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Agriculture News

Alaska Growing: State’s small, but steady agriculture market improving

Frontiersman | Posted on August 31, 2017

There’s something happening in Alaska’s small agriculture industry. It’s little noticed by most, but there are signs. Farmers are selling all they produce. Many think they can sell more.“If farmers sell out, they’ll grow more,” state agriculture director Arthur Keyes said. That trickles through the economy, creating jobs.Several signs are positive: Grocery retailers like Safeway buy local produce during the summer and mount special promotions of Alaskan-grown vegetables, which prove popular.The company is expanding its purchases of Alaskan-grown products, including new products made with Alaska barley flour now being featured in several stores in the state, according to ReinoBellio, Safeway’s general manager for Alaska.New ways of marketing are developing, too. Farmer’s Markets that feature locally grown products are widely popular, and there are now about 40 statewide.There’s also growth of niche food suppliers for local foods. Several small operators work out of the Matanuska-Susitna Borough to supply customers in Anchorage with deliveries of fresh, local vegetables, poultry and eggs.


Maine governor calls for emergency legislative session after feds balk at Maine food sovereignty law

Bangor Daily News | Posted on August 31, 2017

Gov. Paul LePage has told legislative leaders that he will call an emergency legislative session to amend a food sovereignty bill that the federal government has criticized as unlawful. A separate issue LePage says needs fixing during a special session is a funding snafu involving the Maine Office of Geographic Information System, which was identified in early August. The food sovereignty bill, LD 725, proposed by Senate Minority Leader Troy Jackson, D-Allagash, received strong support in the Legislature and was signed into law by LePage in June. It allows municipalities to regulate local food systems, including production, processing, consumption and direct producer-to-consumer exchanges, which are currently regulated at the state and federal levels.The law, which is the first of its kind in the country, will take effect Nov. 1, but LePage said that it needs to be amended immediately. Specifically, he wrote that meat and poultry must be excluded from the bill so that state officials can continue to regulate those products.


Dow-DuPont merger closes Thursday. How will Pioneer, Iowa fare?

The Des Moines Register | Posted on August 31, 2017

With Dow-DuPont's $150 billion merger closing Thursday, the newly combined business's first spin-off could be the agribusiness formed by Johnston-based seed giant Pioneer and Indianapolis' Dow AgroSciences, experts say. "It makes sense, from my view, that agriculture" could be the focus of the first company formed, said Seth Goldstein, an analyst at Morningstar in Chicago. Here's why: Dow Chemical Co. and DuPont, which initially proposed creating three independent, publicly traded spin-offs — agribusiness, material science and specialty products — are facing intense investor pressure to create more, smaller companies. "There’s less debate about what would fall into ag and what doesn’t," said Matt Arnold, an analyst at Edward Jones in St. Louis. "For the most part, that should be pretty straightforward." Dow and DuPont have yet to say which company will first leave the nest. Investors are pushing for as many as six companies. In 2016, Iowa economic development leaders reached a deal with Dow-DuPont that will help cement its 2,600 employee workforce in the state. Most of those jobs are located in Johnston. Altogether, the company will receive $17 million in incentives, including $14 million in state tax credits and a $2 million forgivable loan.


Dole selling resources before IPO

The Los Angeles Times | Posted on August 31, 2017

Dole Food Co. is planning to sell its sprawling corporate headquarters and uproot its strawberry operations in Southern California as it seeks to sweeten its books ahead of yet another public stock offering. The world’s largest fresh fruit and vegetable company, owned by Los Angeles billionaire David H. Murdock, is nearly $1.3 billion in debt and operates with low margins and declining revenue. That makes the sale of some of its vast real estate holdings in Hawaii and the U.S. mainland a near imperative, according to regulatory filings and analysts.Dole reported $4.5 billion in revenue last year, a decline of nearly 3% from the previous year, and a net loss of $23 million. “They don’t want to do these things after the IPO,” said Kathleen Smith, principal of Renaissance Capital, an initial public offering investment advisor. The company has pledged in its prospectus to redraw its multinational real estate footprint by “rationalizing” its patchwork of facilities and selling off unproductive land, including nearly 15,000 acres in Hawaii. The company also has been mum about whether it can close a deal to sell its 10-acre headquarters complex in Westlake Village in exchange for an ersatz Hawaiian plantation theme park, which tells the 166-year-old company’s foundation story.


HSUS pushing new farm animal ballot initiative in California

San Francisco Chronicle | Posted on August 31, 2017

On Tuesday, the Humane Society of the United States introduced a ballot initiative called the Prevention of Cruelty to Farm Animals Act, which calls for a requirement that all pork and veal sold in California be produced without restrictive crates, and that all eggs produced and sold in the state be cage-free. It would make California the only state other than Massachusetts, which passed similar legislation last year, to have such regulations on farm animal welfare. The biggest potential impact of the initiative could be on pork. California does not have a large pork industry, and most of the pork sold here comes from out-of-state producers who would have to comply with the regulations when selling their product here.The next step is for organizers to get more than 365,000 signatures within 180 days in order for the initiative to be placed on the statewide ballot in November 2018.


