Costa runs against Scott to be Democratic leader on House Ag
California Rep. Jim Costa said on Wednesday that he was seeking party support to become the Democratic leader on the House Agriculture Committee, a post now held by Georgia Rep. David Scott. The race would be a rematch of 2020, when Scott became the first Black chairman of the committee.
Costa makes it a two-man race for ag gavel
Eight-term Rep. Jim Costa, who represents an agricultural district around Fresno in California's Central Valley, announced his candidacy for chairman of the House Agriculture Committee, saying the committee "should reflect the changing landscape of agriculture in the United States." As the majority party, House Democrats will select the chairman in the weeks ahead.
Former House Ag chairman seeks to end ethanol mandate
Two of the top-ranking members of the House Agriculture Committee are among the four lead sponsors of a bill to eliminate the federal mandate for corn-based ethanol.
“Looking for the next Cantor”
That's the line used by Kyle Kondik of Sabato's Crystal Ball, referring to the rare defeat of congressional incumbents in a primary election, with House Majority Leader Eric Cantor being this year's headline example. Kondik says an average of six House incumbents and one senator lose a primary each election cycle. In surveying the states yet to hold primaries, Kondik tabbed two farm-state incumbents worth watching: Rep Scott DesJarlais, Tennessee Republican, and Sen Pat Roberts, Kansas Republican.
Cantor defeat chills immigration drive at least through fall
The defeat of House Majority Leader Eric Cantor in a Republican primary in Virginia "could have major implications for an immigration overhaul," says the New York Times.
House agenda: Yes to CFTC and USDA bills, no to immigration
The House could begin debate this week on the Agriculture Department funding bill for the fiscal year that opens on Oct 1, says Majority Leader Eric Cantor's office.
Turning up immigration heat on Cantor
Supporters and opponents of immigration reform cranked up the pressure on House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, says Roll Call, "with less than two weeks to go before a closely watched primary race and the clock steadily ticking down on the 113th Congress."
USDA ‘framework’ intended to reduce salmonella-related illness
Poultry processors could be required to test birds for salmonella bacteria before slaughter and for so-called indicator organisms during processing under a USDA proposal aimed at reducing food-borne illnesses in raw poultry. Under the framework, the Food Safety and Inspection Service might create an enforceable standard to prevent sale of poultry with high levels of the bacteria.
Biden taps long-time USDA scientist to oversee food safety
Jose Esteban, the chief scientist at USDA's meat inspection agency, is President Biden's choice to become agriculture undersecretary for food safety, announced the White House. If confirmed by the Senate, Esteban would be the USDA leader on issues ranging from prevention of food-borne illness to regulation of cell-cultured meat, now approaching commercialization.
USDA will seek improvements to salmonella controls
Pointing to the tens of thousands of salmonella illnesses linked to poultry products each year, Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said on Tuesday that the USDA would mobilize "a stronger and more comprehensive effort" to reduce the risk of the disease-causing bacteria in raw poultry meat. The process could include pilot projects that encourage "pre-harvest controls" on the farm, an area not directly under USDA jurisdiction.
French dairy giant recalls 7,000 tons of baby formula
Lactalis, the biggest dairy company in France, has recalled over 7,000 tons of baby formula and powdered milk products across 80 countries, reports the New York Times. The recalls, which were implemented over the course of several weeks, amounted to one of the biggest such recalls in history. At least 38 children were sickened by salmonella found in the recalled products.
Report: Food-system change ‘startlingly absent’ from countries’ climate change commitments
Food systems account for roughly a third of global greenhouse emissions worldwide, yet a new analysis finds that strategies to reform how food is grown, processed and consumed are “startlingly absent” from most countries’ plans to tackle climate change. <strong>(No paywall)</strong>
Agriculture emerges from COP26 with focus on methane and innovation
The USDA would work with farmers to reduce agricultural emissions of methane, said the White House in describing the domestic impact of the UN climate summit in Scotland. The United States also is a leader in the Agricultural Innovation Mission for Climate, designed to accelerate breakthroughs in climate-smart farm production.
