SUBSCRIBE TO EHN'S MUST-READ DAILY NEWSLETTER: ABOVE THE FOLD
27 May
Climate
Climate-friendly almond farmers coax life from drying Spanish soil - Reuters
In one of the driest corners of Europe, Manuel Barnes has watched the soil become healthier since he started growing almonds using techniques aimed at bringing new life to the land.
Read the Full Article on
www.reuters.com
27 May
Justice
Hunger program’s slow start leaves millions of children waiting
Child hunger is soaring, but two months after Congress approved billions to replace school meals, only 15 percent of eligible children had received benefits.
Read the Full Article on
www.nytimes.com
27 May
Originals
We don't farm because it's trendy; we farm as resistance, for healing and sovereignty
For more than 150 years, from the rural South to northern cities, Black people have used farming to build self-determined communities and resist oppressive structures that tear them down.
<p>
Today, agriculture still serves an important role in the lives of Black people, which is why we see urban agriculture projects and programs in Philadelphia, Detroit, and Washington D.C. and <a href="http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.659.1664&rep=rep1&type=pdf" target="_blank">other cities across the United States</a>. In all of these cities, there are Black-led organizations cultivating food and land sovereignty by helping individuals and communities regain agency and ownership over their food system.
</p><p>My journey in food and land work began long before I was born. My ancestors were enslaved Africans forced to farm under abhorrent conditions in South Carolina, Texas, and Georgia. In 2012, I started my first professional job working at a food justice and nutrition education non-profit in Philadelphia. I worked with youth from across West Philly to explore connections between food, agriculture, culture, sustainability, and leadership.
</p><a href="https://www.ehn.org/agents-of-change-in-environmental-health-justice-2641248263.html" target="_self"><em></em></a><h3><em><a href="https://www.ehn.org/agents-of-change-in-environmental-health-justice-2641248263.html" target="_self">This essay is part of "Agents of Change" — see the full series</a></em></h3><p>I first developed a passion for food sovereignty and agriculture at the Black Farmers Conference in 2013. <a href="http://monicamariewhite.com/freedom-farmers/" target="_blank">Dr. Monica White</a>, author of Freedom Farmers and professor of environmental justice, was the keynote speaker. She spoke of Black farming cooperatives in the South and how they connect to Black folks growing food in cities today.<br></p><p>
What I learned is that farming is not new to Black people. While some dominant modern narratives talk about urban agriculture as an innovative way to build community and fight food insecurity, Black folks in this country have been growing food in cities for as long as they have lived in cities. Before that, our ancestors lived in deep relationship with the land. For the first time in my 22 years, I understood that growing food is a tool for dismantling systemic oppression. I also realized that Black academics have a critical role to play in agricultural resistance and freedom movements; and it was in this moment that I decided to apply for graduate programs.
