After 40 years of dairy farming, I sold my herd of cows this summer. The herd had been in my family since 1904; I know all 45 cows by name. I couldn’t find anyone who wanted to take over our farm — who would? Dairy farming is little more than hard work and possible economic suicide. A grass-based organic dairy farm bought my cows. I couldn’t watch them go. In June, I milked them for the last time, left the barn and let the truckers load them. A cop-out on my part? [node:read-more:link]

President Trump signed the Farm Bill into law on Thursday, the same day the executive branch proposed a rule that could impact participation in the SNAP (food stamp) program.  And earlier this week, USDA announced that a second installment of payments would be made to some producers negatively impacted by ongoing trade disputes. [node:read-more:link]

Thirteen states suing Massachusetts filed a brief petitioning the U.S. Supreme to hear their case this week. “This case affects every producer, distributor, and consumer of eggs, pork, and veal in the country, and it implicates fundamental constitutional principles of horizontal federalism and interstate comity,” the brief filed on Wednesday reads. “The Court should hear it.”The brief pertains to whether the Bay State’s animal cruelty law impinges on the rights of other states under the Constitution’s Commerce Clause. [node:read-more:link]

The Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City released the December Manufacturing Survey revealing that growth in Tenth District manufacturing activity slowed, while expectations for future activity edged slightly higher. Price indexes were mixed, with a considerable drop in month-over-month price indexes but higher prices expected in the next six months. The month-over-month composite index was 3 in December, down from 15 in November and 8 in October (Tables 1 & 2, Chart 1). [node:read-more:link]

Stone built a new bridge across the creek and a new road right in front of the Martins’ house. The company told Martin it needed the road to reach the new natural gas wells it drilled on the new well pad for which it flattened an area she used to go to pray, bucolic hills forested with huge oak trees. Soon, hundreds of trucks rumbled past her house every day, spewing exhaust. Martin had asked the company to build the bridge farther up the creek, away from her house, and the well pad away from the oaks.But Martin didn’t have a say over any of this. [node:read-more:link]

President Donald Trump’s administration miscalculated the potential benefits of putting better brakes on trains that haul explosive fuels when it scrapped an Obama-era rule over cost concerns, The Associated Press has found. A government analysis used to justify the cancellation omitted up to $117 million in estimated future damages from train derailments that could be avoided by using electronic brakes. [node:read-more:link]

New analysis makes a case for why oil development in Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is a bad deal, environmentally and economically.If the environmental risks of opening Alaska’s fragile Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil and gas development weren’t enough cause for concern, a new analysis has found that the economic benefits the Trump administration and Republican lawmakers have touted to push the plan are unattainable.The report, published by conservation nonprofit The Wilderness Society, comes as the Trump administration weighs a proposal to allow seismic surveys in the ref [node:read-more:link]

 Premiums and coverage levels are presented in Figures 1 and 2 for the 2014-2017 period of the 2014 farm bill vs. the 2019-2023 period of the 2018 farm bill.  This comparison argues that, for dairy commodity support policy, the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2018 and Agricultural Improvement Act of 2018 should be treated as the 2018 farm bill.  Taken together the two bills expand the covered milk production history that qualifies for Tier I protection by 25% (5 vs. 4 million pounds), substantially reduce Tier I premiums (for example, by 79% at the $8.00/cwt. [node:read-more:link]

Food labels such as “veggie burgers” and “Tofurky” prompted a new Missouri law making it illegal to stick meat-like names on products that aren’t made from meat — pitting cattlemen against vegetarians in a food fight poised to spread across the country. [node:read-more:link]