This week, Hampton Creek scored a big win in the Great Vegan Mayo Wars of 2015: FDA will allow the company to continue calling its vegan mayo “Just Mayo,” as long as they update the label to state that the product does not contain eggs. CEO Josh Tetrick said the new label will also emphasize the word “just,” not as in “only,” but as in “guided by reason, justice, and fairness.”
Can the Paris Agreement Protect Poor Farmers from Climate Change? (Reuters)
Though the International Food Policy Research Institute released a study showing that climate change is a threat to agricultural growth, the word “agriculture” does not appear once in the text of the new global agreement to tackle climate change. Developing nations have long resisted including agriculture in climate negotiations for fear efforts to feed their people would be compromised by pressure to reduce emissions from farms. The agreement does refer to agriculture indirectly, recognizing “the fundamental priority of safeguarding food security and ending hunger, and the particular vulnerabilities of food production systems to the adverse impacts of climate change.” But it doesn’t address the potential role of agriculture in reducing resource use and/or sequestering carbon. U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) Director-General José Graziano da Silva said, “This is a game changer for the 800 million people still suffering from chronic hunger, and for 80 percent of the world’s poor who live in rural areas and earn income—and feed their families—from agriculture.”
Navajo Nation’s Nutrition Crisis (Al Jazeera America)
According to the Diné Community Advocacy Alliance, a Navajo think tank, 80 percent of food sold in the Navajo Nation could be considered junk, and its nearly 300,000 residents are served by only 10 grocery stores. Almost the entire Navajo Nation is classified as a food desert by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. The health consequences are dire: One in three residents is diabetic or prediabetic and heart disease is the second-leading cause of death among tribal citizens living on the reservation. Researchers found that children growing up on the reservation had “approximately twice the levels of food insecurity, obesity, and Type 2 diabetes relative to the averages for all U.S. children of similar ages.” The U.N. hopes to encourage sustainable food production among indigenous peoples by 2030, but progress in the Navajo Nation will likely be an uphill battle. This past April, the Nation became the first place in the United States to impose a tax on junk food.
Kids Eat More Veggies When Salad Bar is in Lunch Line (Reuters)
A new study found that kids in middle schools eat more fruits and vegetables when they have a salad bar in the lunch line rather than outside the line. Researchers found that more than 98 percent of students at schools with salad bars in the lunch line self-served some fruit or vegetables, compared to 23 percent of kids in other schools. The authors of the study recommend that schools place salad bars inside the school lunch line in the path of students before they pay because most will not seek additional opportunities to take fruits and vegetables.
Pepsi’s Tropicana Orange Juice Will Get a “Non-GMO” Label Next Year (Fortune)
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