Robyn O’Brien is the co-founder of rePlant Capital, an impact investment firm, deploying integrated capital from soil to shelf in order to build soil health and financial resiliency for farmers. She is also the founder of Do Good, a strategic advisory firm, and the AllergyKids Foundation. Random House published Robyn’s book, The Unhealthy Truth, in 2009, and her TEDx talks have been translated into dozens of languages and viewed by millions around the world.
We receive emails and notes from readers every day. Some stop us in our tracks, like this one, and we feel that they are really important to share so that others understand that they are not alone in their work and concern over the health of our families and food system.
What can we do? Educate each other, share resources and stories, keep working towards a smarter food system. The legacy is ours to create.
Dear Robyn,
I just read your post about the woman who worked for Target and your advice to her. It resonated with me because I work for a conventional farm. They spray pesticides, including Roundup. I lost my mom to cancer when I was 26, she was 56.
Before she died, she encouraged me to find my birth mother. I did. I just lost her to cancer too. I’m 42 now, my birth mother was also 56 when she died.
My birth mother was a landscaper her whole life. She sprayed Roundup almost daily. She was told it was perfectly safe and that she didn’t need any PPE. She never saw a label or SDS for any of the pesticides she worked with. She recalled getting it on her hands and clothes and breathing in the mist from the spray.
She was diagnosed with an extremely aggressive form of breast cancer. By the time they found it, it had spread to her lymph and lungs. From there it progressed to her bones and then her brain. She had no family history of cancer, and genetic testing confirmed this.
I work for a small family hop farm in Oregon. The farmers are good people. They are farming the only way they know. The mother of the current (4th generation) farming family was diagnosed with grade 4 glioblastoma two years ago. I am friends with the family and I’m also a scientist with a background in biochemistry and interest in nutrition.
When she was diagnosed they reached out to me for advice. I had already done extensive research about cancer and treatments, both conventional and alternative, for my moms. I worked with the family to learn how much they were willing to adjust their lifestyle and invest in health in the face of a lethal brain cancer diagnosis. As is consistent with my experience, the answer was not very much, with the exception of what mainstream MDs advised.
Based on my research, I determined the most effective thing that would be the easiest to do is to adopt as much of the Budwig diet as possible. She did this, and I’m happy to report that she is alive and well, and the cancer has not come back after her initial surgery. This is basically unheard of with grade 4 glioblastoma, and while her doctors are impressed, I was asked not to come back to any of her appointments with her after the first and only time I accompanied her to her appointment (they did not appreciate my questions).
I’m writing to you to ask for your help. I feel like I should stay at this farm and do what I can to effect change. I have tried and mostly have been met with resistance and negativity, but I have also had success in other areas around sustainability, so I remain hopeful.
The challenge for me is that there is so little information about how to farm any way other than conventionally. I helped the farm become salmon safe certified, but there is still so much to be done. Going organic is not an option for them in the short term, but I am wondering if there are any resources you know of for farms hoping to make the transition or even just for reducing pesticide use.
Thank you so much for the good work you do. You inspire me and give me hope for the future.
Erin Schrode has done more in her first 25 years of life than a lot of people do in a lifetime. She and her mom founded a groundbreaking organization called Turning Green that has gone on to impact families around the country.
Since co-founding Turning Green in 2005, she has developed education and social action platforms to inspire, educate, and mobilize millions of students and the global public. Erin is also the eco correspondent for Fusion (ABC and Univision’s new joint venture). But that’s just the start. Erin has been featured in and tapped as an expert for the NY Times, Vanity Fair, ABC, CNN, Seventeen Magazine and various multimedia outlets. As The White House said, “Erin is a dynamic, passionate and ambitious young woman committed to creating big change everywhere she goes.”
But most importantly, she is a friend, and she has been for several years now. Wise beyond her years, you can’t say you have watched her “grow up,” as she has more wisdom in her than people twice her age. What has been fun as her friend is to watch her champion causes for a better planet. Our health is one of those causes. We won’t get far without it.
