The House version of the 2026 Farm Bill would completely deregulate a category of genetically modified organisms the industry calls “plant-incorporated protectants.” These are crops that are genetically engineered to produce their own pesticides. These pesticides aren’t on your food, they are your food!

Pesticide-producing GMOs include scary new crops that are genetically engineered to kill insects by silencing their genes, a process called RNAi. The way it works is that the plant delivers a genetic signal to a pest that essentially switches off a key gene, killing it.

The problem is that this gene-silencing mechanism does not always stay on target. It can affect genes in other organisms beyond the intended pest, and scientists still do not fully understand how to predict when that will happen. Independent researchers have raised concerns that it may also trigger immune responses in humans, particularly in newborns whose digestive systems are not yet fully developed, and in adults with gut health issues.

U.S. farmers started growing Bayer-Monsanto’s RNAi SmartStax corn in 2023. The Environmental Protection Agency never required the company to study immune system effects or consider vulnerable populations. Corn pollen carrying these traits can travel up to half a mile on the wind, yet inhalation exposure was never assessed either.

With 20 to 30 percent of the 86 million acres of GMO corn now carrying RNAi traits, this is not a future concern. It is already happening. If Congress deregulates pesticide-producing GMOs entirely, oversight disappears and we may never know what hit us.

TAKE ACTION: Tell Congress Not to Deregulate Pesticide-Producing GMOs!

by Dan Lampariello, Jack Amrock & Nathan Aaron, The National Desk:

“Along River Road in Benton, families are bound by more than geography; they are connected by contamination. ‘For a decade or two, my family and I were drinking the water,’ said Mike Deroche, who has lived there since the 1980s.

‘I have levels in my blood that are up above the recommended contaminant level, which makes it unhealthy inside of the blood,’ Deroche said. ‘I also have psoriatic arthritis and M.S., so I have a pretty compromised system.’

For decades, Maine allowed farmers to use treated sewage sludge as a cost-effective alternative to fertilizer. The chemicals and other contaminants in the sludge seeped into the soil and eventually into private wells.”

Now, families like the Deroches are living with the consequences. 

TAKE ACTION: Tell the EPA to Ban Toxic Sludge from Farmland!

Micheline Maynard, Food & Wine:

“If you haven’t already spotted it at your nearest café, it’s time to meet hojicha.

Hojicha is commonly made with ‘bancha,’ the leaves and stems of green tea plants that have been harvested later in the season than other types of Japanese green tea, like sencha or tencha; the latter is used to make matcha. The late-harvest bancha leaves have a milder, straw-like flavor profile, as opposed to the fresh, vibrant flavor of sencha. 

It’s not just the types of leaves used that make a difference in the final tea — production matters too. To start making matcha, green tea leaves are steamed and then dried. For hojicha, the entire leaf and stem are roasted.

Hojicha’s flavor profile reflects these two components: the leaves give it a touch of bitterness, while the stems develop the tea’s signature nutty flavor after being roasted.”

Hojicha is popping up on menus around the world.

There is an entire world beneath our feet that most of us have never seen and probably don’t think about enough, and it turns out it is far more vast and extraordinary than anyone imagined. Scientists have now created the first global map of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungal networks, the living, thread-like connections that weave through soil, link plant roots together, move carbon through the earth, and quietly hold ecosystems together. The scale of it is breathtaking. These networks are long enough to reach the sun a billion times over.

What makes this discovery even more remarkable is how much it still leaves unanswered. What researchers could see, though, was striking. Industrial croplands show roughly half the fungal network density of less intensively managed land, and nobody is quite sure yet what that means for the rest of us.

The researchers describe this as a critical step toward understanding how carbon and nutrients flow on a global scale, and a reminder that some of our most powerful allies in addressing food security and climate change may already be right beneath us.

Read about the new study from the University of Sheffield.

Darla Ponace, CBC News:

“Linda Obey-Lavallee learned all about plants — how to read them, how to pick them properly, their medicinal properties — from her late husband Harold Lavallee, who learned from his grandparents.

Obey-Lavallee, from Piapot First Nation, is a traditional picker and knowledge keeper of medicinal plants. ‘Knowing that this plant is out here, it’s more accessible for a lot of people,’ she said. ‘Sometimes somebody who’s really sick and needs it was told in a lodge or ceremony that they need to have this plant and it only grows in this one specific area.’

The Treaty Land Sharing Network connects farmers and other landholders with First Nations and Métis people who need safe access to land to practice their way of life.”

Read about how the group is creating an inventory of medicinal plants found at more than 60 locations in Saskatchewan and Alberta.

