food you eat & companies you support (gmo food)

everyone needs to know about the food they are eating and the companies they are supporting

Mon, April 14, 2008 - 12:58 PM

What you need to know about the food you eat

There are some things larger then we think we can even comprehend to deal with. One of these things for me is what is happening to the food industry and what is happening to our world because of it. This is really no joke and anyone who EATS FOOD should really be looking into this. It effects your health and it effects the environment. Corporations are getting rich at all of our expense ( what's new right? ) Don't set around and put up with it because if you do you and everyone pays for it one way or another. It's time to take control of the situation. Put it this way... Do you want to be paying to poison yourself? Government subsidies are on the rise for gmo grown product. These gmo grown foods are a huge part of agriculture today and include wheat, corn, and soy. The main Company of food distribution who buys and sells seeds to and from farmers is also the same company that is responsable for much of the gmo foods and they are the comany that uses pesticides that are harmfull to your health. this comany is called Monsanto and they sell what most of us call "round up" What they have done is made " round up ready seeds" these seeds are resistant to weeds etc...but what this means is it does not make for much of a sustainable environment and when out of controll can cause resistance to how nature functions normally and once grown theres no way of stopping it from spreading and seeding more etc...It is importnat to understand that we eat MUCH of the foods that are produced using genetic engineering on seeds. This changes to foods we eat drasticly. The consumption of this on a regular basis is really disgusting. It is easier to ignore it then to try to deal with it but really this is an outrage. There are gmo foods with pesticides going into most of the foods you and I buy and eat that we think are healthy. They are in fact not good for you and they support the bigger picture of large corporations trying to produce in large amounts for super cash flow ... getting rich off of making people buy fod that makes them sick. You and I pay for this because of goverment subsidies to help farmers grow this crap. I would like everyone reading this to take 45 min out of your life to watch this vid and also take a few moments to review the list of comapnies whos food you may be buying and just try your best to stop supporting what s happening. In europe people dont put up with this in their foods...but here we are just too lazy to realize what is going on. Please jsut know what you are supporting when you shop. There are plenty of alternative solutions to keeping this nasty cycle going but people really have to step up becayse this industry is going 100 fold with their gmo productions to profit at the expense of our health at a very fast rate. Now is the time to do something. This is happening right here is California..to our cows...to our wheat..to our corn..to our soy..we are eating it. It is happening in Canada and mexico and is being shipped over seas to be grown and fed to people. There are even strangs of seed that are sold to third world countries that die in a year so that they have to buy more the next year and cannot harvest seeds from crops to grow more causing them to be at the whim an dmercy of seed comanies serving the gmo market.

please see this vid and there are others out there for your information. All about gmo foods and the science of it and the harm its causing. its a very good vid and I suggest you all take time to see it.

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=d1e_1197238721
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[Note from poor_old_dad: The following 4 links are the same.]
www.organicconsumers.org/Corp/mergers.cfm


Organic & Natural Product Companies Associated with Monsanto visit url::
www.organicconsumers.org/Corp/...rs.cfm

Mergers in the food indusry

www.organicconsumers.org/Corp/...rs.cfm

Who owns organic/natural foods companies?
Updated June 16, 2004
Also see list of GMO and non-GMO food products visit url::: www.organicconsumers.org/Corp/...rs.cfm

• Celestial Seasonings®, Hain Pure Foods®, Westbrae Natural®, Westsoy®, Arrowhead Mills®, Health Valley®, Imagine Foods (Rice Dream), Breadshop's®, Casbah®, Garden of Eatin'®, Terra Chips®, Yves Veggie Cuisine®, DeBoles®, Earth's Best®, Nile Spice® and (as of June 2004) Jason Natural Cosmetics are all owned by the Hain Celestial Food Group.
• H.J. Heinz Co. owns about 20% of Hain.
• Cascadian Farms (organic fruits, vegetables and entrees) and Muir Glen are owned by Small Planet Foods, which is owned by General Mills. General Mills is being boycotted for supporting circuses.
• Odwalla Juice and Fresh Samantha (juice) are owned by Coca-Cola.

