Category Archives: Fail!

Salvadoran Peasant Farmers Clash With U.S. of Monsanto Over Seeds | Inter Press Service

Seed quality is monitored and approved by the Salvadoran Ministry of Agriculture, which paid a total of 25.9 million dollars on seed purchases in 2013, most of them maize and beans which are staple foods in El Salvador.

Until the new model was implemented in 2011, 70 percent of the market was cornered by a subsidiary of U.S. biotech giant Monsanto, Semillas Cristiani Burkard. Since then, other producers have entered the field, like the cooperatives, with better quality certified seeds and more competitive prices.

Last year’s seed was purchased by an executive decree of December 2012, with the approval of Congress, and in practice U.S. companies were excluded. The U.S. embassy demanded a public and “transparent” tender process.

In January 2014, lawmakers approved a new decree allowing international companies to participate in the tendering process. However, the bidding in April was won by the same 18 producers.

Ambassador Aponte is now pressing for a different procurement process that will favour U.S. companies. This position is being criticised by social organisations and rural producers, who protested in front of the embassy in San Salvador in June.

“The embassy’s position serves to promote Monsanto’s seeds,” environmentalist Ricardo Navarro told IPS, referring to the world leader in transgenic seeds, against which many protests have been held in Latin American countries.

Aponte did not mention Monsanto in her comments, but according to Navarro “it is obvious she is referring to Monsanto, the largest company in the sector,” whose local branch “lost a market they thought belonged to them.”

via Salvadoran Peasant Farmers Clash With U.S. Over Seeds | Inter Press Service.

Indigenous Resistance: Paris Exclusive! Klee Benally challenges auction of sacred items in Paris

Then she called her boss, Master Alain Leroy, to inform him of the situation. In between, the protesters started to stick posters on the windows of the office. Then Master Leroy himself arrived, tore the posters, shouting that it was damaging his building (they were just stuck with tape and he could tear them without any effort).

Klee tried to explain to him that he just wanted to deliver a letter and discuss the matter peacefully. But Mr. Leroy started with denying the genocide of Native Americans, claimed that the artifacts had been sold by the Natives themselves, although he did not have a document proving it, but claimed that ‘everybody knew that Native Americans never had papers’! He claimed that nobody had any right to challenge his rights to sell sacred objects, as ‘all the courts have ruled for the 4th time that the sale was legal’. As a matter of fact, ‘all the courts’ are the court of the neighborhood, with that one Madame Judge who has no knowledge what so ever of Native Americans and just believes that Constitutions protect private property and the right to trade.

Mr. Leroy also referred abundantly to the right of private property, guaranteed by French and American Law. He also claimed that those artifacts were preserved thanks to white collectors (suggesting that Natives are not able to preserve their inheritance) and that they would not exist anymore if they had not been sold to while people.

Then, at a point, he claimed that the masks were not sacred but had been made specially for tourists, which amounts to admit that he is cheating on his customers, as they certainly don’t go to an auction to buy tourist junk.

via Indigenous Resistance: Paris Exclusive! Klee Benally challenges auction of sacred items in Paris.

Anthrax discovered in beef in Hungary | News | DW.DE | 04.07.2014

{Know where you food is from and if it has been properly inspected – give anyone who suggests privatizing inspection instructions on how to shut the door as they leave their senses!}

Five people were being monitored in hospital for a suspected infection of the disease, Hungarian health authority said ANTSZ in a statement.

The disease appeared to have been identified in frozen beef from two cattle that were slaughtered on a farm near the town of Tiszafured, some 160 kilometers (100 miles) east of Budapest.

Authorities said the five people hospitalized had probably contracted the disease during illegal slaughtering. The ANTSZ said some of the beef had been shipped to a company that operates canteens, with the firm’s operations having been suspended.

ANTSZ added that the vaccination of animals exposed to the anthrax bacteria had already begun. “Authorities have taken the necessary measures, so there is no longer an immediate danger,” the statement said.

The health agency has also asked for people who believe they may have eaten the infected meat to see a doctor, with early treatment being vital.

It added that the matter would be reported to police, given that the canteen firm had allegedly bought the meat from illegal sources.

Anthrax, which is spread by spores, results in flu-like symptoms that can go on for several days, followed by pneumonia and often fatal respiratory collapse. Untreated, it has a mortality rate of more than 90 percent, which falls to 42 percent when treated early with antibiotics.

via Anthrax discovered in beef in Hungary | News | DW.DE | 04.07.2014.

To prohibit United States non-security assistance to Mexico. (H.R. 5017) – GovTrack.us

{In short – don’t help Mexico reduce poverty and reasons to leave Mexico just to make a living – someone should think about giving Yoho the heave ho!}

Ted Yoho

Representative for Florida’s 3rd congressional district

PARTY

Republican

via To prohibit United States non-security assistance to Mexico. (H.R. 5017) – GovTrack.us.

