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How Cheese Saved an Oregon Town
NBCnews.com | Posted onJune 15, 2017 in Food NewsFor over 100 years, the Bandon Cheese Factory in Bandon, Oregon, was the pride of the town. The cheese brought in the tourists, the factory employed the locals, and the business kept the town afloat. Then 17 years ago disaster struck. A national competitor, Tillamook Cheese, bought the name, closed the factory, sent the workers home, and most of the surrounding dairy farms went bust.For nearly 10 years the town’s economy tumbled, the old building lay vacant until it was eventually torn down, and the land was turned into a parking lot.
Why ag producers should approach consumers differently
Watt Ag Net | Posted onJune 15, 2017 in Food NewsA recent study shows that data backed by professional opinions should push producers to change their ways of dealing with consumers, and let emotion and passion tell the ag story.
Losing one dairy farm a day is not 'normal'
Wisconsin State Farmer | Posted onJune 15, 2017 in Agriculture NewsHeadlines from the past month reveal the disappointing truth about the state of Wisconsin’s dairy industry. “Dairy industry breathes a sigh of relief,” said one headline, celebrating a “return to normal” now that most of the farmers who were axed by Grassland Dairy Products have found new milk buyers. And what does “normal” look like?
Large Canadian Arctic climate change study cancelled due to climate change
Science Daily | Posted onJune 15, 2017 in Energy NewsThe Science Team of the Canadian Research Icebreaker CCGS Amundsen has cancelled the first leg of the 2017 Expedition due to complications associated with the southward motion of hazardous Arctic sea ice, caused by climate change.
As High-Tech Farms Take Hold, Can Farm Towns Hold On?
KCUR | Posted onJune 15, 2017 in Agriculture, Rural NewsThat means farms on the Great Plains and in many other parts of the country have had to grow in size and adopt new technologies to make ends meat. He can’t just farm 80 acres and make a living, he says. “I wish you could. I think life would be a lot simpler, easier,” Biesemeier says. “And there’d be a lot more people out here if that was the case.”About a hundred years ago, farming was the way a third of the country made its living.
Forget GMOs. The next big battle is over genetically ‘edited’ foods
The Washington Post | Posted onJune 15, 2017 in Agriculture, Food NewsThe goal is to avoid the sort of public backlash that rocked Monsanto in the late 1990s and still plagues agriculture two decades later. In the United States, consumer skepticism of genetically modified crops has forced biotech companies into long, costly battles over issues such as whether these foods should be labeled; elsewhere in the world, the public outcry has prevented seeds from winning government approval. “It’s more about social science than science,” said Neal Gutterson, the vice president of research and development at DuPont Pioneer.
Communities take the search for broadband into their own hands
Daily Yonder | Posted onJune 15, 2017 in Rural News2017 has been a great year for winning legislative battles against bills threatening to curb or eliminate municipal broadband networks. For example: Missouri: anti-muni bill defeated;Tennessee: co-op won, muni lost in compromise bill that became law;Virginia: anti-muni bill also defeated;Maine: anti-muni bill DOA, sponsors killed it within day of introducing it. Constituents were able to work without the threat of punitive legislation in several states. West Virginia and Georgia are among those states whose legislators have opted to work with communities.
China surpassed the U.S. to become world’s largest renewable power producer last year, BP reports.
Think Progress | Posted onJune 15, 2017 in Energy NewsWorld coal production had its biggest drop ever last year, 230 million tons of oil equivalent (mtoe), BP reported Tuesday in its 2017 Statistical Review of World Energy. China led the way with a 7.9 percent decline in coal production (140 mtoe), followed by the U.S. with a 19 percent drop (85 mtoe). For the first time, China surpassed the U.S. as the world’s biggest producer of non-hydro renewables. “The fortunes of coal appear to have taken a decisive break from the past,” BP’s chief economist Spencer Dale said Tuesday.
Nevada Governor signs 3 marijuana bills into law, vetoes one
Las Vegas Sun | Posted onJune 15, 2017 in SARL Members and Alumni NewsMedical marijuana cards will now cost as low as $50 for Nevada patients, edible products will come in opaque, child-proof packages and a 10 percent excise tax on sales of recreational weed estimated to generate $70 million will be designated for Nevada’s rainy day fund after three of four remaining marijuana bills passed by the Nevada Legislature were signed into law Monday by Gov. Brian Sandoval. Senate Bills 478 and 344 were inked by the governor Monday along with Assembly Bill 422.
Dicamba Drift Complaints Heat Up
DTN | Posted onJune 15, 2017 in Agriculture NewsPucker up is taking on a specific meaning across the soybean belt as reports of dicamba injury start to mount in several states. The slightest whiff of dicamba herbicide causes sensitive soybean leaves to cup and pucker. As of June 12, there had been 41 drift complaints implicating dicamba registered with the Arkansas State Plant Board, according to Adrianne Barnes, communications director for the Arkansas Department of Agriculture.Tennessee Department of Agriculture officials said three complaints have been received so far -- two in Dyer County and one in Shelby County.