And now, from her hometown of Marin County, California to New York University to seventy nations around the globe, this innovative entrepreneur is on a lifelong journey to inspire people to action that ensures a just, safe, thriving world for future generations. Erin is running for Congress. You can follow her on Twitter @ErinSchrode #ErinForUs. And you can listen to our podcast, Take Out with Ashley and Robyn, and this inspiring interview with one of the most powerful game-changers of her generation and in our country. Please meet Erin Schrode. http://tinyurl.com/hhw89ax
April is Stress Awareness Month. Who knew? And did we even have one 20 years ago? What has made life get so busy so quickly? It seems that between managing our families, our kids, our careers, our lives, it is increasingly hard to manage our health. But it is critical. Thankfully, our friends over at Natural Vitality’s just released their latest eBook. It’s a free download and such a good read for our busy lives, full of some great tools to counter stress.
[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]The landscape of childhood has changed in America, and other countries are asking our children to talk about it.
There is something bitter sweet in a new campaign launched in the UK that is calling on American kids to tell their food stories. Our generation of American kids is the first raised on unlabeled, genetically engineered foods. Our kids are also the first to be called “Generation Rx” and the first to have 1 in 13 in their cohort with a food allergy, 1 in 10 with asthma, 1 in 68 with autism, more with ADHD and diabetes and classmates where cancer as the leading cause of death by disease. In other words, they are the first where EpiPens, insulin pumps, ADHD and other meds are part of every classroom.
And they are being asked to share their stories with kids around the world, as seen in the announcement below:
A new video project, by the UK’s Beyond GM, aims to give children a chance to speak up about GMOs and educate other kids in the world about their experiences.
Our Food Our Future is calling on kids of all ages in the Americas to start an international conversation by sending in a short video of themselves talking about the food issues that affect them and their families, with a specific focus on GMOs, pesticides, labeling, health, environment, activism and the future.
The project is a next phase of the successful Letter from America project which launched in 2014 to international acclaim and with widespread support by US NGOs and high profile individuals.
Our Food, Our Future aims to get kids in the Americas telling their stories to kids in the UK and the rest of Europe, where many governments, including the British government, are planning to plant GMO crops and, with the implementation of the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), import more GMOs foods and animal feed.
In an editorial to accompany the launch of the project, Pat Thomas, Director of Beyond GM, reflects: “The current generation of young people in the Americas is unique because they have never known a food system without GMOs and this has, intentionally or otherwise, turned them into a huge uncontrolled experiment in food and health.”
Over the next few months the campaign will be collecting video clips, the best of which will go into a longer compilation video to be launched later in 2016. That video will be will be disseminated throughout social media, at conferences and talks and will also be a first step in Beyond GM’s planned schools outreach in the UK.
In the same way that climate change issues have exposed our willingness to bargain away our future for short-term gains today, GMOs have exposed the future risks we are willing to take with our health and well-being as well as our environment. As a species we can’t thrive or survive without good, clean, healthy food and “the biggest risks we are currently taking are with the health and well-being of our children,” says Thomas.
In addition to making an international call-out for videos, the Beyond GM website will, over the next few months, be featuring guest editorials by young activists, starting with Rachel Parent, founder of Kids Right to Know.
The campaign launch page will also feature a video from one of Beyond GM’s youth supporters, Mya-Rose Craig, inviting kids in the Americas to join in.
“The food we eat today a shapes the adults we become tomorrow” says Mya-Rose “so it’s essential that we have a bigger say in our food future.”
“What our kids have to say about GMOs reflects the conversations that go on around the table, in the kitchen and at the grocery store” adds Thomas. “They see us struggle with food issues, with our own concerns, opinions and even activism and the desire to be heard. It’s time for our kids—tomorrow’s business people, politicians, consumers, farmers and voters—to have a space to speak out and to help other kids, in other parts of the world, understand the terrible impact of GMOs.”
Today, in a surprise move, Monsanto announced that they are launching Monsanto Organics.
“The writing is on the wall,” said Robbie Fraley, Chief Technology Officer. “We’ve spent millions trying to hide our ingredients from Americans and influence legislation. We’ve funded the Grocery Manufacturers Association, keynotes from Hilary Clinton and scientists like Kevin Folta. None of it is working.”