Stacy Malkan, U.S. Right to Know (USRTK):

“Neonicotinoids are the most widely used class of insecticides in the world. They are often used as seed coatings on crops such as corn and soybeans, as well as on turf, ornamental plants, and pets as flea and tick treatments.

A growing body of scientific evidence raises concerns about the human health risks of neonicotinoid exposure. Studies in animals and humans link neonicotinoid exposure to neurotoxicity and reproductive toxicity. Some studies also report ties to breast and liver cancer, and type 1 diabetes.

Human exposure to neonicotinoids is widespread and begins before birth. Neonics are commonly detected in food, drinking water, and household dust. A study of American women found neonicotinoids or their metabolites in more than 95% of pregnant women tested. A 2025 review of evidence reports that neonicotinoids or their metabolites are routinely found in urine, breast milk, placental tissues, and infant cord blood. Children may have higher exposures and they are especially vulnerable to toxic exposures during early critical periods of brain development.”

Read the full breakdown of what the research shows.

TAKE ACTION: Tell Your State Legislators To Ban Bee-Killing Neonic Seed Treatments!

We have some good news to share. After a massive public outcry, the House voted to strip the pesticide liability shield from the 2026 Farm Bill before it passed. That was a real win, and it happened because people like you pushed back.

But we are not done yet. The bill now moves to the Senate, and the deregulation of pesticide-producing GMOs is still on the table. Crops engineered to silence insect genes through a process called RNAi are already being grown commercially across millions of acres of GMO corn in this country. Scientists still do not fully understand why the gene-silencing mechanism sometimes affects organisms beyond the intended pest, and nobody has been required to study what that means for our health or our children. If the Senate removes all oversight, these gene-silencing traits could be moving through our food supply and into our bodies with no one watching and no way to trace the damage back to the source.

This is, and has been OCA’s fight, and we could not do it without you. If you are able to make a donation today, it goes directly toward the education, grassroots lobbying, organic research, market pressure campaigns, and litigation that keep us in this fight.

Thank you, from all of us at OCA.

Make a tax-deductible donation to Organic Consumers Association, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit

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Have you considered making a grant request from your Donor-Advised Fund?

Max Goldberg, Founder, Organic Insider:

“Last month, a state attorney general took enforcement into his own hands, exposing a loophole the USDA’s National Organic Program (NOP) failed to address.

According to the AG’s findings, Albertsons was misting the chemical on the retail floor with no clear-water rinse — a practice that strips the organic status from the produce on the shelf. Albertsons signed the agreement without admitting wrongdoing. What makes the case critical is not just what Albertsons did but the regulatory loophole that allowed it to happen.

Grocery stores that do not process food but sell organic produce, such as Albertsons, are generally exempt from mandatory USDA organic certification and, thus, operate in a blind spot.

Store managers may be connecting chemical drums to automated misting lines that spray organic produce, unaware that doing so puts the product out of compliance.”

That a state attorney general had to step in is a glaring indictment of the USDA.

Who you live with may be shaping your health in ways you never expected. A new study out of the University of Trento, Italy, analyzed the gut and oral microbiomes of 430 people across 207 households and found that people sharing a home swap far more bacteria with each other than with anyone in the outside community, and it has nothing to do with being biologically related. On average, cohabiting people share about 19% of gut bacterial strains and 26% of oral strains. People in separate households share virtually zero.

What researchers found particularly interesting is which bacteria tend to spread most easily between people. The gut strains that moved most readily between housemates were the same ones associated with markers of type 2 diabetes and heart health. Some of the most transmissible species had ties to colorectal cancer. Researchers think the same qualities that help these microbes travel between people may also help them settle in once they arrive.

Read about this fascinating new study by Neuroscience News: Cohabitation Drives Transmission of Diabetes Linked Microbes

Hannah Docter-Loeb, The Guardian:

“Once a year, Dutch kids, parents and teachers take part in a walking festival, heading out for four nights in a single week to explore their neighborhoods, exercise and make friends. It’s a tradition that seems to be genuinely transformative.

It’s the second night of Avondvierdaagse (which literally means ‘four-day evening walk’) , organized by a group of neighborhood volunteers. It’s not a race, but if children complete every night, they get medals, a bouquet of flowers and, if they’re lucky, a lot of sweets. It’s not just Amsterdam; across villages, towns and cities in the Netherlands, hundreds of thousands of Dutch people are doing the same: every year, kids spend four evenings in early summer exploring their neighborhoods with their school friends and parents as part of the Week van de Avond4daagse.”

Encouraging children to go through the whole week of walking can help build a positive association with physical activity.

