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GRAPHIC: Food recalls on the rise post-COVID-19
The number of food recalls issued by the U.S. Department of Agriculture has increased in recent years, after a sharp decline during the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Each year, the Food Safety and Service Inspection division of the USDA issues recalls for food products when problems such as foreign material, undeclared allergens and pathogens are found.
The US labor department added new farmworker protections, but agency needs more resources ‘to do what we need to do,’ agency head says
SANTA ROSA, California — Visit the tourism websites for California’s wine country, and the first images are romantic and idyllic: smiling tourists, expansive vineyards, generous pours of red wine. What’s not shown is what makes the syrahs, chardonnays and pinot noirs possible — farmworkers. The disconnect...
‘It’s getting worse’: US failing to stem tide of harmful farm pollutants
VENICE, Lousiana — Kindra Arnesen is a 46-year-old commercial fishing boat operator who has spent most of her life among the pelicans and bayous of southern Louisiana, near the juncture where the 2,350-mile-long Mississippi River ends at the Gulf of Mexico. Clark Porter is a 62-year-old farmer who lives...
FTC Chair Lina Khan listens to Iowa farmers’ concerns about fertilizer plant deal
This story was originally published by the Cedar Rapids Gazette. Lina Khan, known for trying to stop mergers of Big Tech companies and grocery giants, heard from Iowa farmers Saturday who want her to investigate Koch Industries’ plans to buy one of the state’s largest fertilizer companies, built with state tax credits.
Illinois bills seek to regulate carbon dioxide pipelines and sequestration
Carbon dioxide pipeline and sequestration projects would face significant new scrutiny and regulations under proposed legislation introduced in April in Illinois. Advocates who helped draft the proposal (SB 3930, HB 5814) say it is crucial to institute standards and protections, as multiple companies seek to sequester carbon in Illinois’ Mount Simon sandstone geology and reap lucrative federal tax credits. The legislation was formally introduced Monday.
Iowa environmental groups ask EPA to protect drinking water from agricultural runoff
Iowa environmental groups — inspired by a successful campaign in Minnesota — are asking the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to step in and protect drinking water in northeast Iowa from agricultural runoff. The petition was announced April 16, hours after the Iowa Environmental Protection Commission unanimously approved largely...
How tribes are reversing years of consolidation within the cattle industry with their own meat processing plants
HOMINY, Oklahoma — Cole McKinney leapt onto the edge of a metal fence and began banging its side, trying to spook a nearly 700-pound bison into turning around inside its pen. But the bison repeatedly lowered its horned head into the fence, resisting McKinney’s order to face the other way.
GRAPHIC: China returns as one of top poultry export destinations
Ten years ago, China was the fourth-largest destination for U.S.-produced poultry products, accounting for $315 million in export value, according to data from the Foreign Agriculture Service. However, China-bound poultry exports plummeted in 2015 after the nation banned U.S. chicken following an avian influenza (bird flu) outbreak. By 2019, poultry...
Net zero emission pledges by JBS must be more than hot air
It’s all the rage. Companies rolling out advertising campaigns and plans to reach net zero emissions by such and such a date. Astonishingly including JBS, the biggest meat company in the world. In March of 2021, JBS pledged to reach net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2040 through emission reductions in their operations and by offsetting all residual emissions.
GRAPHIC: More than a third of the food produced in the US is wasted
More than one-third of the food produced in the U.S. is never eaten, ending up instead in landfills, sewers and wastewater treatment facilities, or incinerated. Food waste is the most common material in American landfills, comprising 24% and 22% of landfilled and combusted municipal solid waste, respectively. This waste is generated by households, food service providers, food retailers, and food manufacturers and processors.
ADM trumpeted its nutrition and flavor business. Now the government’s investigating.
In late 2020, Archer-Daniels-Midland, one of America’s oldest and most profitable food companies, predicted customers’ preference for foods with “bright and exciting” colors and “familiar, nostalgic” flavors would “shape the food industry.” ADM seemed poised to capitalize. Over the next few years, it purchased two companies specializing in crafting tastes. One creates savory dairy flavors for snacks and frozen meals.
There soon will be more fireworks over U.S. meat labels
The feds have just dropped the hammer on foreign meat companies conning consumers into believing their products are made in the good ol’ USA. Back in 2015, former President Barack Obama signed the Consolidated Appropriations Act in response to a World Trade Organization ruling that U.S. mandatory country-of-origin labeling — or COOL — law broke WTO rules. Canada and Mexico believed the law was no more than a thinly veiled attempt to convince U.S. consumers that foreign beef was inferior.
GRAPHIC: US ag census showed fewer farms used manure as fertilizer in the Midwest
Between 2017 and 2022, the number of Midwestern farms that used manure as fertilizer decreased from 137,305 to 118,944, according to the most recent Census of Agriculture. South Dakota and North Dakota saw the most significant reductions in the use of manure-based fertilizers, each having a 22% decline. Nebraska, Michigan and Illinois also experienced decreases of 17%.
Farmers have clamored for the Right to Repair for years. It’s getting little traction in John Deere’s home state.
* Right-to-repair legislation for farm equipment, which would require agricultural equipment manufacturers to make software tools available to farmers to fix their own machines, was introduced in the Illinois statehouse for the first time this year. However, it’s going nowhere. * Under an agreement between the farm bureau and...
Nebraska Gov. Jim Pillen’s office, industry groups crafted bill easing ag permitting process, emails show
* The bill would eliminate public hearings at local zoning commissions, the bodies that typically first debate approving permits for concentrated animal feeding operations, or CAFOs. It would also ban counties from considering water quality when considering whether to approve permits. * Pillen dealt with county zoning boards for years...
GRAPHIC: Farms owned by African Americans are much smaller than those owned by all other racial groups
In 1999, a federal judge ruled, in what’s known as the Pigford settlement, that the U.S. Department of Agriculture had discriminated against Black farmers for years. The agency had systematically denied Black farmers assistance to grow their operations, the judge found. Despite the ruling, Black farmers still struggle to...
Cancer in Iowa: What role does agriculture play in Iowa’s high cancer rates?
This story was originally published in The Gazette. Iowa is the No. 1 corn-producing state. We also lead the nation in production of pork, eggs and ethanol. But another state ranking has gotten more attention in recent years: Iowa has the fastest-growing rate of new cancers in the nation and the second-highest cancer rate overall, behind Kentucky.
EPA’s gambit to control slaughterhouse nutrient pollution won’t be the last word
Let’s state the obvious. Nutrient pollution is a massive problem in U.S. meat processing facilities that discharge millions of pounds of phosphorus and nitrogen into the nation’s waterways each year. Within the Environmental Protection Agency’s industrial category, meat and poultry product (MPP) facilities are the nation’s highest phosphorus and second-highest nitrogen polluters.
Extreme heat drives up food prices. Just how bad will it get?
This story was originally published by Grist. Sometimes climate change appears where you least expect it — like the grocery store. Food prices have climbed 25% over the past four years, and Americans have been shocked by the growing cost of staples like beef, sugar, and citrus. While many...
The Fescue Fighters
This story was originally published by Grist and the Food & Environment Reporting Network. America’s “fescue belt,” named for an exotic grass called tall fescue, dominates the pastureland from Missouri and Arkansas in the west to the coast of the Carolinas in the east. Within that swath, a quarter of the nation’s cows — more than 15 million in all — graze fields that stay green through the winter while the rest of the region’s grasses turn brown and go dormant.
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