Federal

Water testing standards that are a key part of the produce safety requirements of the Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA) are undergoing a quiet review that could extend the compliance date for the Produce Safety Rule beyond January 2018.  Produce industry leaders learned  in mid-February during a meeting with U.S. Food and Drug Administration officials led by acting FDA Commissioner Stephen Ostroff that they’d be getting the review with the likely delay in compliance. [node:read-more:link]

USDA's Rural Development, which helps provide water, power, broadband, housing, and small business loans in rural America, gets identified for deep cuts in the president's budget proposal. The proposal, which is just the first salvo in the budget battle, also recommends eliminating agencies like the Appalachian Regional Commission and the Delta Regional Authority. The proposal says Agriculture’s Rural Development programs would be cut so deeply there would be less need for staff in USDA’s Service Center offices. [node:read-more:link]

Darvin Bentlage’s health insurance plan used to be the same as all the other cattle farmers in Barton County, Mo., he said: to stay healthy until he turned 65, then get on Medicare. But when he turned 50, things did not go according to plan.  “Well, I had a couple of issues,” he said.That’s putting it mildly.Over two years, he dealt with hepatitis C and diverticulitis. That was on top of his persistent kidney stones, diabetes and other health problems.“I had to go back and refinance the farm,” he said. [node:read-more:link]

An estimated $5.8 billion in cuts to the National Institutes of Health in President Donald Trump’s proposed budget has universities and medical institutions sounding the alarm. Trump’s spending plan — running into opposition from Republicans and Democrats alike — would cut about 20 percent of the roughly $30 billion budget of the nation’s medical research agency that supports research on cancer, Alzheimer’s disease, Zika and other conditions. [node:read-more:link]

The U.S. Department of Agriculture announced Tuesday that more than $6 million in funding is now available for those affected by the wildfires in Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas. The funding, delivered through USDA’s Environmental Quality Incentives Program, will assist farmers and ranchers as they attempt to restore grazing lands, rehabilitate devastated landscapes, rebuild fencing and protect damaged watersheds, according to a news release.“The availability of USDA conservation funds targeted toward restoring land impacted by the fires is appreciated," said Sen. [node:read-more:link]

China and the European Union curtailed meat imports from Brazil on Monday after police, in an anti-corruption probe criticized by the government as alarmist, accused inspectors in the world's biggest exporter of beef and poultry of taking bribes to allow sales of rotten and salmonella-tainted meats. [node:read-more:link]

The rusty patched bumble bee became the first wild bee in the continental United States to gain federal protection on Tuesday when it was added to the government's list of endangered and threatened species. The bee, once widely found in the upper Midwest and Northeastern United States, was listed after U.S. President Donald Trump's administration lifted a hold it had placed on a plan for federal protections proposed last fall by the administration of former President Barack Obama. [node:read-more:link]

“America's farmers and ranchers help feed the world, fuel our Nation's economy, and lead global markets in output and productivity.  The efficiency of American agriculture has provided this country with abundance our ancestors could not have imagined.”  So begins President Donald Trump’s announcement today that proclaims March 21, 2017 as National Agriculture Day.The proclamation applauds our nation’s farmers as “endlessly innovative,” as well as being determined, self-reliant and a critical component to the nation’s future. [node:read-more:link]

Federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents arrested Enrique “Kike” Balcazar, 24, from Mexico, and and Zully Palacios, 23, from Peru, late Friday afternoon, according to an activist with the group Migrant Justice. They are the third and fourth members of the group to be detained by ICE agents this week. Caesar Alex Carillo-Sanchez, who goes by Alex Carillo, was arrested outside the Chittenden County courthouse in Burlington Wednesday morning. [node:read-more:link]

The week before Donald Trump’s inauguration, Yvette Salinas received a letter she had been dreading for years: legal notice that the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) wants to build a border wall on her family’s land in Los Ebanos. The 21-page document, entitled a “Declaration of Taking,” is addressed to her ailing mother, Maria Flores, who owns the property with her siblings. The letter offers Flores $2,900 for 1.2 acres near the Rio Grande. If she chooses not to accept the offer, the land could be seized through eminent domain. “It’s scary when you read it,” Salinas says. [node:read-more:link]