Profit at seed and chemical giant DuPont Co. surged 8.5 percent in the second quarter as it benefited from strong demand for its agricultural and nutrition products — despite ongoing challenges in the farm sector. [node:read-more:link]
At Lavoie’s Farm in New Hampshire, beans and corn haven’t broken through the ground yet and fields of strawberries are stunted. The drought that has taken hold in the Northeast is especially felt at John Lavoie’s farm in Hollis, presenting him with some tough choices. Irrigation ponds are drying up, forcing him to choose between tomatoes and berries or apple and peach trees. Lavoie decided to hold off watering the fruit trees so he could quench the tomato and berry plants before they succumb to the heat. [node:read-more:link]
Shareholders of Dow Chemical Co. and DuPont Co. approved the companies’ historic merger, clearing a hurdle for the deal to close this year and for a later split into three entities. Majorities of both sets of stockholders approved the 50-50 combination of the two largest U.S. chemical makers, the companies said in a joint statement Wednesday. The $59 billion all-stock transaction, a record for the industry, was announced Dec. 11. [node:read-more:link]
Food prices could rise by more than 2% and greenhouse gas emissions would increase substantially according to a paper to be presented at the Agricultural & Applied Economics Association Annual Meeting in Boston. “There are people that would like to ban GMOs,” said Wally Tyner, a Purdue University economist. “We wanted to see what the result of a ban would be when it comes to food prices and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.” “Total welfare losses associated with loss of GMO technology total up to $9.75 billion. [node:read-more:link]
Three weeks after the scientific world marked the 20th anniversary of the birth of Dolly the sheep, new research has shown that four clones derived from the same cell line -- genomic copies of Dolly -- reached their 8th birthdays in good health. [node:read-more:link]
Farmers in Nebraska, Minnesota, Massachusetts, and New York are staging something of a mechanical revolt. They're attempting to get legislation passed in their states that would enable them, for the first time since the 1998 Digital Millennium Copyright Act, to repair their own tractors or get an independent mechanic to help. At the root of the morass is the software that helps run modern tractors and their sensors, diagnostic tools, and other high-tech elements. [node:read-more:link]
A lawsuit has been filed against the City of Fremont in Nebraska, which is being accused of allegedly blighting farmland illegally for tax incentive financing (TIF) for a proposed poultry plant. Three members of the citizens group Nebraska Communities United (NCU) filed the suit, alleging that Nebraska law does not provide for blighting large portions of agricultural land for the use of TIF money, and that the disputed area must be urban or suburban, and not rural. The city earlier annexed and blighted nearly 1,000 acres for the proposed plant. [node:read-more:link]
Farms that market their goods directly to consumers tend to create more jobs in their own regions than those that don’t, a university study has found. For every $1 million worth of output, farms that sell directly via farmers’ markets, produce stands, community-supported agriculture and other such outlets generated nearly 32 jobs in the Sacramento area, according to the study led by University of California-Davis researcher Shermaine Hardesty. [node:read-more:link]
Massachusetts’ highest court, the Supreme Judicial Court, gave the okay to place on this November’s ballot an initiative backed by The Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) that would ban the use in the state of certain farm animal housing and prohibit the sale in the state of meat and eggs from confined animals. [node:read-more:link]
Pet food shoppers increasingly say they look for non-GMO claims on labels and are even willing to pay more for pet foods with such claims. What if pet foods were required to declare inclusion of GMO ingredients on their labels; would that cause some pet owners to steer clear of such products? We may soon find out, at least in the US. [node:read-more:link]
