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Two Chinese nationals have been charged with allegedly smuggling into the U.S. a fungus called "Fusarium graminearum, which scientific literature classifies as a potential agroterrorism weapon," the Justice Department said Tuesday. Yunqing Jian, 33, and Zunyong Liu, 34, citizens of the People’s Republic of China, were allegedly receiving Chinese government funding for their research, some of which at the University of Michigan, the Justice Department said.

Te world only has 10 weeks worth of grain left, the lowest levels ever seen, as Russia's invasion of Ukraine is creating a "seismic" threat to global food supplies, Gro Intelligence CEO Sara Menker told the United Nations Security Council. "[T]he Russia-Ukraine war did not start the food security crisis. It simply added fuel to a fire that was long burning. A crisis we detected tremors from long before the COVID 19 pandemic exposed the fragility of our supply chains," Menker told the United Nations. Her software company, Gro Intelligence, uses human and artificial intelligence to predict food security and...

Le baguette, le croissant, éclair…some of the words that come to mind when I think France. I eat a gluten-free diet at home due to gastrointestinal sensitivities associated with wheat, yet every time I come to Europe, I find myself wondering why baked goods and pasta don’t make me sick the same way they do in the US… I want to start off by stating that I’m not celiac. Celiac disease is an immune reaction to eating gluten, a protein found in wheat, barley, and rye. Over time, it causes inflammation that damages the small intestine’s lining, leading to some...

Researchers have identified a new target to treat atherosclerosis, a condition where plaque clogs arteries and causes major cardiac issues, including stroke and heart attack. In a study, the team identified an inflammation-reducing molecule—called itaconate (ITA)—that could be the foundation of a new approach to treat such a common and deadly disease. Heart disease is the leading cause of death for men, women and people of most racial and ethnic groups, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Medications help but don't completely protect patients from cardiovascular risk. So, doctors also recommend lifestyle changes, such as a...

Department of General Psychology, University of Padua, Padova, Italy ===================================================================== Perhaps because gastroenterology, immunology, toxicology, and the nutrition and agricultural sciences are outside of their competence and responsibility, psychologists and psychiatrists typically fail to appreciate the impact that food can have on their patients’ condition. Here we attempt to help correct this situation by reviewing, in non-technical, plain English, how cereal grains—the world’s most abundant food source—can affect human behavior and mental health. We present the implications for the psychological sciences of the findings that, in all of us, bread (1) makes the gut more permeable and can thus encourage...

King Ghezo ruled Dahomey from 1818 to 1858, a period marked by military conquests and the transformation of the region's economy, heavily reliant on the slave trade. The kingdom of Dahomey, with its capital at Abomey, was a dominant power in West Africa, known for its aggressive raids on neighboring regions to capture slaves. These captives were either traded for European goods, forced to work on royal plantations, or sacrificed in elaborate voodoo ceremonies.Local legends claim that several structures within the palace complex in Abomey, now a UNESCO World Heritage Site, were constructed using a mortar that included the blood...

...When plant breeders created modern wheat during the 19th and 20th centuries, they focused on crossing and selectively breeding a few key varieties, creating a finicky racehorse of a crop: high yielding but vulnerable to disease, heat, and drought and reliant on a liberal application of fertilizer. Part of the solution, according to a study published today by Nature, may lie in the genetic diversity in 827 kinds of wheat, many of them long vanished from farms...Already scientists have identified genes that, if bred into modern wheat, could reduce the crop's need for nitrogen fertilizer and increase its resistance to...

I'm beginning to think we are being gaslighted again. We've heard all year how the Ukraine/Russia situation was going to drive the price of wheat up so much that a loaf of bread would cost $10. Well folks, it didn't happen. I sold my Oklahoma wheat this morning for 5.72/bushel, which is down from 7.80/bushel last year. It's a big drop, but not as big as I've seen over the years. However, last year was a bad year for wheat nationwide, and I think that's what drove the price of wheat up. This year, we had a great crop, so...

TOKYO -- The global wheat market has been hit by Chinese buyers canceling major shipments, seemingly in an attempt to secure better prices and bolster the country's food security. Benchmark Chicago wheat futures are trading at about $5.50 per bushel, up slightly from a three-and-a-half-year low marked in mid-March but down about 10% from the beginning of the year. The U.S. Department of Agriculture last month said 504,000 tonnes of wheat sales to China had been canceled. The figure is equivalent to about half the total U.S. wheat shipments to China in 2022 and the largest cancellation on record going...

'Congress alone has the authority' to breach federal dams, lawmakers write in letter to White House.. The Biden administration is quietly discussing a potentially far-reaching settlement with environmental groups that advocate for tearing down four hydroelectric dams in Washington... ... In the filings, jointly submitted by the federal government and eco groups... However, the filing failed to detail exactly what conditions were included in the secretive package .... We find it necessary to remind you Congress alone has the authority not only to order the breach of the Lower Snake River Dams, but also exclusive authority to direct the study...

