World hunger rate rises quickly as global economy stutters
Nearly one in 10 people worldwide suffer from hunger, an increase of 150 million since the pandemic struck in 2020, and the numbers are sure to worsen, said the annual UN hunger report on Wednesday. “The global price spikes that we are seeing as a result of the crisis in Ukraine threaten to push countries around the world into famine,” said the leader of the World Food Program.
FDA says it will permanently streamline infant formula imports
A crash program to streamline U.S. imports of infant formula has worked so well, the FDA will make it permanent, said agency leaders on Wednesday. The program, which began in May when domestic supplies ran low, has resulted in shipments from nine countries of enough formula to fill 400 million 8-ounce bottles.
Farmer confidence is second-lowest in nearly six years
Seven out of every 10 large-scale farmers and ranchers expect high inflation to persist into 2023 and 51 percent anticipate their operations will be worse off financially next summer than they are now, said Purdue University on Tuesday. Its Ag Economy Barometer, a monthly gauge of farmer confidence, fell to its second-lowest level since October 2016.
Biofuels are driving up already high vegetable oil prices
Biofuels are far more responsible for high vegetable oil prices than Russia's invasion of Ukraine, said agricultural economist Aaron Smith of UC-Davis, and the biofuel industry will drive up vegetable oil prices further. Ukraine and Russia produce more than half of the sunflower oil in the world but the oil accounts for only 10 percent of global production of vegetable oils.
Keep China out of U.S. agriculture, say House lawmakers
A week after a House committee voted to prohibit China from purchasing U.S. agricultural land, the No. 3 House Republican leader cited national security concerns in spearheading legislation to block China from acquiring U.S. agricultural companies. The restrictions were proposed at the same time business groups sought removal of U.S. tariffs on Chinese goods, remnants of the Sino-U.S. trade war.
Are Iowa’s proposed CO2 pipelines a legitimate climate mitigation tool?
Iowa environmentalists say the plan to build three pipelines to move liquified carbon dioxide — collected from the smokestacks of ethanol refineries — to North Dakota and Illinois, where the carbon would be pumped underground, will simply prop up the fossil fuel industry and shower their agribusiness investors with tax credits.
Higher reference prices come with a cost
Since early this year, farm groups worried about rising production costs have called for higher reference prices, which are used in calculating crop subsidies, to be written into the 2023 farm bill. Congress is months away from drafting the farm bill, so there has been little discussion of the budgetary impact. But it could be significant, according to university economists who looked at a related concept: The reference-price escalator that was included in the 2018 farm law.
Record soybean crop within reach, despite planting delays
Farmers might still harvest the largest U.S. soybean crop ever, even if a rainy spring kept them from planting as much of the oilseed as they had intended. Meanwhile, growers planted slightly more corn than expected, despite high prices and tight supplies for fertilizer and pesticides, reported the Agriculture Department on Thursday.
USDA funds to help schools buy food
The Biden administration said it would provide an additional $943 million in USDA funds to schools so they can purchase American-grown food for their meal programs.
Climate ruling could ripple into food and ag regulations
The U.S. Supreme Court limited the EPA’s ability to regulate carbon dioxide emissions from power plants on Thursday. The ruling could have broad impact with its reasoning that Congress must give an agency specific authority to act on particular issues.
On Bangladesh shrimp farms, climate adaptation gone wrong
Since the 1980s, as rising seas and storm surges started pushing saltwater through the banks of tidal rivers and ruining their crops, rice farmers in Bangladesh, backed by the government, began shifting to shrimp farming. As Stephen Robert Miller writes in FERN’s latest story, published with The Guardian, “It was a way to adapt, and for a while it worked. Commercial shrimp, known as ‘white gold,’ has become one of the country’s most valuable export commodities.” <strong>(No paywall)</strong>
Global demand for biofuels to slow in decade ahead, says forecast
Corn will become less important and sugarcane will become the dominant feedstock for making ethanol in the coming decade, said an agricultural outlook published jointly by the OECD and FAO on Wednesday. The report forecast a relatively slow growth rate for biofuels, averaging 0.6 percent a year worldwide, with growth in the United States constrained by declining gasoline consumption.
Producers receive $4 billion in ERP payments
In the six weeks since the USDA launched the program, farmers have received $4 billion from the Emergency Relief Program as compensation for losses from wildfire, drought, hurricanes, winter storms, and other natural disasters, said Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack on Wednesday.
As the heat rises, who will protect farmworkers?
In much of the country, as climate change drives increasingly brutal heat waves, farmworkers lack protection. How they fare will largely depend on whether their employers voluntarily decide to provide the access to water, shade, and rest breaks that are critical when working in extreme heat. <strong>(No paywall)</strong>
Miller defeats fellow House Ag member Davis in Illinois district
First-term Rep. Mary Miller easily won the Republican nomination to the House over veteran Rep. Rodney Davis in an Illinois primary election that she framed as a test of loyalty to Donald Trump. The former president endorsed Miller. Davis was one of 35 House Republicans to vote for creation of an independent commission to investigate the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol by a pro-Trump mob.
G7 nations pledge additional $4.5 billion for food aid
Up to 323 million people worldwide are at risk of starvation due to the pandemic, climate change, global economic woes and warfare including Russia's invasion of Ukraine, said the leaders of the world's leading democracies. The Group of Seven committed an additional $4.5 billion on Tuesday "to protect the most vulnerable from hunger and malnutrition."
Dead zone in Chesapeake Bay forecast to be smaller this year
Bayer ‘not surprised’ by second Roundup rebuff
For the second time in a week, the Supreme Court rejected Bayer's attempts to shield itself from lawsuits alleging that its Roundup weedkiller is carcinogenic. Bayer said it "is not surprised" by the decision on Monday and pointed to the possibility of a change in the legal environment in its favor.
In a key step, developer says FDA finds GMO wheat is safe to eat
After a generation on the sidelines, the wheat industry may be on the cusp of joining the era of agricultural biotechnology. Crop developer Bioceres said on Monday that the FDA has determined during consultations that its HB4 wheat variety, genetically modified for drought- and herbicide-tolerance, was safe to eat.
Groceries for July 4 cookout cost $10 more than last summer
The supermarket tally for an Independence Day cookout is a first-hand look at inflation — up by 17 percent from last summer, with the skyrocketing price of meat a leading reason. The American Farm Bureau Federation said on Monday that data from its volunteer price checkers nationwide indicated the groceries to feed 10 people at a cookout would cost $69.68, almost $10 more than last year.