Arkansas court changes dicamba deadline
Soybean and cotton growers in Arkansas are free to spray the weedkiller dicamba on their crops until June 30 under an order from the Arkansas Supreme Court on Tuesday. It was the latest turnabout in court for use of the herbicide, which has been embraced by farmers as a tool against invasive weeds but criticized as too likely to evaporate from its target areas and land on nearby fields.
As the Salton Sea shrinks, a toxic mess looms
The Salton Sea, the largest lake in California, is drying up, revealing a bed packed with toxic chemicals, the residue of a century of runoff from Imperial Valley farms. Public-health experts worry that those chemicals pose a grave risk to the health of people who live nearby, mostly farmworkers, the elderly and families too poor to relocate, as Lindsay Fendt reports in FERN's latest story, published with The Weather Channel. <strong>(No paywall)</strong>
How buying Monsanto tanked Bayer
The 2016 acquisition by Bayer of seed and chemical giant Monsanto has turned out to be a rotten deal. Shares in the German company have fallen 30 percent since the $63 billion deal closed, and are now at just 50 percent of their value in 2015, when the company was Germany’s most valuable.
Controversial pesticide use sees dramatic increase across the Midwest
Farmers have been using the weed killer glyphosate – a key ingredient of the product Roundup – at soaring levels even as glyphosate has become increasingly less effective and as health concerns and lawsuits mount. Nationwide, the use of glyphosate on crops increased from 13.9 million pounds in 1992 to 287 million pounds in 2016, according to estimates by the U.S. Geological Survey. <strong>(No paywall)</strong>
Informal FDA tests find glyphosate residue pervasive in food
The Food and Drug Administration says it has not found illegally high residues of the weedkiller glyphosate in samples of corn, soy, milk or eggs. But informal work by its scientists found residues in an array of commonly consumed food, said the Guardian. The FDA has been testing food for traces of glyphosate for two years and will likely release an official report later this year or in early 2019.
USDA now obscures the names of some farm subsidy recipients
After decades of releasing the names of everyone who receives farm subsidy payments, the USDA has changed course, hiding the names of a portion of farm subsidy recipients. An advocacy group that publishes the data says that the decision to withhold recipient names obscures how billions of dollars of taxpayer money is spent.
Farm payments doubled during subsidy flood, says EWG
The government paid a record $41.6 billion in a variety of subsidies to farmers in 2020, double the amount they received in 2018, when the Trump-era cash gusher began flowing, said the Environmental Working Group on Wednesday.
Very large farms collect one-fifth of USDA’s coronavirus payments
The average USDA coronavirus relief payment to farmers is less than $16,000 but the biggest operators are getting payments that are 22-times larger, said an environmental group on Tuesday in questioning the fairness of the $10 billion program. Meanwhile, lawmakers agreed to give more funding to the USDA so it can keep farm supports flowing.
‘Big pile of money’ for farmers could backfire in Congress
The Trump administration enabled multimillion-dollar payments to some large operators in this year’s round of trade war payments by obliterating the usual limits on farm subsidies, said the president of the National Farmers Union on Thursday.
Report links farm manure to algae blooms in Lake Erie
A spike in the number of large-scale animal farms and resulting manure production in the Maumee watershed is contributing to algae blooms in Lake Erie, a new report finds. The authors write that over half of the manure contributing to water pollution comes from farms that don't require permits or regulatory oversight.
Analyst: ‘Sure looks like’ ag census undercounted corn and soybean acreage
The latest Census of Agriculture, released in February, reported a 2.2 percent decline in U.S. farmland from 2017 to 2022. A portion of that reduction, involving corn and soybean cropland, may be overstated, said Aaron Smith, a professor of agricultural economics at UC-Davis, in a blog.
For the second time, Nebraska has top U.S. farm district
Stretching from Wyoming to Iowa and larger in area than New York State, Nebraska’s 3rd congressional district is again the No. 1 farm district in the nation, with $16.6 billion in crop and livestock production, says the new edition of the Census of Agriculture.
On average, U.S. farmers are aging, but a quarter of them are newcomers
One-third of America’s 3.4 million farmers are over the age of 65, and nearly a million more of them are within a decade of that milestone, according to the 2017 Census of Agriculture, released by the USDA on Thursday. For decades, the aging U.S. farmer has been a cause for concern, expressed in this question: Who will feed America in the future? [No paywall]
Ag census delayed by a year for Puerto Rico
Farmers in most of the United States will receive questionnaires this month as part of the twice-a-decade Census of Agriculture, but the USDA has decided to delay the survey of producers in Puerto Rico until December 2018.
