Organic Bytes
Newsletter #930: Expansion of Food Libel Laws to Silence the Public

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Food Safety and Free Speech in Jeopardy with New Libel Food Law

“Food Libel” laws are the corporations’ attempt to keep us from knowing where our food comes from and how it’s produced.

In an alarming move, Florida is considering expanding its food libel law with a provision to broaden “food disparagement” restrictions. A victory for free speech was won last week when the Senate dropped the issue, but a House bill still includes it.

While Florida’s current law is limited to perishable food products like fruits and vegetables, the proposed changes seek to broaden the scope in two major ways:

The addition of “Farm Practices”: The provision explicitly adds agricultural practices, such as fertilizer use and pesticide application.

And the removal of “Perishable”: This expansion would include all agricultural products. This would allow powerful agricultural corporations like Bayer and Corteva to use a new legal weapon to target those who speak out publicly about farming practices, including pesticides, water pollution, and harmful health effects. If passed, this provision would set a dangerous precedent, stifling free speech, silencing environmental and health advocates, and creating a food system that prioritizes industry interests over public health and safety.

This expansion would heavily prioritize industry interests, making it perilous for individuals, organizations, and farmers to speak up about harmful practices, undermining free speech and efforts to create a safer, more transparent food system nationwide.

In a frightening example of how food libel laws like Florida’s can be misused, Apeel is currently suing Robyn Openshaw, the Green Smoothie Girl, for her campaign to educate consumers about how to avoid its “edible” fruit-and-vegetable coating.

We need to act now!

TAKE ACTION: Tell Your State Legislators to Protect Food and Environmental Activists’ Right to Free Speech! Block and Repeal Food Libel Laws!

HOMEOPATHY

Protect Consumer Access to Homeopathic Medicines – Support H.R. 7050

Momentum is building in Congress to clarify and protect the role of homeopathic medicines in American health care. The Homeopathic Drug Product Safety, Quality and Transparency Act (H.R. 7050), introduced by Pete Sessions and co-sponsored by Jonathan Jackson and Mike Kennedy, would establish clear, appropriate standards that recognize the unique nature of homeopathic medicines while safeguarding consumer access and product quality.   

This bipartisan effort reflects growing recognition that families across the country deserve both safety and choice in their health care options. With health care costs continuing to rise and chronic disease rates affecting millions of households nationwide, access to safe, affordable options has never been more important.

Homeopathic medicines have long been used as low-cost, over-the-counter remedies for minor illnesses and as complementary approaches in clinical care. For many individuals and families seeking budget-friendly, low-risk health solutions, maintaining open access to these products is not simply a preference—it is a practical necessity.

Recent actions by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, including the removal of certain homeopathic eye drops and other longstanding remedies, have highlighted the urgent need for statutory clarity. Without congressional action, more products could disappear from shelves, limiting consumer access and narrowing health care choice.

For the past seven years, Americans for Homeopathic Choice has worked tirelessly to bring about this legislation. We encourage you to visit their website to review the broad coalition of supporting organizations and to stay updated on the progress of H.R. 7050.

Now is the time to act.

Protecting access to homeopathic medicines requires visible public support to ensure lawmakers understand how many people depend on these products every day.   

Please send your message to Congress and read more about this urgent issue

PESTICIDES

The 2026 Farm Bill Is a Deregulation Dream

Alexis Baden Mayer, Research Director, Organic Consumers Association:

The 2026 Farm Bill, newly introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives, is the deregulation dream of companies like Bayer that peddle pesticides and genetically modified organisms (GMOs).

It completely guts the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA), with sweeping exemptions and huge changes. This law governs how the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) regulates pesticides.

At the same time that it makes EPA’s pesticide authority weak to non-existent, it concentrates power within the agency, forbidding states from doing anything to protect us, including preventing courts from hearing cases brought on behalf of people who have been killed, injured, or sickened.

