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Today’s Topics
farm subsidies
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Farm groups prod Congress for economic relief

With two weeks left in the congressional schedule for this year, time is running out for lawmakers to provide financial relief to agriculture, said two farm groups. "It is imperative that they address the well-defined and fully substantiated needs of farmers just trying to hold on for another season," said Zippy Duvall, president of the American Farm Bureau Federation.

Farmers need emergency assistance to offset lower income, says Boozman

The government should provide emergency aid to farmers to help them weather sharply lower commodity prices, said Arkansas Sen. John Boozman, the senior Republican on the Senate Agriculture Committee, on Tuesday. Prompt action on emergency aid should be coupled with enactment of a new farm bill yet this year, he said.

Don’t water down climate funding, says Stabenow

Senate Agriculture Committee chair Debbie Stabenow curtly rejected on Thursday a suggestion to divert climate change funding for agriculture to more generalized soil and water conservation work. “I know that there is a broad coalition of support standing with me,” she said.

Higher reference prices would benefit mostly Southern growers, says EWG

U.S. farm groups are giving priority to winning higher reference prices, a key factor in calculating crop subsidies, in the farm bill due this year in Congress. But the benefits would flow to a relative handful of large cotton, rice, and peanut growers, said an environmental group on Tuesday.

CFAP
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Pandemic aid to farmers at $7 billion as USDA pro-rates timber payments

The USDA will pro-rate its final round of pandemic payments to timber harvesters and haulers to stay within the $200 million limit for the aid program, officials said on Thursday. Meanwhile, USDA data showed disbursements of $6.98 billion in coronavirus relief to farmers and ranchers this year.

Burst of USDA top-up pandemic payments to farmers

Farmers have received $4.8 billion in long-promised payments of $20 an acre on crops that range from corn, soybeans, and wheat to sorghum and sugar beets, said USDA data on Monday. It was the largest disbursement of coronavirus relief funds since the Biden administration took office.

Coronavirus payments to farmers near $18 billion

Farmers get $1.96 billion from new coronavirus program

In the two weeks since the USDA began accepting applications for coronavirus relief, it has paid $1.96 billion to farmers and ranchers through the so-called CFAP2, according to data released on Thursday. The average payment was $20,639 on the 94,959 applications approved for assistance.

NIH
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Alcohol industry funding NIH study into benefits of drinking

An ambitious 10-year study undertaken by the National Institute for Health, which examines whether daily drinking can have positive health effects, is largely funded by the alcohol industry. It raises questions about the integrity of the trial and whether NIH employees broke the agency’s fundraising policies.

Critics in Canada and U.S. lambast WHO cancer agency

House panel questions U.S. support of WHO cancer agency

The National Institutes of Health has given the International Agency for Research on Cancer more than $1.2 million so far this year, says Chairman Jason Chaffetz of the House Oversight Committee. In a letter to the NIH director, Chaffetz blasts the IARC, part of the World Health Organization, for "controversy, retractions and inconsistencies," using its rulings on glyphosate and red meat as examples.

Rockey to head new food and ag research foundation

The Foundation for Food and Agriculture Research (FFAR), created by the 2014 farm law, has hired Sally Rockey as its executive director. She begins work in September.

Ag needs bigger view to win research money-Glickman

The agriculture sector should broaden its coalitions so it can land more research money, said Dan Glickman, former agriculture secretary, in a speech at the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Wayne Pacelle
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Pacelle leaves Humane Society as donors question his leadership

Less than 24 hours after a vote of confidence from the board of the Humane Society of the United States, Wayne Pacelle resigned as its chief executive due to complaints of sexual harassment. "Major donors said they would withdraw or reconsider their support," said the blog Nonprofit Chronicles. "Two of Pacelle's accusers went public with their charges. Others surfaced."

Pacelle stays as Humane Society chief, one-fifth of board members quit

Seven of the 31 members of the board of the Humane Society of the United States resigned in protest of the decision to keep Wayne Pacelle as the group’s chief executive, said the Washington Post.