</p>
<img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yMjg3NTIwMy9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYzODI0NTY1N30.rGBg_r18YMaV9huoruxX014XTxn4oSo_YNuElyC5AUc/img.jpg?width=980" id="90d26" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="166dca9069ad12e6a08aca87bd025057" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" alt="Black women farmers " />
Shivon Pearl-Love leads a lesson on the farm with Our Mothers' Kitchens program participants. (Credit: Gabrielle Clark)
<p>As a PhD candidate, I am exploring and understanding the ways that urban agriculture impacts the mental health, spirituality, and collective agency of Black communities using a wide range of analytical tools such as mapping, focus groups, and spatial analysis. In some cases, I am developing new survey and measurement tools specifically for these communities and this context. I engage in this research using an <a href="https://drrobertbullard.com/principles-of-environmental-justice-turn-21/" target="_blank">environmental justice</a> approach, grounded in racial justice, history, culture, and community participation. Before we even begin to do this research, it is important for us to understand the roots of Black farming.</p><p>Black farmers across the South created cooperatives largely in response to the anti-Black government and society; in response to supermarkets not serving Black customers; in response to White people terrorizing Black folks when they tried to register to vote. These cooperatives were a means of providing economic autonomy, political education, and <a href="https://uncpress.org/book/9781469643694/freedom-farmers/" target="_blank">collective agency to Black people in the South</a>.</p><h3><em><a href="https://www.ehn.org/reflexiones-sobre-la-resistencia-resiliencia-e-investigacion-agricola-del-pueblo-negro-2645479469.html" target="_self">This essay is also available in Spanish</a></em></h3><p>Despite migration patterns from the South to the North and Midwest, many Black urban communities have kept in touch with their agricultural roots, establishing farms and gardens throughout the United States. Black people have ancestral ties to this land – to caring for it, nurturing it, loving it, and allowing it to heal our communities and us…and we have faced immeasurable discriminatory practices and policies as we sought to reclaim and live in relationship with the land. We must not forget this history as we engage Black agricultural communities in our research endeavors.<br></p><p>Danger lies in the face and narrative of urban agriculture being co-opted by White liberals and academics. It is presented as something new, trendy, and without sociopolitical and historical ties or influences.</p><p>This limited perspective views White community gardens and urban farming alone as acts of social justice, which is problematic because it inadvertently attempts to erase the decades of urban agricultural practices, resistance, and activism that Black communities have engaged in.</p><p>White-led urban agriculture projects receive the majority of grant and institutional funding. This further replicates the cycle of narrative dominance, White land ownership, and the physical exclusion of Black and Brown folks from access to land, wealth, and resources and we must use our tools, resources, and privileges as researchers to stop this cycle.</p>Resilience in the face of exploitation
<img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yMjg3NTE5NC9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYzNDU4ODA2OX0.depFOtB5ukmhTPWVqqz20Ua6BPa106BRVycSNwCOwVA/img.jpg?width=980" id="82cc3" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="d3cc6bbaadd44b5f076c96a3c813a8b9" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" alt="History of Black farming" />Caravan holds signs that read, "Support Black Farmers" and "Caravan to Washington." (Credit: Bioneers)
<p>In the decades following the Civil War, Black folks <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.5149/9781469602028_daniel" target="_blank">sought to acquire land as a means to provide for themselves</a>, their families and communities, and become independent of previous slave and plantation owners. But they faced many obstacles. White landowners and merchants routinely denied Black farmers access to private credit.</p><p>They were instead often offered exploitative sharecropping or rental agreements. This resulted in many Black farmers being unable to keep up with mortgage and debt payments. They were often forced to sell their land for far less than what it was worth. </p><p>Can we pause and talk about resilience? </p><p>Despite these many concerted efforts to thwart Black farmers, they still acquired more than 16 million acres of land at the height of Black farming in the U.S. in 1920. <a href="https://thecounter.org/usda-black-farmers-discrimination-tom-vilsack-reparations-civil-rights/" target="_blank">There were more than 5.1 million Black farmers who made up 14 percent</a> of the overall farming population.</p><p>Over the <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/30036966?seq=1" target="_blank">proceeding decades</a>, terrorism, Jim Crow, and increased industrialization in northern cities <a href="https://www.history.com/topics/black-history/great-migration" target="_blank">drove many Black people</a> from the South to places like Philadelphia, Washington D.C., and Detroit. From 1920 – 1997, the number of Black farmers declined by about <a href="https://www.npr.org/2005/02/22/5228987/black-farmers-in-america" target="_blank">95 percent nationwide</a>.</p><img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yMjg3NTIyMS9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTY1MTY2OTcwOX0.xLfYrnGoitalgGpI6Tg2jwlsPh7sn2V4yQjsq-sPeSg/img.jpg?width=980" id="60701" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="b05fc4833d301c7337752e2adfefb505" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" alt="Black women farmers" />
