Tag Archives: China

Food from China largely free of glyphosate

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We did not expect Chinese foods to be free of glyphosate, primarily because of two reasons.

  • China is the world’s largest producer of glyphosate.
  • China is known to be the largest importer of Argentinian, Brazilian and US RoundUp Ready Soy. The Argentinian Soy being grown in the Pampas is known for aerial spray over the plains which are suspected to be linked to birth defects of indigenous people that live there.

However, the records from CFIA’s testing of foods available in Canada, both of local and imported origin, show a trend of remarkably clean foods as imported from China into Canada.

This had originally made me skeptical and doubt the quality of my transcription of the CFIA data, or the selection of sampling varieties by CFIA. However, as more data is transcribed, totalling over 3,700 records, I can see that the samples have a wide variety. Also, readings of similar foods grown in other countries including Canada and the US are showing much higher level of glyphosate in them. Eventually I had to acknowledge, grudgingly at first, that for some inexplicable reason, the foods exported from China to Canada are a lot better in terms of glyphosate poisoning, than one might expect.

There are around 120 samples of foods listed by CFIA as originating from China, among the fist 3,700 odd records. The average parts per billion count of glyphosate and AMPA turns out to be below 5. This makes China among the best five countries whose foods are available in Canada, and whose sample numbers as tested by CFIA is above 40. The few countries that beat China in this category of clean food supply, are Mexico, Thailand, South Africa and Peru. This has been covered in a separate blog. A few other countries also have exported very good food to Canada, and their numbers are catching up, such as Bolivia, with 23 samples and an average ppb of 4.

Since soy is a big item in Chinese cuisine, there was an expectedly high number of samples tested that contained soy. So a separate table was prepared for them, as shon above. With 26 samples, the average ppb count came to be just 5, and the worst one, a dry, roasted, salted, gluten free soy product, had 51 ppb of the herbicide.

Although soy is also a bean, it was separated from other beans because of the number of samples and because of its prevalence in Chinese food. The rest of the bean containing samples were compiled in a second table, shown above.

A single bad sample, of Pinto Beans with a combined ppb of glyphosate and AMPA measured 204. All others had either zero or low values of the herbicide. The average ppb in this group, totalling 24 samples, came to 10.3.

Next come the grains. Again, out of 21 samples, only a few had any glyphosate or AMPA. The highest concentration was only 24.8 ppb in a sample of Barley. The average ppb for this group was 2.3.

And then comes a long list of almost fifty samples that all showed zero glyphosate.

I consolidated that longish list by category type and number of samples, as shown here. The largest number of samples in this group are baby food.

I remember the local story of baby food scandal in the interiors of China some years ago, when I heard it from locals during one of my past work visits to the coastal region.

Apparently, there was this odd phenomenon of babies in the interior being reported to have a proportionately larger head for its body. Eventually some doctors and specialists went there to look into it and found a whole different and horrible story. The heads were normal, but the body was underdeveloped. The root cause was found to be lack of nutrients and too much of synthetic stuff that looks like food into the baby formulae.

At that time, China was making the major change from a state controlled economy to a free market entrepreneurship. In the process, food quality inspection and control was not as well established, especially in the rural areas, as they should have been. So free market entrepreneurship when rampant and at reached at times extreme levels of adulteration.

Also, at the same time, westernization and modernism was spreading into the rural heartlands, where nursing through breast milk was not as cool as giving modern balanced food through baby formulae.

The combination of all this was causing severe malnourishment in babies. This practice was reportedly put a stop to, and ruthlessly, by a new regime of quality control in baby food. That is what I heard at the time.

And now, so many years later, here is a list of 15 baby food samples from China, tested in Canada, show absolutely no glyphosate at all. Of course, glyphosate was not the issue at the time – adulteration and lack of nutrition was. The current test involves glyphosate and AMPA only. I suspect the reasons such large number of Chinese baby foods are in the test records is because Canadians that trace their origin back to China might be importing these foods for their babies. This is just a guess.

Anyhow, this post was made with the best efforts to show that, whatever might be the case with China producing glyphosate and importing Argentinian RoundUp Ready Soy, the   samples of foods imported from China and collected in Canada seem to show a remarkably clean range of foods comprising of grains, soy, beans and various other natural and processed foods.

All these records were based on the first 3,700 odd records, or about half of the total numbers of tests conducted by CFIA. When the rest are also transcribed, I should be revisiting this topic, if there is a major change in the findings.

A note of caution

We should remember that China is the largest producer as well as exporter of glyphosate, for Roundup as well as many other glyphosate based herbicides for sales around the world.

Following learned from some Chinese activists :
In 2015 and 2016, over 80 million tons of RR (RoundUp Ready) soybeans soaked with glyphosate residues were imported into China, mostly from USA, Brazil and Argentina. They contain neurotoxin solvent hexane (with carcinogen benzene residues) chemically extracted for the RR soybean oil with glyphosate/AMPA residue flooding the domestic food market (inside China).

The side-product RR soybean meal soaked with glyphosate + hexane + benzene residue is partly processed into animal feed, and partly processed into human consumed RR soybean protein, added to ham, sausages, frozen food, bread, cakes, soy milk, infant formulas etc etc. These are again sold on the Chinese market.

China still produces about 10 million tons of non-GMO soybeans, including much smaller amount of organic soybeans. American, European, Japanese importers actively purchase them for processing medical products, health care products and food products, and in many cases hire inspectors to test these soybeans in the field.

Chinese companies exporting food products to USA, Europe, Japan etc., are very careful in only using non-GM soybeans to process such products, Chinese government inspection bureaus also carefully test exported food products, making sure they are not processed by RR soybeans with glyphosate residue which only enter the food supply for Chinese domestic consumption.

