In North America, we spend almost 90 percent of our food budget on processed food which contains a staggering number of artificial food additives, preservatives, colours and flavour enhancers. The Centre for Science in the Public Interest compiled a list of common food additives. There is a short description for each additive and a safety rating for each.

In what has been called the biggest beef recall in Canadian history questions are flying over why Ottawa regulators didn’t act sooner to a recall that could top 1,800 beef products scattered across Canada.

On Sept. 4, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food Safety and Inspection Service notified the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) that a positive E. coli sample was found in beef trimmings from XL Foods Inc. On Sept. 12, the USDA informed CFIA that it found two more positive samples from the same company. On Sept. 13, XL Foods were removed from the list of establishments eligible to export to the United States – at the request of the U.S. government. But it wasn’t until Sept. 27 that Ottawa suspended the operating licence for XL Foods’ Lakeside plant.

How can any government say this is safe to eat? Two years after the BP spill the affected area is producing some seriously nasty stuff. Shrimp without eyes, some without sockets. Shrimp with abnormal growths and female shrimp with their babies still attached to them and gills so full of black stuff the fish can't maneuver in the water.

A study published April 22 in the journal Nature Climate Change shows for the first time climate change's influence on year-to-year swings in corn prices.

Researchers from Stanford and Purdue universities found that climate change's impact on corn price volatility could far outweigh the volatility caused by changing oil prices or government energy policies mandating biofuels production from corn and other crops.