Company Conspires To Cover-Up Dangerous Asbestos Poisoning in Montana And Gets Away With It

By Theodora Filis

As the 8th Annual International Asbestos Awareness Conference (Asbestos: An International Public Health Crisis) comes to an end today, an email from Libby, Montana, pops up in my mailbox. It's from a gentleman who has just been diagnosed with Pleural Thickening – a common side effect of exposure to asbestos, and an early warning sign for mesothelioma and asbestosis – seeking answers to questions he has no idea he should be asking.

In February of 2004, W.R. Grace & Co. along with seven current or former executives were indicted in a federal court in Missoula, Montana, for breaking environmental laws and conspiring to cover up what the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has described as the biggest environmental disaster to human health it has ever faced.

According to the EPA: “W.R. Grace and its executives, as far back as the 1970s, attempted to hide the fact that toxic asbestos was present in vermiculite products at the company’s Libby, Montana plant. The grand jury charged the defendants with conspiring to conceal information about the hazardous nature of the company’s asbestos-contaminated vermiculite products, obstructing the government’s clean-up efforts, and wire fraud. To date, according to the indictment, approximately 1,200 residents [out of a population of about 3,000] of Libby have been identified as suffering from some kind of asbestos-related abnormality.”

A federal jury in Montana acquitted W.R. Grace and three of its former executives of knowingly exposing mine workers and residents of Libby, Montana, to asbestos poisoning and then covering up their actions.

W.R. Grace purchased the Zonolite mine, a branded trademark product produced from vermiculite, in 1963. The mine contained tremolite asbestos, winchite, and richterite (both fibrous amphiboles formed underground). Pure vermiculite does not contain asbestos and is non-toxic. Impure vermiculite may contain asbestos, minor diopside, and remnants of biotite or phlogopite.

Investigations by the US Federal Government found air samples from Libby, Montana, had high levels of fibrous tremolite asbestos, which is suspected of causing asbestos-related diseases among former Zonolite employees and their families. In 1999, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer published a series of articles documenting extensive deaths and illnesses from the asbestos-contaminated vermiculite at the Grace mine in Libby, Montana.

Reports claim that asbestos from the now-closed vermiculite mine on a mountain near Libby has killed 192 people and left at least 375 with fatal diseases. Thousands more who live or grew up in Libby are expected to die from asbestos-related diseases in the coming decades. The asbestos fibers contaminated not only workers at the mine but also their families when they brought home the asbestos fibers on their clothing and in their hair. Even local ball fields and an athletic track were contaminated from fallout and fill.

Former President Bush, appointed Granta Y. Nakayama, head of the Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance (OECA), the enforcement division of the EPA. At the time of his appointment, Nakayama was serving as a "Partner for Environmental Law and Product Safety" at Kirkland & Ellis, a law firm in Washington, DC, that was representing W.R. Grace in its troubles with the federal government. The Senate confirmed Nakayama on July 29, 2005. Nakayama's law firm helped Grace file for bankruptcy and restructure so it could continue doing business.

The Fairness in Asbestos Injury Resolution Act – the FAIR Act – was sponsored by Patrick Leahy, the highest-ranking Democrat in the Senate, and Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Arlen Specter. Many people in Libby, Montana believe this bill is nothing more than a way of pretending to help the victims of years of abuse by mining companies while actually making sure that those companies don't get sued too badly for all their wrongdoing.

The Fair Act established a $140 billion privately financed trust fund that would compensate asbestos claimants who agree to give up their right to sue. The bill also caps liability for companies that made or sold products containing asbestos. Companies routinely declare bankruptcy to avoid paying huge settlements due to lawsuits. To avoid paying out on asbestos claims hundreds of US companies have filed for bankruptcy.

A report on Nightline said: “The evidence is strong that the executives at Grace knew about the dangers of their product as far back as the 1960s, even before they bought the vermiculite mine in Libby. They suppressed evidence not only about their product but about the health of their employees. For more than thirty years they knowingly sent out a dangerous product that would be used in somewhere between 15 and 30 million homes across America.”