Texas hurricane exposes flaws in flood protections

High Country News | Posted on August 31, 2017

“Today, the Property Casualty Insurers Association of America estimates that homeowners covered by federal flood insurance pay just half of the “true-risk cost” to insure their properties. In the highest-risk areas, they pay just a third.” A series of disasters has left the NFIP struggling financially. Hurricane Katrina and Superstorm Sandy devastated the flood insurance program’s budget and today, the program is about $24 billion in debt. As climate change fuels an increase in disasters, storms of the same caliber may become the norm.“There is actually a 50 percent chance within a 10-year period the NFIP will once again experience Hurricane Sandy-size losses,” Roy Wright, the director of the NFIP, wrote.Financial concerns aside, there are other problems as well. The program encourages people to build and stay in areas that flood constantly. There’s no incentive to leave because taxpayer subsidies rebuild homes and buildings, even if those structures have repeatedly flooded.Attempts to overhaul the NFIP have not been successful and repeatedly have been met with backlash. In 2012, Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) and Rep. Judy Biggert (R-Ill.) introduced the Biggert-Waters Act, a law that would increase the rates for business properties in special flood zones and properties that experience repeated flooding. These proposed increases would have led to an enormous spike in premiums. According to a 2013 RAND Corporation study, premiums in flood prone areas in New York City would have increased by $5,000 to $10,000 a year. Even Rep. Waters was outraged once the numbers came in and was part of a bipartisan effort to draft a bill to make sure premiums wouldn’t suddenly spike. In 2014, Congress passed the Homeowner Flood Insurance Affordability Act, which delayed the Biggert-Waters reforms for two years. Today, premiums now have slowly begun to increase. The current White House proposal for the program would certainly lead to more financial headaches. As part of deciding which areas are riskier, FEMA creates flood maps—but many of them are out-of-date. Funds had been previously allocated to update them, but Trump’s proposed 2018 budget included cutting $190 million from this effort. Without that money, FEMA would be forced to find money from somewhere else to fund mapping.Financial solvability aside, the NFIP is must be reauthorized by September 30. 


Commission seeks more oversight, surveillance on antibiotic use in food animals

Meatingplace (free registration required) | Posted on August 31, 2017

A new commission supported by the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) has issued a report calling for more surveillance, oversight and restriction of antibiotic use in food animals.  


Broiler welfare: Who is behind Global Animal Partnership?

Watt Ag Net | Posted on August 31, 2017

Foodservice and restaurant companies following the recent trend of adopting broiler welfare standards have typically been pledging to adopt standards set by the Global Animal Partnership (GAP) by 2024.GAP standards call for the following:Using broiler breeds scientifically proven to have markedly improved welfare outcomes,Providing chickens with more space (maximum stocking density of 6 lbs./sq. ft.) and improved environments, including lighting, litter and enrichments. Eliminating live shackling and dumping and ensuring birds are rendered unconscious through multistep controlled atmospheric stunning. But other questions commonly asked are what is GAP and who are the people that make decisions on behalf of the GAP? GAP is presently governed by a seven-member board. None of the board members are involved in broiler production, although one is involved in pork production and another is involved in beef production. Also present on the board is a Whole Foods Market representative and leaders from four animal rights or animal welfare organizations, including Wayne Pacelle, head of HSUS.


India, China jointly propose removal of US, EU farm subsidies

Live Mint | Posted on August 31, 2017

China and India have jointly proposed the elimination of $160 billion of trade-distorting farm subsidies in the US, European Union and other wealthy nations, a move that has come as a game changer in global farm trade negotiations at the World Trade Organization, say trade envoys familiar with the development. As the WTO’s 164 members prepare for the crucial eleventh ministerial meeting in Buenos Aires starting on 10 December, China and India have turned the tables by calling for the elimination of what is called the Aggregate Measurement of Support (AMS) or “the most trade distorting element in the global trade in agriculture.”


Maine blueberry crop falls with disease, lack of pollination

The Seattle Times | Posted on August 31, 2017

 Maine’s wild blueberry crop is likely to be much smaller this year than in recent summers because the industry is contending with troubles such as disease and a lack of pollination. The New England state is the wild blueberry capital of the U.S., and in recent years crop sizes have soared and prices have plummeted, bringing uncertainty to a key state industry. The crop grew a little less than one percent last year to almost 102 million pounds, while prices hit a 10-year low of 27 cents per pound to farmers.But it’s apparent as the summer harvest nears its end that that’s all changing this year, University of Maine horticulture professor David Yarborough said. He said “mummy berry” disease, a crop-killing ailment caused by a fungal pathogen, and other factors could cut the crop as much as 36 percent this summer.


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