At climate talks, countries agree to halt deforestation and cut methane emissions
The second day of the UN Climate Change Conference (COP26) brought sweeping pledges to end deforestation and curb methane emissions. “This is a significant moment, like a ‘Paris moment’ for forests,” said Yadvinder Malhi, a professor of Ecosystem Science at the University of Oxford.
As COP26 nears, activists say agriculture should be a bigger part of the agenda
The United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP26), which starts Oct. 31 in Glasgow, has been billed as a “turning point” for humanity and the “last, best chance” of averting climate disaster. And given the growing awareness of the central role that food and agricultural systems play in climate change—both as a cause and as part of a potential solution—many activists say that the sector is not as big a piece of the COP26 agenda as it should be. <strong>(No paywall)</strong>
Will high-tech urban ag be the future of local food?
High-tech, indoor, urban agriculture is growing in places like New York, but so is controversy around them, according to FERN's latest story, produced in partnership with Edible Brooklyn magazine. The story, by Rene Ebersole, points to one indoor company that produces high-end specialty greens for restaurants called Farm.One. "In a town of eight million, Farm.One is part of a rising movement to cultivate produce where large numbers of people live by using high-tech systems and smart greenhouses placed at grocery stores, in basements and even inside cargo vessels."
Indoor-farming company set to go global with major investment
The tech-investment firm SoftBank Vision Fund says it will spend $200 million to help the indoor farming startup Plenty expand around the globe. Currently the company has two farms, one in San Francisco and another in Laramie, Wyoming, but it wants to scale up, tapping into population centers around the world.
In frigid, high-cost Alaska, ‘the salad wars are on’
Two small startups "with a starkly different vision of how to grow produce year-around, under uniquely Alaskan conditions," hope to reap profits, along with vegetables, in a state where the food chain is long and prices are high, says the New York Times.
Per capita meat consumption, now a record, to dip in 2025
The U.S. appetite for meat continues to grow. Ten years ago, Americans consumed an average of 200 pounds of meat per person annually. This year, it will be a record 227.6 pounds, thanks to larger pork and poultry supplies, before ebbing next year.
Appetite for meat in China could lead to much larger imports
Meat consumption in China has increased significantly since the 1970s and could climb further in the next decade, giving the country one of the highest per capita consumption rates in Asia, said a USDA report: "This trend creates new opportunities for exporters in the United States and other countries but it also poses food security challenges and environmental impacts."
Wealthy nations are losing their taste for meat, says report
For decades, the rule of thumb has been that as a country’s income rises, so does its meat consumption. Now a turning point may be at hand among high-income nations, especially in Western Europe and North America, where per capita consumption of meat is projected to decline in the coming decade, said a report on the world agricultural outlook on Thursday.
How food became a weapon in America’s culture war
As the conversation around food got bigger in the ’90s, the stakes also got higher. Mounting evidence that the American way of eating was causing serious health problems spurred talk of reform. Rather than engage with reformers, however, the right simply broadened its culture war around food, politicizing the debate in ways that had significant consequences, not only for public health but, eventually, for the nation’s response to climate change.<strong>(No paywall)</strong>
Trump administration seeks overhaul of fishing industry with new executive order
As the coronavirus pandemic ravages the meatpacking sector, the Trump administration late last week made a major announcement about another essential food industry: seafood. With a late-afternoon executive order, the administration laid out a pathway for the approval of ocean aquaculture in federal waters, a controversial departure from existing policy that could reshape the country’s seafood production.<strong>(No paywall)</strong>
Trump signs order to keep meat plants in operation during pandemic
Patagonia threatens to sue over national monument review
The outdoor retailer Patagonia says it’s prepared to sue if the Trump Administration tries to revoke any of the country's national monuments. Trump has ordered an unprecedented review by the Department of Interior of all national monuments established under the 1906 Antiquities Act in the last two decades.
Six months to sow ideas for voluntary organic checkoff
Rebuffed by the Trump administration, the Organic Trade Association turned to the public on Monday for ideas on how to design a voluntary checkoff program to raise research-and-promotion money for the sector and where to put the money. "The need for more investment in organic is widely agreed upon," said OTA chief executive Laura Batcha.