Several legal experts have raised questions about the evidence that was withheld from the jury because the judge deemed it overly prejudicial. David Uhlmann, University of Michigan law professor and former environmental crimes prosecutor at the Justice Department, told Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Andrew Schneider that, “Many questions now linger about what would have happened if the trial had been conducted in a manner that was fair to everyone involved.”

More than 250,000 asbestos-related suits have been filed against W. R. Grace. The company has closed its mine in Libby and has declared bankruptcy restructured itself and continues to make about $1.4 billion in sales per year.

Gas and Oil Exploration and Exploitation in the Mediterranean Sea

by, Theodora Filis

July 3, 2023 - Oil and gas companies have intensified the hunt for new deposits in a long-term bet on demand, as they reinvest some of the record profits from the fossil fuel price surge driven by the Ukraine war, according to data and industry executives.

The exploration revival - on the part of European majors in particular - reflects a renewed commitment to oil and gas after Shell and BP went back on pledges to reduce output and invest in renewables as part of the energy transition. 

Credit to: https://www.oedigital.com/news/506238-oil-giants-drill-deep-as-profits-trump-climate-concerns

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The lack of iron and, especially, coal reserves within the Mediterranean Basin has influenced the industrial development of the countries surrounding the Mediterranean Sea.

Forty-four percent of the Mediterranean area is either contracted or designated for oil & gas exploration (WWF 2015 Medtrends) – this poses a risk that those zones, especially the ones in the Eastern Mediterranean may be explored at one point, potentially leading to increased pollution. In addition to the emission of greenhouse gases, offshore oil and gas operations in a sea with considerable seismic activity come with a risk of accidents and oil spills posing a real threat to the fragile Mediterranean ecosystem.

The offshore renewable energy sector in the Mediterranean is still almost nonexistent. Deployment can be expected once costs decrease; the latest offers for offshore wind in the North Sea are quite promising in this regard.

The existence of oil and gas reserves located in Algeria, Cyprus, Egypt, Israel, Italy, Lebanon, Libya, and Syria motivates the presence of more than 40 refineries and petrochemical installations around the Mediterranean.

The geographical distribution of industrial activities in the Mediterranean Basin is uneven, with most industries concentrated in the northwest, particularly in Italy, France, and Spain.

Consider The Environmental Impact of Offshore Drilling in the Mediterranean

By Theodora Filis

The doubling of the world's population over the past five decades is putting great strain on deep-sea ecosystems, which cover more than half of Earth. According to researchers gathered at the American Association for the Advancement of Science, these ecosystems are now threatened by the same kind of mass industrialization common on land during the 20th century.

The Earth's oceans are all connected to one another. Until the year 2000, there were four recognized oceans: the Pacific, Atlantic, Indian, and Arctic. In the Spring of 2000, the International Hydro-graphic Organization delimited a new ocean, the Southern Ocean (it surrounds Antarctica and extends to 60 degrees latitude). There are also many seas (smaller branches of an ocean); seas are often partly enclosed by land. The largest seas are the South China Sea, the Caribbean Sea, and the Mediterranean Sea.

Our nation’s oceans, waves, and beaches are vital recreational, economic, and ecological treasures that will be polluted by an increase in offshore oil and gas drilling.

The Gulf oil spill (also known as the BP oil spill, Deepwater Horizon oil spill, or Gulf of Mexico oil spill) took place on April 20, 2010. The rig exploded, but at first seemed to emit no oil. A leak eventually was found – 1,000 barrels of oil flooded into the Gulf's water every day. This oil spill was the worst man-made environmental disaster in all of United States history. Water was ruined and undrinkable, marine animals washed ashore dead, and everything was coated in a thick film of oil. A year later it was said that "fish and seabirds were marinating in black sludge."

Today there are some 2,000 platforms drilling on deep sea ocean floors, bringing with it the potential for environmental disaster of the sort we saw with the Deepwater Horizon.

The discovery in late 2010 of natural gas off Israel’s Mediterranean shores triggered neighboring countries to look more closely at their own waters. The results revealed that the entire eastern Mediterranean is swimming in huge untapped oil and gas reserves. That discovery is having enormous political, geopolitical as well as economic consequences. It well may have potential military consequences too.

Preliminary exploration has confirmed similar reserves of gas and oil in the waters of Greece, Turkey, Cyprus, and potentially, Syria.