For the above reason, China experiences the same dramatic increase of malignant diseases as in the USA

Reference article by Chinese Military Scientist on GM Watch.

Its a bizarre world.

Comments welcome.

Russia-China vetoes Aleppo ceasefire resolution

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Well, the goings on in UNSC is perhaps an indication of geopolitical shift in the issue of regime toppling efforts by western interests.

The issue is the town of Aleppo in Syria. There is a multi-pronged warfare going on in much of the country. A lot of different groups are trying to topple the current government of Assad.

According to the US, the people fighting the government are local Syrians that wish to topple a brutal regime there.

According to other reports, the country is infiltrated by jihadists, ISIS, mercenaries etc, sent there specifically to start the next phase of the middle east war, and to topple the Assad government.

Assad

To complicate matters, there are also Kurdish resistance groups who wish to have a homeland of their own, and currently occupy strips of Turkey, Syria and Iraq, and are treated as second class citizens most everywhere. I am not sure which side of the war they are on, but Turkey, who hates the Kurds (Because the Kurds in Turkey also want independence) would either like a piece of land carved out of Syria so all the Turkish Kurds could perhaps also go there and stop bothering Turkey, or perhaps hoping that all the Turkish Kurds would cross the border and join the fight in Syria, on whichever side, as long as they vacate Turkey.

Obama

These are reasons why the issue may be too complex to fully comprehend, and many folks have opinion based on one or another point of view.

There are other factors about Syria that might be relevant. Assad does not allow western banking and oil interests to benefit from Syria’s land or its assets.

Also, Syria, while Muslim, is largely secular and do not promote a sunni version of lifestyle. Women are not required to cover themselves or stay home.

There is also additional issues of two competing oil pipelines proposed to go through Syria. The US plan leads gulf oil from Qatar to reach the west via Turkey to the Mediterranean.

Putin

There is apparently another Russian plan to help Iran develop a pipeline going through Iraq and Syria and reach the west through a Syrian terminal facing the mediterranean.

Saudi Arabia, Israel and the US do not want Iran to benefit from pipelines, and do not want Syrian ports to benefit from the business, unless Assad regime is toppled and a pro-West, Pro-Saudi, Pro-Israeli group rules Syria.

IN the middle of all this, is the issue of the current legitimate government of Syria inviting Russia to come and help fight the opponents of the regime, who they claim are foreign terrorists being funded by Saudi, Israeli and US interests, and are using US weaponry. Russia accepted the offer.

Jinping

This pits Russian military in direct confrontation with US-Saudi-Israeli interests.

Things have reached a pitch where nothing USA says about Syria, including what comes out specifically from Obama and Hillary (before she lost the election) could be believed.

It was better to look for independent reports emerging from the ground in Syria, such as Canadian reporter Eva Bartlett

Now, the epicentre of the fight is concentrated around the city of Aleppo. It was completely in control of the rebels, and there were reports of horrific treatment of the civilians coming out from there too, including mass graves and using the people as human shields against Syrian forces trying to free the town.

Anyhow, now the rebels are apparently surrounded by the syrian forces who are also being supported (I am not too sure of the details) by Iraqi forces who also want ISIS and jihadists defeated, since they believe these people actually came from Iraq, and if they succeed in Syria, would turn and haunt Iraq again. Anyhow.

Maduro

Now the battle around Aleppo has apparently turned a decisive corner, and much of the town is liberated by the govt forces. The rebels, which are perhaps the concentrated mass of ISIS forces and mercenary soldiers on pay, are surrounded and cannot flee and regroup because their escape route through the desert is blocked by Russian missiles, fighters and bombers.

USA and its supporters have been pushing for a no-fly zone for a long time, specifically in areas where the rebels move around. But since the area is under control of the Russian air force intent on cutting off rebel movement, this pitches the US directly against the Russians. USA has not put their own airforce to enforce a no-fly zone here, presumably because US generals warned Obama that this move would trigger a direct war against Russia.

Hillary herself has spoken often about wanting a no-fly zone there, fully toting the Obama-military-industrial wish. Putin’s intensions are not very clear, but this much is accepted by most – Russia does not have a wish to control the assets of the region. Rather, Russia is more interested in ensuring the region does not become an US stooge and hostile to Russia.

So, now, three countries pressed a resolution in the UNSC to force the security council to adopt a 7 day stopping of bombings around Aleppo, in order to “pass humanitarian aid” to suffering residents of Aleppo.

What has happened today, is that Russia, China and Venezuela voted against it, and 11 other security council members (some non-permanent and some permanent) voted for it. Russia and China are permanent members with veto power.

In essence, this perhaps is the first time China has openly joined Russia in a veto about the war in Syria.

I take that as the beginning of a new phase of China. They are also, slowly, beginning to bring assistance to the Assad regime, in paramilitary and military sphere.

I believe one of the main reason for China to decide to help Syria and defeat the insurgency, even at the cost of openly opposing western commercial and military interests, is because China itself has a lot of boundary provinces with substantial muslim population, and it believes some of the Islamists and Jihadists are fomenting trouble in those Chinese provinces, hoping to start a revolt and turning those areas into an expanding Islamic state. China believes some of the mushrooming or budding terrorists from these regions have already been recruited and are right now being trained first hand in insurgency through the war in Syria.

Therefore, China would like the rebels to be defeated. It considers this mushrooming of Islamic terrorism that spreads from nation to nation, and is apparently supported by Saudi Money, Israeli political support and US weaponry, poses a threat to China’s own security and integrity. In other words, its not a joking matter for them.

Ohh.. well .. we are all living in interesting times..