Farmer Kirtrina Baxter smiles as she looks down to two hands full of beautiful and bright green kale. (Credit: Sonia Galiber)
<p>However, Black farmers did not sit idly by while their communities and livelihoods were attacked. They organized. And protested. And rallied. In 1997, they brought a lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Agriculture in the Pigford v. Glickman case for <a href="https://tuspubs.tuskegee.edu/pawj/vol1/iss1/6/" target="_blank">decades of alleged discrimination</a>. This resulted in one of the largest civil settlements in US history of $1.2 billion.</p><p>This may seem like a generous amount, but it isn't once you consider the tens of thousands of Black farmers who faced discrimination at the hands of the USDA. The average amount a farmer could request was $50,000. After losing hundreds of thousands of dollars in farming equipment, land, seasons, and harvests, that doesn't even put a Band-Aid on the wound created by the USDA and anti-Black racism.</p><p>Today there are about 45,000 Black farmers in the U.S., making up only 1 percent of the farming population, and owning far fewer acres of land compared to 1920. <a href="http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.5149/9781469602028_daniel" target="_blank">This happened through a series of USDA discriminatory policies</a> and procedures such as Heirs Property, unjustified loan and crop insurance denials, and blatant prejudice like <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/african-americans-have-lost-acres/" target="_blank">forcing Black farmers off their land</a>.</p><p>The Great Migration, while often solely and incorrectly attributed to job opportunities, occurred because Black people were being hunted and terrorized by racist mobs in the South. This too contributed to the decline in numbers of Black farmers.</p>Surviving, thriving, and self-determination
<img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yMjg3NTE3OS9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYwMjU5NTgzNX0.Gq8eJ0gRquqSRzcC9TpYDon5ez0sTlBk6QAxZggZ89c/img.jpg?width=980" id="63c96" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="ec56fe533217138038eb9e3d2a18c7bf" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" alt="Philadelphia urban farming " />During city council hearings on urban agriculture in Philly, Soil Generation members hold up a sign that reads "Who controls the land we stand on?" (Credit: Angela Gervasi)
<p>Black farmers and gardeners continue to push for their community's right to self-determination, to survive, and to thrive. In my hometown of Philadelphia, <a href="https://whyy.org/articles/urban-agriculture-leaders-ask-for-citywide-commitments-to-garden-preservation-and-creation/" target="_blank">food justice activists and urban growers protest to save their farms and gardens</a>, although city council control of land sales often make it hard for community members to contend with wealthy developers. </p><p>These growers and activists understand that, in a city where <a href="https://www.phila.gov/2019-09-11-health-department-report-finds-unhealthy-foods-at-city-food-stores/" target="_blank">81 percent of food stores offer mostly unhealthy food choices</a>, a major key to population health and collective healing is having control over what goes in our bodies. Data have also shown that those <a href="https://www.phila.gov/media/20190910114607/Neighborhood-Food-Retail-in-Philadelphia.pdf" target="_blank">unhealthful food stores are disproportionately located in Black neighborhoods</a>. Unsurprisingly, <a href="https://www.phillyvoice.com/here-are-leading-causes-death-philadelphia/" target="_blank">heart disease is the leading cause of death in Philadelphia</a>. </p><p>Heart disease is what the doctors listed on my father's death certificate just over a month ago. They ruled that as the cause of death, despite the neglect, negligence, and implicit healthcare bias that likely contributed to his passing. </p><p>Diet-related illnesses are often attributed to individual behavior and poor lifestyle choices, but the reality is that these illnesses and deaths are the result of systemic racism. </p><p>Black people in Philadelphia disproportionately experience targeted unhealthy food marketing, lack of access to healthcare, and inadequate educational systems—all of which can lead to mental and physical health challenges. </p><p>These challenges are exacerbated by pandemics like COVID-19, where practitioners make choices, often rooted in racism, about who lives and who dies. Whose life is valuable and whose life can be discarded. Pandemics like COVID-19 emphasize why community control of food systems and land are not just important but they are quite literally our means of surviving, healing, and thriving.</p><img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yMzMwMDQ5Mi9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTU5NTMxODgyOX0.VEAztUsS8WyFR2TTWTm6KGVNE9ZNG3qGitEpEngYAhg/img.jpg?width=980" id="ec9c4" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="42e3e5f91c20b283fff03ae390430f68" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" />
Author Ashley Gripper with her father.
