AgClips
Recent AgClips
Vegetarian men more likely to get depressed: study
Meatingplace (free registration required) | Posted onAugust 24, 2017 in Food NewsVegetarian men showed more symptoms of depression than non-vegetarians, possibly due to nutritional deficiencies, a University of Bristol study said. Researchers analyzed data from 9,668 men in the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children in southwest England, of which 350 identified themselves as vegetarians. Those who were vegetarian for a longer period of time tended to have higher depression scores.
Marijuana states try to curb smuggling, avert US crackdown
Capital Press | Posted onAugust 24, 2017 in SARL Members and Alumni NewsTracking legal weed from the fields and greenhouses where it’s grown to the shops where it’s sold is their main protective measure so far.
CA:cannabis czar to regulate legal pot industry
Capital Press | Posted onAugust 24, 2017 in SARL Members and Alumni NewsWith recreational marijuana use just months away from being legal in California, Los Angeles has appointed a so-called cannabis czar tasked with regulating the local pot industry.
CA:State to hand out nearly $7 million in grants for soil health
Capital Press | Posted onAugust 24, 2017 in Agriculture, SARL Members and Alumni NewsThe California Department of Food and Agriculture is offering nearly $7 million in competitive grants to assist farmers and ranchers with such soil health projects as composting, planting cover crops and reducing tillage.
Will rural Iowa wither as big ag becomes bigger, squeezing out farms in the middle?
Des Moines Register | Posted onAugust 24, 2017 in Agriculture NewsThe extended-family farm operation is what many imagine is dotting Iowa's countryside — fathers and sons, husbands and wives, working together to raise animals, crops and kids.But that picture is changing rapidly, as family-run midsized farms give way to bigger agriculture operations and smaller hobby acreages.Farm consolidation has emptied out rural Iowa for decades.
Immigration and Farm Labor: From Unauthorized to H-2A for Some?
Migration Policy Institute | Posted onAugust 24, 2017 in Federal NewsAlthough immigrant workers have long been employed on U.S. farms, shifting migration patterns and employer labor strategies are reshaping the agricultural workforce. Migration from Mexico to the United States has slowed with the the 2008–09 recession, improving conditions in rural Mexico, and stepped-up border enforcement.With fewer new arrivals, the agricultural workforce is aging, settling down, and forming or reuniting families, as this analysis of data from the U.S. Department of Labor’s National Agricultural Worker Survey (NAWS) shows.
A pent-up threat to the Chesapeake Bay: Editorial
Penn Live | Posted onAugust 24, 2017 in Rural, SARL Members and Alumni NewsJust a few miles from the Maryland- Pennsylvania border lies the Conowingo Dam, an 88-year-old power station stopping the massive Susquehanna River, which is the source of much of the freshwater flowing into the Chesapeake Bay. Since bay cleanup began, states in the Chesapeake watershed have relied on the dam to limit the flow of sediment and phosphorous further downstream, and the plan was to continue doing so for decades to come. But the dam's sediment pools are full, long before the cleanup plan projected them to be.
Sierra Club sues Energy Department over grid study
Washington Examiner | Posted onAugust 24, 2017 in Energy, Federal NewsThe Sierra Club sued the Energy Department on Monday to release the names of groups and experts that the department consulted while developing a yet-to-be-released study on electric grid reliability. "We want to make sure that when this study is finally released, that the public and policy makers fully understand how it went about doing it, who they were influenced by, and whose views they did not take into consideration," said Casey Roberts, a lawyer with the environmental group.
Fate of ‘Ag Gag’ Laws May Ride on Utah, Idaho Cases
Bloomberg | Posted onAugust 23, 2017 in Agriculture, SARL Members and Alumni NewsIn July a federal trial court struck down the Utah farm protection law as unconstitutional. A host of supporters and critics of such laws are closely watching what happens next in both the Utah case and in a similar Idaho case pending before a federal appeals court.Observers say the cases will help determine whether other states will join the nine, including Utah and Idaho, that have statues allowing criminal or civil cases against those who carry out undercover operations at animal production facilities.
Farm Economy Softens Further
Kansas CIty Fed | Posted onAugust 22, 2017 in Agriculture NewsA prolonged downturn in the agricultural economy continued in the second quarter of 2017, but recent data suggest conditions in the farm sector may be stabilizing. Although farm income and farm real estate values continued to decline, and credit conditions weakened further, the pace of deterioration has slowed. With the fall harvest approaching, agricultural lenders and borrowers remain concerned about prospects for the farm economy in the Federal Reserve’s Tenth District, particularly in regions with limited potential for high crop yields.