Monsanto is having a tough year. The company cut its 2016 earnings forecast in December, and Goldman Sachs recently downgraded the stock to a “Sell” rating.
In Europe, over half of the member countries have recently moved to ban GMOs, and in the last month, Sweden, France, the Netherlands and Italy caused the delay in the re-licensing of glyphosate, the key ingredient in Monsanto’s signature product, Roundup, due to concerns over its cancer causing properties after the World Health Organization declared it a probable carcinogen.
But perhaps, most telling, is the recent stalemate in the Senate, after Senator Roberts attempted to push through a piece of legislation that would keep Americans in the dark about whether or not Monsanto’s products are in their food. Famously dubbed the “DARK Act” because it denies Americans the right to know, Senator Roberts was unable to secure his own party’s support, perhaps forgetting that the Republican party very much supports a citizen’s personal responsibility for his or her health, as well as the importance of states’ rights. Senator Roberts’ bill would have stripped Americans of both.
Monsanto, under pressure from shareholders, after spending millions on PR campaigns and lobbying attempts to hide their products, have decided to hedge and will be launching Monsanto Organics.
Hugh Grant, Monsanto’s CEO said, “For the sake of our shareholders, we need to capture the upside that is happening in the marketplace. 21st century consumers have made it crystal clear that they want food that is free from our products. Organic is growing at 14% a year, and non-GMO represents an $11 billion industry.”
Grant continued, “We look forward to working with the organic industry to grow organic agriculture in the U.S., as right now, it only represents less than 1% of U.S. farmland.”
He’d be a fool not to, but it’s April Fools Day.
So Monsanto’s strategy continues to be to plow as many chemicals into their business model and as much money as possible into keeping Americans in the dark.
I have a friend battling stage 4 cancer. We met when we were five. People teased him in first grade. He was still my friend. People teased me in middle school, and he was still my friend. By high school, we competed academically in just about everything. He is fiercely intelligent, and for twelve years, he was one of my closest friends.
When I got the news he had stage 4 cancer, I cried. Life doesn’t turn out the way we plan. He reached out, “What can I do with my nutrition?” So I gave him the best resources available.
He isn’t the first one to reach out on this. In the past year, not only have I watched friends and family lose parents to cancer, but I have also seen friends lose spouses, children and siblings. Today, 1 in 2 men are expected to get cancer in the United States and 1 in 3 women. It is the leading cause of death by disease in American children. It is not just an epidemic, it is quickly becoming a plague, and we have to stop it.
One of the friends that I lost to cancer this year was another high school classmate. He was captain of the football team, captain of the track team, and someone that everyone simply adored. His heart was huge.
When we were in high school, I remember hanging out with him one night, and he shared that the night before his birthday, every year, he would dance. He danced to celebrate the year he’d just had, to wrap it up.
Tomorrow is my 45th birthday. A birthday has never felt as precious as it does this year, and tonight, as we cook dinner, I will turn on the music and dance. Dance in memory of Stephen, dance to celebrate Chris’ fight, dance because I love so many amazing people in my life and still have them here.
Life is loaded with minutes in every day where we can use our talents to make the world a better place and use our hearts to love.
Do it without hesitation. We never truly know how long we have.
Jim Cochran arrived at work before dawn. He walked out into the strawberry fields. As the sun rose and light hit the field, he began to smell chemicals. His eyes watered. His head spun. He started to shake.
He had just walked into a field that had been sprayed with pesticides.
An acre of conventional strawberries is covered with 300 pounds of pesticides, 1,100 percent more than the average food crop. As he recovered from the effects of the spray he knew that he had to help the industry change.
Jim Cochran helped invent the organic strawberry industry. He didn’t just get the industry to rethink all of the pesticides it was applying. After pioneering the healthier crop, he turned his attention to the health of his workers. His workers make three times the national average for strawberry work, have health care, vacation pay and an employee owned stock plan.
Impossible is just something that hasn’t been done yet. Don’t let a word stand in the way of your vision.