<p>Through grassroots organizing, policy advocacy, and urban planning, <a href="https://soilgeneration.org/about-us" target="_blank">we are pushing for access to land</a> for emotional, spiritual, physical, and collective healing because our communities' health and livelihoods depend on it.</p><p>Gardens and farms provide people with exposure to greenness, opportunities for physical activity and potential benefits to the microbiome since exposure to soil and its many <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31450753" target="_blank">microorganisms can boost our gut health</a>.</p><h3><em><a href="https://www.ehn.org/farmworker-health-rights-and-justice-2644436920.html" target="_self">Related: It's time to bolster farmworkers' rights</a></em></h3><p>They offer spaces to connect and engage with our neighbors. They <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.2979/racethmulglocon.5.1.13?seq=1" target="_blank">provide reclamation and renewal of our spiritual and ancestral relationships</a> to the land. Community-led urban agriculture projects are a means of <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/environmental-practice/article/environmental-reviews-case-studies-dtown-farm-african-american-resistance-to-food-insecurity-and-the-transformation-of-detroit/DDCA95024D97287611FE0D428D8FF2C3" target="_blank">sharing education and information, strengthening social capital and support</a>.</p><p>Agriculture can offer Black people opportunities for economic autonomy while providing safe spaces for community members to gather and celebrate without fear of criminalization or state-sanctioned brutality.</p><p>Black agriculture provides a way to engage with the disturbing history of this country, that we live in a place built on stolen Indigenous land and the brutal enslavement and stolen labor of my ancestors. It opens the door to us understanding how this all shapes our collective journey toward liberation.</p>
Showing up for your community
<img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yMjg3NTE5OC9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYyMjI1ODcyNH0.2y8Rf4PT8ixSOEmHFwKO3lWDOwzc_9YSJt60lXwktXI/img.jpg?width=980" id="cd41b" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="b66bf350f02c6de47bf4ef6d941234b4" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" alt="Philadelphia farm" />Sign in front of Sankofa Community Farm. (Credit: Sankofa Community Farm)
<p>It is in and through this work that my activism and scholarship intersect. As a scholar, I am intentional about how I frame my research. While there is value in establishing your reputation and securing tenure before challenging the status quo, I choose not to wait until I have a PhD, professorship, or tenure, to be bold and honest in my work.</p><p>Black land loss is happening now, across cities and rural communities. This is why as a student, I choose to name environmental racism and injustices in my research, pushing my department and school to think about the myriad of ways institutions have done harm to marginalized communities and to think about the sociopolitical and historical contexts that shape our present day environments. </p><p>And while that may leave some colleagues uncomfortable, you must get a little uncomfortable first in order to do and be better. Also, I hold myself more accountable to the communities I serve and with whom I work.</p><img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yMjg3NTIxMS9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYwMTQ2NDU3OX0.fX1Ur4auLenQ9NQ50tchEEeLiCEYdXoxpifBVs8EMWk/img.jpg?width=980" id="bc26b" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="c4136a40be2adf2bb68a25cac9b9e614" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" alt="Black Philadelphia farming " />
Farmer Chris Bolden-Newsome stands on farm watering leafy greens. (Credit: Sankofa Community Farm)
