LBAM!
LBAM is in the news lately. The Light Brown Apple Moth has been discovered in Santa Cruz county and various other counties surrounding the Bay Area. LBAM, as it is called, could be a tremendously bad pest for a very large number our favorite food crops. The California Dept. of Food and Agriculture LBAM Project wants to spray to exterminate the pest. A number of anti-spray groups, like Stop the Spray, have organized to protect citizens from exposure to the spray (as CDFA will be spraying over cities as well as farms). The issue is complicated to say the least. Pablito, the Farmer at Terra Firma Organic Farm, has weighed in on the issue and, I think, offers some insight in a recent Terra Firma CSA newsletter.
posted by Blair at
10:09 AM
2 Comments:
Dear Blair,
Thank you for blogging about LBAM. However, I urge you to further research this crisis before publishing the idea that the light brown apple moth will harm crops.
Not only does this moth not eat any of the fruits or vegetables we eat, it also only has a cosmetic effect on leaves. It doesn't even eat leaves, but rather, builds its home on them. The moth has done 0 agricultural damage in California and will not do any, because that is not its behavior.
The California Dept. of Food And Agriculture has purposely published deceitful information about this negligible pest, calling it a threat to agriculture and has been called out by independent scientists, doctors and numerous local government officials for doing so.
The truth is that the moth is a threat to profits, not food. Because it was originally incorrectly classified as a Class A pest decades ago, trade restrictions apply to areas where the moth lives. However, Mexico and Canada are quite willing to change their policies on this if the U.S. government will change theirs by correctly reclassifying this non-threatening insect as a minor pest.
As a fellow blogger, I urge you to further research this public health crisis. More that 600 people were horrendously sickened by the initial spraying in the Monterey Bay Area in 2007, and it is CDFA's intention to spray 17 million citizens this year, exposing children, men, women and wildlife to known carcinogens and mutagens encapsulated in particulate plastic which lodges in the lungs and remains their forever.
In addition, this enforced spraying will put an end to organic gardening in California, as every bit of water and land will be fouled with surfactants, carcinogens and other toxins.
Follow the money trail on this, Blair, and you will discover that both the Ag Secretary and the manufacturer of the spray - Suterra LLC. are financial contributors to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. These men are willing to expose 17 million human beings to cancer causing substances to line their pockets in violation of the California and U.S. constitutions and the Nuremberg Code which was put in place after WWII to ensure that human beings would never be experimented upon against their will.
Lawsuits are going on, there are 4 bills attempting to stop the spray, and the majority of civic governments have passed resolutions demanding that their citizens not be aerially sprayed with these toxins.
This is the most important issue you are ever likely to face in your lifetime - whether State and Federal governments have the right to experiment on U.S. citizens against their will.
Please, visit lbamspray.com and veganreader.com to get the most updated news on this subject and join us in fighting this violation of human and environmental rights.
Thank you
As of April 24, it is now ruled in court that the moth being here is NOT AN EMERGENCY.
The judge's decision was based on the fact that CDFA could not show any damage to crops nor native plants -ZERO.
The moth is likely to have been in California for decades and yet no damage has occurred. In New Zealand it is kept in check just fine by natural predators once that country stopped using organophosphates that kill beneficials.
Read the New Zealand report by Dan Harder and Jeff Rosendale! Download it here http://forum.stopthespray.org/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=471
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