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.
Organic checkoff goes on the back burner
The industry proposal for a checkoff program to support organic food and products is moving so slowly at USDA that the Obama administration will probably leave office before producers vote on it. The Organic Trade Association submitted its proposal in May 2015 and as recently as this summer hoped for a referendum this year to establish the producer-funded research and promotion program.
GMO disclosure bill divides organic food community
The fractious organic food industry is deeply divided over the GMO disclosure bill nearing a vote in the Senate, says a blog post by Carey Gillam in Huffington Post, with the influential Organic Trade Association supporting it while opponents include the Rodale and Cornucopia institutes. "The bitterness runs so deep that some players are now pulling out of a two-day summit scheduled for July that is supposed to build consensus around GMO issues, sources said."
Organic sales leap 11 percent in one year for another sales record
Thanks to seemingly unquenchable consumer demand, the U.S. organic industry tallied sales of $43.3 billion in 2015, up 11 percent from the previous year and the latest in a string of records.
Trump chooses former White House adviser to become Agriculture secretary
President-elect Donald Trump nominated Brooke Rollins, director of his Domestic Policy Council during his first term, for Agriculture secretary, saying she would "spearhead the effort to protect American farmers, who are truly the backbone of our country." Rollins is chief executive of a think tank that has advocated stronger work requirements for SNAP recipients. She would be the second woman to lead USDA.
Issue new SNAP exemptions quickly, senators say
With the debate on the debt limit over, Democrats heading four Senate committees urged the Biden administration to act swiftly to remove a time limit on food stamps to able-bodied veterans, homeless people and young adults who "aged out" of foster care. The debt bill waived the time limit on those groups at the same time it lengthened the age range of people who must work at least 80 hours a month or be limited to 90 days of SNAP benefits in a three-year period.
Debt deal would boost SNAP outlays marginally, says CBO
The debt limit deal between President Biden and House Speaker Kevin McCarthy would expand rather than cut SNAP enrollment and spending — an unexpected result given Republican insistence on broader application of work requirements, said the Congressional Budget Office on Tuesday. The increases would be modest, amounting to an additional 78,000 people and from $200-$400 million a year in a program with 42.5 million participants at latest count.
SNAP work requirement waivers are element in debt ceiling debate
House Republicans returned to one of their original targets in the debt limit debate with President Biden — the authority of states to exempt able-bodied adults from the 90-day limit on food stamps unless they work at least 20 hours a week. Hundreds of thousands of SNAP recipients could be affected if Congress curtailed or eliminated state waivers.
Republicans elect farm-state Sen. Thune for majority leader
Republican John Thune of South Dakota prevailed over two rivals in closed-door voting on Wednesday and will become Senate majority leader in January. A supporter of biofuels, Thune, No. 2 in GOP leadership since 2019, will be the first majority leader from a farm state since Democrat Tom Daschle, also from South Dakota, in 2002.
Ernst’s soy slip stirs Senate race in Iowa
If all politics is local, the Senate race in Iowa was roiled by a profoundly local question last week: What's the break-even price for corn and soybeans? Sen. Joni Ernst, a member of the Senate Agriculture Committee, missed by a mile on soybeans and the reverberations continue. The Iowa Farm Bureau said on Sunday that Ernst "continues to have our full support" after a fake email suggested otherwise.
Trump acolyte presses ahead in Mississippi Senate race
Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith, a member of President Trump’s agriculture advisory committee in 2016, is following the president’s no-apology campaign style in the Senate runoff election against former U.S. agriculture secretary Mike Espy, a Democrat. Hyde-Smith is the front-runner in strongly Republican Mississippi.
Messer joins crowded GOP field to take on Indiana Sen. Donnelly
Indiana Sen. Joe Donnelly, a member of the Senate Agriculture Committee, is considered one of the most vulnerable Democrats running for reelection in 2018, and Republicans are lining up to take him on. Rep. Luke Messer, who currently represents Vice President Mike Pence’s former district, is the latest to announce his candidacy.