<p>Black and Brown Philly farmers are who, in many ways, sent and gave me blessing to pursue graduate work as a means to support our collective agricultural resistance. Everything that I call out and choose to uplift in the academy I've learned from these communities and I will continue to acknowledge that in my research.</p><p>To me, my work is that of scholar-activism. It means being so committed to change, healing, and liberation in a place and for a community, that you continually show up for them. This requires sacrifice.</p><p>I am not advocating that everyone make these kinds of sacrifices, however, for me this looks like six-hour monthly drives from Boston, where I currently live, to be in community with these folks; to continually learn about what is happening on the ground in Philly, at home.</p><p>From community-based participatory research, to conference planning, to offering competitive stipends to all the community members who contribute this work, everything that I do and have done in the academy has been to amplify the voices of Black and Brown growers in Philly. At each step of the research process, I go back to this community to seek input.</p><p>The entire field of public health needs to rethink how it engages communities, especially considering that marginalized folks have the greatest understanding of the nuanced ways that environmental factors impact their communities. We must uplift and value their expertise and knowledge systems as much, if not more, than we do those with PhDs.</p><img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yMjg3NTE2MC9vcmlnaW4ucG5nIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYzNjc0MDUwMn0.6M3AoVSa2gBACztwyZ4WexUYcq7H6pqZYxfHJW6stkU/img.png?width=980" id="ce4bc" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="b09078467bd5b8f8ee8f15a77ad02670" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" /><p><em>Ashley Gripper is a PhD Candidate in the Environmental Health Department at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. She is also an Health Policy Research Scholar, a program of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, and an active </em><em>member of </em><a href="https://soilgeneration.org/" target="_blank"><em>Soil Generation</em></a><em>, a Black and Brown-led coalition of urban farmers, gardeners, and food justice activists. Through her policy work with Soil Generation, she is a part of the team responsible for designing the Urban Agriculture Plan for the entire City of Philadelphia.</em></p><p><em>Learn more about Ashley's work at </em><a href="http://www.ashgrip.com" target="_blank"><em>www.ashgrip.com</em></a></p>
<p><em>Contact her on </em><a href="https://twitter.com/ashgrip_?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor" target="_blank"><em>Twitter</em></a><em> or via email at </em><a href="mailto:asg745@g.harvard.edu" target="_blank"><em>asg745@g.harvard.edu</em></a></p>
<p><em>This essay is part of </em><a href="https://www.ehn.org/agents-of-change-in-environmental-health-justice-2641248263.html" target="_self"><em>"Agents of Change,"</em></a><em> an ongoing series featuring the stories, analyses and perspectives of next generation environmental health leaders who come from historically under-represented backgrounds in science and academia. Essays in the series reflect the views of the authors and not that of EHN.org or The George Washington University.</em></p>
Keep reading...
Show less
27 May
Toxics
Artificial sweetener safety unclear after years of research
Experts suggest consumers use them with caution.
Read the Full Article on
www.washingtonpost.com
26 May
Food
New wave of locusts raises fear for summer crops in India
A new wave of locust attacks has alarmed India's farmers and experts warn of extensive crop losses if authorities fail to curb fast-spreading swarms by June when monsoon rains spur rice, cane, corn, cotton and soybean sowing.
Read the Full Article on
www.reuters.com
25 May
Climate
Plant-based ‘meats’ catch on in the pandemic
As the meat industry struggles to respond to the outbreak, makers of vegan substitutes are ramping up production to meet new interest from shoppers.
Read the Full Article on
www.nytimes.com
24 May
Climate
Taking New Zealand wine carbon neutral to lure younger buyers
New Zealand wine producers, both big and small, are innovating to meet the challenge of making their industry carbon neutral by 2050.
Read the Full Article on
www.stuff.co.nz
21 May
Toxics
Bees force plants to flower early by cutting holes in their leaves
Hungry bumblebees can make plants flower up to a month earlier than usual by cutting holes in their leaves, which may help them adapt to climate change.
Read the Full Article on
www.newscientist.com
21 May
Justice
Red Wing United is building power in Laredo, 'the last place to get aid'
Two young organizers have rallied the border town community to meet the needs of the most vulnerable during the pandemic.