U.S. appeals court overturns dismissal of pork checkoff suit

The U.S. appeals court in Washington "is breathing new life into a previously dismissed lawsuit alleging pork checkoff funds were indirectly used to benefit the lobbying efforts of the National Pork Producers Council," said Agri-Pulse.

National Restaurant Association
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Americans are more willing to experiment on cuisine

One-third of U.S. consumers tried a new cuisine in the past year and two-thirds eat a wider variety of ethnic foods than they did five years ago, says a survey by the National Restaurant Association.

Lobbying by the ‘good food’ sector is ‘limited to non-existent’

The "good food" sector, which includes Chipotle, Whole Foods and Applegate, are making inroads in the marketplace, but when it comes to policymaking, "their involvement on Capitol Hill, on issues from the farm bill to nutrition labeling, has ranged from limited to non-existent," says Politico.

Local meat, seafood, produce top food trends in 2015

A survey of professional chefs says the top food trends in 2015 are locally sourced meats and seafood, and locally grown produce, says the National Restaurant Association.

Restaurant chains cut calories 12 percent in new menu items

A survey of menus at the 66 largest U.S. restaurant chains found a new items on the menu contain 12 percent fewer calories, says a study in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine.

hydroponics
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I work for Tokyo Metro. I grow vegetables.

Under the name of “Tokyo Salad,” the Japanese subway operator Tokyo Metro is growing lettuce, salad greens, and herbs in a hydroponic warehouse under an elevated section of its Tozai Line, said the Mainichi newspaper.

Organic board decides hydroponics, but not aeroponics, can be organic

For 15 years, USDA has allowed hydroponic crops to be sold as organic and, at a meeting this week in Jacksonville, Fla., the advisory National Organic Standards Board decided to let that practice continue. The board rejected, 8-7, a proposal to deny the USDA Organic label to hydoponics and aquaponics despite a long-running campaign to limit the label to plants grown in soil.

Departing NOSB member supports ‘add-on’ organic label

Francis Thicke, who owns a certified organic dairy farm in Iowa, is ending his five-year term on the National Organic Standards Board with criticism of the influence of “big business” on the USDA organic program and with support for an add-on organic label that “represents real organic food.”

More study of bioponics is needed, says organic standards board

On a 10-4 vote, the National Organic Standards Board sent back to subcommittee the contentious question whether bioponics, a term covering hydroponics, aquaponics and aeroponics, are part of organic agriculture, reports Food Safety News. "This means that food grown using hydroponic methods may continue to be certified as organic" if producers meet other criteria for the organic label, said FSN.

illness
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Chicken is top among food categories in CDC analysis of food-borne illnesses

Chicken is America'a favorite meat, with per capita consumption approaching 110 pounds per person this year, roughly twice as much as beef. Five CDC scientists who analyzed U.S. outbreaks of food-borne illness in recent years say chicken caused the largest number of illnesses when outbreaks were ranked by food category.

General Mills recalls 10 million pounds of flour in food illness probe

Virus identified as cause of “dancing pigs”

Researchers at Iowa State University have pinpointed the virus that causes a mysterious trembling in piglets that in severe cases prevents them from nursing and can lead to starvation, said Feedstuffs. The affliction, sometimes called "shaker pigs" or "dancing pigs," dates back more than 90 years and is uncommon. The virus that causes the ailment comes from a family known as pestiviruses. Veterinary researchers used a new type of DNA sequencing to identify the virus causing the involuntary tremors. The next step is to develop a vaccine against the virus. The research team says the virus is not known to infect humans and does not affect the safety of pork from animals with the virus.

CDC says 77 new cases of salmonella linked to cucumbers

An additional 77 cases of salmonella were reported in the past week in a outbreak of food-borne illness linked to cucumbers imported from Mexico, said the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

antibiotic
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Bacterial resistance to antibiotics rises globally

A report from the think tank Center for Disease Dynamics, Economics and Policy warns there are more and more cases of antibiotic-resistant infections around the world, "and the agricultural use of antibiotics plays a large part," says Modern Farmer.