Your U.S. Representatives and Senators need to hear from you about this immediately. Please call or write to them, letting them know about the pesticide deregulation sections in the House Farm Bill and urging them to work for their removal.

TAKE ACTION: Tell Congress to Strike the Pesticide Deregulation Subtitle from the 2026 House Farm Bill!

Learn more

HEALTH

That Dry, Bitter Taste May Be Waking Up Your Brain

Shibaura Institute of Technology:

“New research suggests the astringent sensation caused by flavanols could act as a direct signal to the brain, triggering effects similar to a mild workout for the nervous system.

In mouse experiments, flavanol intake boosted activity, curiosity, learning, and memory—despite these compounds barely entering the bloodstream. The key appears to be sensory stimulation: the taste itself activates brain pathways linked to attention, motivation, and stress response, lighting up regions involved in arousal and memory.  

Astringency is the dry, puckering, rough, or sandpapery feeling people notice when eating foods rich in certain plant compounds called polyphenols. Polyphenols include flavanols, which have long been linked to lower cardiovascular disease risk. Flavanols are especially common in cocoa, red wine, and berries, and research has associated them with better memory, improved cognitive performance, and protection against damage to brain cells.

However, flavanols present a scientific puzzle. Only a small portion of what people consume actually makes it into the bloodstream after digestion. This low bioavailability raises an important question: if so little is absorbed, how do flavanols still appear to influence brain function and the nervous system?”

Read about this new hypothesis focused on taste

SUPPORT OCA & RI

The Future of Our Food, Health, and Freedom Is at Stake

Florida’s new Food Libel law is just the beginning. Corporations are pushing to silence us, hiding the truth about pesticides, GMOs, and agricultural practices.

But we won’t be silenced, we’re fighting back.

Your support is crucial! Can you help us fight this fight?

With your donation, we’ll continue to:

Fight against Food Libel and Ag-Gag laws that silence and intimidate critics and protect corporate interests.
Expose the dangers of pesticide deregulation and GMOs.
Support small farmers and local communities, not corporate agribusiness.
Champion organic, regenerative agriculture, small farmers and local food systems.

Your donation will fuel our efforts to educate, take action and build a healthier food system now, and for a better future for many generations to come.

Let’s work together!

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

Make a tax-deductible donation to Regeneration International, our international sister organization

Have you considered making a gift from your IRA?

NEW SCIENTIFIC REVIEW

Forests Don’t Just Store Carbon. They Keep People Alive

Rhett Ayers Butler, Mongabay:

“For decades, a dominant argument for protecting forests has focused on carbon. Trees absorb carbon dioxide, store it in wood and soils, and slow the accumulation of greenhouse gases.

A new scientific review suggests this emphasis overlooks other ways forests shape climate and human well-being. Forests, it argues, are not only a mitigation tool for the future climate. They also help people adapt to climate change today, shaping temperature, water, and human well-being in ways that are felt locally.

The paper, ‘More than mitigation: The role of forests in climate adaptation,’synthesizes research on how forests regulate climate through physical processes as much as chemical ones. At local scales, trees act as thermal buffers. Canopies shade the ground and drive evapotranspiration, a process that converts heat into water vapor.

Across nearly one hundred field sites, daytime temperatures inside forests were on average about 4°C lower than in nearby open areas, while nighttime temperatures were slightly higher. The result is a narrowing of extremes: cooler afternoons, milder nights.”  

Read how forests do not merely slow climate change; they help societies live with it

NEW DOCUMENTARY

Breaking Big Food

Jigsaw Health:

“40 years ago, Big Tobacco hijacked our food system. Today, a group of local ‘Davids’ is fighting to take it back. This is their story.

Starting in the 1980s, cigarette companies began to acquire the largest food companies in America. Over the last 40 years, the American food system has gotten ‘forked’ beyond all recognition. Calley Means, a former DC lobbyist, explains the broken incentive structure of how ‘Big Food’ manipulates ‘Big Government,’ leading to garbage in our grocery stores, which he contends may in fact be the culprit lurking behind the horrifying health statistics in America over that same time period.