a. Coca-Cola prohibits unionizing: WASHINGTON, Nov. 19 /PRNewswire -- Edgar Paez, of the Colombian trade union Sinaltrainal, was joined on Monday by Teamster representatives, the AFL- CIO, members of the clergy, civil rights activists and political leaders as he described the brutal torture, kidnapping and murders of union workers in his country -- particularly those working at Coca-Cola bottling facilities. The group assembled for a peace vigil in front of the World of Coca-Cola Museum in Atlanta, GA. "My brothers and sisters in Colombia have suffered unspeakable horrors because they belong to a trade union," Paez said. "We stand united with American workers to demand that Coca-Cola stop the violence."
b. Coca-Cola paid $192.5 million to settle a U.S. racial discrimination lawsuit in 2000.


• Boca Burgers is are owned by Kraft Foods, which is owned by Philip Morris. Most Boca products use GMO soy. Some products are "made with organic soy" but because they are not 100% organic they may still contain GMOs.
• Morningstar Farms is owned by Kellogg. Morningstar products use GMOs.
• Natural Touch is now Morningstar Farms' Natural Touch products are "made with organic soy" and other organic ingredients but because they are not 100% organic they may still contain GMOs.
• Kashi is owned by Kellogg.
• White Wave was purchased by dairy giant Dean Foods in May 2002. White Wave makes organic soy products like Silk soy drink, tofu and tempeh.
• Horizon Organic (dairy) is also now owned by Dean Foods.
• Arrowhead Water and Poland Spring Water are owned by Nestle, which is being boycotted because its "breast milk substitute" causes the deaths of millions of babies.
• Seeds of Change is owned by M&M Mars Candy.
• Lightlife (soy foods) is owned by ConAgra, one of the largest if not the largest food company in the United States.
• Knudsen, After the Fall and Santa Cruz Organics are owned by Smuckers.
Buyer
Purchase
Price
Date

Coca Cola
Odwalla and Fresh Samantha (fresh juices, energy bars)
$181 million
October 2001

ConAgra
owns Lightlife, manufacturer of vegan meat substitutes like Gimme Lean, Smart Dogs, Foney Boloney, Smart Deli Slices, and more.

ConAgra
International Home Foods
$1.6 billion
June 23, 2000

Danone
McKesson Water Products
$1.1 billion
January 2000

Dean Foods (nation's largest dairy)
White Wave (manufacturer of soy products including Silk) (also, part owner of Horizon Organic Dairies currently being boycotted for not really using free range cows and other not so good practices)
approx $189 million
story
May 2002

General Mills
Small Planet Foods (parent of Cascadian Farms and Muir Glen)
Not available
December 1999

Hain Food Group
Celestial Seasonings, Terra Chips, Garden of Eatin', Yves Veggie Cuisine, Arrowhead Mills, more brands (also has alliance with Heinz)
$326 million (Celestial Seasonings)
March 2000

Kellogg
Worthington Foods
$307 million
November 1999

Kraft Food
Boca Burger
About $100 million
March 2000

Kroger
Fred Meyer Inc.
$8 billion
Creates largest U.S. grocer.
No date

Nestle
Power Bar
Not available
February 2000

Phillip Morris
Nabisco
$14.9 billion
June 25, 2000

Unilever
Bestfoods
$20.3 billion
June 6, 2000

SlimFast
$2.3 billion
April 2000

Ben & Jerry's
$326 million
April 2000

this list is from 2003 but it is a list of foods that are gmo and non gmo and is in the workings of being updated please visit the link to see what you buy and are supporting the list is really amazing

www.truefoodnow.org/shoppers...able.html

Monsanto is tied directly to the goverment in a number of ways you can visit this link :

www.organicconsumers.org/monli...nsanto

how the food and drug admin. are connected to Monsanto:

the FDA does not protect your best interests …
http://www.smart-publications.com/nutrition/fda.php
[Note from poor_old_dad: There was a typo in the above link, now corrected. VERY interesting info.]

