service “allows companies to demonstrate on their labels that they meet a third-party certifying organization’s standards, provided that the third-party organization and the company can show that the claims are truthful, accurate and not misleading,” Cathy Cochran, a U.S.D.A. spokeswoman, said in a statement.

For more on this story visit www.nytimes.com

GFP Commentary

We at the Galactic Free Press do no advocate anyone calling attention to themselves in this manner.  Stay safe everyone.

The Oregonian, By: Kimberly A.C. Wilson, 06/20/2013

Federal investigators are asking the public to help solve middle-of-the-night crimes that left ruined fields of genetically engineered sugar beets in rural Jackson County. The crop destruction took place over the course of two separate nights in early June, when an unknown individual or group destroyed about 6,500 sugar beet plants genetically engineered to stand up to the herbicide Roundup on a pair of privately-owned plots of land leased and managed by Syngenta.

For more on this story visit www.oregonlive.com

By: Theextinctionprotocol.wordpress.com, 06/21/2013

BRAZIL – Brazil’s president, Dilma Rousseff, and key ministers are to hold an emergency meeting on Friday following a night of protests that saw Rio de Janeiro and dozens of other cities echo with percussion grenades and swirl with teargas as riot police scattered the biggest demonstrations in more than two decades. The protests were sparked last week by opposition to rising bus fares, but they have spread rapidly to encompass a range of grievances, as was evident from the placards. “Stop corruption. Change Brazil;” “Halt evictions;” “Come to the street. It’s the only place we don’t pay taxes; “Government failure to understand education will lead to revolution.” A vast crowd – estimated by the authorities at 300,000 and more than a million by participants – filled Rio’s streets, one of a wave of huge nationwide marches against corruption, police brutality, poor public services and excess spending on the World Cup.

For more on this story visit www.theextinctionprotocol.wordpress.com

By: Euronews, 06/19/2013

The Bulgarian parliament has formally cancelled the controversial appointment of businessman and MP Delyan Peevski as the new head of the State Agency for National Security (ДАНС or DANS), the Bulgarian secret service. All 128 deputies present in the Assembly voted unanimously to reverse the controversial designation that had provoked protests against the current government, just three weeks after it took power. His rushed appointment – he was nominated, voted through and sworn in in a single afternoon – had sparked numerous protests all over Bulgaria since last Friday.

For more on this story visit http://www.euronews.com/2013/06/19/with-peevski-out-after-five-days-of-protests-what-is-next-for-bulgaria/