Is the FELIX programme to detect genetically engineered DNA a game-changer for gene-edited foods?
GMWATCH, December 21, 2022

The research programme is an important move in the right direction, but more work is needed before it can detect unknown GMOs in food and feed. Report: Claire Robinson

The researchers are focusing primarily on "biothreat" detection of genetically engin- eered viruses and bacteria that could cause new pandemics. But the new technologies could flag up the use of genetic engineering in a wide range of organisms, including new gene-edited GM plants and animals in the food and feed supply. In time and with further work, the technologies could identify unknown, unauthorised and "hidden" GMOs, as well as the relatively easily identifiable known and authorised GMOs.

The development has been met with a flurry of excitement at a time when governments and regulatory agencies across the world are moving to exempt "new GM" plants from regulatory oversight partly based on the claim that they cannot be distinguished in laboratory tests from plants produced by conventional breeding and random mutagenesis breeding. If FELIX develops its work with the collaboration of the GMO industry and regulators, the days when that claim can reasonably be maintained might be numbered.

Read the full story  GMWATCH

From Raising Cattle to Now Reindeer, How One Family is Sharing the Magic Of Christmas On Their Farm
by AGWEB, December 23, 2022

Source: https://www.agweb.com/news/livestock/beef/raising-cattle-now-reindeer-how-one-family-sharing-magic-christmas-their-farm

Legal Victory: Court Rules EPA’s Registration of Bee-Killing Insecticide Unlawful, Citing Failure to Assess Risks to Endangered Species
by Center For Biological Diversity, December 23, 2022

In a major win for pollinators and other wildlife, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit today ordered the Environmental Protection Agency to protect endangered species from the bee-killing insecticide sulfoxaflor. The court held that the agency’s 2019 decision to allow new uses of sulfoxaflor across more than 200 million acres of pollinator-attractive crops violated the Endangered Species Act.

Today’s ruling comes in response to a legal challenge to the expanded use of the insecticide by the Center for Food Safety and the Center for Biological Diversity. In a strongly worded decision, the court stated,

"When an agency deliberately ignores Congress’s legislative command, it undermines the will of the people and ultimately our constitutional structure of government."

The court wrote that by routinely registering pesticides without protecting endangered species, which then prompts the public to sue to gain those protections, the EPA is "engaging in a whack-a-mole strategy for complying with the ESA."

Read the full story  GlobalResearch