CHURCHVILLE, VA—McDonald’s just agreed to pursue pesticide-free potatoes for its restaurants. The anti-technology zealots pushing this organic move had better hope the company drags its feet—or we risk having the first McDonald’s in history with no French fries. Less than a decade ago, the Danish government’s high-level Bichel technical committee concluded that an organic-only mandate would cut Danish potato production by 80 percent.

 

As for the published claim that French fried spuds are “bathed in pesticides,” give me a break. The pesticides—including the organic ones—are used on the plant’s leaves, while the potatoes grow underground. There’s absolutely no documented danger from conventionally raised potatoes.

 

We understand why McDonald’s is retreating. The organic/hard-left/anti-corporate movement seems to be ruling the world right now. The Obama White House is planning an organic “First Lady” garden. Most important, non-profit institutional McDonald stockholders are threatening to stir investor turmoil.

 

Potatoes, however, are a uniquely important crop for the world, especially the world’s poor. They produce more food value per acre than any other crop, even in short growing seasons. That’s why cool Ireland got so potato-dependent that the famine starved one million people in the 1840s, and drove another 1.5 million refugees out of the country.

 

Unfortunately, potatoes are also particularly vulnerable to pests. Late blight is always a lurking disaster, and a more-aggressive new strain has recently presented itself in Europe. Organic farmers try to stave it off by dousing their fields with huge amounts of copper sulfate—which is highly toxic to virtually every mammal, bird and insect. The EU has tried to ban copper sulfate, but organic farmers say they can’t survive without it.

 

Will McDonald’s growers be allowed to use copper sulfate? If so, why substitute toxic pesticides for less dangerous ones?

 

Colorado potato beetles are another big threat, because they quickly develop resistance to most pesticides. Conventional growers have to keep constantly rotating their pest chemicals, though they still get close to 100 percent effectiveness. Staving off the beetles organically looks hopeless. The famous Bt toxin is only 50 percent effective—an invitation to crop collapse.

 

Home gardeners are virtually helpless against the blight and the beetles because they can’t move their plantings far enough from last year’s. For McDonald’s, the demand to grow pesticide-free potatoes means the commercial growers concentrated near their frozen French-fry plants would be constantly at risk of losing their entire production. That would shut down the processing plants and leaving the fast-food restaurants with hamburgers sans fries. How will that affect the stockholders as customers flock to Burger King?

 

Ironically, there’s already a biotech solution. Resistance to late blight was found many years ago in a wild relative of the domestic potato—but never successfully captured by cross-breeding. In 2003, BASF genetically engineered the resistance gene into a blight-resistant potato. However, they were denied permission for test-plantings in Ireland, where the memory of the potato famine should have made blight-resistant potatoes welcome.  The anti-technology activists reject biotech too. BASF has now suspended its blight-resistance efforts.  

 

Is there hope for the future? Can a world that will need twice as much food and feed in the next few decades afford to pander to the relatively few voices that demand low yield farming? Will the activists finally embrace biotech? Or, will all avenues of high productivity and high sustainability be denied those who must feed the world?

 

In the meantime, enjoy your fries while you can still get them.

 

DENNIS T. AVERY is an environmental economist, and a senior fellow for the Hudson Institute in Washington, DC.  He was formerly a senior analyst for the Department of State. He is co-author, with S. Fred Singer, of Unstoppable Global Warming Every 1500 Hundred Years, Readers may write him at PO Box 202, Churchville, VA 24421 or email to cgfi@hughes.net

CHURCHVILLE, VA—A leading “climate skeptic” met with the U.S. Senate Committee on Environment on February  25.^th  Dr. William Happer holds an endowed chair in physics at Princeton, served as the senior scientist at the Department of Energy—and was reportedly fired by then-Vice President Al Gore for disagreeing with Gore’s belief in man-made global warming.

 

Happer noted that climate change has long worried humans.

 

“Sometimes the obsession for control of the climate got a bit out of hand, as in the Aztec [society] where the local scientific/religious establishment of the year 1500 had long since announced that the debate was over and at least 20,000 human sacrifices a year were needed to keep the sun moving, the rain falling; and thus stop climate change. The widespread dissatisfaction of the [neighboring tribes] who were unfortunate enough to be the source of these sacrifices played an important part in the success of the Spanish conquest of Mexico.”

 

Professor Happer also pointed to Switzerland in June, 1644, when the Bishop of Geneva led a flock of believers to the face of a glacier that was advancing “by over a musket shot” every day, and threatening a village. The Bishop and his flock prayed over the glacier, “and it is said to have stopped.”

 

“I predict that future historians will look back on this period much as we now view Prohibition. . . . Deeply sincere people thought they were saving humanity from the evils of alcohol, just as many people now sincerely think they are saving humanity from the evils of CO₂. . . . Like the temperance movement 100 years ago, the climate-catastrophe movement has enlisted the mass media, the leadership of scientific societies, the trustees of foundations, and many other influential people to their cause. Even elementary school teachers and writers of children’s books are enlisted to terrify our children and promote the idea of impending climate doom,” Happer warned.