In the seven years since I wrote my book, The Unhealthy Truth, How Our Food is Making Us Sick and What We Can Do About It, the Centers for Disease Control has updated the autism statistics 3 times. Back in 2008, the estimated number of children with autism in America was 1 in 110. A few years ago, that statistic was updated to 1 in 68, and this year, it was revised again to 1 in 45.
Genetics don’t change this quickly. When the movie Rain Man came out in 1988, we were so unfamiliar with what autism looked like that the movie presented a novelty, a condition so totally unfamiliar to our country. Less than 30 years later, so much has changed. And while headlines run about the escalating rates of diabetes and obesity, other conditions like food allergies and autism are skyrocketing, leaving many of us to ask “Why?”
There are many theories as to why autism is increasing. Most are controversial, speaking to the enormous need to conduct more research.
Dr. David Perlmutter, an MD that I had the honor of meeting recently, shares the following insight. It’s food for thought.
Dr. Perlmutter speaks to the role that pesticides can play in the health of our children, he is not alone. The President’s Cancer Panel has urged that we take the same action: reduce our children’s exposure to synthetic pesticides wherever possible. With both autism and pediatric cancers on the rise, it is sound advice. In the absence of any conclusion, we should be exercising precaution wherever we can.
Brain scientists are at a loss when it comes to trying to explain to the general public why we are seeing a profound, and ever-increasing, incidence of autism spectrum disorder.Obviously, although there may be some genetic predisposition for autism spectrum disorder, it is not primarily a genetic disease. If it were, we wouldn’t see such a sudden and dramatic increase in the number of children being diagnosed.
So we have to turn our attention to things extrinsic to our genetics. That means, we’ve got to pay attention to factors in our environment that can be having a detrimental effect upon brain development and function.
In this extensive research project, the scientists attempted to determine if there was any relationship between childhood developmental disorders, autism spectrum disorder, and exposure to environmental toxins, specifically commercial pesticide application, in the state of California. They look at the odds of a child being diagnosed with either of these disorders in comparison to “typical development” and compared the incidence of these events with the proximity to commercial pesticide application where mother lived during pregnancy.
The study looked at the most commonly used commercial pesticide groups, including organophosphates, organochlorines, pyrethroids, and carbamates.
In their report, the researchers revealed that living within 1km (just under 1 mile) of an agricultural pesticide application was associated with an incredible 60%(!) increased risk for a child being diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder. In fact, if an expecting mother was exposed during her third trimester, the risk was was actually doubled. Another commonly used pesticide, chlorpyrifos, was actually associated with a tripling of the risk for autism spectrum disorder if mothers were exposed during the second trimester.
Here’s what the authors concluded:
Children of mothers who live near agricultural areas, or who are otherwise exposed to organophosphate, pyrethroid, or carbamate pesticides during gestation may be at increased risk for neurodevelopmental disorders. Further research on gene–environment interactions may reveal vulnerable subpopulations.
According to a new government survey of parents, the prevalence of autism spectrum disorder in children ages 3-17 is now pegged at one in 45. Even the more conservative estimate, from the Centers for Disease Control, puts the prevalence at 1 in 68. These are well-respected institutions that are sounding the alarm that a virtual epidemic is occurring in America, and aside from releasing these statistics, it really seems like no one is listening.
There is no treatment whatsoever that has merit when it comes to autism spectrum disorder. That said, we’ve really got to do everything we can to pay attention to information that points to possible environmental causes, especially because this information offers us up the opportunity to make changes.
One of the most important ways that we can vote is with our wallets, by choosing to buy foods that are organic. Ultimately, this simple choice may move the needle in favor of decreased pesticide usage. This seems even more urgent now that we see published science connecting the dots between pesticide exposure and our children’s health.
The last few weeks have been full of announcements from the food industry about their move to label GMOs. It’s smart. They’ve spent millions of dollars defending GMOs for the biotech industry, only to lose their consumer base.
In 2014, 45% of new product launches were non-GMO. The consumer wants out of these ingredients.
