AgClips
Recent AgClips
Fewer risking illegal border crossings to work on farms
My San Antonio | Posted onAugust 17, 2017 in Agriculture, Federal NewsThe profile of the U.S. immigrant farm worker is changing, with fewer chancing an illegal crossing of the U.S.-Mexico border to follow harvests and more settling in with the same employers and establishing roots here, a new study by the nonpartisan Migration Policy Institute found. The August issue brief, which analyzes data from the U.S. Department of Labor’s National Agricultural Worker Survey, found that the percentage of undocumented agricultural workers dropped from 55 percent in 2000 to 47 percent in 2014.
Urban floods intensifying, countryside drying up
Science Daily | Posted onAugust 17, 2017 in Agriculture, Rural NewsDrier soils and reduced water flow in rural areas -- but more intense rainfall that overwhelms infrastructure and causes flooding and stormwater overflow in urban centers. That's the finding of an exhaustive study of the world's river systems, based on data collected from more than 43,000 rainfall stations and 5,300 river monitoring sites across 160 countries.
Canada's goals for 'progressive' NAFTA include labour and environmental standards, gender equality
CBC | Posted onAugust 17, 2017 in Agriculture, Federal NewsSounding optimistic, but warning that negotiations could be difficult, Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland used a series of appearances on Monday to explain that Canada will seek to modernize North America's 23-year-old trade deal to update its labour standards, ease cross-border movements of professionals, cut red tape and open up government procurement.
Vegetable Growers’ Food Safety Vigilance Is Paying Off (Opinion)
Growing Produce | Posted onAugust 17, 2017 in Agriculture, Federal, Food NewsI wanted to get a handle on just how often food safety recalls involving vegetable growers occur, so I pored through public records from the FDA. The agency reports every recall it issues, from medical devices to vitamins and supplements, to meat and dairy, to produce. It turns out vegetable growers are doing pretty well.There have been 210 food safety recalls so far in 2017 as of this posting.
California Nurseryman Settles With Feds Over Plowing Dispute
Growing Produce | Posted onAugust 17, 2017 in Agriculture, Federal NewsJohn Duarte, and Pacific Legal Foundation (PLF) and their co-counsel announced today Duarte Nursery has agreed to a settlement in the federal government’s nearly five-year enforcement action over Duarte’s plowing of his property to plant wheat in late 2012. Under the agreement, Duarte would admit no liability, pay the government $330,000 in a civil penalty, purchase $770,000 worth of vernal pool mitigation credits, and perform additional work on the site of the plowing,” Francois said in a statement.The case has drawn national attention.
Biomass-Based Biodiesel Prices--How Much Does Policy Matter?
Farm Doc Daily | Posted onAugust 17, 2017 in Energy NewsOur analysis suggests that the imposition of an antidumping duty that restricts biomass-based diesel (BBD) imports from Argentina and Indonesia would add about $0.15 per gallon to the average price of BBD in 2018. In addition, an EPA remedy to the court ruling invalidating the interpretation of "inadequate domestic supply" that increased BBD demand by 500 million gallons in 2018 would also add $0.15 to the equilibrium price of BBD. The price impact of each of these policy alternatives is relatively small at about four percent, with a combined impact of about 8.5 percent.
Farm Groups Sign Joint Letter Stressing Need to Avoid Disrupting Current Ag Trader
DTN | Posted onAugust 17, 2017 in Agriculture, Federal NewsThree farm leaders from Canada, Mexico and the United States on Wednesday sent a joint letter to their respective trade negotiators as talks began to renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement. The leaders called on trade representatives to streamline regulations and tackle trade barriers without disrupting the current flow of agricultural products among the three countries.
JBS pork plant in Louisville agrees to new fines
Meatingplace (free registration required) | Posted onAugust 17, 2017 in Agriculture, Food NewsThe JBS Louisville pork processing facility has agreed to pay the Louisville Metro Air Pollution Control District $60,000 in penalties resulting from records-keeping omissions and an inspection that found faulty equipment handling.
Editorial: How Iowa can save the family farm
Des Moines Register | Posted onAugust 17, 2017 in Agriculture NewsCould Iowa someday be a state of mega-farms and small acreages, with the traditional, midsized family farm a relic of the past? It’s possible, and our state would be poorer for it, economically and culturally. But that doesn’t have to be the future. The outlook for Iowa’s family farms isn’t good, but the continued decline isn’t inevitable.As reported in Sunday’s Register, midsized farms are getting squeezed. Profits are falling and debt levels are climbing.
Did This Billionaire Game Ethanol Markets for a $50 Million Windfall?
The Motley Fool | Posted onAugust 17, 2017 in Energy NewsIt hasn't exactly been a secret that billionaire investor Carl Icahn holds contempt for renewable fuels. His companies, CVR Energy and CVR Refining, have often blamed government rules for eating into profits. Fuel blenders are required to submit to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency special compliance credits, called renewable identification numbers, or RINs, to show that mandated volumes of renewable fuels are being blended into the nation's gasoline supply.