Read the Full Article on
civileats.com
20 May
Climate
Why bees aren’t having sex in the heat
This World Bee Day we look at how bee bonking is being used to understand the climate crisis.
Read the Full Article on
www.euronews.com
19 May
Originals
Reevaluating fish consumption advisories during the COVID-19 pandemic: Analysis
Even in the best of times, spring's long days, warming temperatures, greening landscapes, and sunshine represent a time of growth and optimism—a time to open windows, go outdoors, perhaps even try one's hand at gardening or fishing.
<p>This spring, during a moment in history that will be remembered for its uncertainty, the arrival of spring feels especially welcome and fishing is among the activities that people will be engaged in as the weather warms. </p><p>For some, fishing is a means of outdoor recreation. For others, it is a livelihood. And for others, it represents an affordable way to meet their nutritional needs—especially pressing now, given the economic hardship and <a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/coronavirus-live-updates/2020/04/13/833110486/u-s-meat-supply-is-perilously-close-to-a-shortage-ceo-warns" target="_blank">potential supply-chain disruptions</a> brought on by the novel coronavirus virus. </p><p>Since the pandemic began, grocery store fish and shellfish sales in the United States <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/05/dining/seafood-fish-coronavirus.html" target="_blank">have risen</a> and the consumption of self-harvested fish and shellfish <a href="https://www.hcn.org/articles/covid19-hunting-and-fishing-provide-food-security-in-the-time-of-covid-19" target="_blank">may also increase</a> as a result of this pandemic.</p><p>Changes in dietary patterns have public health and environmental implications, and it is important for health and environmental professionals to consider revisiting the usual approach to weighing benefits and risks of fish and shellfish consumption to better reflect a full scope of considerations during the COVID-19 pandemic. </p><p>In some cases, this may mean shifting the narrative around fish consumption advisories from the current harm-prevention framework, to more of a risk-reduction model.</p>
<img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yMzI4NzA4OS9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTY1MTc0OTAzNX0.Nj_64QZSg4LVxgkyJIsR5ociME2hsBI_ZD4t0rULy5g/img.jpg?width=980" id="d34bf" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="d35a16d095518886c5b80c1d145676dc" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" alt="Fish advisory" />
Fish advisory sign in Monroe County, Indiana. (Credit: Wikimedia Commons)
Shortcomings in current advisories
<p>Fish consumption presents a critical tradeoff to consumers even under normal circumstances.</p><p>Fish are a major source of protein and omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids, a class of lipids associated with a <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29350557" target="_blank">wide range of health benefits</a>, including decreased risk of cardiovascular disease. </p><p>Unfortunately, environmental contaminants accumulate in fish tissue, posing health risks to consumers. </p><p>Contaminants known to be associated with adverse health effects that are commonly found in fish include <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22275730" target="_blank">methylmercury</a>; <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41370-018-0094-1" target="_blank">per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances</a> (PFAS); <a href="https://publications.iarc.fr/Book-And-Report-Series/Iarc-Monographs-On-The-Identification-Of-Carcinogenic-Hazards-To-Humans/Polychlorinated-Biphenyls-And-Polybrominated-Biphenyls-2015" target="_blank">polychlorobiphenyls</a> (PCBs); and other <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21071550" target="_blank">organochlorines</a>. </p><p>In the U.S., state agencies use a traditional risk assessment process to establish fish consumption advisories. The process is predicated on harm prevention and estimates how much fish can safely be consumed from a specific body of water or region that is contaminated. </p><p>The advisories state the frequency with which fish servings of a given size (e.g., two 4-oz servings of locally-harvested trout per month) should be consumed by sensitive populations—usually women of child-bearing age and young children. <br></p><p>While fish consumption advisories are considered best practice for protecting fish consumers there are key shortcomings. Common limitations include:</p><ul><li>The risk-only approach, which does not adequately address the trade-offs between health benefits and risks, </li><li>The individual-chemical approach used for calculating advisories, which addresses each contaminant but does not account for the combined health effects of multiple chemicals, </li><li>The cultural or personal significance of fish or shellfish in one's diet. </li></ul>
