We here at Food & Water Watch believe strongly in the power of ideas. We also believe in the power of water (you’ve at least seen pictures of the Grand Canyon, no?).  But, we have no idea if ideas or emotions can change the molecular structure of water – that’s just not our area of expertise.  What we do know is that, even if it’s true, the infusion of love, health, or luck does not redeem the bottled water habit.

In spite of our convictions, this Valentine’s Day, Whole Foods will be selling water that purports to transmit love, or as the product website says, “will allow you to feel loved”. The company is silent on whether they have tested their water's energy's shelf life. Do luck and love infused waters maintain their potency when trucked across the country, stuck in traffic, heaved onto shelves by minimum wage workers with unknown emotional states, and stored in close proximity to hundreds of harried shoppers in the grocery story? Have they calculated whether there is a karmic net gain from health infused water considering the environmental and social consequences of the water bottling industry?

While this is not the first bottled water company to make a claim like this, it is the first we’ve seen to suggest that consumers test out their theory at home by writing messages on bottles of tap water and comparing the taste (and vibe?) with un-messaged water. This begs the question: if you can do it yourself, why buy it?

Australian and U.S. researchers have recently discovered something remarkable about fish that could have major implications on the way coral reefs are managed. Baby fish just millimeters long can find their way home through kilometers of open sea by using their sense of smell. The research team found that the tiny fish were able to sniff out the “unique chemical signature” emitted by their coral reef homes.

The director of the study, Professor Mike Kingsford of the ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies, explains that many coral fish species are swept from their home by ocean currents within days of hatching.

“Ordinarily you’d expect them to be thoroughly mixed up and this would mean the population of one reef would be pretty much the same, genetically, as another,” he said. “But this is not the case.”

Kingsford said there are major genetic differences between fish of the same species on nearby reefs, with diversity between the same fish species driving evolution on a reef.

Researchers theorize that the scent is imprinted on them either when they are an egg inside their mothers, as a fertilized egg, a newly hatched fry loose in the stream or while being brooded in their parent’s mouth.

Mother Nature continues to amaze.... And human activity continues to destroy.

Coral reefs support an extraordinary biodiversity, but these precious areas are increasingly threatened by overfishing, pollution, coastal development and global warming. Experts warn that they could be doomed in just a few decades unless drastic action is taken.

In our last issue of Aquabits, we related a story of bottled water executives commiserating at a conference about how the high cost of oil was cutting into profits. 

“What?” you say.

“Oh, yes,” we say.  All that oil gets used for things like making plastic bottles to fill with water, making plastic trays to hold plastic bottles of water, and filling trucks with diesel fuel to transport plastic trays of plastic bottles of water.  E magazine reported that just making plastic water bottles for Americans consumes about 17.6 million barrels of oil per year (enough fuel for more than one million cars for a year). And, that’s before you calculate how much oil it takes to ship all that water around, of which we ship 22 million gallons globally every year.

But, when you buy Fiji water, are you at least supporting some little company in Fiji?

Nope, turns out you are supporting a rather wealthy couple in L.A., according to the final installment in a three part San Francisco Chronicle series on bottled water (L.A. business tries to make Fiji Water a star – 01/21/07).

vs.

A choice bit from the column:

“[T]he people behind Fiji Water readily acknowledge that water is only part of what they offer consumers. They're also selling a perception.”

That must explain the mark up.

Read the rest of the series:

• How water bottlers tap into all sorts of sources – 01/19/2007
• Spin the (water) bottle –– With $11 billion in U.S. sales, the beverage's marketers have become clear winners – 01/17/2007

You may have seen the news this week and wondered why Food & Water Watch hasn’t yet declared victory on our campaign to get Starbucks to buy better milk.

Of course we’re happy to hear about the company making progress toward being totally artificial hormone-free – well, it wasn’t really news to us since Starbucks told Reuters exactly what they told callers on our national call-in day last December – but there is still more to do.

Starbucks has not committed to a timeline for going completely rBGH free. In fact, their statement:

"We are actively engaged with all our dairy suppliers to explore converting our core dairy products to be rBGH-free in our U.S. company-owned stores"

is eerily similar to what they told Organic Consumers Association back in 2001, that they were

“already discussing with existing suppliers what we can do to ensure the remainder of our supply is rBST-free."

That’s more than five years of discussing and exploring. It’s time for Starbucks to act! Tell them so here.