California Firm Recalls Chicken Products Due to Possible Salmonella Heidelberg Contamination

The products subject to recall bear the establishment number “P6137,” P6137A” or “P7632” inside the USDA mark of inspection. The chicken products were produced on March 8, 10 and 11, 2014. These products were shipped to Costco, Foodmaxx, Kroger, Safeway and other retail stores and distribution centers in Arizona, California, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, New Mexico, Nevada and Utah. The list of products subject to recall can be accessed here. We will continue to update the list as more information is available. FSIS and the company want the public to be aware that the products are mostly likely no longer available for purchase, but may be in consumers’ freezers.

via California Firm Recalls Chicken Products Due to Possible Salmonella Heidelberg Contamination.

Ebola conference agrees to set up regional fund | Africa | DW.DE | 03.07.2014

However, in an interview with DW, Anja Wolz of Medecins Sans Frontieres/Doctors Without Borders (MSF) said the situation in Sierra Leone was still a matter of great concern. In the last two days, another 30 patients had been taken in at the treatment center where she works, she said.

According to Wolz, a major problem is that many people “are denying that Ebola exists.” People who fell sick were hiding rather than go to a doctor and could infect others. There was still a great need for public awareness campaigns, she said, as many Africans “think the white people are bringing Ebola.” MSF staff were working hard to overcome this but they could not go to every single village, Wolz said, addding that the problem was the same in Liberia and Guinea.

via Ebola conference agrees to set up regional fund | Africa | DW.DE | 03.07.2014.

Study: 4 big wells injecting wastewater from energy drilling trigger more than 100 quakes

A new study explains how just four wells forcing massive amounts of drilling wastewater into the ground are probably shaking up Oklahoma.

Those wells seem to have triggered more than 100 small-to-medium earthquakes in the past five years, according to a study published Thursday by the journal Science. Many of the quakes were much farther away from the wells than expected.

Combined, those wells daily pour more than 5 million gallons (19 million litres) of water a mile or two underground into rock formations, the study found. That buildup of fluid creates more pressure that “has to go somewhere,” said study lead author Cornell University seismologist Katie Keranen.

Researchers originally figured the water diffused through underground rocks slowly. But instead, it is moving faster and farther and triggers quake fault lines that already were likely ready to move, she said.

“You really don’t need to raise the pressure a great deal,” she added.

The study shows the likely way in which the pressure can trigger fault lines — which already existed yet were not too active— but researchers need more detail on the liquid injections themselves to absolutely prove the case, Keranen said.

via Study: 4 big wells injecting wastewater from energy drilling trigger more than 100 quakes.

1,512 suspected cases of chikungunya in addition to 5,698 confirmed cases of dengue – Fides News Agency

According to the Ministry of Health in El Salvador (MINSAL) there are 1,512 suspected cases of chikungunya in the State of El Salvador. Most of them in the department of San Salvador, with a total of 1,365; of these, 1,035 have been located in Ayutuxtepeque, 138 in Mejicanos, 73 in Apopa and 41 in the capital of the department, and in Ciudad Delgado. San Vicente is another department where there have been 118 cases of the virus, and 88 in the municipality of San Ildefonso. MINSAL has stated that the age of the people most affected by the disease varies between 10 and 19, with 395 cases. Compared to the situation of dengue in the territory of El Salvador, the Ministry of Health reported a total of 16.937 suspected cases and 5,698 confirmed cases. Compared to the same period of 2013 there has been an increase of 101%. Of the confirmed cases, 97 were severe dengue, 56% more than last year. MINSAL reiterates its appeal to the people to work together to prevent the proliferation of the mosquito aedes aegypti, vector of chikungunya virus and dengue.

via 1,512 suspected cases of chikungunya in addition to 5,698 confirmed cases of dengue – Fides News Agency.

Fifty Indian nurses forced onto buses in Tikrit | News , Middle East | THE DAILY STAR

Nearly 50 Indian nurses from the southern state of Kerala have been taken against their will from a hospital in the militant-controlled city of Tikrit in Iraq, India’s Foreign Ministry said Thursday.

The nurses were forced to board buses, Foreign Ministry spokesman Syed Akbaruddin told reporters at a briefing, but he declined to say who had ordered them aboard or where they were headed.

Asked if the nurses had been kidnapped, Akbaruddin said: “In zones of conflict there is no free will. This is a situation where lives are at stake.”

A senior aide to Kerala Chief Minister Oommen Chandy, who spoke to the nurses Thursday, told Reuters that “militants” had forced the nurses to vacate the hospital and board two buses.

Tikrit, the birthplace of former President Saddam Hussein, has been the site of fierce fighting this week as Iraqi troops battle to regain control of the city from Al-Qaeda splinter group the Islamic State in Iraq and Greater Syria (ISIS).

via Fifty Indian nurses forced onto buses in Tikrit | News , Middle East | THE DAILY STAR.