<img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yMzI4NzA5Ni9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTU5MTQ1NDU1OX0.zS2PCAAQp38gpGCFrMwfuSwwamHD_AwZRbdswd1COMU/img.jpg?width=980" id="cef85" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="e048645bdcd3a2a649bcfd15b97a2a51" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" alt="Tribal Fishing Washington" />
A Yakama Nation member fishing at the Horn Rapids in Washington State. Most current fish advisories don't account for cultural or personal significance of fish in one's diet. (Credit: Scott Butner/flickr)
<p>For example, the <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2649230/" target="_blank">evaluation</a> of risks of mercury exposure and benefits of omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids improves the recommendations about fish species and vulnerable populations.</p><p>In the North American Great Lakes region, about half of advisories would be more stringent if they <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5381969/" target="_blank">considered inter-chemical interactions</a>. </p><p>Further, communities fish for different reasons. <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21730195" target="_blank">A study</a> on residents of Robeson County, North Carolina, found that the African American and native Lumbee communities sought local fish for cultural reasons, whereas Latino community members procured local fish for reasons of economic necessity. </p><p>In sum, fish consumption advisories are not well-equipped to address the complex simultaneous cost-benefit analyses of fish consumption. </p><p>Despite these limitations, fish consumption advisories have proven effective in altering consumers' perceptions and behaviors. </p><ul><li>In Maine, a booklet mailed to residents <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0013935113001540" target="_blank">increased women's knowledge</a> of fish benefits and risks, as well as their ability to identify high-mercury and low-mercury fish.</li><li>When urban anglers in the Great Lakes region <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29266340" target="_blank">were provided with a brochure</a> outlining recommended fish consumption limits, those who previously exceeded advisory recommendations decreased their sport-harvested fish consumption, and those who previously ate very little sport-harvested fish increased their intake frequency.</li><li>A <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1989666/" target="_blank">decline in fish consumption was reported</a> among pregnant women following the announcement of updated U.S. Food and Drug Administration guidelines aimed to reduce mercury exposure.</li></ul>
<p>These results indicate that fish consumption advisories can be an effective tool if they contain clear, comprehensive recommendations. </p>
Reevaluating advisories during the COVID-19 crisis
<p>While the advisories attempt to balance the risks of contaminant exposure with the health-protective benefits of fish intake, the relative importance of these competing factors may shift given individual circumstances—or a global pandemic.</p><p>The COVID-19 pandemic has turned people's lives upside-down, including shifts in diet, lifestyle, and finances. Established fish consumption advisories are based on assumptions about fish consumers' behaviors and the availability of alternative sources of nutrition. Yet, the validity of these assumptions may be tested by cultural preferences or abrupt circumstantial changes such as <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6068685/" target="_blank">natural disasters</a>.</p><p>As individuals face economic hardship, disruptions in access to other protein sources, and the loss of recreation options, the relative benefits of fishing and of consuming self-harvested fish and shellfish may change in ways that existing consumption advisories did not anticipate.</p><p>As the pandemic and its fallout continues, health and environmental professionals need to reevaluate fish consumption advisories to ensure that they reflect the current needs of their constituents. </p><p>In some instances, this will require shifting the consumption advisories from a harm-prevention framework to a risk-reduction model. It is not reasonable, or even safe, to expect consumers to prioritize minimizing contaminant exposures if doing so will undermine their basic food security. </p><p>For example, public health professionals and risk assessors should consider making recommendations about where people can most safely fish and which species are safest to consume locally. This will help people minimize their risk of exposure to contaminants, while recognizing the importance of self- and locally-harvested fish in their lives.</p><img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yMzI4NzEwOS9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYzMTE5MzAwOH0.iLFK_xsoiTxhu_-4Nz9rNuV7p-OuKbkr065EiAEk1Ng/img.jpg?width=980" id="63d06" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="e6f3db9e7ed606ead0c36e3cb8fb3aa3" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" alt="Fishing Milwaukee River" />