Scientists at South Carolina’s Hollings Marine Laboratory recently revealed findings that Prozac in the water is endangering Ohio’s freshwater mussel populations. The study shows that even a minute amount of the drug causes female mussels to release their larvae within just 48 hours of being exposed. Research by environmental toxicologists in Texas found fluoxetine (the active ingredient in Prozac) in high concentrations and in every tissue sample of bluegill, channel catfish and black crappie they sampled.

Over the past few years, ecologists surveying the waters around waste treatment plants have found a wide array of pharmaceuticals in the water. Researchers have known since the 1960s that pharmaceuticals and other chemicals that affect hormone systems can turn male fish into females.

We are seeing this at alarming rates in the bass that populate the Potomac River. The problem first appeared downstream from sewage treatment plants in 2002, when male bass begin producing eggs. As a D.C. resident, I was just thrilled to think of how nourishing our drinking water must be if it causes male fish to produce eggs. And let’s not even talk about eating the fish.

Scientists suspect the cause of the problem is birth control pills or pesticides and herbicides that mimic estrogen.

As our pipes and treatment systems age, more and more sewage spills into our streams, rivers, lakes and ocean, creating serious public health hazards. And population growth puts even more strain on our water systems.

The federal government spends more than $30 billion a year on a highway trust fund and more than $8 billion on an air transport trust fund. But there is no trust fund to safeguard our nation's water.

If we don’t invest in our nation’s water infrastructure, then we may see our rates increase, water quality suffer, and customer service decline.  It’s time to fill the funding gap with a trust fund - a dedicated funding source and sustained commitment to clean and safe public water.

No, it’s not the name of the rock band I just formed.  “Farmyard Freaks” is a reference to the industrial animals of the future.  I’m hip enough to know that sometimes, being a freak is cool.  It means you’re an individual and that nobody can fit you into a preconceived box.  In this instance, it means the farmyard animal is "highly prolific and oblivious to their physical and mental status".  I could be wrong but not quite so cool, right?

Despite the “ick” factor still conveyed by most consumers, biotechnology experts are already working on creating this food animal.  Apparently, removing certain genes that trigger stress and aggression could produce a zombie…er…I mean, an “animal vegetable” (not as good a band name as The Farmyard Freaks but still doable.) 

In all honesty, I think I would have to be oblivious to my own physical and mental status to eat one of these creatures.  OR I could just be oblivious because of the lack of labeling.

Some 800,000 salmon and trout escaped from Norwegian fish farms in 2006, setting a shameful record that poses a serious environmental threat to Norway's wild fish stocks. Escaped fish compete with wild stocks for resources, while spreading diseases and parasites. Yum. They also breed with wild fish and destroy the natural gene pool.

The number of escapes has risen ten percent since last year, partly due to huge storms last January and February that made it easier for farm-fed fish to gush out of their pens. These careless farmers do not currently receive penalties for their crimes against the environment, although the Norwegian government set up a commission to look into ways to minimize the impact of escapes, and says they will punish negligent farmers.

The Norwegian aquaculture industry is expected to post record-high revenues of $192.8 million in 2006. No punishment there.

As the aquaculture industry expands, the problem will only worsen. And this isn't just a problem for Norway. In 2004, one million farmed salmon in Chile escaped on just one occasion. An estimated three million salmon escape fish farms every year.
 
Don't support an industry that is so environmentally irresponsible! Buy wild! Wild, wild, wild!!!!

Most every American has heard of the Pepsi Challenge but have you ever heard of the Conventional Milk Challenge? This is how it works. (Feel free to follow along at home.  It’ll be fun!)  Place conventionally produced milk, milk produced without artificial hormones and organic milk in unmarked cups side-by-side for you to sample. Can you taste which one was made with recombinant Bovine Growth Hormone (rBGH)?  No? Don’t feel bad. I couldn’t either. 

Some pro-rBGH folks are taking the stance that consumers don’t need to know how the milk is produced if the end products do not differentiate compositionally (which is still up for debate.) Why bother the uneducated consumer with “extra-labeling?” It will drive “more children towards the soda aisle and away from nutritious products.”  (We all know how diligent children are about reading labels!) This is some of the reasoning as to why a campaign has been launched to stop the labeling of hormone-free milk.

