Agriculture News
Immigrant workers have significant impact on agriculture, dairy farms
Channel3000 | Posted on February 20, 2017The purpose of days like Day WIthout Latinos and Day Without Immigrants is to show the value of immigrant workers in our communities, which is especially true in the dairy industry, where immigrant workers make up more than 50 percent of farm employees. "They are a significant impact on agriculture, especially the dairy industry," Jennifer Blazek said. "Having those people who are willing to work and who are hard workers, a lot of farmers have really enjoyed the work ethic of their employees," Blazek said. She said without them there could be significant impacts. "I think the most prominent thing that we might see here locally is a lot of dairy farms going out of business," Blazek said.
Organic farming finds itself at a crossroads
Capital Press | Posted on February 20, 2017Within the organic community, some worry the movement — and that’s how many see it, as a movement — will lose its soul as “Big Ag” takes over organic production and snaps up small organic processors. “If we continue to mainstream, is there anything left of what was organic, or do we just become product manufacturers?” asked Oregon organic pioneer David Lively. As the Costcos, Wal-Marts and Krogers of the world continue to enter the organic market, “Are they really concerned with what we’re doing, or is it a marketing opportunity?” Lively said. “It would be shortsighted if we strive only to fill the shopping baskets of millennials and be happy at that,” warned Drew Katz, who coordinates farm transitions for Oregon Tilth, an organic certification group. But it’s creeping bigness that seemed to bother many of the 1,100 growers, processors and activists who attended the three-day Organicology conference and trade show in Portland earlier this month. One of the panel discussions was even titled, “Challenging the Empire: Forming a Rebel Alliance.”
Economists Highlight Struggling Farm Economy, Seek Safety Net Changes
DTN | Posted on February 20, 2017Economists painted a gray outlook for the farm economy and called for a stronger federal safety during a congressional hearing meant to set the stage for drafting a new farm bill. Economists from USDA, the Kansas City Federal Reserve, Texas A&M and the University of Missouri all said farm finances look to dip in 2017 for the fourth consecutive year. Farmers are struggling, but not as bad as the 1980s yet and low prices are buoyed by higher yields. Low interest rates and better-than-expected land values are also offsetting at least some of the concerns over higher debt-to-asset ratios.
Maryland farm turning manure into energy
Del Marva Now | Posted on February 16, 2017The Maryland Department of Agriculture and Irish agri-tech company Biomass Heating Solutions Limited, or BHSL, have committed nearly $3 million toward manure-to-energy technology that they hope will significantly reduce the impact of Murphy's chickens — and perhaps one day all Eastern Shore poultry — on the Chesapeake Bay. "Our main objective is bird enhancement," BHSL project engineer James O'Sullivan said. "We want to completely diminish ammonium (from Murphy's chickens to the bay). We want to reduce humidity (in the chicken houses) and have a drier atmosphere for the birds, hence drier manure." The project was completed and went online in December. While O'Sullivan oversees the equipment on the farm, BHSL runs it off-site."The whole system is fully automated," O'Sullivan said. "It is controlled by our remote operations team in Ireland."The farm houses more than 160,000 chickens — a large number, no question — but a fraction of the 300 million "broilers," or chickens bred specifically for meat production, that the USDA says the state produces annually.O'Sullivan says the chickens on Murphy's farm can produce as much as 10 tons of manure a day. BHSL utilizes a process called fluidized bed combustion, which works by heating a bed of sand inside a fuel combustion chamber until bubbling at 600 degrees Fahrenheit. Once this level is reached, manure is fed into the chamber and the temperature is raised to 1,600 degrees Fahrenheit. This process produces hot gases, which in turn are used to boil water that ultimately heats the chicken houses.Not only does the process heat the chickenhouses with clean, renewable energy, it keeps the manure off the ground and out of the waterways.
Study rewrites the history of corn in corn country
Science Daily | Posted on February 16, 2017A new study contradicts decades of thought, research and teaching on the history of corn cultivation in the American Bottom, a floodplain of the Mississippi River in Illinois. The study refutes the notion that Indian corn, or maize, was cultivated in this region hundreds of years before its widespread adoption at about 1000 A.D.
