Three pork plants are top U.S. priority for reopening, says Peterson
The Trump administration's top meat-industry priority is reopening three pork plants, now shuttered due to coronavirus outbreaks, that account for 12 percent of U.S. hog slaughter, said the House Agriculture Committee chairman on Wednesday. Labor and public officials said meat production will not revive nationwide unless workers feel safe in the processing plants. <strong>(No paywall)</strong>
Soybean stocks to surge if Sino-U.S. trade war flares
Faith leaders call for stronger worker protections at meatpacking plants
The crisis faced by meatpacking and food processing workers amid the coronavirus pandemic requires further intervention, say faith leaders. More than 100 religious leaders have signed a letter to be sent to Congress and President Trump demanding additional assistance for rural communities and food system workers. <strong>(No paywall)</strong>
Farmers to Families Food Box will move from ‘truck to trunk’
The first deliveries of the USDA's Farmers to Families Food Box, a coronavirus relief initiative to move surplus commodities to food banks from U.S. farms, are expected in mid-May, said Agricultural Marketing Service officials on Wednesday. <strong>(No paywall)</strong>
‘The workers are being sacrificed’
new FERN investigation, published Friday in collaboration with Mother Jones, reporters Esther Honig and Ted Genoways tell the stories of workers in America's meatpacking plants who are facing high rates of Covid-19 — and of the industry's chilling disregard for its workforce. <strong>(No paywall)</strong>
USDA pilot offers 30-year contract for Conservation Reserve
Since 1985, the Conservation Reserve has paid landowners an annual rent to idle environmentally fragile land under contracts that last for 10 or 15 years. Now a pilot program will offer a 30-year contract in the Great Lakes and Chesapeake Bay regions.
As meat plants reopen, Iowa, South Dakota, Pennsylvania and Nebraska are coronavirus leaders
As many as 18 percent of workers in meat and poultry plants are infected with the coronavirus in Iowa and South Dakota, while Pennsylvania and Nebraska account for one-quarter of the Covid-19 cases nationwide, said CDC scientists and state public health officials. The CDC released the report as Smithfield Foods, one of the giants of the meat industry, began to reopen a hog plant that was a coronavirus hot spot three weeks ago.<strong>(No paywall)</strong>
FERN asks leaders about the future of the food system
The novel coronavirus crisis has made it impossible to ignore the fundamental weaknesses of our system of food production and distribution. Highly efficient, this system evolved to fulfill expectations of endless choice, immediate service, high yields, and low prices — but it has come at a cost. Now the country is experiencing food shortages, massive food waste, and rising hunger, while food processing plants have become hotspots of Covid-19. FERN asked a handful of people who work within the system, or who study it, what needs to change and got their views in a series of short statements. Click here for the full article. <strong>(No paywall)</strong>
Trump tariff payments went to big farm operators
When the Trump administration poured billions of dollars into rural America to mitigate the impact of trade war, "most of it bypassed the country's traditional small and medium-sized farms that were battered by the loss of their export market," said the CBS News program 60 Minutes on Sunday. It's just as likely big farmers will benefit in a big way when the USDA disburses $16 billion in coronavirus-relief cash to farmers and ranchers, said the program.
Trump signs order to keep meat plants in operation during pandemic
Advocates slam Trump order to keep meatpacking plants open
Environmentalists, labor groups, and animal rights advocates on Tuesday condemned President Trump's planned executive order to keep meatpacking plants open, despite reported outbreaks of Covid-19 at more than 60 of these plants across the country.
Packing plant reopenings will begin ‘maybe by the end of this week,’ says Perdue
Two days after President Trump ordered meat plants to operate during the pandemic, Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue said that some plants shuttered by coronavirus outbreaks will reopen "maybe by the end of this week, over the weekend." The labor union representing 250,000 meat workers asked state governors to set stronger safety standards than those proposed by the CDC. <strong>(No paywall)</strong>
Congressional control needed of ‘USDA’s bank,’ says Peterson
China may miss ‘phase one’ target for U.S. farm purchases
The prospect of ‘depopulating’ the U.S. hog herd
Nationwide, pork production has dropped by more than 20 percent over the last month, and industrial farmers find their barns filling up. Now, the "end for hundreds of thousands of pigs is likely to arrive in an orgy of waste that turns the stomachs of even the most pragmatic," writes Elizabeth Royte, in FERN's latest story. "Asked to describe how a farmer decides to 'depopulate' — the word of choice — a barn full of market-ready pigs, David Newman, a Missouri pig farmer and president of the National Pork Board, sighs heavily. 'It’s a tremendously emotional time to be in the livestock business. We’re trying to be creative.'”<strong>(No paywall)</strong>
Iowa leaders ask federal indemnities for hog culling
Farmers across the nation may be forced to kill 700,000 hogs a week because of coronavirus closures and slowdowns at slaughter plants, said four Iowa leaders in a letter to Vice President Mike Pence on Monday. Led by Gov. Kim Reynolds, the elected officials asked for federal indemnities to help the farmers stay in business.
Key senator defends decisions on nutrition spending
Congress increased funding significantly for public nutrition programs in the $2 trillion coronavirus relief package, said the chairman of the Senate subcommittee in charge of USDA spending on Monday. Congress has come under criticism for unfairly funding food programs in favor of farmers.
Coronavirus question: Spend more on food aid or farm aid?
Farmers and ranchers will need billions of dollars in coronavirus aid beyond the $16 billion in cash that USDA plans to disburse by June, 28 senators said in a letter to President Trump. At the same time, a band of university economists said USDA aid is weighted 4-to-1 toward producers and that the agency "should arguably show an equivalent amount of creativity to help the broader spectrum of struggling Americans with food needs."<strong>(No paywall)</strong>
As meat plants slow, U.S. will help growers kill livestock
The government offered to help livestock producers locate contractors skilled in killing herds or flocks of animals and to provide cost-share funding for their disposal because the coronavirus pandemic has shut down packing plants and reduced consumer demand. The National Pork Board held a webinar on Sunday that discussed step by step "emergency depopulation and disposal" of hogs.<strong>(No paywall)</strong
More coronavirus tests, broadband needed in rural America, say Senate Democrats
Covid-19 cases have been reported in more than two-thirds of rural counties, said a report by Senate Democrats, who called for nationwide rapid-response testing for the coronavirus and for expansion of high-speed internet to maintain commerce and healthcare in rural areas. <strong>(No paywall)</strong>