Having learned much about the negative effects of GMO, Sabrina & I are careful about what we feed our children here in Bali. The strawberry you can see above in the hands of my daughter Luna is not GMO.
Monsanto & Soy Beans
It has been common knowledge for some time now that soy beans around the world are almost all GMO.
Monsanto control a whopping 90% of soy bean production after creating a high yielding disease resistant crop, patented to ensure it would be illegal for farmers to do anything else but keep on buying their GMO seeds from them year after year.
It's doesn't take much digging to see how Monsanto have proven themselves to be more interested in optimising profit than feeding people with quality food.
The cases are numerous and Monsanto is fast becoming a name associated with something quite dark and evil.
WHAT IS A GMO?
A genetically modified organism is something which has been developed in a laboratory setting. When creating a GMO the genetic material from one species is forced into the DNA of an unrelated plant or animal.
Doesn't sound very natural hey!
But it sure sounds good for business.
The Edamame Bean
For two years my whole family here in Bali have been eating these tasty green beans on a daily basis. We buy them either from the village market or the basic supermarket in Ubud. And they usually look something like this...
Once prepared they look like this:
To me they didn't much look like my perception of a dried soy bean which you can see here.
Intentional misleading?
In the entire two years of eating these tasty green beans here in Bali I have never once seen a single label to indicate they are GMO soy beans. Here they are simply referred to as Edamame. But what they actually are is immature soybeans in the pod. And it seems strange to me that they have been given a different name, just because they are not dried in the way soy beans are dried. A dried banana is still a banana right???
And I find myself wondering if this is intentional, given that the world is waking up to the problem with soy.
The resulting skin problems
Both my children have been suffering with ongoing skin problems for almost a year now and for the first time today the penny dropped as to why this might be. No doctor here has been able to explain the random outbursts of spots and skin irritation.
You can see Esteban's back a few months ago, just after a severe outbreak.
We imagined it was to do with the heat and humidity but now that I am reading about the effects of eating GMO food, I am not so sure.
The spots would come and go all over his body despite our best efforts to resolve the problem... but the one thing we didn't change was his vegan diet.
So, you can be sure edamame is off the menu from now on!
And I will keep you informed if this solves the skin problems.
Here is a list of the main GMO foods to avoid:
- Corn
- Soy
- Milk
- Rice
- Tomato
- Beets
- Potato
- Canola Oil
- Papaya
- Yellow Squash
as stated on the Food Matters site here
In conclusion
Skin irritation is just the beginning of a long list of problems now associated with the consumption of GMO.
Lack of education
I am sorry to say that there is a huge lack of education or plain and simple poverty here. And no effort on the part of the government to help people understand what is happening to their food... and now the chemical filled rivers and rice field waterways in which they wash themselves.
Pesticides are another part of this problem and again, the source is the same. Monsanto.
The FDA
Even the FDA admit the possible side effects:
possible side effects: organ damage, immune reactions, allergies, sterility, birth defects, skin conditions (including acne and eczema), increased cancer risks, accelerated aging and other symptoms. It is difficult to study long-term effects from GMOs, since they have not been on the market for a very long time; they were first introduced in 1996. However, there are more and more health issues appearing that are possibly linked to GMOs. source
The eco community in which I live are dedicated to producing organic food and teaching the locals how to do the same. Ultimately these very poor village folk will be able to sell their organic crops for more! But people here are just very stuck in their traditional ways and change take time & persistence to implement.
Especially when most of the poor children are being brainwashed ever day by the endless TV commercials advertising colourfully packaged foods which more closely resemble poison than nutrition, to those of us who understand.
Lesson learned
I take full responsibility for this oversight and ultimately lack of research into what I was feeding my children. I made an assumption that the bean was one of the healthiest things my children were eating.
Won't be making this mistake again!
Stay vigilant parents!
We all want the best for our children right, so let's do what is so clearly the most natural thing to do. Let's grow our own food using natural feeds and enjoy the high nutrition, life extending, disease protecting nutrition it gives us.
Blessing from Bali everyone. Soon we will be in the South of France where there will be a whole new selection of fruit & vegetables to choose from and I am pretty certain there will be no more skin problems for the kids.
- All non original photo sources can be found by clicking on the image
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