Four states consider laws defining meat (AP): Missouri led the way, and now state legislators in Nebraska, Tennessee, Virginia and Wyoming are considering bills that would restrict “meat” to flesh from animals, which would bar the word from packages of cell-cultured, plant-based or insect-based products.
Western snowpack to melt away (Mother Jones): The Sierra Nevada snowpack, which provides much of California’s water, including irrigation supplies for fruit, vegetable and nut farms, will dwindle over the next several decades as climate change creates warmer winters, according to a growing body of research.
Canada again says glyphosate is safe (iPolitics): After taking a second look, the agency Health Canada said glyphosate, the most widely used weedkiller in the world, is not a health risk if residues on food are within tolerance levels; the International Agency for Research on Cancer ranked glyphosate as a probable human carcinogen in 2015.
Global food prices fell in 2018 (FAO): The Food Price Index, based on a basket of five food commodities, fell 3.5 percent during 2018 due to lower average prices for meats, vegetable oils, sugar and dairy products.
Breeding higher-yielding, disease-resisting cassava (Nature): Researchers in Nigeria are cross-breeding disease-resistant African varieties of cassava with higher-yielding Asian varieties in hopes of new beneficial strains of the starchy root that provides income and food for more than 800 million people around the world.
Rural universities: More career training, less liberal arts (New York Times): Faced with declining funding and enrollment, public universities in rural areas stress career-focused programs and curtail liberal arts studies.