Greece imports almost all of its oil and natural gas, spending about 5 percent a year of its GDP on purchases. It pays about 1 billion euros ($1.4 billion) a year alone on oil to produce electricity for dozens of islands that are not connected to the national power grid. 

Not surprisingly, amid its disastrous financial crisis the Greek government began serious exploration for oil and gas. Since then the country has been in a curious kind of a dance with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and EU governments, over who will control and ultimately benefit from the huge resource discoveries there.

In December 2010, Greece’s Energy Ministry formed a special group of experts to research the prospects for oil and gas in Greek waters. Greece’s Energean Oil & Gas began increased investment into drilling in the offshore waters after a successful smaller oil discovery in 2009. Major geological surveys were made. Preliminary estimates of total offshore oil in Greek waters exceed 22 billion barrels in the Ionian Sea off western Greece and approximately 4 billion barrels in the northern Aegean Sea.

The southern Aegean Sea and Cretan Sea are yet to be explored, so the numbers could be significantly higher. An earlier Greek National Council for Energy Policy report stated that “Greece is one of the least explored countries in Europe regarding hydrocarbon (oil and gas-w.e.) potentials.”

Despite what many Greeks believe to be a financially rewarding endeavor, offshore drilling will have damaging effects on their environment, and ultimately their strong tourism industry. 

Oceans provide us with vital sources of protein, energy, minerals, and other products. Creates over half our oxygen, drives weather systems and natural flows of energy and nutrients around the world, transports water masses many times greater than all the rivers on land combined, and keeps the Earth habitable.

Let's try to remember that the next time we want to exploit, pollute, and abuse our oceans and seas.

Wireless Radiation Poses Health Risks - Doctors Demand Precaution!

As of 5/2023 -
2% of the public is still concerned that exposure to radiofrequency from mobile phone masts is harmful to human health.

This statistic is a stark reminder that, despite the lack of scientific evidence to support the notion that exposure to radiofrequency from mobile phone masts is harmful to human health, a significant portion of the public still holds this belief. This highlights the importance of continuing to educate the public on the safety of mobile phone masts and the lack of evidence to support the notion that they are harmful.

35% of the general public believe that mobile phone masts should not be placed near schools or residential areas due to health risks.

This statistic is a powerful indicator of the public’s concern about the potential health risks associated with mobile phone masts near schools and residential areas. It shows that a significant portion of the population is aware of the potential dangers and is taking a proactive stance in protecting their health and the health of their children. This statistic is an important piece of evidence that should be taken into consideration when discussing the potential health risks of mobile phone masts.

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According to the United Nations Telecom Agency, the world now has nearly as many cell phone subscriptions as inhabitants and says there were about 6 billion subscriptions by the end of 2011 – roughly one for 86 of every 100 people. The International Telecommunication Union (ITU) said, China alone accounted for 1 billion subscriptions, and India was expected to hit the 1-billion mark in 2012.
Many people living near masts claim to be experiencing increasing health problems; especially sleep disruption, headaches, tiredness, behavior changes in children, epilepsy, nosebleeds, and skin complaints.

"Studies of protests against mobile phone masts typically concentrate on the potential health risks associated with mobile phones and their masts. Beck’s Risk Society has been particularly influential in informing this debate. This focus on health, however, has merely served to limit the discussion to those concerns legitimated by science conveniently ignoring other disputed issues. In contrast, this article contends that it is necessary to use a wider notion of risk to understand fully how the current political emphasis on active citizenship may have contributed to the protests. It examines how "neoliberal governmentality" and the move to empower people are in contention with one another. The study draws upon case material from a small village protest group in the United Kingdom and argues that much of the tension arises from the encouragement of the public on one hand to become active citizens but on the other to be passive consumers." -Abstract by, School of Geography, University of Leeds, United Kingdom

Human populations are increasingly exposed to microwave/radiofrequency (RF) emissions from wireless communication technology, including mobile phones and their base stations. Exposure to low-level electromagnetic fields has been associated with a reduction in the production of the hormone melatonin. A powerful antioxidant and part of the human immune system, melatonin is thought to inhibit cancer growth and slow down the aging process. It is produced by the pineal gland (located in the brain) at night, explaining why it is so important to avoid exposure to EMFs while sleeping. At night the body cleans repairs and detoxifies itself. If it is exposed to electromagnetic stress at this time, in fact, any stress, then our bodies produce water clustering which inhibits the cell’s natural detoxifying and repairing actions and inter and extracellular activity (e.g. electrolyte exchange).