 

But Happer pointed out that “Institutions like organized crime got their start in that [Prohibition] era. Drastic limitations on CO₂ are likely to damage our country in analogous ways.” Happer told the Senators, “I believe that the increase of CO₂ is not a cause for alarm and will be good for mankind,” noting that more CO₂ helps plants yield more food per acre

 

The former Energy Department official also took a shot at former Vice-president Gore. “Al Gore likes to display graphs of temperature and CO₂ concentrations over the past million years or so, showing that when CO₂ rises, the temperature also rises. Doesn’t this prove that the temperature is drive by CO₂?  Absolutely not!  If you look carefully at these records, you find that first the temperature goes up, and then the CO₂ concentration of the atmosphere goes up. There is a delay between a temperature increase and a CO₂ increase of about 800 years. This casts serious doubt on CO₂ as a climate driver.” 

 

Happer says his furnace comes on in the mornings, and his house gets warmer. But the igniting of the furnace precedes the house warming by about an hour. “The thing that changes first is the cause. In the case of the ice cores, the cause of increased CO₂ is almost certainly the warming of the oceans.” In other words, instead of more CO₂ causing warming, a warming ocean releases some of its abundant CO₂ back into the air.

 

“I personally don’t believe we are facing a crisis, unless we create one for ourselves,” said Happer—as the Aztecs created a crisis of revolution among their neighboring tribes.

 

 

DENNIS T. AVERY is an environmental economist, and a senior fellow for the Hudson Institute in Washington, DC.  He was formerly a senior analyst for the Department of State. He is co-author, with S. Fred Singer, of Unstoppable Global Warming Every 1500 Hundred Years, Readers may write him at PO Box 202, Churchville, VA 24421 or email to cgfi@hughes.net

 

CHURCHVILLE, VA—Incoming President Obama will undoubtedly call for a renewed crusade against greenhouse gas emissions. Will Thanksgiving dinners in the future feature kangaroo instead of turkey?

 

Don’t get me wrong. Turkeys emit lots less greenhouse gas than beef cattle. Cattle today are fed lots of grain, and growing it requires nitrogen fertilizer (made with natural gas), and much diesel fuel for the tractors and combines. In addition, cows naturally emit vast amounts of methane, a greenhouse gas 20 times as dangerous to the environment as CO₂.

 

Turkeys (and also chickens) make twice as much meat per pound of grain as cattle, and their stomachs don’t create methane. That means far less than half as much greenhouse gas emitted per pound of turkey as from beef production. But Britain just passed a law to cut its greenhouse gas emissions 80 percent by the year 2050. If the U.S. is to match that sort of emission cuts, even turkey won’t be “green” enough.

 

Kangaroos emit hardly any greenhouse gas. The Australian Wildlife Services tell us the kangaroo’s unique digestive microbes emit just seven pounds of CO₂-equivalent greenhouse gas per year, compared with more than 4,000 pounds per year of CO₂ equivalents from each cow! 

 

Equally important, kangaroos eat grass. Millions more kangaroos could substitute for today’s millions of cattle on the world’s natural grasslands. If that grass isn’t grazed, lightning strikes would set off the sort of massive prairie fires that used to strike terror in the hearts of the early Great Plains settlers. The gas emitted from a prairie fire—need I remind you—is CO₂.

 

The northern parts of the United States may be too cold for happy kangaroos. But the southern rangelands should be able to feed millions of them. Fences will obviously be a problem, however, since they can jump up to ten feet off the ground.

 

What’s it like eating kangaroo? We’re told it’s a gamy, low-fat meat similar to elk or venison. Due to the ultra-low fat content, it needs to be cooked rare or it turns leathery. Experts suggest steaks be cooked just 2-3 minutes on a side. Australia already sells kangaroo meat in some supermarkets and exports it to game-lovers in Germany and France.

 

But hold on!  

 

• Since 1998, CO₂ in the atmosphere has risen another 5 percent—but the earth’s temperatures have dropped half a degree C, defying the Greenhouse Theory.

 

• Durban, South Africa, recently had the coldest September night in its history.

 

• Switzerland has had “the most snow for any October since records began.”

 

• On October 29, 115 American weather stations broke or tied their all-time lows for the date.

 

• Alaska was very warm in 2007, but this October brought a low of minus 25 degrees F., breaking the previous low for Oct. 29 by 4 degrees F. The Arctic sea ice now covers 2 million square kilometers more than it did last year.

 

• NASA announced April 21 that its Jason satellite had confirmed the Pacific Decadal Oscillation is entering a cool phase likely to last 25–30 years. Pacific Rim tree rings indicate the earth’s temperatures have mirrored the shifts in Pacific temperatures for the past 400 years. It’s our biggest ocean, after all. Thus our current cooling is likely to look like our last cooling between 1940 and 1975. That temperature decline also occurred during a Pacific cooling, even though human greenhouse emissions were surging then also.