USDA kicks off twice-a-decade Census of Agriculture
The USDA will begin mailing questionnaires for the 2017 Census of Agriculture to producers this week, the first step in a survey conducted every five years to create what is the most complete USDA picture of the farm and ranch sector.
After dry years, California snowpack is among deepest ever
Two years after an extremely dry winter led to restrictions on water use, the snowpack in the Sierra Nevadas is among the deepest on record, says the Los Angeles Times. An end-of-winter measurement by state snow survey chief Frank Gehrke found 94 inches of snow near the town of Phillips.
California drought: Bone dry in the south, wet in the north
California is so big "[i]t has different droughts in different places," Jay Lund, an engineering professor at UC-Davis, told the Los Angeles Times. Rainfall in the northern Sierra Nevada, a water source for much of the state, is 180 percent of average so far in the wet season, but Southern California, which gets half of its water from local sources, is historically dry.
Climate change could reduce Sierra Nevada snowpack by 50 percent
Snowmelt from the northern Sierra Nevada provides water for a large part of California during the warm months. An analysis by UCLA says that if greenhouse-gas emissions are not curbed, the snowpack that provides the water could be half its current size by the end of the century, reports public radio KPCC-FM in Pasadena.
California water board gives farmers a break thanks to rain
A wetter fall has convinced California regulators to ease up on water restrictions for farmers and ranchers in the San Joaquin-Sacramento River Delta and its watersheds, says Reuters. A foot of rain fell on the northern half of the state in October, making it the second wettest on record in the northern Sierra Nevadas. The south remained dry.
Fungicides may be factor in bee population decline
Scientists at Cornell University "found a shocker" when they analyzed two dozen environmental factors that may be at play in the decline in bumblebee populations: "Fungicides," says a Cornell release. "The scientists discovered what they call 'landscape-scale' connections between fungicide usage, pathogen prevalence and declines of endangered U.S. bumblebees."
Varroa mite more prevalent than thought among honeybees
A five-year survey of parasites and diseases affecting honeybee colonies found the varroa mite, regarded as a major factor in population declines, "is far more abundant than previous estimates indicated and is closely linked to several damaging viruses," says Feedstuffs.
Wild bumblebees are up for endangered species status
Federal wildlife biologists are considering whether to declare wild bumblebees endangered, reports The Denver Post.
Sales of antimicrobials for use in livestock are second lowest in a decade, says FDA
Drugmakers sold 24 million pounds of antimicrobials for use in food-bearing animals last year, a slight decline from the previous year and the second-lowest total in a decade, said the Food and Drug Administration on Thursday. Sales have declined sharply since the FDA shut down using the drugs to encourage weight gain in cattle, hogs, chickens, and turkeys.
Global declaration calls for lower use of antimicrobials in agriculture
Nearly 200 United Nations member states, warned of the rising health threat of drug-resistant pathogens, approved a declaration on Thursday to step up their work to preserve the efficacy of disease-fighting medicines, reduce the death toll from antimicrobial resistance (AMR) by 10 percent, and “meaningfully reduce” antimicrobial use in agriculture by 2030.
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.
‘Superbugs’ surging in Brazilian lakes, rivers, seas
A new study, to be published in November in the journal Science of the Total Environment, found that the waterways in Brazil’s two biggest cities have become “major sources of multidrug-resistant bacteria,” reports SciDev.Net. It is the first time these so-called superbugs have been found in these waters, which include those off the beaches of Rio de Janeiro, Guanabara Bay, and the waterways of São Paolo.
More states are incentivizing schools to buy local food
A growing number of states are reimbursing schools for buying locally grown and produced foods in an effort to improve children's diets while supporting local farmers. Before the pandemic, eight states and the District of Columbia had programs that subsidize local food purchases at schools — seven more states have added these programs since 2020.
Farm bill coming in a ‘timely manner,’ says House chairman
House Agriculture chairman Glenn Thompson acknowledged on Monday that time is tight for enactment of the new farm bill by Sept. 30, when current law expires. But he stuck to his frequent forecast of a bipartisan and bicameral bill "on time," which might mean a floor vote in the House.
Maine pulls plug on controversial salmon farm project
The Maine Department of Marine Resources on Thursday killed a proposal by a Norwegian-backed company to build two massive salmon farms in the middle of pristine Frenchman Bay, next to Acadia National Park. The decision ended a long-running saga that had generated considerable opposition in the community over fears that the farms would foul the water and ruin the local fishing and shellfish industries.