But there is hope… you’ll be inspired as we follow what’s happening at the local level where renegade local businesses – such as Shake Up SuperFoods, Good Living Greens, Firefly Organic Coffee & Market, and others work with local farms – like Inspire Farms, Crow’s Dairy, Arizona Grass Fed Beef Company, and others to bring clean, organic, healthy food back to the people in their community.”

WATCH: “Breaking Big Food: How The American Food System Went Rotten… And How It’s Being Revived”

NEW STUDY

Can Eating High Fat Cheese and Cream Reduce Dementia Risk?

Professor Eef Hogervorst, Loughborough University:

“A large Swedish study reported a lower risk of dementia among middle-aged and older adults who consumed higher amounts of full-fat cheese and cream. The findings may sound like welcome news, but they need careful interpretation.

The study followed 27,670 participants for 25 years, during which 3,208 developed dementia. Among people without a known genetic risk for Alzheimer’s disease, eating more than 50 grams of full-fat cheese per day was associated with a 13%–17% lower risk of Alzheimer’s. No such reduction was seen among people who carried genetic risk factors for the disease.

Consuming more than 20 grams of full-fat cream per day was linked to a 16%–24% lower risk of dementia overall. No associations were found for low-fat or high-fat milk, fermented or non-fermented milk, or low-fat cream. These findings are notable given longstanding public health advice to choose low-fat dairy to reduce cardiovascular risk.”

The most consistent message remains that balanced diets, moderation and overall lifestyle matter far more than any single item on the cheese board

FOOD ACCESS

We Don’t Have a Food Production Problem 

Thin, Thin-Ink:

“The topic of availability versus access and affordability has been going on for decades. The great Amatya Sen started it in 1976, and many other experts have followed since. Here’s why: in almost every forum, conference, and seminar on food I’ve attended in the past two decades, I hear this refrain: ‘But we cannot do (fill in whatever actions that will make food systems fairer, greener, and healthier) because we need to produce more food.’ More often than not, they are talking about staple crops: the grains and cereals that form a major part of our daily diets.

Given how pervasive and persistent this talking point is, I feel compelled to debunk it every time I get the chance. This time, I sought help from two people whose work I admire: Sophia Murphy, Executive Director at the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy (IATP), and Jose Luis Chicoma, program chair for the Future of Food at The New Institute, to parse the differences.

Both are veterans on food and trade issues: Sophia’s 2012 report with Jennifer Clapp on grain traders was a key educational document for me (and so useful for this issue) and Jose Luis’s most recent report on power in food systems is an important read (I covered it here).”

So, here we go… again.. about why record grain production does not equal food security, because hunger is about access, power and rights

BRAIN HEALTH

Consuming 2-3 Cups of Coffee Daily Associated with Lower Dementia Risk, Better Cognitive Function

Mass General Brigham:

”A new prospective cohort study by investigators from Mass General Brigham, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, and the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard analyzed 131,821 participants from the Nurses’ Health Study (NHS) and Health Professionals Follow-Up Study (HPFS), finding that moderate consumption of caffeinated coffee (2-3 cups a day) or tea (1-2 cups a day) reduced dementia risk, slowed cognitive decline, and preserved cognitive function. Their results are published in JAMA.

Early prevention is especially crucial for dementia, since current treatments are limited and typically offer only modest benefit once symptoms appear. Focus on prevention has led researchers to investigate the influences of lifestyle factors like diet on dementia development.

Coffee and tea contain bioactive ingredients like polyphenols and caffeine, which have emerged as possible neuroprotective factors that reduce inflammation and cellular damage while protecting against cognitive decline. Though promising, findings about the relationship between coffee and dementia have been inconsistent, as studies have had limited follow-up and insufficient detail to capture long-term intake patterns, differences by beverage type, or the full continuum of outcomes—from early subjective cognitive decline to clinically diagnosed dementia.”