Angler on the Milwaukee River. (Credit: Brandon Blanke/flickr)
<p>Environmental and health authorities should consider prioritizing additional seafood tissue monitoring in 2020 to ensure that risk assessors and public health professionals have the best available data when making recommendations about areas where fish are the least contaminated.</p><p>Clinicians should consider asking patients whether their dietary patterns have changed during the pandemic, particularly changes in their reliance on self-harvested foods, including fish and shellfish. </p><p>Clinicians should also consider recommending that patients prioritize other sources of protein for members of their family who are most vulnerable— pregnant women; children; women of childbearing age—to the adverse effects of contaminants in fish.</p><p>Fish and game agencies and other environmental organizations should make additional efforts to publicize fish consumption advisories to ensure that anglers have the available information to make the best choices for themselves and their families. Distributing local advisories with fishing licenses and/or posting new signs in all languages commonly spoken in a region are examples of how the information could be better disseminated.</p><p>Researchers should consider asking questions about commercial and self-harvested fish and shellfish consumption patterns among participants in new and existing studies to document how the pandemic has affected fish consumption.</p><p>Finally, it is important for health and environmental professionals to identify their own communities' specific needs with respect to self-harvested fish. While we know that fishing confers many nutritional and psychological benefits, the salience of different benefits during the COVID-19 pandemic will vary across populations.</p><p>Advising the public effectively about fish consumption requires an understanding of the risks presented by contaminant exposures, but it also requires a willingness to listen.</p><p>Knowledge about environmental hazards is only as valuable as knowledge of their context, and as the context shifts, so must we all.</p><p><em>Kathryn Crawford is a Postdoctoral Research Associate at the Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth. Brittany Cleary is a Junior at Dartmouth College. Caredwen Foley is a graduate student at the Boston University School of Public Health, Wendy Heiger-Bernays is a Clinical Professor of Environmental Health at the Boston University School of Public Health. </em></p><p><em></em><em>Their views do not necessarily represent those of Environmental Health News, The Daily Climate or publisher, Environmental Health Sciences</em>.</p>
<p><em>Banner photo: Fishing in New York City. (Credit: Liz/flickr) </em></p>
Keep reading...
Show less
18 May
Climate
Warming seawater will push Antarctic krill farther south
Rising ocean temperatures will alter the distribution and life cycles of Antarctic krill in the coming decades, according to a new study led by the University of Tasmania.
Read the Full Article on
www.earth.com
18 May
Climate
In South Korea, centuries of farming point to the future for sustainable agriculture
Agriculture in South Korea is a blend of centuries-old traditions and contemporary techniques adapted to a variety of environmental conditions, making it a model to adopt in the effort to future-proof food production against climate change.
Read the Full Article on
news.mongabay.com
18 May
Climate
What insects eat vital to future of food, says Aberdeen University study
The study has found that much like humans, insects will change their diet to try new things depending on where they are. The discovery, led by Dr Lesley Lancaster, could have a serious impact on crops as global warming causes insects to colonise new regions.
Read the Full Article on
www.eveningexpress.co.uk
From our Newsroom
They blinded us with SCIENCE!
From climate change to COVID-19, even the clearest warnings from scientists can misfire with millions of Americans. Pop culture may be a big reason why.
Coronavirus, the environment, and you
How the spread of the deadly virus is impacted by climate change, the environment, and our lifestyles.
Fracking linked to rare birth defect in horses: Study
The implications for human health are "worrisome," say researchers.
PFAS-free firefighting foams: Are they safer?
A small-scale certification effort could offer a path forward.
Cutting edge of science
An exclusive look at important research just over the horizon that promises to impact our health and the environment
Of water and fever
While we're rightly distracted by fighting a virus, are we ignoring other "just" wars over water?