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While the The International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) recognition of the human right to food remains in place, the definition of food itself has been hollowed out. Some countries have created a new legal definition of food. It does not include any reference to the core aspects of food - sustaining life.
Food is defined as "any substance consumed to provide nutritional support for the body. It is usually of plant or animal origin, and contains essential nutrients, such as carbohydrates, fats, proteins, vitamins, or minerals. The substance is ingested by an organism and assimilated by the organism's cells in an effort to produce energy, maintain life, and/or stimulate growth."
In the legal definition, the essence food - what is in it, what it does - is not considered, only what is done to it or with it. These countries define food as "any item that is to be processed, partially processed, or unprocessed for consumption." Perhaps in recognition of the removal from food of what makes it food rather than any other material, the word "food stuffs" is used, which include any substance to be ingested by humans. This could be "stuff" insufficient to sustain life or even antithetical to it.
This is precisely what Vandana Shiva said about "food safety." It is about only about what is around the food, not what is in it.
Irradiation of food destroys ... vitamin A, thiamin, B2, B3, B6, B12, folic acid, C, E, and K; amino acid and essential polyunsaturated fatty acid content may also be affected. A 20 to 80 percent loss of any of these is not uncommon. (Mercola Nuclear Lunch: The Dangers and Unknowns of Food Irradiation)
Irradiation of food generates radiolytic compounds such as formaldehyde, formic acid, quinones, benzene - all harmful to human health. Bezene is a known carcinogen.
Irradiation of food was approved illegally.
It is quickly apparent at a common sense level that irradiation of food should not be called food safety.
In fact, it changes food so drastically it can no longer meet the definition of food as a substance that sustains life. The opposite of food safety is achieved through irradiation, as food is made dangerous in new ways.
" Research dating to the 1950s has revealed a wide range of problems in animals that ate irradiated food, including premature death, a rare form of cancer, reproductive dysfunction, chromosomal abnormalities, liver damage, low weight gain..." (Mercola)It also does not deal with many of the contamination issues that are its justification, doing "nothing to remove the feces, urine, pus and vomit that often contaminate beef, pork, chicken and other meat. Irradiation will not kill the pathogen that causes mad cow disease." (Mercola)
In the name of food safety, food required for health and for life itself is being depleted of what gives it value and, additionally, severely altered in ways that make it dangerous.
The food marketing system is the largest direct and indirect non-government employer in the United States (Wikipedia).
"Because irradiation increases the shelf life of food and is used in large, centralized facilities, irradiation encourages globalization and consolidation of [greater monopoly over] the food production, distribution and retailing industries." (Mercola)In saying that "irradiation increases the shelf life of food" one is actually saying that the food industry is increasing altering food into "stuff" - more easily stored and shipped globally.
They seemed to have prepared for what that means to real food in creating the legal definition that fits "stuff" that is ingested" but leaves aside maintenance of life and health.
With the legal definition, the global food industry and those profiting from it, have prepared themselves in advance for lawsuits in which human rights objections are raised to the degradation of real food. The right remains but the actual food is being removed through industrial processing. But in the US, the food industry is even attempting to remove basic rights around food as is evident in FDA assertion in a suit against it, in which it asserts in court that people have no rights to obtain, consume or feed their children the foods of their choice (and the case is over access to nutrient-dense food that sustains life and even heals). The FDA is in effect saying the public may not have food that is still real food, that the FDA will decide what the public may have. And then in subtle recognition of true nature of the industrial food the FDA allows (does not criminalize access to), the FDA asserts that the public has no fundamental right to its bodily and physical health.
The FDA is responsible for illegally approving GMOs in the US, not having performed any testing for human safety. These substances do not meet the definition of food but do meet the definition of weapon. They do, however, meet "the legal definition" of food simply because they are processed, partially processed or not processed. They meet the definition of "food stuffs" simply because they are ingested. One might note that fecal material - "crap" - and nuclear waste meet both definitions if they are ingested.
The corporations have thus prepared themselves legally for lawsuits against them for the multiple ways they are removing the human right to food, by altering the very definition of food in such a way as to remove the essential function of food - sustaining life.
The emptying from food of what is crucial for life creates a new type of food deprivation. The US has already seen the impact of people stuffing themselves with empty food, being malnourished and developing diseases. These diseases are profitable, for the new "food stuffs" are creating what economists call "supplier-induced demand." Such generation of diseases is a pre-condition not only for the investment business, the pharmaceutical industry, but for the nuclear industry which profits by then treating diseases it causes with irradiation of food, with radiation for cancers.
The pharmaceutical industry is the food industry (Big Pharm), is the banking industry and the banking industry already profiting by the absence of food. Their actions have created the food crisis and led to profitable starvation.
Deplete the food sufficiently of its essentials through irradiation, and there could come a point at which food could cause starvation. This is biologic famine in the midst of abundant "food stuff." The Food Modernization and Safety law (FMSA) backed by the food industry and the bankers gives the FDA power to irradiate all food based on claims of "terrorism" or "contamination" (no proof is required), as well as to stop deliveries of food to entire communities.
True food safety is based on actual food (not definitions) and it being left intact and capable of sustaining life. Food and "sustenance" should be synonymous but thanks to corporate interests, no longer are.
Thus, the explosion of a food movement.
People are understanding that food "stuffs" come from industry and that real and nutritious food now comes only from farmers and community and home gardens. The corporations understand this as well and food safety laws, such as Bill Clinton's HACCP and Hillary Clinton's proposed FMSA, were designed by the globalized food industry to eliminate both. The food safety laws have already forced family farmers and ranchers out of business, removed real food from the commercial marketplace, wreaked havoc on local economies, and put American farmers and ranchers at the edge of a cliff economically."
"Food safety" has left Americans with food that increasingly is no longer food. Irradiation is a major tool in industry's hands to speed this up. And new legal definitions lie in wait. For when the public demands the right to food, they will find it decoupled from their right to health and to choose which real food. Instead, the corporations have arranged legally for "food stuffs," operating as they do only at the level of definition and appearance.
Substance and sustenance are missing.
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