The following excerpts appeared in Organic Bytes 17:

QUICK QUIZ: HOW U.S. DEMOCRACY WORKS

Question: How is it that every industrialized nation in the world has banned Monsanto's rBGH as unsafe, but it's legal (and unlabeled) in the United States?

Answer: In order for the FDA to determine if Monsanto's growth hormones were safe or not, Monsanto was required to submit a scientific report on that topic. Margaret Miller, one of Monsanto's researchers put the report together.

Shortly before the report submission, Miller left Monsanto and was hired by the FDA. Her first job for the FDA was to determine whether or not to approve the report she wrote for Monsanto. In short, Monsanto approved its own report. Assisting Miller was another former Monsanto researcher, Susan Sechen.

Deciding whether or not rBGH-derived milk should be labeled fell under the jurisdiction of another FDA official, Michael Taylor, who previously worked as a lawyer for Monsanto.

HOW MONSANTO'S POLICIES HAVE BECOME U.S. POLICY

Prior to being the Supreme Court Judge who put G.W. in office, Clarence Thomas was Monsanto's lawyer.

The U.S. Secretary of Agriculture (Anne Veneman) was on the Board of Directors of Monsanto's Calgene Corporation.

The Secretary of Defense (Donald Rumsfeld) was on the Board of Directors of Monsanto's Searle pharmaceuticals.

The U.S. Secretary of Health, Tommy Thompson, received $50,000 in donations from Monsanto during his winning campaign for Wisconsin's governor.

The two congressmen receiving the most donations from Monsanto during the last election were Larry Combest (Chairman of the House Agricultural Committee) and Attorney General John Ashcroft.

(Source: Dairy Education Board)

Source: (Biodemocracy) Organic Bytes 17, 7/03

Please join Millions Against Monsanto and boycot the products and support local growers in sustainable farming. your health and the earth and the future of our worlds food depend on it.

if you have no idea what gmo food means visit www.saynotogmos.org/

As of now the fda does not require labeling of gmo foods on packaging. So comanies like kraft and many many other comapnies can produce these foods and even clal them "natural" if they want to and you cn't even have to knwo what you are eating is helping poison your body. help Demand that labeling need sto be enforced! I don't want to be eating it and I dont want it fed to my kid.

Feel free to comment and add info if you'd like. This has to do with everyone weather you think you are part of it or not and ignoring it won't make it go away. If seeds are patented and anything patented is owned by the patent then you could be owned too. This is madness. Farmers are being sued and stolen from and people could be next. Seriously what's next? If you didnt see the vid please go back and at least listen to it

 

There are probably some folks who don't think the above post is a real gardening type of a post. But it does have a lot of good info about where food comes from, who owns some seed companies (including Seeds of Change, which I have been doing business with for over 12 years), plus info about GMOs, etc. There is also a bit of political type info, but I don't think it was too much.

In the process of checking out the links I found a couple that didn't work and I fixed them, but I didn't change ANY of the content of the post. There is one link that is repeated many times.

Peace,
poor_old_dad

 

I find you list very informative, but....

Unilever now owns Ben and Jerry's:

http://www.commondreams.org/views/041300-106.htm

http://www.oligopolywatch.com/2003/04/15.html

 

I really don't know what to do with this information. What am I supposed to eat??? I get a CSA basket every week, grow a little bit, and I'm going to go to the farmer's market more, but I still have to buy some food at the store. How do I find a safe brand?

 

It seems impossible. I am starting to understand the Amish more & more in our day & age.
I remember going to the store hungry & I was so pissed because I couldn't find anything without chemicals that was fast other than veggies & fruit & I really just eat those for joy-eating.

It's impossible. Like I've been saying we need to start an island with an eco-dome for fear of cross pollination. We shall shine our dome to safety!