USDA

Growers across the country face tighter margins due to the combination of high production costs and sharply lower commodity prices, a panel of farmers told a House Agriculture subcommittee. They asked for action against farm subsidies overseas and for continued federal support at home. "For many Texas producers, there is no room for error" this year, said Steve Verrett, a cotton grower and executive vice president of Plains Cotton Growers in Lubbock, Texas.

House Agriculture chairman Michael Conaway forecasts easy passage of a bill to repeal country-of-origin labeling (COOL) on cuts of beef, pork and chicken, beginning with his committee today and on the House floor in June. "If we can get a big vote in the House ... that will help" build momentum for Senate approval, Conaway told reporters on Capitol Hill. He said he was working with GOP House leaders to arrange a floor vote in early June. "The train is leaving the station, if not left the station."

The House Agriculture Committee will vote on Wednesday on repeal of the U.S. law that requires cuts of beef, pork, chicken and lamb to carry labels that say where the animals were born, raised and slaughtered. Chairman Michael Conaway, committed to repeal, called the meeting in the wake of a World Trade Organization ruling that the country-of-origin labels (COOL) are a trade barrier in disguise that suppresses imports from Canada and Mexico, which have fought COOL since 2008.

U.S. manufacturers and foodmakers are pressing lawmakers for speedy repeal of the U.S. law that requires labels on packages of beef, pork, lamb and poultry meat to say where the animals were born, raised and slaughtered. So-called country of origin labeling (COOL) has been under challenge since December 2008 at the World Trade Organization, which has promised a final ruling on the matter by today. The United States lost three previous rulings and was expected to lose this one as well. WTO says COOL distorts trade by discouraging imports of livestock from Canada and Mexico.

With farm income suffering from low crop prices and livestock producers facing tighter margins, more operators are borrowing money to cover short-term needs and some are having trouble repaying the loans, according to Federal Reserve banks in the Farm Belt. Agricultural bankers expect farmland values in the Midwest and central Plains to soften or hold steady through June. Land is a farmer's greatest asset.

Nearly four of every 10 colonies of honey bees die annually, a markedly high rate, according to surveys of beekeepers designed to gauge the welfare of a prominent species for plant pollination. Losses have averaged 37 percent over the past five years.

Two major trade groups, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the National Association of Manufacturers, told lawmakers that repeal is the only option available in a losing battle over the so-called country of origin labeling (COOL) law. The World Trade Organization has ruled three times against COOL, which requires labels on packages of beef, chicken and pork saying where the animals were born, raised and slaughtered.

The rapidly growing organic industry petitioned the USDA for a referendum to create a checkoff program to pay for research and promotional work to expand production and sales. The checkoff, to be called the Generic Research and Promotion Order for Organic, or GRO Organic, would be the first such program dedicated to a production method. Two-dozen checkoffs, focusing on products from pork, cotton and popcorn to mangos and watermelons, are in operation and have spawned advertisements such as "Got Milk?" and "Beef - It's what's for dinner."

A new rule proposed by the USDA would limit joint ventures and general partnerships to a maximum of three people who can collect crop subsidies by declaring they are farm managers. The proposal is open for public comment until May 26. The 2014 farm law empowered the USDA to write stricter rules about who is "actively engaged" in farming, but it exempted family farms, which constitute 97 percent of the 2.1 million farms in the country.

Highly pathogenic avian influenza was confirmed in a backyard flock of mixed poultry in northeastern Indiana, the farthest east the disease was been identified since the epidemic began last Dec. 14, said the USDA. The outbreak occurred in Whitley County, about 25 miles west of Fort Wayne. State official quarantined the property and said the flock would be destroyed as a precaution against spread of the disease.

The House Agriculture Committee voted to elevate the USDA's reports on livestock sales prices to an essential federal service that would stay in operation even if there is another government shut-down. The designation was written into a bill to extend the life of the mandatory livestock price-reporting law for cattle, hogs and sheep to Sept. 30, 2020.

The government will make its first estimate of the winter wheat crop and project the corn and soybean harvests in a pair of reports on Tuesday that traditionally rank among the most important of the year. They mark the moment when the USDA turns its attention to the new crops and when the key question for 2014's crops becomes the size of the stockpile when the marketing year ends.