The only way to know for certain how a particular place, such as a house, apartment, school, or workplace, is affected by environmental microwave radiation is to measure the exposure.

At the moment, there is no way for the general public to object to the erection of a mobile phone mast (also referred to as a mobile phone base station) on the grounds of health concerns. With the current uncertainty, local planning authorities should have the executive power to grant or deny planning applications, and both the potential harm to health and the public concern over health issues should be considered to be material planning considerations.

According to Powerwatch, "Many people do not know how many masts there are near them. There is a UK government website that has a reasonably accurate map of the masts currently integrated into the national network. Details are only put up when the mast is up and running. Ofcom, which maintains the site, depends on the phone operators to give them accurate information about the base station. They update the site every 3 months (or so). We have found inaccuracies with respect to the existence, siting, and information included in the database - and we have not looked at many places. Do not accept the information as definitive or accurate."

Kept Under Wraps – Russian Oil Spills Are The Worst In The World

By Theodora Filis

UPDATE: July 3 (Reuters) - A pipeline burst in Russia's northwestern Komi Republic threatens to leak 1,000 cubic meters of oil into a nearby river and cause serious environmental damage, the head of the state environment watchdog Rosprirodnadzor warned on Monday.

"There was a burst in an oil pipeline near Usinsk. According to our calculations, 1,000 cubic meters of oil could get into the Kolva River," the official, Svetlana Radionova, wrote on the Telegram messenger app. 

The energy-rich region witnessed one of the worst oil spills in Russian history in August 1994, when its aging pipeline network sprang a leak that was officially said to have totaled 79,000 tonnes, or 585,000 barrels. Independent estimates put the figure at up to 2 million barrels.

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Rosneft, the Russian oil company worth an estimated $60 billion, is headquartered in a palace across the Moscow River from the Kremlin. Poised to become the face of Russia's oil country, Rosneft, is situated on a sprawling, inhospitable zone that experts say represents the world's worst ecological oil catastrophe.

Environmentalists estimate at least 1 percent of Russia's annual oil production, or 5 million tons, is spilled every year. That is equivalent to one Deepwater Horizon-scale leak about every two months. Crumbling infrastructure and a harsh climate combine to spell disaster in the world's largest oil producer, responsible for 13 percent of global output.

Russian state-funded research shows 10-15 percent of Russian oil leakage enters rivers; and a 2010 report commissioned by the Natural Resources Ministry shows nearly 500,000 tons slips into northern Russian rivers every year and flow into the Arctic.

The oil seeping through rusty pipelines and old wells, contaminates soil, kills all plants that grow on it and destroys habitats for mammals and birds. Half a million tons every year get into rivers that flow into the Arctic Ocean, the government says, upsetting the delicate environmental balance in those waters.

It's part of a legacy of environmental tragedy that has plagued Russia and the countries of its former Soviet empire for decades, from the nuclear horrors of Chernobyl in Ukraine to lethal chemical waste in the Russian city of Dzerzhinsk, and paper mill pollution seeping into Siberia's Lake Baikal – which holds one-fifth of the world's supply of fresh water.

Oil spills in Russia are less dramatic than disasters in the Gulf of Mexico or the North Sea, more the result of a drip-drip of leaked crude than a sudden explosion. But, they are more numerous than in any other oil-producing nation including insurgency-hit Nigeria, and combined, they spill far more than anywhere else in the world, scientists say.

"Oil and oil products get spilled literally every day," said Dr. Grigory Barenboim, senior researcher at the Russian Academy of Sciences' Institute of Water Problems.

Greenpeace estimates that at least 5 million tons leak every year in a country producing about 500 million tons a year. Dr. Irina Ivshina, of the government-financed Institute of the Environment and Genetics of Microorganisms, supports the 5 million ton estimate, as does the World Wildlife Fund.