I admit I failed the Conventional Milk Challenge miserably. I couldn’t taste the rBGH. I also couldn’t taste the udder infections developed by some of the cows that are administered artificial hormones. My taste buds did not detect the increased use of antibiotics in animals caused by rBGH that creates antibiotic resistant bacteria, a huge human health concern. I was even unable to taste the chance of increased rates of colon, prostrate and breast cancer in humans. The lesson learned? I guess you really can’t judge a book by its cover but you can certainly judge a gallon of milk by its label.

To find out more about what you can do to stop the use of rBGH, please visit www.holdthehormones.org.

(Please note that the Conventional Milk Challenge is a figment of this blogger’s imagination.)

In which city would the answer: "Thanks, I'd like a glass of water," not result in a serving of a free, drinkable, municipal beverage:

1. New York City, NY
2. London, England
3. Huber Ridge, OH
4. All of the above?

Apparently providing, and presumably charging for, bottled water is all the rage in London and New York restaurants if patrons simply request "water" without specifying the source.  This weekend, William Saffire of the New York Times, lamented the rise of the term "Bloomberg water" which is the trendy way to request tap water in the city and simultaneously indicate that you know who the mayor is.  We don't know if Mr. Saffire's objections stop with vocabulary but the British organization Consumer Council for Water objects to the trend for financial reasons.  The group recently urged Brits not to feel embarrassed ordering tap water, which is thousands of times cheaper than bottled.

As for the residents of Huber Ridge, many of them would like to order tap water at their local diner but may not dare.  You'll have to read Currents to find out about this Columbus Ohio suburb's problems with the private company Ohio American Water, which include down right undrinkable water, and what they are doing about it.

So that makes the answer: All of The Above.

Back to work then.

And you thought library staff were reticent? Well, you haven't met Tony Del Plato, a university access services supervisor & reserve coordinator in upstate New York. In 1969, Tony started on a path of food activism, and has been bucking the food industry ever since. Realizing that the only way to get organic and wholesome foods at a reasonable price was to do it themselves, he and a group of students founded Staten Island's first food cooperative, the excellently-named Shanti Food Conspiracy.

Tony eventually settled in Ithaca, New York to become a chef. Now retired, "after nearly 30 years stirrin' pots n' woks," Tony spent 24 years as chef, co-owner, and menu planner for the famed Moosewood Restaurant. He is co-author "of 5 or 6" of Moosewood's popular cookbooks. (Anyone who can't remember how many books he's authored has led quite the life.) Tony also worked for many years with the Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) peoples on vegetarian protein alternatives to fish and meat in native cuisines. "Garlic is one of my many sacraments," he says, a position we endorse wholeheartedly.

Most recently, Tony has been a standout volunteer here at Food & Water Watch. Well plugged into the New York food scene, we can count on him to spread the word about artificial growth hormones, irradiated food, or whatever nasty thing agribusiness has dreamed up. For our Starbucks Week of Action in July, Tony braved the mean streets of Ithaca many evenings in order to inform Starbucks' customers of its unfortunate use of milk with artificial hormones. His action was featured in both the Ithaca Times and on a local country music station, an impressive feat!

In general, Tony prefers to encourage the alternatives to the conventional food system. "I buy local whenever I can and love to garden." By living and preaching it, Tony is an inspiration to the sustainable food movement, and we are thankful for all his good works.

Editor's Note: Activist Spotlight is a new series featuring a FWW volunteer who has worked hard to help ensure a food or water system that better serves the public. Stay tuned to our blog to see who we feature next! If you would like to volunteer, click here.

We can now add Starbucks to the “trans-fat-free” club that includes such noble members as KFC, Wendy’s and Taco Bell.    Apparently, they have been working on eliminating trans fat from their food menu for two years now and expect to completely phase out the health-adverse hydrogenated oil by the end of the year. 

"This is just something we have been working on, and our focus has always been on providing our customers with healthy and nutritious food options," spokesman Brandon Borrman said Tuesday.

Finally, doughnuts, brownies, and cookies that are healthy and nutritious!  Now all we need is some rBGH-free milk to wash it all down with!

Talk about a Christmas bonus- A Japanese fisherman recently reeled in a moneybag containing 10,000 yen bills while fishing in Hakusan, Ishikawa Prefecture. This big  catch is equivalent to $67,000! Police reported that the man was attempting to catch sea perch when he felt his line snag on something. When he reeled it in he didn't find a fish but rather a moneybag filled with cash (and some antiseptic and paper.) The money is all his unless someone comes forward in the next six months to claim it. Talk about the catch of your life!