Greenpeace lists GM food brands

Greenpeace China published a report that guides people on how to distinguish genetically modified food sold on the market and avoid GM Food by providing a list of 400 international and domestic brand products and whether they use genetically modified (GM) food in their products. The companies that use GM food are given red marks and others are labelled green. Red manufacturers include food giant like Nestle and the Yili dairy group as they have not declared themselves GM food-free and Green companies included Coca- Cola and China Resources that produces Snow beer. The China's two biggest dairy producers Yili and Mengniu both fell into the red zone from the green in the last two years. Eighteen baby food producers were included in the red section including Nestle and Wondersun, compared with only seven in the green. Although it has not been proven that GM food is hazardous for people, scientists don't rule out its harm to human health in the long run. However, China largely forbids growing GM farm plants, but food producers can import genetically modified soybean, corn and many other agricultural products, mainly from the US. Greenpeace wants to promote good enterprises for their continuous efforts to maintain a high quality in their products, not downgrade their products and services.

Goats produce silk in their milk: study

Goats in Wyoming are being milked for a product - spider silk. The researchers successfully implanted a herd of goats with silk-making gene proteins from a golden orb spider. Because of its strength and flexibility, people are interested in spider silk for uses that range from artificial ligaments and tendons to bulletproof vests and even car airbags. Spider silk is three times stronger than kevlar and at least five times stronger than steel. The problem with using the silk in bio-medical applications has been one of availability - collecting enough raw material from spiders to use in tendon, ligament or bone repairs would take a really long time. To fix this, they cloned the genes for the protein that makes up the six different kinds of spider silks and glue and implanted them in the goats. When the goats give birth to kids and start lactating, they produce spider silk proteins in their milk. Goat's milk is collected and then purified to reveal the silk proteins, which are then spun into silk. Harvesting spider silk from goats has a huge impact on speed : as researchers are finding more than one gram of spider's silk in one litre of goat's milk.

 Battle royal over Bt cotton royalty

A determined battle is being fought in the courts, and outside, by US agricultural biotech giant Monsanto, its Indian affiliates and seed lobbyists to free the prices of genetically modified Bt cotton from state government control. At stake is a huge business running into several thousand crore of rupees, with royalty alone on the Bt cotton seeds grossing over Rs 1,500 crore for the US firm and its Indian licencees since 2002 when Bt cotton was introduced in the country (a claim that is not accepted by the US company). Farmers’ organisations across the political spectrum, seed dealers and seed companies have been drawn into the dispute which could have a major impact on the direction that agriculture, specially the volatile cotton production sector, takes. Caught up in the trait war is the issue of the viability of the seed sector in India, which is a Rs 6,000-crore business. The National Seed Association of India (NSAI), which is being driven by the small coterie of technology providers, has also joined the fray with a lawsuit that questions the fixing of seed prices. The major thrust of the battle is against the Andhra Pradesh (AP) government which has taken the lead in keeping Bt cotton seed prices at affordable levels for farmers.

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