Billions of dollars being spent developing Russia’s Arctic shelf for offshore drilling is a massive environmental worry. The risks of drilling in the Arctic are extremely high, and there are thousands of miles of leaky pipelines to build across some of the world’s most pristine environments. If you thought Deepwater Horizon was bad, cleaning up a spill in the Arctic is unimaginably more difficult.

A report by The Russian Economic Development Ministry estimated spills at up to 20 million tons per year – that estimate is considered conservative. That estimate appears to be based partly on the fact that most small leaks in Russia go unreported. Under Russian law, leaks of less than 8 tons are classified only as "incidents" and carry no penalties.

An enormous offshore Arctic oil boom is coming, and it’s being led by a government-owned agency in one of the most corrupt countries on Earth.

Safely Disposing of Radioactive Waste -- Fact or Myth?

By Theodora Filis

On February 2013, the Hanford Nuclear Reservation, Washington – One of America's First Nuclear Plants, and one of the two Manhattan Project nuclear plants that provided fissile material for the bombs dropped on Japan, reported a major leak of highly toxic sludge from a single-wall storage tank.

Categorized as the “perfect radioactive storm” Washington Governor, Jay Insles said, “I am alarmed about this on many levels. This raises concerns, not only about the existing leak... but also concerning the integrity of the other single-shell tanks of this age” -- adding, “I fear the past is coming back to haunt us.”

According to a 2010 survey of energy accidents, there have been at least 56 accidents at nuclear reactors in the United States – defined as incidents that either resulted in the loss of human life or more than $50,000 of property damage. Nuclear power plants operate in most states in the US and produce about 20 percent of the nation’s power. Nearly 3 million Americans live within 10 miles of an operating nuclear power plant.

The USA is the world's largest producer of nuclear power – 100 nuclear power reactors in 31 states – operated by 30 different power companies accounting for more than 30% of worldwide nuclear generation of electricity.

Since World War II, Hanford Nuclear Reservation facilities have leached roughly one million gallons of radioactive waste into the surrounding soil and groundwater beside the Columbia River, with specialists estimating that the newly discovered leak maybe adding an additional 150-300 gallons a year, though no one knows when it began.

The Hanford Nuclear Reservation currently houses 149 single-wall nuclear waste storage tanks, along with 28 newer tanks with double walls. They contain residue from decades of refining plutonium for nuclear weapons, roughly 56 million gallons of highly radioactive waste in aged and corroded underground storage tanks.

Most US nuclear power comes from reactors built between 1967 and 1990.

Most frightening of all – 104 nuclear power reactors now in operation in the US have a safety problem that cannot be fixed and should be replaced with newer technology – shutting them all down at once is not practical – some suggest phasing them out rather than trying to extend their lives, would be most practical.

So... can the US safely dispose of decades of nuclear waste?

The basic method of Nuclear Waste Disposal is to bury it in the ground and hope it doesn't leak out. More specifically, to identify stable Geological Foundations which can host the material for 10,000 years.

The potential danger from an accident – Like Three Mile Island and Fukushima Daiichi, or nuclear waste leaking out of the ground, Like Hanford Nuclear Reservation – is exposure to radiation, radioactive materials, and ingestion of radioactive materials.

Radioactive materials are composed of atoms that are unstable. An unstable atom gives off its excess energy until it becomes stable. The energy emitted is radiation. Each of us is exposed to radiation daily from natural sources, including the Sun and the Earth. Small traces of radiation are present in food and water. Radiation also is released from man-made sources such as X-ray machines, television sets, and microwave ovens. Radiation has a cumulative effect. The longer a person is exposed to radiation, the greater the effect.

The main objective in managing and disposing of radioactive waste is to protect people and the environment. This means isolating or diluting the waste so that the rate or concentration of any radionuclides returned to the biosphere is harmless. – World Nuclear Association

George Monbiot, February 12, 2012, Nuclear waste – can it be disposed of safely?

“There is well-documented geological evidence of what has come to be known as the Oklo nuclear reactor. Located in the West African state of Gabon, there exists a deposit of uranium ore which was once so highly concentrated that spontaneous fission reactions started to occur inside it. Over periods of what may have been thousands of years, the uranium deposit began to act just like a modern-day reactor – maintaining a self-sustaining fission reaction, which released energy and what were essentially nuclear wastes.