Here in the United States, the news to label GMOs couldn’t come quickly enough, as headlines have also been about how other countries are opting out of Monsanto’s products. India and China are pushing back on Monsanto’s operating system, introduced to us by Monsanto in the 1990s with their Roundup Ready seeds, genetically engineered to withstand increasing doses of their weed killer, Roundup. Syngenta rejected a pricey acquisition. Scotland, the country that Monsanto’s CEO is from, is pushing back on the weedkiller Roundup.
Why are people increasingly allergic to this business model?
Because of lingering questions about the toxicity and cancer causing ability of the weedkiller.
The World Health Organization declared Roundup a “probable carcinogen” a year ago, and the fall out has been fierce. Most recently, with the European Environmental Committee voting against renewing the approval of glyphosate in Europe, with the FDA finally deciding that they are going to test for it in our food, and perhaps most tellingly, with Goldman Sachs downgrading Monsanto (MON) to a sell rating.
No one is in a better position to tell this story than Carey Gillam. She has been a journalist for twenty years, most recently covering the food and agriculture industries as a senior reporter at Reuters. When she decided to leave that post, I reached out, understanding that today, in many cases, journalists can not always tell the complete story without fear of retribution. I’ve seen magazine editors quit because of the sway that companies held over content.
Carey’s story was no different. She could no longer report on what she was seeing, without compromising the integrity of her work, so she quit.
When we asked her for an interview for our podcast, it was both an honor and enormously insightful to speak with her for Take Out with Ashley and Robyn. We could have talked for hours, so expect us to circle back for more.
We discussed tough issues like how can media trust a source, can a journalist & publication be truly neutral when advertising dollars play such a critical financial role? And what should consumers be looking for when reading a story in the media today?
Courage is contagious. And each time that one of us stands up against the injustice that has become our food system, it inspires others to do the same.
A few weeks ago, I spoke at a financial conference. My talk was titled “The New Food Economy.”
In it, I discussed the the incredible transformation that is happening in our food system and the opportunities in it.
In the last few years, we have seen explosive growth in the “free-from” category, as consumers around the country are trying to protect their health and move to #dumpthejunk.
The demand for organic continues at the retail level, in grocery stores like Kroger, in Wal Mart, in Costco and in Safeway, and online with the launch of Thrive Market.
However, we don’t just wake up with a new set of eyes. In many cases, this food awakening and demand for food that is free from artificial ingredients, additives, artificial growth hormones and GMOs has been proceeded by a diagnosis. Something sends us into the grocery store with a different lens: for some, it is food allergies, for others, diabetes and for others, perhaps it’s cancer.
The escalating rates of pediatric cancers, food allergies, diabetes, obesity, autism and so many other conditions, are forcing consumers to pay attention to how their food is made.
The escalating rates of pediatric cancers, food allergies, diabetes, obesity, autism and so many other conditions, are forcing consumers to pay attention to how their food is made. None of us would choose the diagnosis that brought us here, but once our eyes have been opened, we can not unlearn the information. We are waking up to the fact that diet can play a significant role in health and disease, and as a result. there is an incredible movement towards transparency in our food production.
We see it in the number of food shows on television, we see it in the number of apps we can download, and we see it in the health of our loved ones.
As our country is hit with increasing rates of disease, it is impacting everything from our personal finances, to the health care costs in our companies, to the U.S. economy. We spend more than any other country on the planet on health care and disease management. There is so much that we can to do clean up our food supply, especially when we learn that U.S. food companies are already making their products without artificial ingredients, artificial dyes and artificial growth hormones overseas. It is especially hard to also learn that our own U.S. food companies label GMOs in their products overseas but not for their American consumers. That double standard hits us in the gut, but it is also a reminder that making these changes is very much within reach. We are not asking these companies to reinvent the wheel, simply to bring it home.
Those companies that have nothing to hide are winning. Campbell’s and General Mills stepped forward, calling for mandatory GMO labeling, as the organic industry sees growth at 11-14% per year.
