So the bill is essentially saying that it would be illegal to manufacture (grow I presume) your own produce? It seems kinda foolish to me that such a bill would be proposed. I'm willing to bet most of us grow for ourselves and probably not commercially or for market (at least I don't) I'll have to read more carefully, I just skimmed it over and it seems kind of preposterous to me.

From what i got from This "Canada Consumer Product Safety Act." This its for companies that are selling items to other places or people.. They want to be allowed to do regular testing on these items.. "The maximum penalty for a violation is $5,000 in the case of a violation committed by a non-profit organization  or by any other person for non-commercial purposes  and $25,000 in any other case." I however dont think this is a problem, i dont think they do enough testing as it is look at the big nut out break we just had where people were getting sick.. I think it should be random testing and they should be allow to do it... As for growning vegis as long as your not selling them to companies, even if you have a little fruit or vegi stand and they wanted to test your vegis why would there be a problem you eat them they should be safe... the fine from what I got is for contaminated foods... And to be honest if i'm growning contaminated vegis in my backyard i would want to know... not to add that the sale of pesticides is illegal here so really what could i put on my vegis that could be all that bad... Aside from all this if they stopped all the farmers in our area that sell food to the local groccers then we have to import even more and that is a little silly to me since the econmy is so bad as it is... now to import even more for outside of canada i think not... the government would never tell you, you cant grow foods for your family nor would such a thing be passed... if you READ!! this act you would see thats not the case....
sorry to be so harsh but it makes me mad when people put down the government with out the whole story...
jen

Hi Jen - I have been following the whole story since the 80's with regard to this bill - It is important to look at " Codex Alimentarius " A UN based initiative to eventually ban natural herbs and Vitamins. The UN's deadline is 2009 for all UN member countries to be in Compliance. Not to get Political - but we are the Gov't, the people, not Global elites like Monsanto and other multi nationals Corporations that try to dictate legislation by lobbying our politicians for what works for their interests and not ours. I do respect your position. I myself am erring on the side of caution. It seems like the many checks and balances that once protected us are disappearing. One example of this is Alberta's oil - Not one drop is refined in Canada - It is sent directly to the US and sold back to us - yet is our oil..lol. We are the only country with that amount of reserves that doesn't nationalize its own oil..On the contrary we give it away..Why because Shell is powerful..they have lots of money to influence parties..If it happens with oil it happens in every instance where there is money to made. Again I didn't want to get into politics as I am very political..I did want to provide the information so that people could check it out.

cheers

Jeff Tiffany

An environmental organization could possibly use this legislation to ban the importation of GM seeds if they can be shown to be even a RISK to public health... Of course it would need a slew of lawyers and a big bank account to take on Monsanto, ADM, Dow and Syngenta. Not likely to happen. Remember Percy Schmeizer? His "victory" wasn't exactly decisive, and it pretty much bankrupted him.

The legislation, unlike Bill C-51, appears to be silent on the issue of herbal and non-traditional medicines, although the pharmaceutical industry giants are sure to find the necessary loopholes to shut down the small but growing market segment they don't yet control.

Thanks for posting this Jeff. I'll be doing some research. I'd be curious to read the "experts" you mention and their analysis/comparison of this bill to the Codex.

I have put more information on Codex Alimentartius in the Conversations link at the top of the forums.

Let's put this in perspective. This should not be a fearmongering post, but an informative one.

Codex will eventually "outlaw" this stuff, but I don't think this particular bill will do it. This is more of a labeling bill than anything from what I've read. C-6 is just another stepping stone in the overall process. That doesn't make it right, however.

What most people don't understand is that Codex Alimentarius is a part of the United Nations programs.

They are saying in C-6 that people won't be able to list medicinal plants as medicinal, but still could probably sell the plants as is. Like saying Lavender is only Lavender but no mention of its medicinal properties. Same with Garlic. Who's going to stop people from growing garlic for garlic toast?

And who's going to actually prove that someone cutting Lavender is going to use it in a medicinal sense? A person could pick Lavender as a scent thing for a lingerie drawer or weave ribbons through it. But as long as it's not a product labeled to have a medicinal claim to cure or prevent, it will still be sold as just a plain old plant.

I only list these as examples. There will be absolutely no budget to enforce these laws on regular people that only have a single herb growing in their garden. They can't afford to press charges against someone who's cutting Lavender, whether it's for keeping the plant tidy or to use in a scented pillow. And who's going to be dumb enough to want to call the cops on their neighbors because there's a pot of basil growing in the window?

It all boils down to big business and profit. Big pharma wants to use these plants and create synthetic versions of the plant chemicals and sell them in medicine form. If every Joe/Jane citizen makes their own "medicines" out of herbs, then big pharma sees this as competition that should be squashed. They want to copyright plants so that no one else has the right to use anything for their own purposes.

Herbal medicines work and they know it. More and more people are turning away from big pharma to try alternative medical help, or just to feel better even if it's only a placebo effect. They see herbal medicine as a huge threat to their profit margin.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monsanto

Thank You for posting this as it should cause people to be concerned, these are VERY serious issues...HANS.org has info too. Thanks Jane