INTERNATIONAL HAPPY GOSE DAY Every year on November 17th beer lovers gather together to celebrate International Happy Gose Day. Instead of rhyming with rose, Gose (ɡōzə) rhymes with Rosa. #InternationalHappyGoseDay Gose is a fermented sour wheat beer that originated during the sixteenth century in Goslar, located in Northern Germany. In later years, Gose became more associated with the city of Leipzig. The beer became so popular that it gained exemption for the country’s purity law called Reinheitsgebot. This law stated that German beer could only contain water, barley, yeast, and hops. But Gose is also made with malted wheat and...

While others in her Zimbabwean village agonize over a maize crop seemingly headed for failure, Jestina Nyamukunguvengu picks up a hoe and slices through the soil of her fields that are lush green with a pearl millet crop in the African country’s arid Rushinga district. “These crops don’t get affected by drought, they are quick to flower, and that’s the only way we can beat the drought,” the 59-year old said, smiling broadly. Millets, including sorghum, now take up over two hectares of her land — a patch where maize was once the crop of choice. Farmers like Nyamukunguvengu in...

In a normal year, America’s heartland would be brimming with lush, green wheat crops – but this is not a normal year. According to reports, western Kansas is a wasteland of parched, dead fields. Wheat crops have been decimated, which means the American food supply will suffer yet another major blow. “There’s nothing out there,” says Vance Ehmke, a wheat farmer from Lane County. “It’s dead. It’s just ankle-high straw.” Ehmke’s farm is one of many that, after being planted several months ago, now looks like a dust bowl. Rows of brown, shriveled plants nest in hardened dirt that is...

Food insecurity is rising globally because of the war in Ukraine, according to experts, with Africa expected to be hit the hardest. The world’s superpowers, China and the U.S., say they are trying to mitigate the fallout but at the same time are accusing each other of exacerbating the crisis. A state newspaper, The China Daily, placed blame for the situation partially on Washington, saying: “Food prices have reached an all-time high, as Russian and Ukrainian grain exports are hindered by port disruptions and Western sanctions.” The U.S., for its part, has accused China of hoarding, after President Xi Jinping...

The so-called “deadlock” over resolving the global food crisis is just as artificially manufactured as its origins since Kiev has now officially declared that it won’t resume wheat exports by sea to the Global South unless it receives anti-ship missiles first. Ukrainian Ambassador to Turkey Vasily Bodnar officially demanded weapons in exchange for resuming wheat exports by sea in what amounts to the blatant blackmailing of the Global South in the midst of the artificially manufactured food crisis. He said that “Effective security guarantees are required for maritime shipments to resume. These guarantees must be provided through the supply of...

The world has about 10 weeks of wheat supplies stored as Russia's invasion of Ukraine enters its fourth month, a food insecurity expert told the UN. Sara Menker, the CEO of agriculture analytics firm Gro Intelligence, told the UN Security Council that the Russia-Ukraine war was not the cause of a food security crisis but "simply added fuel to a fire that was long burning." Ukraine is considered the world's "breadbasket" and Russia and Ukraine combined account for almost a third of the world's wheat exports.

After being accused of using the food supply as blackmail and a bargaining chip, Russia said Wednesday its military will open up protected sea corridors for international shipping to pass through from seven Ukrainian ports that have thus far been blockaded. According to a defense ministry statement reported by Bloomberg late in the day, “Humanitarian maritime corridors from ports on the Black Sea and Azov Sea, including Odesa, will operate from 8 a.m. to 7 p.m. daily.” Black Sea port of Constanta, Romania recently had a drifting mine nearby. Image: AlamyThe announcement comes two days after the head of the...

A food insecurity expert said the world has only about 10 weeks of wheat supplies left in storage amid the conflict in Ukraine and as India has moved to bar exports of wheat in recent weeks. Sara Menker, the CEO of agriculture analytics firm Gro Intelligence, told the United Nations Security Council that the Russia–Ukraine war “simply added fuel to a fire that was long burning,” saying that it is not the primary cause of the wheat shortage. Ukraine and Russia both produce close to about a third of the world’s wheat. “I want to start by explicitly saying that...

Droughts, flooding, heatwaves, and even war threaten wheat production worldwide, pushing up the price of bread, pizza crust, pastries, and noodles. Just about every major producer is facing some issue, and the latest is in the US, where ‘crop scouts’ have begun to scour arid fields across the Midwestern US. Bloomberg reports crop scouts from the wheat industry have begun to examine plants in farm fields in Kansas to Oklahoma to Nebraska. Harvest is just a few weeks away, and there are concerns devastating droughts have caused damage in US wheat country. Some farmers already are writing off losses from...

Explains the coming wheat crop failure as a result of the drought in the high plains.