Oh no Brad, tell me it ain't so!

If the idea of genetically modified crops made you feel slightly queasy, then a technicolour yawn might be induced at even the passing thought that it's not only fictional serial killers who may've been having something extra with their fava beans.
Of course the only possible place to hide the stuff originally derived from R&D using human cells would possibly be in the "high fructose corn syrup" or "natural" flavouring. Then again the blog first reporting this was an American Christian pro-life site and thus its balance is suspect.
Conclusion: No-one is actually eating foetal product, but quite a few food and beverage multinationals are somewhat embarrassed because it seems that they probably do benefit from research and development originally based on human embryonic stem cells – and maybe cadavers.

#"Several big food and beverage companies are looking at a new ingredient in the battle for health-conscious consumers: a chemical that tricks the taste buds into sensing sugar or salt even when it is not there."

# "Pepsi is funding the research and development, and paying royalties to Senomyx, which uses HEK-293 (human embryonic kidney cells) to produce flavor enhancers for Pepsi beverages."

# "PepsiCo is ignoring criticism from pro-life advocates upset that the company contracts with a research firm that uses fetal cells from babies victimized by abortions to test and produce artificial flavor enhancers."

# "Senomyx is collaborating with leading global food, beverage, and ingredient supply companies to develop and commercialize our flavor ingredients. We have entered into exclusive or co-exclusive product discovery and development collaborations with Ajinomoto Co. Inc.; Cadbury Adams USA LLC, a unit of Kraft Foods Inc.; Firmenich SA; Nestlé SA; PepsiCo; and Solae."

#"Overview: Human embryonic stem cells (hESCs) are stem cells derived from the inner cell mass of a blastocyst, which is a stage reach 4-5 days post fertilization."

#"The idea is the brainchild of biotech firm Senomyx of San Diego, California. To create its taste testers, the company adapted a tool that has been used by the pharmaceutical industry for over 20 years – lines of kidney cells with genetically modified DNA. Drug companies typically insert genes into these cells that coat their surfaces with receptors involved in certain diseases, to test how they respond to treatments.

Senomyx inserts genes from the surface of the human tongue instead, which cover the cells with taste receptors. The company has developed cell lines that respond to each of the five tastes: sweet, bitter, salty, sour and savoury (also known as "umami")."

#"Thank you for contacting us to share your sincere concerns," the PepsiCo response says. "Please be assured that PepsiCo is committed to using only the highest ethical methods in all aspects of our research. This is something we take very seriously, and we hold ourselves and all of our research partners to the same high standards as the world's leading research centers."

The email continues: "With respect to the flavor discovery research with Senomyx, we utilize techniques that have been the gold standard for several decades by top universities, hospitals, U.S. government agencies, food and beverage companies, and essentially every pharmaceutical and biotech company in the world. Yet, there is some misinformation being circulated meant to distort what we're doing and question our motives and those of other companies. This is unfortunate, and it is certainly not reflective of the work we are doing. We hope this information is helpful and reassuring. Thank you again for reaching out to us and allowing us to clarify the situation."

Gillard and Ludwig fiddle while last of the goodwill burns

Labor MPs are stepping up pressure on Julia Gillard to take decisive action on Australia's live export trade to counter a growing community backlash against cruelty to animals.
They are concerned at the potential effect on the Government of a television campaign to be unleashed today by three groups that have received more than 200,000 online signatures to a petition calling for a total ban on the live export of cattle.
Agriculture Minister Joe Ludwig confirmed last night that a ban was now in place against the export of live animals to 12 Indonesian abattoirs outed by the ABC for cruel slaughtering practices.
However the promised independent reviewer had not been appointed by last night, nor had the terms of reference for the inquiry been settled.
[The Canberra Times 4 March 2011]

It is hardly surprising that Labor backbenchers are pushing the Prime Minister.

This issue has the ability to mushroom even further than troubling concerns over the treatment of asylum seekers given that it doesn’t trigger that deep well of xenophobia within the Australian psyche.

The general response would be the same if the Four Corners exposé had been concerned with local abbattoirs.

The Gillard Government cannot afford to go slowly or employ half measures when addressing live animal export to Indonesia – only a total ban will see Australian cattle protected from deliberate and unthinking cruelty in that country.

Agriculture Minister Joe Ludwig needs to do the maths. There are more voters living in urban areas of this country who don’t make a living either directly or indirectly from the cattle industry than those who do in rural and regional Australia.

Snapshot of RSPCA Australia banner 4 June 2011

GRACE: mapping Earth's water supplies 2002 to 2010

The GRACE Tellus program has been running for nine years now and is a collaboration of the US and German space agencies (NASA and DLR) whose key partners are the University of Texas Center for Space Research, Geoforschungszentrum Potsdam and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

Its twin satellites, launched 17 March 2002, are making detailed measurements of Earth's gravity field over land and ice and over the oceans to investigate Earth's water reservoirs .

Earth’s gravity from space

WHAT IS 'EQUIVALENT WATER THICKNESS'?

The observed monthly changes in gravity are caused by monthly changes in mass. The mass changes can be thought of as concentrated in a very thin layer of water at the surface, whose thickness changes. In reality, much of the monthly change in gravity is indeed caused by changes in water storage in hydrologic reservoirs, by moving ocean, atmospheric and cryospheric masses, and by exchanges among these reservoirs. Their vertical extent is measured in centimeters, much smaller than the radius of the Earth or the horizontal scales of the changes, which are measured in kilometers. Some changes in gravity are caused by mass redistribution in the 'solid' Earth, such as that following a large earthquake, or that due to glacial isostatic adjustment; in those cases the concept of 'equivalent water thickness' does not apply, even though it is possible to compute the quantity...

