Decision will allow EU producers to compete on even-footing with New World winemakers.

Wine producers in the EU will be able to label their products as "organic wine" following a decision adopted today (8 February) by the European Commission's committee on organic farming.

Previously only grapes could be defined as organic, forcing wine producers to label their wines as "wine made from organic grapes." This put them at a disadvantage, they said, because competitors in the United States, Chile, Australia and South Africa could label their wine as organic.

"These rules will boost the development of the market for organic wines," said Uwe Hofman, a member of the IFOAM organic farmers group. "The new rules are a good compromise, even if the level of sulphites reduction will be a challenge for organic wine producers in some EU countries from Central Europe."

As the interest in environmentally responsible business practices grows globally, researchers are interested in how that interest translates into consumer sales. Researchers from the University of Missouri have found that United States consumers are more willing to buy clothing made from sustainably grown U.S. cotton than apparel produced using conventional practices in an unknown location.

Jung Ha-Brookshire, an assistant professor in the textile and apparel management department in the College of Human Environmental Sciences at MU, says transparency is the key.

"It is important for the apparel industry to remain transparent about its products, especially if they are produced in a sustainable manner," Ha-Brookshire said.

"We have shown that consumers want to know where their clothes come from and would rather buy sustainably produced clothes. Many apparel companies use sustainable practices; however, they don't promote them very well."

Brazil is on course to dislodge the United States as the world's top producer of biotech crops in the coming years, a leading promoter of farm biotechnology said Tuesday.

The US currently holds the lead with 69 million hectares (170 million acres) under biocrop cultivation in 2011, ahead of Brazil with 30.3 million, Argentina with 23.7 million and India with 10.6 million, the International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-biotech Applications (ISAAA) said.

But USAAA, a government-funded international body promoting the use of farm biotechnology, particularly in developing countries, said Brazil was last year the engine of global biocrop growth, with 4.9 more million hectares, up 20 percent from 2010.

Speaking in a teleconference from the Philippines, ISAAA President Clive James said that while the United States was currently well ahead, "Brazil is closing the gap very quickly" and bringing in new biocrops like sugar cane.

Brazil has eight million hectares of sugar, the largest hectareage in the world, and is expected to increase it by 50 percent in the next five years for both ethanol and sugar production, he noted.

A cargo ship spilled acid into China's longest river last week, contaminating tap supplies and sparking a run on bottled water in eastern China, the government and state media said.

It is the nation's second water pollution scare in a month, after factories in the southern region of Guangxi contaminated water supplies for millions with toxic cadmium and other waste in January.

The ship, reportedly South Korean, was docked in Zhenjiang city on the Yangtze river last Thursday when it leaked phenol -- an acid used in detergents -- into the water because of a faulty valve, local authorities reported.

Residents started complaining their tap water had a strange smell on Friday, and soon rumours that a capsized ship was polluting the river sparked a run on bottled water in at least two cities in Jiangsu province, the Shanghai Daily said.

A recent op-ed published in the journal Nature, by several scientists who are experts in their field, has the pundits all aflutter. But the subject is somewhat surprising: Sweeteners. (Nutrition professor Marion Nestle has posted the full PDF of the article here.)

Drs. Robert Lustig (a minor YouTube celebrity since his 2009 lecture on fructose), Laura Schmidt, and Claire Brindis argue that added sweeteners of all kinds -- including sugar, high-fructose corn syrup, and all their oddly-named ilk (that means you, maltodextrin!) -- have as many negative health effects as alcohol and should be regulated.

Responses have come from all over the food politics spectrum -- from Raj Patel in The Atlantic, who took to dreaming of a world where large corporations aren't in charge of feeding us, to Jennifer LaRue Huget on the Washington Post's Checkup blog, who just wants everyone to  get off her lawn leave such issues to personal responsibility.

Others have expressed scorn toward the group of scientists for addressing policy at all. This opinion can be summed up by a tweet from reporter Dan Mitchell that read, "Scientists need to set a much higher bar for proposing policy measures."

Daily Kos: "Winter Deep Freeze Will Cause Breakdown of German Electric Grid"

Well, at least that is what pro-nuke advocates predicted when Germany shut down its eight oldest nuclear power plants last year and decided to drive towards a renewable energy future. The recent deep freeze in Europe has, however, proven that to be thoroughly untrue. Recently, it is, in fact, nuclear-dominated France that is having problems covering its electricity needs because of the severe cold snap.