Farmers need seasonal workers — and an immigration solution
The Seattle Times | Posted on February 16, 2017Agricultural labor is not just an issue for farmers. For every job on the farm, there are two to three more supported in transportation, food processing, equipment and supply manufacturing, sales and marketing, and other fields beyond rural farm communities. The ongoing shortage of available seasonal farm labor and the uncertainty related to the legal status of the existing workforce has prompted many growers to attempt to use a federal temporary guest-worker visa program for agriculture, known as H-2A. Such a decision is not taken lightly, as the program is extremely complex and requires verification that domestic workers are not available. Employers must also cover the cost of transporting the employees, provide housing and pay wages substantially above the prevailing rates for comparable work. That the use of the program in Washington has expanded from 814 jobs filled in 2006 to 13,697 jobs in 2016 despite these disadvantages is further proof of the acute shortage of farm labor.
State Fair of Texas to give Dallas $6 million for improvements at Fair Park
The Dallas Morning News | Posted on February 16, 2017State Fair officials on Friday announced they would give the city a minimum of $6 million to fix up Fair Park. The funds, which the State Fair is contractually obligated to use on such improvements, are an increase over last year's total. But the announcement coincided with increasing scrutiny of the State Fair's finances and whether the 24-day festivities make for a bad neighbor to the impoverished residents who surround the 277-acre city-owned park.
Beekeeper develops ‘smart bee’ winter storage system
Capital Press | Posted on February 16, 2017Designing “smart bee storage” to revolutionize the industry has been a labor of love for Israel Bravo for the past 15 years – and it appears it’s an idea whose time has come, given the success of a prototype facility this winter. Bravo had looked far and wide to find a system that could dependably control the climate in a storage facility to keep bees healthy during their winter reprieve from pollinating crops and producing honey for human consumption. He finally found it in the expertise at Agri-Stor, a Twin Falls company that has been designing potato cellars for 60 years. “I figured I would find that brain to control everything inside, but I didn’t think I’d find it in my backyard,” Bravo said. Bravo and Agri-Stor teamed up a year ago to design a building that would control temperature, humidity and CO2 levels and allow for smart phone monitoring to keep those elements stable, alert beekeeper to any problems and give the bees the quiet and the total darkness they need to stay healthy. With off-site monitoring, “you don’t have to disturb the bees. You want to keep things as quiet and dark as possible until it’s time to go to work,” he said. With almond orchards calling, that time has come — and the results look promising. Bees are coming out of storage healthier than they would in conventional storage. Frames are fuller, the bees are livelier and there’s more honey reserve to nourish them.
HSUS teaming with company to screen companies for aniaml welfare
Financial Advisor | Posted on February 16, 2017Teaming with the Humane Society of the United States, Folio can now screen out companies involved with factory farms, which have come under increasing criticism from animal rights advocates for the overcrowding and mistreatment of their livestock. “We are very interested in allowing people to invest in a way that alligns with their values,” said Greg Vigrass, president of Folio Institutional. “Working with filters for investments has always been in our DNA and we recently stepped up the commitment.” The Humane Society maintains a list of firms that engage in factory farming. Folio can cross reference investors’ portfolios with that list to screen out the firms that use factory farms. Folio uses a number of screens that investors can use to incorporate their philosophies into their investing, Vigrass said.
Animal research saves human lives
Missoulian | Posted on February 16, 2017A recent column (Dec. 19) denouncing the significance of biomedical research that uses animals and encouraging the University of Montana to abandon such projects was grossly misleading with respect to the true need and value of animals in research, including their treatment and care. Further, the claim that faculty at UM (or any other research university) conduct research with mice, rats and pigs based solely on the goal of garnering grant dollars from the National Institutes of Health and not upon years of successful scientific discovery-based improvements in human health is without evidence and, fundamentally, absurd. NIH policy: “All animals used in federally funded research are protected by laws, regulations and policies to ensure the smallest possible number of subjects and the greatest commitment to their welfare.” Pronouncing that research with animals has not played a critical role in countless medical breakthroughs and reduced the suffering of millions of patients simply ignores the facts. As the aforementioned column specifically focused on pigs, it is worth considering just a few of the medical advances that emerged from studies with this species. The development of CAT scans relied on the use of pigs, owing to anatomical similarities to the human brain and spinal cord. Immunotherapies, such as vaccines, are commonly validated in pigs because their immune system so closely resembles that of humans. Before it was synthetically produced, pigs were the primary source of insulin for treating diabetes, and bioprosthetic heart valves from pigs (or cows) have been transplanted into thousands of patients with heart disease. The first tissue-engineered, stem cell-based whole organ transplant of a trachea relied upon preclinical studies in pigs. The list goes on and on.