Drugmakers oppose FDA proposal on antibiotic reporting

The veterinary pharmaceutical industry strongly opposes an FDA proposal to collect more details about antibiotic use in livestock, said Agri-Pulse.

Antibiotic-resistant genes in bacteria on Australian wildlife

Researchers have found antibiotic-resistant genes are spreading to bacteria on Australian wildlife, says Macquarie University.

Six big US school districts specify antibiotic-free chicken

The Urban School Food Alliance, composed of six of the largest U.S. school districts, announced its members want antibiotic-free chicken to serve in their cafeterias.

USDA relocation
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USDA expected agency relocation would drive away employees

With the USDA on the cusp of moving two research agencies to Kansas City, a senior official said on Thursday that massive staff turnover — so far, 250 employees have declined to leave Washington — is par for the course for cross-country relocations. Michigan Sen. Debbie Stabenow offered a different take: “This is not a relocation. It’s a demolition.”

USDA says agencies are going to Kansas City regardless of staff refusals

Newly hired USDA employees will begin work in Kansas City on Monday as part of Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue’s decision to move two research agencies out of Washington. The USDA said it would use “an aggressive hiring strategy” to replace the 250 staffers who declined the offer to move halfway across the United States.

USDA tries to plug the holes as ERS staff flows away

The USDA is already recruiting employees to replace Economic Research Service staff workers who will not relocate to Kansas City this summer, said Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue on Wednesday.

White House targets ag provisions in veto threat of mammoth funding bill

The U.S. House opened debate on a mammoth federal spending bill, including money for the USDA, on Tuesday under the threat of a presidential veto of the $322 billion bill. The White House said it opposed half a dozen USDA provisions in the bill, including language that would preclude relocating two research agencies to Kansas City and implementing a new inspection system for hog-slaughter plants.

USDA moving ahead on agency relocations

A British consulting company will whittle down the list of potential relocation sites for two USDA research agencies in coming weeks with an eye to making a final recommendation after April, the USDA said on Wednesday.

food safety
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Trump picks Kennedy, vaccine skeptic, for health secretary

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. will head the Department of Health and Human Services in the new administration, said President-elect Donald Trump on Thursday. “For too long, Americans have been crushed by the industrial food complex and drug companies who have engaged in deception, misinformation, and disinformation when it comes to public health,” said Trump in announcing the nomination.

Huge losses in food supply and human health if superbugs spread

Drug-resistant pathogens could throttle meat, dairy, and egg production and cause millions of additional human deaths by 2050 if the superbugs are not controlled, said researchers on Thursday. They called for increased funding worldwide to prevent the spread of antimicrobial resistance.

Drugs often used on livestock despite ‘raised without antibiotics’ label

Federal researchers found drug residues in one of every five cattle marketed as “raised without antibiotics” in samples collected last fall, said the Agriculture Department on Wednesday. The findings “underscore the need for more rigorous substantiation of such claims,” it said, in “strongly” encouraging — but not requiring — meat processors to routinely test for residues if they put a “no antibiotics ever” label on their meat.

USDA plans one-year test of culled dairy cows for H5N1 virus

At the same time that the FDA said a second round of tests showed pasteurization kills the bird flu virus in dairy products, the USDA said it would test beef from culled dairy cows for the H5N1 avian flu virus for the coming year. Nearly $2 million has been paid to dairy farmers since July 1 as compensation for milk production lost to bird flu.

Inspector general slams FDA handling of infant formula recall

The FDA lacked or had inadequate policies in place to identify risks to the infant formula supply chain when it received complaints about production at a plant in Sturgis, Michigan, said an inspector general’s report on Thursday. Months passed before the FDA warned consumers in February 2022 not to use some of the products made at the Abbott Laboratories plant, leading to a formula shortage.