U.S. asks for WTO ruling on wine sales in British Columbia
The third-most populous province in Canada discriminates unfairly against U.S. wine, said the Trump administration in asking the World Trade Organization to rule on retail wine sales in British Columbia. The issue of wine sales in grocery stores has been raised in negotiations over the new NAFTA as well.
Trump wants to double U.S. farm exports to China within five years
While U.S. and Chinese officials publicly set a goal of “meaningful increases” in farm exports, President Trump wants to more than double U.S. sales to China in the near term, said Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue on Wednesday.
Organic turns inward in the face of setbacks at USDA
On Thursday, Laura Batcha, chief executive of the Organic Trade Association, announced an OTA pilot project to prevent fraud in the organics supply chain. The group, she said, is also exploring a voluntary program to fund promotion and research for organics.
Honeybees, and beekeepers, have a tough winter
Beekeepers lost three of every 10 of their managed honeybee colonies to harsh weather this past winter, the highest winter mortality rate in five years, according to a nationwide survey released on Wednesday.
Modernized farmworker visa on the way, says administration
With immigration legislation stalled in Congress, four members of President Trump’s cabinet said on Thursday that they will modernize the H-2A guestworker program for agricultural labor.
Don’t mess with farmers, warns biggest U.S. farm group
Voting against the farm bill can invite electoral consequences, the president of the largest U.S. farm group wrote in an essay. “Rural America still packs an influential punch,” he said.
House quietly aims for farm bill revival by June 22
Four days after defeating the farm bill, the House quietly delayed Speaker Paul Ryan's attempt to revive the bill until June 22, with GOP leaders hoping that hardline Republicans will vote for it the second time. Members of the House Freedom Caucus provided the decisive votes against the farm bill to underline their demand for a roll call on immigration controls. <strong>(No paywall)</strong>
EPA bars reporters from Pruitt summit on water contaminants
The Environmental Protection Agency barred reporters from a national summit on water contaminants, which was convened Tuesday by EPA administrator Scott Pruitt. Reporters from the AP, CNN, and E&E News were blocked from attending the meeting, and one reporter was shoved from the building.
Less leverage for farm payment reform, says Grassley
The USDA has a "glaring loophole" in its farm subsidy rules that allows people to collect up to $125,000 a year in subsidies for providing farm management, said Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley, who is trying to get a tougher set of rules into law.
Senate panel ignores White House on foreign food aid
The Food for Peace program, created during the Cold War to alleviate hunger overseas, would see $1.7 billion in funding in the new fiscal year, a Senate Appropriations subcommittee decided on Tuesday, ignoring a White House proposal to mothball the program.
Trump: China will buy ‘practically as much as our Farmers can produce’
In a pair of tweets on Monday, President Trump touted a potential trade deal with China that would mean massive Chinese purchases of U.S. farm exports. The tweets followed a joint statement by the two nations that a deal would include “meaningful increases” in agricultural goods.
GOP whip says House will try immigration, then farm bill re-vote
Acceding to demands by conservatives, the House will take up the restrictive Goodlatte-McCaul immigration bill during the third week of June and then follow that with a new vote on the farm bill, said Majority Whip Steve Scalise on Monday.
What comes after ‘Got Milk?’ It’s ‘Got Jobs?’
The U.S. dairy industry launched the “Got Jobs?” campaign on Monday to highlight the importance of the dairy sector and build support for dairy exports, which account for about 14 percent of U.S. milk production.
After House rejection, farm bill timeline may stretch into 2019
In the last farm bill, conservative Republicans demanded the biggest cuts in food stamps in a generation, leading the House to defeat the bill in June 2013. It then took Congress more than six months to put the pieces together. The same outcome is possible now after a revolt by Republican conservatives defeated a new farm bill calling for stricter work requirements for food stamp recipients and looser payment limit rules for farmers. But this time the delay may stretch into the new year.
Big crop subsidies despite USDA payment limits
A corn, soybean and rice operation collected $3.7 million in crop subsidies in 2015, said the Government Accountability Office in a report on USDA's rule limiting subsidies to people "actively engaged" in farming. The rule requires members of general partnerships and joint ventures to provide land, capital or equipment to a farm and also labor or management.
Organic food sales rise by 6.4 percent in a year
Americans purchased a record $45.2 billion worth of organic food last year - half of it in fruit, vegetables, dairy and eggs - as organics took a still-larger share of U.S. spending on food, said a survey commissioned by the Organic Trade Association. Sales of organic food more than doubled in the past decade and now account for 5.5 percent of grocery sales.
With a bit of help, House GOP breezes past farm bill obstacles
Democrats joined the Republican majority to defeat the final challenges to crop subsidies in the House farm bill on Thursday, immediately followed by two-party teamwork to reject a more stringent line of SNAP work requirements than were written into the bill.
Farm groups disagree on farm bill checkoff amendment
Thirty-eight farm groups signed on to a letter to the ranking members of the House Agriculture Committee urging them to oppose a farm bill amendment that would more stringently regulate commodity checkoff programs.
While House smolders, Senate chugs along on farm bill
The leaders of the Senate Agriculture Committee are working in private on a bipartisan farm bill, according to aides, who declined to suggest when a draft would be released. The emphasis on bipartisanship contrasted with the political rupture in the House over work requirements for food stamps.
Sharp division, specter of 2013 defeat in farm bill debate
House Democrats stood solidly against the GOP-written farm bill in a test vote on Wednesday that gave Agriculture Committee chairman Michael Conaway little room to maneuver on the legislation, which would tighten work requirements for food stamps and loosen subsidy rules for farmers.