First-in-the-nation ‘right to food’ wins in Maine
Voters in Maine approved a constitutional amendment establishing a right to food in a landslide on Tuesday, despite disagreement over what it would mean, according to unofficial results. The amendment, the first such constitutional guarantee in the nation, was ahead by a 3-to-2 margin with votes counted in 507 of 571 precincts statewide.
Danone to terminate organic milk contracts in Northeast
Global food company Danone has given a year's notice to 79 organic dairy farms in the Northeast that it will stop buying their milk on Aug. 31, 2022. The decision is just the latest squeeze on organic dairy producers, who face rising costs and pressures to consolidate.
As part of reorganization, FDA names its first deputy commissioner for food
Seven months after saying he would put more emphasis on food safety, FDA commissioner Robert Califf announced the appointment of James Jones as the agency’s first deputy commissioner for human foods on Wednesday. Jones, a former EPA pesticide regulator, was a member of a task force calling for unified leadership on food safety duties that have been scattered among FDA offices.
FDA to ‘unify’ splintered food regulation duties under a single leader
After a baby formula crisis and a scathing critique of the FDA's disjointed structure, Commissioner Robert Califf said on Tuesday he would reorganize the agency to put food safety offices under the control of a powerful deputy commissioner. Consumer groups generally applauded Califf's plan as a step forward, although some critics called for more sweeping reforms, such as creation of a separate agency for food safety.
Put more emphasis on food regulation at FDA, says expert panel
The Biden administration should re-structure the FDA to give more prominence to federal regulation of the food supply with steps that could include appointing a deputy commissioner for food or even splitting the FDA into two entities, one dealing with drugs and the other overseeing food, said a panel of experts on Tuesday. "The current organizational structure lacks a clear leader and decision-maker," said the panel's report.
Interior agency will ‘maximize water deliveries’ to Southern California
State officials are expected to fight the Trump administration’s proposal to “maximize water deliveries” through the Central Valley Project to Southern California, including farmers in the Westlands Water District, the largest agricultural water district in the nation, says the Sacramento Bee.
Congressional leaders agree on California drought relief
A bipartisan water bill that includes drought relief for California could be put to a vote in Congress before the end of this week, said House and Senate leaders after agreeing on terms of the $558 million package. California Sen. Barbara Boxer said the bill tramples on the Endangered Species Act in order to divert more water to agriculture at the expense of salmon and the imperiled Delta smelt, said The Associated Press.
The LA Times tours America’s biggest — and most controversial — water agency
“I like people to be able to see with their own eyes that the state is not out of water because of lack of rainfall or snow pack,” Johnny Amaral, manager of California’s Westlands Water District, told the LA Times, after inviting the newspaper to tour the Westland facilities.
California’s latest attempts to save fish have farmers afraid
In California, federal fisheries regulators are mulling two new plans to save the state’s endangered winter-run Chinook salmon and Delta smelt—plans that could mean serious water shortages for farmers. While this year saw ample rain and snowfall in the northern half of the state, regulators warn that the precipitation wasn’t enough to make up for several years of historic drought.
As coronavirus hog backlog shrinks, farmers should see higher prices
Hog farmers struggled with a coronavirus-caused backlog of market-ready hogs that peaked at 3.5 million head at the end of May, forcing them to cull some and slowing weight gain on others. The backlog remains large, but Purdue economist Jayson Lusk says farmers may see "possibly elevated hog prices" by the end of the year as the hog supply shrinks.
Hog backlog on U.S. farms could hit 2 million head
As many as 2 million hogs are backed up on U.S. farms because of coronavirus slowdowns and shutdowns at meatpacking plants, said three economists on Thursday, with the backlog likely to persist into the fall. The oversupply will weigh on market prices unless there is a strong recovery as the economy reopens, they said. <strong>(No paywall)</strong>
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>
Hog prices below cost of production because of trade war
Pork producers will struggle through this winter with market prices below the cost of production, says economist Chris Hurt of Purdue University. "Record pork production and trade disputes continue to be the near-term drag on prices," wrote Hurt at the farmdoc Daily blog, adding that futures prices in the spring and summer "will be high enough to provide profitability."
Disease hitting Chinese hogs sure to spread in Asia
The world's leading hog producer, China has culled nearly 40,000 hogs in its attempts to stop African swine fever since the disease, deadly for hogs but no threat to humans, was spotted on its farms last month. The U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization said the disease will almost certainly emerge in other countries in Asia.