The Oklo reactor is estimated to have been active over a billion years ago. What is remarkable is that the nuclear waste products from this nuclear reaction moved only a few centimeters from where they were first created – this is even with water flowing in and around the ‘core’ of the reactor. The main reason for the successful containment of this waste was the existence of multiple barriers around the reactor, slowing the permeation of the radioactive elements away from the core.

With knowledge of geological formations such as Oklo and many other natural analogs, combined with advanced, corrosion-resistant materials developed in recent decades, there is really no reason why safe nuclear waste repositories cannot be built in all countries that have nuclear waste.”

Read the entire article here: http://fissionenvironmentalists.wordpress.com/2012/02/17/nuclear-waste-can-it-be-disposed-of-safely/

According to a report from the US National Academy of Sciences, it will take 3 million years for radioactive waste stored in the United States, as of 1983, to decay to background levels. So, right now, our only solution – and not a very good one – is to store the waste in a place so that the environment won't be contaminated.

The problem with storing nuclear waste is both political as well as technological. In terms of politics, no one wants it stored near them. So there's much dispute as to where radioactive waste should be stored. In addition, storing so much waste is a major technological challenge.

According to a report issued by the British Parliament, "In considering arrangements for dealing safely with such wastes, man is faced with time scales that transcend his experience." 

EU Allows Untested GM Crops Into European Food Chain

By Theodora Filis

A press release issued today by Greenpeace - European Unit said the European Union (EU) is now allowing untested Genetically Modified (GM) crops into the European food chain.

The end to Europe's zero-tolerance approach to untested GM crops in animal feed was made final today by EU member state representatives in Brussels, allowing the unintended mixing of approved and unapproved GM varieties to enter Europe.

Both the animal feed industry and biotech industry have been lobbying individual countries to vote in favor of a proposal to allow imports of animal feed to contain up to 0.1 percent of non-approved GMOs. They claimed the current restrictions are costing the EU 4 billion Euros and leading to a 'crisis' of supply that will lead to higher meat prices for consumers.

Because of the new rules, adopted today and expected to come into force in early summer 2011, the EU will be allowed contamination of up to 0.1% by crops that have not undergone safety testing in Europe.

In an apparent concession to France and other EU countries initially opposing the plan, untested crops pending authorization in the EU for at least three months will be let through, but with no guarantee that they subsequently will be declared safe.

Anti-corruption group, Corporate Europe Observatory, has published its own investigation into heavy lobbying by industry groups.

“I think it's safe to say that allowing the presence of illegal GM in food and feed is one of the key targets of the industry to break down the resistance in the EU against GMOs. It would basically give the message [that] all GMOs are safe,” said campaigner Nina Holland.

Europe imports large quantities of animal feed from the United States, Brazil, and Argentina, where 80% of the world’s GM crops are grown. European governments have come under pressure from the United States and the animal feed industry to relax their rules to allow more GM crops into the market.

“If the safety of a GM crop has not been tested in Europe, it should not be allowed. Setting a tolerance threshold, however low, is a sign that Europe is losing control over its own food production to please American exporters. The danger now is that EU countries come under pressure from the pro-GM lobby to also allow GM contamination in food products for direct human consumption,” said Greenpeace EU agriculture policy adviser Stefanie Hundsdorfer.

With European consumers less aware of what is being used in animal feed, it is feared this new ruling, by EU member state representatives in Brussels today, will make it easier to push GM crops into Europe.

How Bill Gates, Syngenta and Rockefeller Became Custodians of the Doomsday Crop Diversity Vault

By Theodora Filis

When names like Gates, Rockefeller, and Syngenta show up as key players on the same project, I find time to research. One thing this elite group can not be accused of is a reluctance to make an impact on the world, be it positive or negative. So what could get them all to invest millions of US dollars each? I found out, and it's fascinating.