As GRACE travels over areas of snow and ice sheets such as Greenland and Antarctica, changes in mass will be recorded. This information, along with measurements from the ground and other satellites will enable scientists to determine if these areas are growing or shrinking. Knowledge of this mass variation is key to understanding the effects of climate change and sea level rise.

WATER

LAND

World Environment Day 5 June 2011

Think about it
Deeply and often
Then act

Australian and British attitudes to climate change: latest 2011 report

It would appear that more Australians accept the science behind climate change predictions than believe contrarians, denialists, propagandists and prevaricators like Tony Abbott, Nick Minchin, Andrew Bolt, Alan Jones and The Australian campaign against science.

Public Risk Perceptions, Understandings, and Responses to Climate Change in Australia and Great Britain: Interim Report
[Joseph P. Reser, Nick Pidgeon, Alexa Spence, Graham Bradley, A. Ian Glendon & Michelle Ellul, Griffith University Climate Change Response Program and Understanding Risk Centre, Cardiff University, 2011]

Australia-specific research findings1
71% of Australian respondents reported that their level of concern about climate change had increased over the past two years.
78% of Australian respondents agreed that, “If nothing is done to reduce climate change in the future, it will be a „very serious‟ or „somewhat serious‟ problem for
Australia”.
When asked, “How serious a problem do you think climate change is right now”, 45% of Australian respondents reported that it was a serious problem.
Respondent objective knowledge levels about matters relating to the underlying science of climate change and projected impacts were modest, with respondents
getting, on average, four to five out of 10 true/false statements correct. These findings are interesting when compared with respondent self-reported knowledge level, with close to 75% of respondents feeling that they knew a reasonable amount about climate change, suggesting that many respondents either overestimated or underestimated their own knowledge levels in the area of climate change.
The Australian survey findings with respect to perceived interrelationships between climate change and natural disasters are of particular interest. It is clear that the evidence and projected consequences which respondents refer to in the context of their belief and concern about climate change are often related to extreme weather events and natural disasters.
37% of Australian respondents reported having had direct personal experience with differing natural disaster events. Overall, public risk perceptions and understandings of the threat of climate change in Australia appear to be strongly influenced and informed by knowledge of direct or indirect experience with both acute and chronic natural disasters in the Australian environment.
59% of Australian respondents thought that the region where they lived was vulnerable to the impacts of climate change, with two thirds of these respondents indicating that their location was „very‟ or „reasonably‟ vulnerable.
An important and neglected domain in climate change surveys relates to the possible psychological impacts of the threat and perceived environmental consequences of
climate change. Australian survey respondents completed a seven-item measure of experienced psychological distress with respect to the threat of climate change. 20%
of respondents reported feeling, at times, appreciable distress at the prospect and implications of climate change and its consequences.
1 A number of these specific findings are not reported or discussed in detail in the interim report, but will befully addressed in the subsequent final report which will be completed and available in July 2011.

More specific joint findings include the following:
74% of Australian respondents and 78% of British respondents believed "that the world's climate is changing", with 8% reporting "not knowing" in both countries.
71% of Australian respondents either "strongly agreed" or "tended to agree" with the statement, “I am certain that climate change is really happening”.
90% of Australian respondents and 89% of British respondents believed that human activities were playing a causal role in climate change.
54% of Australian respondents and 41% of British respondents believed that they were already experiencing the effects of climate change. Australian respondents provided many examples of direct encounters with what they viewed as evidence of climate change in open-ended survey items.
66% of Australian respondents and 71% of British respondents reported that they were "very concerned" or "fairly concerned" about climate change, with an additional 22% and 19% respectively, indicating some level of concern.
Australian and British respondents were only slightly less concerned with respect to the personal impacts of climate change, with 62% of Australian and 60% of British respondents reporting that they were "very concerned" or "fairly concerned".
A psychological variable of demonstrated importance in the context of climate change is perceived self efficacy, i.e., the extent to which people feel they can engage in actions that could make a difference either in their local or global environment.
The survey findings suggest that the majority of both Australian and British respondents feel that despite clear difficulties and challenges, their actions can make a difference, and that the issue of climate change is serious, urgent, and personally relevant.
Taken as a whole, these Australia/Great Britain comparison findings indicate striking similarities, high levels of climate change concern, and strong belief on the part of over 70% of respondents in both countries that human activities are in part responsible for current global climate change.
These findings also suggest that media coverage of public perceptions of and responses to the threat of climate change is often very wide of the mark, and that reported declines over the past several years in public concern about climate change and its relative importance as an environmental issue and threat have been overstated.

Download full report here.

Koori Mail Collection Online 1991-2011 digital archive of a vibrant media presence

The Koori Mail Collection Online

The Koori Mail – 100 per cent Aboriginal owned and controlled – is situated on Bundjalung country on the far north coast of New South Wales. Its shareholders are five small Aboriginal organisations – the Bundjalung Tribal Society (Lismore), Bunjum Co-operative (Ballina/Cabbage Tree Island), Buyinbin Co-operative (Casino), Kurrachee Co-operative (Coraki) and Nungera Co-operative (Maclean).