Acai Berry and MonaVie

Acai Berry and MonaVie
There are several people in Bowling Green selling MonaVie - here is another perspective:

Unless you've been under a rock, you've probably heard of the Acai Berry (pronounced AH-sci-EE). This little Brazilian berry has been on Oprah, all the major morning shows, magazines, etc. Touted as the best antioxidant, apparently it's nothing short of a miracle.

The acai berry grows in the Amazon Rain Forest and tastes like a berry with a chocolate aftertaste. Sounds fabulous! It even beats the blueberry in its antioxidant properties.

[BUT]

Be forewarned -- as good as this little berry is, it will not reverse aging and cure diseases! I've seen press releases with those words in the title. When you go to the website, it's just a front for another website that sells the product - but you won't see that claim on THEIR website.

It wasn't until a friend of mine started taking MonaVie and told me how much he was paying for it that I decided to explore it further.

$39 a bottle ($25 with a bulk purchase) - and a bottle only lasts about a week! No joking! Not only that, MonaVie is basically an MLM (multi level marketing) product.

So the quest was on. Find out what I could about this "miracle antioxidant" and see if other quality products are available for less.

I found a site that gives a pretty good detailed description of what it is and what it does. Granted, they are selling a product, but they also give great non-technical information. You can get information from the link at the end of this article.

What Are Some of the Different Acai Berry Products?

You can purchase it in various formats, but the primary 3 types are in juices, powders, and freeze-dried capsules.

JUICE

MonaVie comes in juice format and has to be refrigerated. Their acai juice is really a blend of 19 different fruits. There's no way of knowing precisely how much acai berry is in their formula.

If you like the juice blend, I've discovered another product for about half the price. If you scroll down their sales page, you'll find a side-by-side comparison of their ingredient labels. They at least publish the amount of acai berry they have in their juice. I find it funny that they also claim to have more acai in their juice than the MonaVie product - how is that possible when nobody knows how much acai is in the MonaVie product?

POWDER

The powders sure ran the gambit, but most of them are not all that pure in their ingredients. Even Dr. Perricone's powder (made from extract) had all kinds of other fruit extracts and ingredients. So you can get Dr. Perricone's Super Berry Powder with Acai for $50 for a month's supply, or for less than half the price, you can get Berry Splash. It looks like about the same ingredients - at least they provide some ORAC values (that's a way of measuring the antioxidants).

FREEZE DRIED CAPSULES

In this process, the berries are freeze dried and then processed as a powder or capsule. Most of the acai powders you see on the market are not actually freeze dried. They are usually made from a extract (which does not use the whole berry) or spray dried. There are some good ones, though. Check the ingredient labels.

I have found what I think is perhaps the purest grade of Acai available in an easy-to-take capsule form. Be sure to check out the link below for recommendations to various types of Acai Berry products.

To read which Acai Berry supplements are recommended (and which are not), go to: Acai Berry Article While you're there, get the free book Healthy Aging.

By GiGi Konwin

Cibus Global

Ag-tech upstart is armed to take on Monsanto
Posted by Jeffrey M. O'Brien
September 21, 2009 7:05 AM

Cibus Global uses bioscience to enhance plant genes with a different approach than agribusiness giants.


Israeli crop-protection company Makhteshim-Agan is investing $37 million in San Diego ag-tech startup Cibus Global to spur the development of new strains of crops that will be resistant to various forms of disease, pests, and herbicides.

The investment, which will occur over five years and will eventually allow the Israeli company to acquire slightly more than 50% of the startup, provides a shot in the arm for the 8-year-old upstart whose grand ambitions could put it on a collision course with ag-tech giants like Dow Chemical (DOW), Monsanto (MON), and Syngenta (SYT).

Cibus’s primary asset is its so-called Rapid Trait Development System. Unlike the transgenic approach used by Monsanto, where a foreign gene is inserted into a plant’s genome to confer, for example, immunity to an herbicide (à la Roundup-ready cotton and soybeans), Cibus’s technology teases out such characteristics from the genome without inserting foreign material.

It essentially hurries along standard plant breeding in a highly controlled setting. In simple terms, a molecule is inserted into a plant’s cell, causing the plant to mutate in a desired way. What could take Mother Nature tens of thousands of years to accomplish through millions of mutations over myriad generations takes Cibus anywhere from three to five years, lab to market.

Winning over activists and international governments

This is an important breakthrough for a few reasons: PR, accuracy, and money.

While the company is highly successful, Monsanto, for example, has battled a persistent public relations onslaught over its transgenic practices.

Genetically modified organisms (GMOs) have been largely resisted by European nations, rejected by much of Africa, and railed against by various environmental organizations that claim genetically modified crops are either highly infectious to other crops, potentially dangerous to our health, or both.

A technology that could achieve the same benefits — pest or herbicide resistance, for example — without inserting foreign material into a genome should gain the approval of the marketplace and activists alike.

What’s more, transgenic mutations are highly complex and notoriously difficult to get right — which makes for an expensive process.

Zigging while Monsanto zags

“Monsanto estimates that it takes as much as $50 million to launch a transgenic product, which includes all the regulatory work to get it cleared in the U.S. –- and in some parts of the world, it’s not even possible,” says Keith Walker, president of Cibus.