Deep inside a frozen mountain, high above an icy fjord, near the Arctic Circle, three concrete chambers are home to our world's most important natural resources. Built to withstand global warming, floods, wars, and a nuclear catastrophe, the Svalbard Global Seed Vault, nicknamed the 'doomsday seed bank' by the BBC, was officially opened on February 26, 2008, and serves as the ultimate safety net for our world's seeds.

Bill Gates is investing tens of millions of US dollars, in this project, along with the Rockefeller Foundation, the Norwegian government, and many others.

“The history of Svalbard Global Seed Vault starts as early as 1983. Preserving seeds from food plants is an absolutely essential part of the work of preserving the world’s biodiversity, adapting to climate change and global warming, and thereby ensuring food for the world’s population for the foreseeable future. There are hundreds of gene banks around the world. But some of them are vulnerable to natural disasters, war, or the lack of management or finance. The foundation of a global ”central bank” for the world’s seeds (primarily of food plants) has therefore long been an issue.” Svalbard Press Release

Did we miss something here? Their press release stated, 'so that crop diversity can be conserved for the foreseeable future'. What future do the seed bank's sponsors foresee that would threaten the global availability of current seeds?

The first notable point is who is sponsoring the doomsday seed vault. Joining the Norwegian government are, as noted, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation; the US agribusiness giant DuPont/Pioneer Hi-Bred, one of the world's largest owners of patented genetically-modified plant seeds and related agrichemicals; Syngenta, the major Swiss-based GMO seed and agrichemicals company through its Syngenta Foundation; the Rockefeller Foundation, the private group who raised over $100 million for this project since the 1970s; CGIAR, the global network created by the Rockefeller Foundation.

Why are the Gates and Rockefeller foundations supporting the proliferation of patented seeds – which, as it has in every other place on earth, destroys the plant seed varieties? At the same time, why invest tens of millions of dollars to preserve every seed variety known in a bomb-proof doomsday vault near the remote Arctic Circle ‘so that crop diversity can be conserved for the future’?

Perhaps it's no accident that the Rockefeller and Gates foundations are quietly financing the ‘doomsday seed vault’ on Svalbard.

The Svalbard project will be run by an organization called the Global Crop Diversity Trust (GCDT). Founded by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) and Bioversity International (formerly the International Plant Genetic Research Institute), an offshoot of the CGIAR.

The Global Crop Diversity Trust is based in Rome. Its Board is chaired by Margaret Catley-Carlson a Canadian also on the advisory board of Group Suez Lyonnaise des Eaux, one of the world’s largest private water companies. Catley-Carlson was also president in 1998 of the New York-based Population Council, John D. Rockefeller’s population reduction organization, set up in 1952 to advance the Rockefeller family’s eugenics program under the cover of promoting “family planning,” birth control devices, sterilization, and “population control” in developing countries.

Other GCDT board members include former Bank of America executive presently head of the Hollywood DreamWorks Animation, Lewis Coleman. Coleman is also the lead Board Director of Northrup Grumman Corporation, one of America’s largest military industry Pentagon contractors.

Jorio Dauster (Brazil) is also the Board Chairman of Brasil Ecodiesel. He is a former Ambassador of Brazil to the European Union and Chief Negotiator of Brazil’s foreign debt for the Ministry of Finance. Dauster has also served as President of the Brazilian Coffee Institute and as Coordinator of the Project for the Modernization of Brazil’s Patent System, which involves legalizing patents on seeds that are genetically modified, something until recently forbidden by Brazil’s laws.

Cary Fowler is the Trust’s Executive Director. Fowler was a Professor and Director of Research in the Department for International Environment & Development Studies at the Norwegian University of Life Sciences. He was also a Senior Advisor to the Director General of Bioversity International. There he represented the Future Harvest Centres of the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) in negotiations on the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources. In the 1990s, he headed the International Program on Plant Genetic Resources at the FAO. He drafted and supervised negotiations of FAO’s Global Plan of Action for Plant Genetic Resources, adopted by 150 countries in 1996. He is a past member of the National Plant Genetic Resources Board of the US and the Board of Trustees of the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center in Mexico, another Rockefeller Foundation and CGIAR project.

