FDA must study what happens if GMO salmon escape, says judge
A federal judge in San Francisco ordered the FDA on Thursday to take a new and stronger look at the potential consequences on native salmon if AquaBounty's fast-growing GMO salmon escaped from fish farms and established itself in the wild.
New chairs on the way for Senate and House Agriculture panels
Southerners could lead both of the Agriculture committees in Congress as a result of Tuesday's general election, which trimmed the majorities Republicans hold in the Senate and Democrats hold in the House. Rep. David Scott of Georgia was first in seniority to succeed chairman Collin Peterson of Minnesota on the House Agriculture Committee, and Sen. John Boozman of Arkansas was in line to chair the Senate panel.
Once again, rural America votes for Trump
Rural America was key to Donald Trump's election in 2016 and rural voters backed him again this year, although by how much is unclear. While one exit poll reported that 54 percent of small city or rural residents voted for Trump, the Daily Yonder said the president's performance in Ohio, a battleground state, "looks a lot like 2016," when he rolled up huge margins in rural counties.
Peterson, ag committee chair, defeated after three decades in House
Two and possibly three of the "four corners" of farm policy, the Capitol Hill nickname for the chairmen and the minority leaders of the Senate and House Agriculture committees, will be occupied by new faces when Congress convenes in January. Two of the seats could go to Arkansans: Sen. John Boozman appears certain to succeed Pat Roberts as the top Republican on the Senate committee and Rep. Rick Crawford is vying to be the ranking Republican on House Agriculture.
Farmer optimism is record high in a pandemic year of extremes
More than 1 million SNAP households shop online
The USDA is trying to expand online grocery shopping for SNAP recipients by adding local and regional grocers to the program, said Agriculture deputy undersecretary Brandon Lipps. The USDA said over 1 million SNAP households shopped online in September, out of more than 22 million households participating in the program.
Financial and trade issues loom in agriculture as presidential race ends
U.S. ‘stabilizes’ H-2A pay rates at 2020 level through 2022
Trump runs in rural America on ethanol, tax cuts, regulatory relief
President Trump is ending his re-election campaign in rural America on the same issues that boosted him in 2016: Promises of tax cuts, fewer federal regulations and support for corn ethanol. In addition, farmers are wealthy from $23 billion in trade-war payments, said Trump in Dubuque, Iowa, on Sunday; "That's why you're all here and you're all happy."
Agriculture’s meeting season will be mostly digital this winter
Farm groups, from local cooperatives to large national organizations, traditionally hold their annual meetings during the winter, when field work is at a minimum and a meeting in town mixes business with a social get-together. Many of the national meetings will be held online this time due to the pandemic.
U.S. hits Thailand for blocking American pork
The United States suspended $817 million in trade preferences granted to Thailand "based on its lack of sufficient progress [in] providing the United States with equitable and reasonable market access for pork products," said the Office of the U.S. trade representative on Sunday. Trade representative Robert Lighthizer said when countries fail to meet the criteria to participate in the General System of Preferences, "we will take action by limiting their preferential duty-free access to the U.S. market."
Judge blocks USDA suspension of farm wage survey
The USDA will have to go ahead with its semiannual survey of farmworker wages under a ruling issued Wednesday by a U.S. district court judge. Farmworker advocates say the Trump administration, by attempting to abandon the survey, is trying to depress farm wages.
Presidential election should be followed by a national food strategy, says report
The coronavirus pandemic, which has disrupted food supplies and heightened food insecurity, should be the impetus for unified oversight of the food system, now splintered among dozens of regulatory agencies, said an "urgent call" for action from groups at the Harvard and Vermont law schools on Thursday.
EPA reduces exclusion zone around pesticide applicators
The EPA finalized a regulation on Thursday that reduces the size of the buffer zones intended to protect people from pesticides being applied on the farm. EPA administrator Andrew Wheeler said the new regulation would be simpler and easier to follow than its predecessor.
‘Phase one’ fails to deliver, and a new approach to China is needed, says trade expert
The "phase one" agreement that de-escalated the Sino-U.S. trade war is not paying off in massive sales of U.S. products, including food and agricultural exports, to China or in the long-term reform of Chinese trade practices, said Chad Brown of the Peterson Institute for International Economics. "(President) Trump's trade war has failed to address what really ails the U.S.-China trade relationship," wrote Brown in a blog. "It is time for a new approach."
Rural Covid rate exceeds rural share of U.S. population
Rural communities are bearing the brunt of new Covid-19 cases nationwide with the pandemic in its seventh month, said a report from the Center for American Progress on Wednesday. "Since the beginning of August, the rural share of new cases has exceeded the rural share of the U.S. population."
With Trump rule, food-insecure immigrants have few options
The pandemic has exacerbated food insecurity for households across the country, but undocumented immigrants and mixed-status families have faced unique challenges. That’s in part because they’ve been excluded from the momentary salve of government relief efforts, from stimulus checks to enhanced unemployment benefits. But it also stems from the Trump administration’s hostile immigration policies and rhetoric — and notably the president’s changes to the “public charge” rule, which has led many to shy away even from benefits for which they are eligible. <strong>(No paywall)</strong>
EPA approves dicamba on GE cotton and soybeans through 2025
The Trump administration approved the use of the weedkiller dicamba on genetically engineered cotton and soybeans for the next five years, saying new safeguards would tame a notoriously volatile herbicide blamed for damaging millions of acres of neighboring lands. Farm groups cheered the continued access to a "critically important weed control tool" and the Center for Food Safety, a skeptic of industrial agriculture, said it "will most certainly challenge these unlawful approvals."
Farm and ranch groups oppose Colorado’s gray wolf referendum
Colorado voters will decide on Nov. 3 whether the gray wolf, nearly hunted to extinction a century ago, will have a home west of the Continental Divide in their state. If they approve Inititiative 114, the Colorado Parks and Wildlife Commission would be charged with planning for and carrying out the reintroduction of the gray wolf by the end of 2023, including the possibility of compensation for livestock lost to wolves.