“For us," Walker says, "it’s a $5 million to $7 million exercise to take a product to market. That gives us opportunities to work in crops that are smaller in acreage.”

The arrangement with Makhteshim-Agan allows Walker and his team of bio-scientists to explore any number of crops and characteristics.

Walker won’t yet say which crops he’s targeting, but they won’t be the enormous ones where Monsanto already has a foothold: cotton, soy, and corn.

But that still leaves plenty of opportunity.

“The markets are multiple billions of dollars,” says Walker, “and you don’t have to go against Dow Chemical and Monsanto until you’re ready.”

Cibus has already gone through field testing with several crops and plans to release its first crop to market, an herbicide-resistant form of canola developed with BASF, in the U.S. by 2011 and other parts of the world a year later.

Its success in the marketplace should pave the way for Cibus to launch subsequent products quickly, and there are few ends to what such a technology can accomplish.

“Monsanto puts a whole gene in, but it’s not necessary,” says Walker. “Literally, as each day goes by, we see new information coming out of functional genomics research that creates new potential targets of opportunity.”

A new dawn!

Well, maybe not :-) Anyway, for the couple of folks following, I plan to start posting at least weekly at this location. The blog will contain community events, recipes, gardening tips and that sort of thing. Spread the word and keep checking in! If any of you all are familiar with RSS feeds, there is an option to subscribe on the blog. Enjoy!

Greener Groundz Presents!

On Sunday July 19, Benita and I presented at the Unitarian Universalist Church on Nashville Rd. in Bowling Green, KY. While I am pretty well verse in theology, I found that my knowledge was limited when it can to the UU Church. I am very thankful for GOOGLE!

We spoke to the congregation about being a locavore and ethical eating, which addresses the UU church’s commitment to social justice and ethical eating. From their website (http://www.uua.org/socialjustice/issuesprocess/currentissues/ethicaleating/index.shtml)

“Delegates at the 2008 General Assembly in Fort Lauderdale, FL, selected "Ethical Eating" to be the 2008-2012 Congregational Study/Action Issue (CSAI) of the Unitarian Universalist Association of Congregations.

The Congregational Study/Action Issue is an invitation for congregations and districts to take a topic of concern and confront it, reflect on it, learn about it, respond to it, comment on it take action—each in their own way. A CSAI is NOT a statement—it is a question.”

I think that many folks understand the importance of recycling and driving cars will low carbon output but it is a bit harder to grasp the concept of ethical eating because it transcends the idea of a “carbon footprint.” Ethical eating deals with environment issues, social equality, animal rights, economic & political stability, and much more. It takes more than just commitment; it takes an intellectual capacity to connect the dots. As citizens in our communities, states, regions, and so forth, it is our responsibility to lead our fellow brothers and citizens to developing consumer habits that are just. I think I like the Unitarians!

I would encourage each of you to visit their website and read some of their materials – I am in awe!

H.R. 875 Food Safety Modernization Act of 2009

Congress recently introduced a food safety bill that could potentially eliminate the production of organic food in the United States. While congress is adamant that chemical companies are the driving force behind the bill, the bill was introduced by Rosa DeLauro whose husband Stanley Greenburg works for Monsanto. Although many times I am called a "Communist" for promoting legislation that will make health care available for all or require that people give their dogs water and shelter, I think this might be a better example of dictatorship by "capitalist gold-diggers."

Here is a summary of the bill...
"To establish the Food Safety Administration within the Department of Health and Human Services to protect the public health by preventing food-borne illness, ensuring the safety of food, improving research on contaminants leading to food-borne illness, and improving security of food from intentional contamination, and for other purposes."

Here is more lengthy version of the summary...

"2/4/2009--Introduced.

Food Safety Modernization Act of 2009 - Establishes in the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) the Food Safety Administration. Assigns all the authorities and responsibilities of the Secretary of Health and Human Services related to food safety to the Administrator of Food Safety.

Transfers to the Administration all functions of specified federal agencies that relate to the administration or enforcement of food safety laws. Renames the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) the Federal Drug and Device Administration.

Directs the Administrator to: (1) administer a national food safety program; and (2) ensure that persons who produce, process, or distribute food prevent or minimize food safety hazards. Sets forth requirements for the Administrator to carry out such duties, including: (1) requiring food establishments to adopt preventive process controls; (2) enforcing performance standards for food safety; (3) establishing an inspection program; (4) strengthening and expanding foodborne illness surveillance systems; (5) requiring imported food to meet the same standards as U.S. food; and (6) establishing a national traceability system for food.

Requires the Administrator to: (1) identify priorities for food safety research and data collection; (2) maintain a DNA matching system and epidemiological system for foodborne illness identification, outbreaks, and containment; (3) establish guidelines for a sampling system; (4) establish a national public education program on food safety; (5) conduct research on food safety; and (6) establish a working group on foodborne illness surveillance.

Requires the Secretary, acting through the Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), to develop the Food-Borne Illness Health Registry.

Directs the Comptroller General to report on the federal resources being dedicated to foodborne illness and food safety research.

Sets forth provisions regarding prohibited acts, recalls, penalties for violations of food safety laws, whistleblower protections, and civil actions."

AND, here is the whole thang...
http://www.govtrack.us/congress/billtext.xpd?bill=h111-875

You decide.
Molly