GCDT board member Dr. Mangala Rai of India is the Secretary of India’s Department of Agricultural Research and Education (DARE), and Director General of the Indian Council for Agricultural Research (ICAR). He is also a Board Member of the Rockefeller Foundation’s International Rice Research Institute (IRRI), which promoted the world’s first major GMO experiment, the much-hyped ‘Golden Rice’ which proved a failure. Rai has served as Board Member for CIMMYT (International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center), and a Member of the Executive Council of the CGIAR.

The first installment from the CGIAR collections will contain duplicates from international agricultural research centers based in Benin, Colombia, Ethiopia, India, Kenya, Mexico, Nigeria, Peru, the Philippines, and Syria.

Collectively, the CGIAR centers maintain 600,000 plant varieties in crop gene banks, which are regarded as the foundation of global efforts to conserve agricultural biodiversity. The seed banks are supposed to be protected from attempts by Monsanto et al to try to use the seeds for their patent efforts. However, there have been documented cases where seed samples were illegally given to Monsanto and other GMO giants to develop GMO traits.

Global Crop Diversity Trust Donors also include the Rockefeller and Gates Foundations, GMO giants DuPont-Pioneer Hi-Bred, Syngenta of Basle Switzerland, CGIAR, and the State Department’s energetically pro-GMO agency for development aid, USAID.

It would seem the foxes are guarding the hen-house of mankind – the global seed diversity store in Svalbard.

FDA Approves GE Foods, But Keeps Consumers In The Dark!

By Theodora Filis

California introduced a bill requiring any AquaBounty's genetically engineered salmon sold in the state to be clearly labeled for the public, together with Alaska senators who reintroduced their bills, one to ban the GE animal from being cultivated in Alaskan waters and one to require that it be labeled.

AquaAdvantage salmon developed by AquaBounty Technologies is an Atlantic salmon modified with genes from a Chinook salmon and an ocean pout, which makes for a faster-growing fish that requires 10 percent less feed. Regardless of a wary public, a protest letter by 11 Pacific Northwestern senators, and strong warnings by an overwhelming amount of government scientists and public interest groups, the FDA looks to be moving closer to approving the salmon.

Just like any other GMO, this salmon is a patented product. Once fishermen own the product -- or their waters are unintentionally contaminated with the product -- they'll have to continue purchasing it to continue using it. Just as GM corn seeds can't be saved, these salmon won't breed on their own. And as opponents have warned, there's no telling if they're safe for human consumption, as the FDA has not conducted adequate testing.

Concerns, such as fish escaping and breeding with other salmon, have been raised about the AquAdvantage salmon. It may also cause additional harm to the environment, causing more waste than “regular” salmon.

Because of this, the salmon have to be engineered to be sterile, another GMO-use. And AquaBounty claims that using this wouldn’t cause more planet farms, but instead “help reduce pressure on wild fish stocks suffering from over-fishing.”

AquaBounty is confident of a positive ruling soon from the FDA, given the agency’s previous approval of the salmon.

Anticipating the FDA approval of AquaBounty salmon, lawmakers from Alaska, Oregon, and Washington have introduced a backup plan to protect American consumers and wild fish populations.

The Alaskan bipartisan bills come from senators Mark Begich (D-AK) and Lisa Murkowski (R-AK). "Frankenfish threatens our wild stocks, their habitat, our food safety and would bring economic harm to Alaska's wild salmon fishermen," said Begich The fish are "risky, unprecedented and unnecessary," he adds.

The bill to ban GMO fish is co-sponsored by Sen. Patty Murray (D-Washington). The bill requiring labeling, should GE fish get approved, is co-sponsored by Sen. Murray and Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Oregon).

If that fails, an alternate bill (Bill# S. 229/H.R. 520) would require companies to at least put a sticker on any product that contains frankenfish to let Americans know what they are eating.

"Frankenfish is uncertain and unnecessary," said one representative. "The assessments of these 'fish' are flawed at best and the threat to the population of our wild salmon stock is unacceptable."

Consumers, who have the purchasing power, have the right to know if they are eating sterile fish spliced with the growth hormone of a Chinook and the genetic code of an ocean pout.

Suggested Reading:
Genetically Engineered Salmon No Laughing Matter
FDA Caught Hiding The Truth About GMO Salmon
Genetically Modified Fish: It's What's For Dinner!