At the event, hosted by Tony Robbins, I discussed the opportunities in the food industry as well as the bottleneck: the fact that less than 1% of U.S. farmland is organic, despite the exploding demand. In the United States, we have over 900 million acres under farm management, but only 5.5 million of them are organic, despite the incredible interest from companies like Wal Mart, Costco, General Mills and others. So who provides the supply to this growing demand? Right now, it’s being outsourced to other countries, countries more invested in organic food production. companies that have hedged themselves against the biotech industry’s promises of GMOs. In other words, we are giving away that economic upside to our trading partners. Their farmers are winning, their economies are winning, their food industry is winning because in America, we don’t have enough diversity – less than 1% of our farmland is organic.
During any talk, my absolute favorite part is the Q&A. But at this financial conference, this audience was different. The audience had people in it, who if they’d wanted to, could have reverse-engineered a hedge fund.
Their Q&A reflected that, and I was asked what I thought would happen to Monsanto. There was no emotion in it. What happens next?
I said, “If Enron taught us anything, you can only financially engineer your earnings model for so long. Monsanto has financed share buybacks with debt and are doing everything they can to secure policy in their favor. But the truth is that a growing number of countries are opting out of their signature products.”
They will look to M&A activity, they will look to secure policy in their favor.
Needless to say, when the biotech industry learned I’d given this talk, they threw up all over social media. But it didn’t change the truth.
As I flew home from the event, the emails starting coming in, the stories, the gratitude from those who had attended. “I have a son with peanut allergy….” “My mom is battling cancer…..” Diet is not one size fits all, but food that is free-from artificial ingredients is better for everyone.
What I’ve found in the last decade of giving these talks, is that once you learn of this double standard, you can’t unlearn it. Many then ask: Why are American companies making their products without these ingredients overseas but not here? How can we take personal responsibility for our health if we don’t know how our food is produced or what is applied to it? And why, only in the last month, did the FDA finally announce that they would start testing for the amount of glyphosate on our food? Last year, the World Health Organization declared this product a probable carcinogen.
But nothing could have prepared me for what happened next.
And then, headlines that Sweden and the Netherlands are joining France in opposition to Monsanto’s signature product.
Beyond that, Portland announced that they are suing the agrochemical giant, Citigroup downgraded them, and in an amazing turn of events, the Senate slowed a bill that would have taken away our right to know what is in our food. The Senate hedged on deciding whether Americans should know whether or not GMOs are in our food.
And General Mills stepped into that, announcing that they would label GMOs. They listened to their consumers.
The food industry is realizing that by listening to the chemical industry, they failed to hear their consumers.
The food industry is realizing that by listening to the chemical industry, they failed to hear their consumers.
The food companies and American families do not need a chemical company running our food system. It’s not in the best interest of either.
And this agrochemical model, genetically engineering seeds to withstand increasing doses of weedkillers now considered a “probable carcinogen” is a business model that the world increasingly no longer trusts, especially from the company making these product here in America.
In China, there are companies making GMOs. In China, GMOs are labeled. Most companies are proud to represent their products in a consumer-facing way. It builds brand loyalty. But here in the U.S., Monsanto was able to get the food industry to do its bidding, to carry its dirty water and to hide the fact that their products, their GMOs, were in our everyday foods.
Thankfully, this stage is over. With pressure coming from around the country, state labeling bills like Vermont, efforts to do the same in Colorado, California, Oregon and so many other states, it has become increasingly clear that transparency is not a fad. The anti-labeling movement is un-American. The food industry is moving with its consumers, stepping away from spending millions on anti-labeling campaigns that protect the interests of the chemical companies.
It’s a big move for the industry, and consumers could not be more grateful.
We need all hands on deck.
It is time to build a better food system for our farmers, our families and our future. And that starts with our own food companies.
It is time to hedge ourselves against this monoculture of corn and soy created by the chemical industry, to diversify our farming economy and to protect our future. It is time to reallocate our subsidies so that more than 1% of them can be used to support fruit and vegetable farmers.
It’s time to diversify here, to open these opportunities to American farmers and American food companies.
Food security is national security.
Securing our health secures our country. It is a national security issue. Right now, 7 out of 10 young Americans can’t quality for the military. Where we were once too fat to fight, we are now too allergic, too diabetic. We can fix this. There’s upside in this new food economy for our food companies and for our families.
