Dennis T. Avery
Born(1936-10-24)October 24, 1936
Lansing, Michigan
Died(2020-06-20)June 20, 2020 (87 years old)
Swoope, Virginia
Occupation(s)Author, Food policy analyst
Known forSupport of biotechnology in farming. Global warming denier.

Dennis Teel Avery (born October 24, 1936 – June 20, 2020) was the director of the Center for Global Food Issues at the Hudson Institute, where he edited Global Food Quarterly. He died on June 20, 2020, at the age of 83.[1]

A food policy analyst for 30 years, Dennis Avery began his career with the U.S. Department of Agriculture, served on the staff of President Lyndon Johnson's National Advisory Commission of Food and Fiber, and, prior to joining Hudson, was the senior agricultural analyst for the U.S. Department of State.[2] He was the author of several books, including the New York Times best-seller Unstoppable Global Warming: Every 1,500 Years which he co-authored with S. Fred Singer of George Mason University in Virginia.

Avery was an outspoken supporter of biotechnology, pesticides, irradiation, industrial farming, and free trade, as well as a long-time critic of organic farming and farm subsidies.[citation needed] He did not believe that DDT causes egg shell thinning in eagles.[3][4] Hudson Institute's financial backers include major agricultural companies (e.g. ConAgra, Cargill) and pesticide manufacturers (e.g. Monsanto Company, DuPont, Dow-Elanco, Sandoz, Ciba-Geigy.[5]

Dennis was also the father of Alex Avery, Adam Avery and Kevin Kelly.

Organic food and E. coli

According to critics Avery was the source of a claim that organic food is more dangerous to eat than food produced using chemical pesticides because of usage of animal manure in organic farming.[6][7] Specifically, in a 1998 article for The Wall Street Journal, he claimed the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) had conducted studies showing that eating an organic diet carried an 8-times the risk of E. coli infection than eating a conventional diet. Despite the fact that the CDC had never conducted any such testing, the Avery article was widely quoted.[8] The New York Times wrote about him: "Dennis T. Avery wants organic food to go away. And he doesn't care what it takes."[9]

Climate change

Avery believed that global warming is part of a natural cycle and therefore unstoppable.[10] Avery also predicted that the next 20 to 30 years would bring cooling temperatures.[11] These views are contradicted by the scientific consensus on the effects of global warming, that humans have had an unprecedented impact on Earth's climate system and caused change on a global scale,[12] and expects climate change to have a significant and irreversible negative impact on climate and weather events around the world, posing severe risks like ocean acidification and sea level rise to human society and to other organisms.[13][14][15]

Bibliography

References

  1. ^ "Dennis Avery (1936 - 2020)". The Heartland Institute. Retrieved 20 September 2020.
  2. ^ "Dennis T. Avery". Hudson Institute. Archived from the original on 5 January 2014. Retrieved 26 October 2007.
  3. ^ Researchers Closer to Solving Disappearing Bee Mystery, Heartland Institute, March 1, 2008.
  4. ^ Greenpeace: A Long History of Poor Judgment, Dennis Avery, Heartland Institute, March 1, 2008
  5. ^ John Stauber and Sheldon Rampton, Trust Us, We're Experts - How Industry Manipulates Science and Gambles with Your Future (New York: Penguin Putnam, 2001). ISBN 1-58542-139-1.
  6. ^ "Food wars". The Nation. Retrieved 21 October 2008.
  7. ^ "Saving the Planet With Pestilent Statistics". PR watch. Archived from the original on 14 October 2007. Retrieved 31 October 2007.
  8. ^ Suslow, Trevor; Department of Vegetable Crops, UCD (May 1999). "Organic Produce Production and Food Safety" (PDF). Perishables Handling Quarterly (98). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2010-12-14. Retrieved 2010-10-02.
  9. ^ Marian Burros (February 17, 1999). "EATING WELL; Anti-Organic, And Flawed". The New York Times. Retrieved 2007-12-14.
  10. ^ Dennis Avery & Fred Singer. "The Physical Evidence of Earth's Unstoppable 1,500-Year Climate Cycle". Archived from the original on December 2, 2008. Retrieved 2009-01-16.
  11. ^ CNN. "CNN;LOU DOBBS TONIGHT;aired Jan 13 2009". Retrieved 2009-01-16. ((cite news)): |author= has generic name (help)
  12. ^ IPCC AR5 WG1 Summary for Policymakers 2013, p. 4: Warming of the climate system is unequivocal, and since the 1950s many of the observed changes are unprecedented over decades to millennia. The atmosphere and ocean have warmed, the amounts of snow and ice have diminished, sea level has risen, and the concentrations of greenhouse gases have increased; IPCC SR15 Ch1 2018, p. 54: Abundant empirical evidence of the unprecedented rate and global scale of impact of human influence on the Earth System (Steffen et al., 2016; Waters et al., 2016) has led many scientists to call for an acknowledgment that the Earth has entered a new geological epoch: the Anthropocene.
  13. ^ Molina, M.; et al. (n.d.). "What We Know: The Reality, Risks and Response to Climate Change. A report by the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) Climate Science Panel" (PDF). AAAS. Archived from the original (PDF) on 5 June 2014. Retrieved 27 April 2019.
  14. ^ IPCC. "IPCC Fourth Assessment Report: Climate Change 2007 Sec. 3. Projected climate change and its impacts".
  15. ^ "ESRL News: New Study Shows Climate Change Largely Irreversible" (Press release). US Department of Commerce, NOAA, Earth System Research Laboratory (ESRL). 26 January 2009. Retrieved 27 April 2019.

Works cited

External links

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