Comments Lisa J. Bunin has made

Let's get to the point

You seem to have missed it, so let's try again...

World agriculture is increasingly becoming dependent upon a single tool for weed control -- the weedkiller glyphosate, Monsanto's Roundup in particular.  This situation is largely attributable to the rapid spread of GM, Roundup Ready (RR) crops, which is also driving the expansion of glyphosate-resistant weeds.  Since Roundup is becoming less and less effective in killing weeds, farmers are turning to the use of more toxic and persistent herbicides, such as atrazine and 2,4-D, to eliminate those same weeds that formerly succumbed to Roundup.  

Contrary to your claims that Roundup adversely affects only plants, studies have shown that the weedkiller is toxic to amphibians, frogs, and earthworms.  Studies suggest that Roundup is a potential hormone disruptor and it may be correlated with increased rates of birth defects and cell division dysfunction.  At least one study has shown that children of glyphosate applicators experience higher rates of behavioral disorders than non-exposed populations.

So, there's ample cause for concern not only that more Roundup is being sprayed on sugar beets, but also that more residues - a 5,000% increase since 1998 - are being allowed on sugar beet roots!
Now straying, as you do, from the subject at hand...
Let's start with manure.  Your vote for high-intensity livestock production is a vote for huge manure lagoons created in animal factories housing thousands of cattle, pigs, and poultry crowded into confined animal feeding operations or CAFOs.  These manure lagoons sicken rural people with their stench and often leak into surface waters or breech their containers, contaminating local streams with a flood of fecal matter, causing massive fish kills.  

At CAFOs, cattle are force-fed corn that they were never meant to eat, creating unnaturally acidic conditions in their guts that foster development of deadly E. coli 0157:H7.  The source of pathogenic E. coli is animal factories, not organic agriculture.  Organic farmers use cover crops that fix nitrogen and spread safely COMPOSTED manure in their fields.  

Once organic farming systems are established, their yields are close or equal to that of the destructive "high-intensity" agriculture systems that you recommend.  Organic farmers produce high yields without using massive doses of nitrogen fertilizer that have numerous adverse side effects including huge emissions of nitrous oxides (potent global warming gases) and the creation of ever-expanding dead zones such as the one found in the Gulf of Mexico.  Dead zones are caused by hypoxia, a lack of oxygen due to nitrogen fertilizer-induced overgrowth of marine plants that suck all the oxygen (life) out of the water and then die.

Like you, I am also worried about habitat destruction, but I guess you haven't heard that practices such as ripping out riparian habitats and farmland vegetation are currently being touted as the solution to combat E. coli 0157:H7.  This is a big mistake and so is misleading people to think that high-intensity agriculture will solve our food safety problems when, actually, it's the root cause.

Lisa J. Bunin Campaigns Coordinator Center for Food Safety and Switzer Environmental Leadership Fellow