Agriculture

A federal appeals court has ruled that plaintiffs' lawyers leading federal multidistrict litigation against Bayer CropScience over genetically modified rice are entitled to 10 percent of a $92 million settlement the company struck with a farmers' co-op in state court.  The 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed a lower court decision finding the lead MDL lawyers' work had benefited the co-op, Riceland, which had also filed a separate federal action that was part of the MDL. [node:read-more:link]

In her new book “Rancher, Farmer, Fisherman: Conservation Heroes of the American Heartland,” published Sept. 6, Miriam Horn follows five people whose forward-looking practices sometimes defy widely held beliefs about sustainability and farming. Below, Horn pulls from the story of Justin Knopf, a farmer in central Kansas, to show that industrial-scale farming — and yes, even the pesticides that come with it — can be sustainable. [node:read-more:link]

Researchers at DuPont Pioneer have published a study about a strain of corn engineered with CRISPR to be more resistant to drought. Once it receives government approval, this could soon be the first-ever CRISPR-modified crop to go on sale. In this study, the DuPont engineers didn’t use CRISPR to alter maize’s DNA per se; instead, they changed how one single gene is expressed. [node:read-more:link]

José Eduardo Calzada Rovirosa, a New Mexico State University graduate and minister of the Secretariat of Agriculture, Livestock, Rural Development, Fisheries and Food, will visit the New Mexico State University campus Sept. [node:read-more:link]

The widespread adoption of genetically engineered (GE) crops has clearly led to changes in pesticide use, but the nature and extent of these impacts remain open questions. We study this issue with a unique, large, and representative sample of plot-level choices made by U.S. maize and soybean farmers from 1998 to 2011. [node:read-more:link]

In the ferocious, sprawling brawl over genetically modified crops, one particular question seems like it should have a simple factual answer: Did those crops lead to more use of pesticides, or less?  Sadly, there's no simple answer.  Pesticides include both insecticides and herbicides. Backers of GMOs point to the example of crops containing new genes that fight off insect pests, so farmers don't have to spray insecticides. [node:read-more:link]

A Swiss agrochemicals company caught up in legal battles over its farming of genetically modified crops in Hawaii is planning to sell its operations in the state.  Syngenta announced Tuesday that it is looking for a buyer for nearly 6,000 acres of land it leases or owns on Oahu and Kauai. The company says it will continue to operate in Hawaii, but under a contract with a new owner.  Syngenta and four other companies — BASF, Dow AgroSciences, DuPont Pioneer and Monsanto — operate 10 seed farms on Oahu, Maui, Molokai and Kauai. [node:read-more:link]

California dairy farmers are battling proposed state regulations on methane emissions they say are fundamentally flawed and unachievable and will set them up for failure.  They say the state Air Resources Control Board has lost sight of reality in its Climate Pollutant Reduction Strategy to reduce total methane emissions 40 percent by 2030 — including a 75 percent reduction in dairy manure emissions.  While the board’s draft strategy, which also includes reducing black carbon (soot) and fluorinated gases, is not regulation, the reductions have made their way into legislation. [node:read-more:link]

Elected officials in an Oregon county rejected a proposed plan from a group of residents that sought greater local control over the management of federal lands. [node:read-more:link]

Idaho wants to take over regulating pollution discharge into the state’s lakes and rivers from the federal government. The Idaho Department of Environmental Quality on Wednesday submitted an application to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to shift control of permitting and enforcement aspects under the federal Clean Water Act to the state. Idaho is one of only four states where federal authorities manage pollution discharge into surface waters, the others being New Mexico, New Hampshire and Massachusetts. [node:read-more:link]