FDA Approves First New Sunscreen Ingredient in Decades, and It Looks Promising The FDA just approved bemotrizinol, the first new active sunscreen ingredient to be approved in the US in over 25 years. Already widely used in Europe, data submitted to the FDA suggests minimal skin absorption and low risk for cancer, reproductive toxicity, and immune concerns. EWG ( with limited data) rates it low hazard across the board, some good news in the world of personal care ingredients. Learn more at EWG Skin Deep

Scientists Discover How Exercising Muscles Communicate With the Brain to Fight Depression New research has identified the biological pathway through which physical activity sends mood-boosting signals from the muscles directly to the brain, offering a clearer picture of why exercise is so effective against depression. Learn more at PsyPost

Maria Day: A Woman Who Quietly Turned Her Home Into a Lifeline for Neighbors One Richfield woman has been feeding and supporting her neighbors out of her own home for years, building the kind of quiet community infrastructure that holds neighborhoods together. Read the full story at City of Richfield

In Decisive Ruling, Court Finds Government Failed to Protect More Than 1,500 Endangered Species From Toxic Pesticide Malathion A federal court has ruled that the EPA failed in its legal duty to assess the harm malathion poses to over 1,500 endangered species, a significant legal blow to the agency’s track record on pesticide oversight. Learn more at Daily Hunt

How Being a Little More Social Can Change Your Life Research from UC Berkeley’s Greater Good Science Center finds that even small, low-effort social interactions can meaningfully improve mood our sense of belonging, and overall wellbeing. Learn more at Greater Good Magazine

Campaigners Call for Ban on Use of Weedkiller Glyphosate at Harvest Time Health and environmental advocates are pushing for an end to the practice of spraying glyphosate on crops just before harvest, a common technique that leaves higher residue levels on the food that reaches your plate. Learn more at BBC

Glucosamine Supplements May Speed Memory Loss From Alzheimer’s, New Research Shows A new study raises serious concerns about glucosamine, one of the most popular joint supplements on the market, finding it may accelerate cognitive decline in people with Alzheimer’s disease. Learn more at The Conversation

Want to Sleep Better? Research Shows Eating More Potassium at Dinner Can Help New research suggests that adding potassium-rich foods to your evening meal may improve sleep quality, pointing to diet as a simple and overlooked tool for getting better rest. Learn more at Verywell Health

State Bans on PFAS Reduce ‘Forever Chemicals’ in Clothing and Textiles, U.S. Report Finds A new report finds that state-level bans on PFAS chemicals are actually working, with measurable reductions in forever chemicals found in clothing and textiles in states that have taken action. Learn more at The Guardian

New Research Finds University Students Experiencing Increasing Levels of Perfectionism Researchers at the London School of Economics found that perfectionism among college students has risen significantly in recent decades, with real consequences for mental health and wellbeing. Learn more at LSE

Shortages Create Fertile Ground for Compost as Farmers Look for Affordable Alternatives With fertilizer costs still elevated and supply chains unpredictable, more farmers are turning to compost as a practical and affordable alternative that also builds long-term soil health. Read the full story at Local News Matters

‘Ecocide’: How International Law Falls Short in Addressing the Environmental Toll of War As environmental destruction from armed conflict grows harder to ignore, legal experts are asking why international law still has no effective mechanism to hold anyone accountable for it. Learn more at Indian Express

The Ancient Roots of Modern Winemaking Archaeologists and food historians are tracing winemaking back thousands of years further than once thought, revealing a deep and surprisingly sophisticated human relationship with fermentation. Read the full story at Nautilus

Rhode Island Passes Sludge Plant Moratorium Amid Controversial Facility Plans Rhode Island has put a temporary halt on new biosolids processing facilities while lawmakers take a closer look at the health and environmental risks, a rare and celebrated win for communities fighting industrial sludge operations near their homes. Learn more at Waste Dive

Almost All Plant-Based Meat Alternatives Contain Mycotoxins, New Research Finds A new study found mycotoxins, toxic compounds produced by mold, in nearly all plant-based meat products tested, raising fresh questions about what is actually in these highly processed foods. Learn more at Phys.org

U.S. Defense Spending on Critical Minerals Surges in the Last Decade Pentagon investment in critical minerals has grown dramatically over the past ten years, raising concerns about the environmental and community costs of the mining operations being fast-tracked to supply it. Learn more at Mongabay

Another Food Crisis? Yes, But This Time It’s Different GRAIN argues that the food instability now taking shape is not a repeat of past crises but something structurally different, driven by a convergence of land concentration, climate disruption, and policy failures that won’t be solved by the old playbook. Read the full story at GRAIN

Op-Ed: The Next Farm Bill Can Help Farmers Kick Fertilizer A new op-ed makes the case that the 2026 Farm Bill is a real opportunity to wean American agriculture off its costly and environmentally damaging dependence on synthetic fertilizers. Read the full story at Civil Eats