 

The Obama team would still like you to try the kangaroo fillet with caramelized pear and red current sauce, or perhaps the grilled loin of ‘roo’ with fig and onion.

 

DENNIS T. AVERY is an environmental economist and a senior fellow for the Hudson Institute in Washington D.C. He was formerly a senior analyst for the Department of State. He is co-author, with S. Fred Singer, of Unstoppable Global Warming Every 1500 Years. Readers can email him at:  cgfi@hughes.net

Hudson InstituteCenter For Global Food Issues
Alex Avery And Dennis Avery
November 26, 2007
Click here to view the entire paper.

New Beef Eco-Report: Pound-for-pound, beef produced with grains and growth hormones produces 40% less greenhouse gas emissions and saves two-thirds more land for nature compared to organic grass-fed beef.

To reach these startling conclusions, analysts at the Hudson Institute’s Center for Global Food Issues used beef production models from Iowa State University’s Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture and greenhouse gas emissions estimates from the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (UN IPCC).

More than 95% of beef produced in the United States is raised on grain-based diets in feedlots, using supplemental growth hormones, both natural and synthetic. The report details the extensive human and environmental safety requirements for the use of supplemental hormones on feedlots, as well as the growing body of environmental monitoring studies showing no significant negative impacts from their use. Instead, the data show major environmental benefits of this production system: Saving 2/3rds more land for nature and producing 40% fewer greenhouse gas emissions per pound of beef produced.

The use of supplemental hormones in beef production has been deemed safe for humans by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, Health Canada, the World Health Organization, the Codex Alimentarius Committee of the World Trade Organization, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, and a conference of expert toxicologists established by the European Agriculture Commission.

The first-of-its-kind analysis compared the land costs and greenhouse gas emissions of organic grass-based beef with conventional grain-finished beef. The findings are particularly relevant in light of a UN Food and Agriculture Organization report published last summer estimating that beef and dairy production are responsible for 18% of all human greenhouse gas emissions.

“Environmentally conscious consumers who have been told that grass-raised beef is more environmentally sensitive and sustainable should rethink their beef purchases in light of our findings,” says lead author Alex Avery, director of research at the Center.

Executive Summary

Growth promoting hormones are a key component of North American beef production. Their use over the past 50+ years (since 1956) has proven beneficial not only to beef producers, but to consumers and the environment, who benefit from lower costs and more efficient use of scarce natural resources. In short, they allow us to achieve the old Yankee maxim of producing more from less.

Every food safety authority that has examined their use and the resulting beef products have found them to be both safe and wholesome, helping to produce an overall leaner beef supply with minimal residues of no practical health consequence. This assessment is shared not only by the Food and Drug Administration of the United States and Health Canada, but also by the Codex Alimentarius Committee of the World Trade Organization, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, the World Health Organization, and even a conference established by the European Agriculture Commission.

There are six hormones approved for use in beef production in more than 30 countries. Three of these are natural, three synthetic. The three natural hormones (testosterone, estradiol, and progesterone) have been deemed completely safe for use in beef production, are a natural part of all mammalian physiology, and are released into the environment at levels well within natural ranges. Their use is uncontroversial.

The three synthetic growth enhancing hormones are melengestrol acetate (MGA), trenbolone acetate (TBA), and zeranol. These are more stable analogs of the three natural hormones. All three of these synthetic hormones enter the environment predominantly in the same way as the natural: via cattle waste. All three have undergone extensive eco-safety assessments, including worst-case estimates of their levels in cattle waste, runoff from cattle feedlots, and runoff from land on which the waste has been applied. In addition, there is a growing body of science regarding their fate in real-world environments.

But beyond this reassuring history, there are enormous environmental benefits to be gained from use of these products. Increased feed use efficiency, reduced land requirements, and reduced greenhouse gas emissions per pound of beef produced have all been conclusively demonstrated.

Comparing conventional beef production to an alternative grass-based beef production system using an economic/production model created by scientists at Iowa State University shows that growth promoting hormones and ionophores decrease the land required to produce a pound of beef by two thirds, with fully one fifth of this gain resulting from growth enhancing pharmaceuticals. Whereas grass-based organic beef requires more than 5 acre-days to produce a pound of beef, less than 1.7 acre days are needed in a grain-fed feedlot system using growth promotants.

Grain feeding combined with growth promotants also results in a nearly 40 percent reduction in greenhouse gases (GHGs) per pound of beef compared to grass feeding (excluding nitrous oxides), with growth promotants accounting for fully 25 percent of the emissions reductions.

In short, growth promoting implants safely and responsibly allow humanity to produce more beef from less feed, using less land, and creating less waste.

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A devastating and detailed review of four highly publicized case studies showing the deep anti-pesticide bias of ecologists. The report asks why ecologists continually chase chemical phantoms despite the scientific evidence and when ecology will become a science again instead of an antipesticide activist cheerleading squad.