Silver has been used as an antimicrobial agent for more than 100 years. Today, silver in the form of nanoparticles is incorporated in such products as plastic food containers, medical materials, and clothing. In textiles, however, preventing the nanoparticles’ antimicrobial properties from washing away has always been a problem. [node:read-more:link]
Proponents of food sovereignty in Maine hope a new law, based on exchanging locally produced and grown food, will bring back some of that community-based commerce. On June 16 Gov. Paul LePage signed LD 725, An Act to Recognize Local Control Regarding Food Systems, June 16, legitimizing the authority of towns and communities to enact ordinances regulating local food distribution free from state regulatory control.“This is huge,” said Heather Retberg, who has helped craft ordinance language. [node:read-more:link]
A report released recently by Georgetown University Center for Children and Families and the University of North Carolina Rural Health Research Project, Medicaid in Small Town America: A Lifeline for Children, Families and Communities, confirms what many of us who care for patients in rural areas suspected: Children and families in small towns and rural areas rely on Medicaid for health coverage, and cuts to Medicaid could be devastating for rural America.In Texas, 46 percent of children in rural areas and small towns are enrolled in Medicaid or the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP [node:read-more:link]
In just 20 years as a publicly traded company, Amazon has become a retailing colossus, decimating traditional brick-and-mortar stores on its way to a market valuation of nearly half a trillion dollars.So since Amazon announced plans this month to buy high-end grocer Whole Foods, consumer groups have lined up against the deal.Their concern is understandable. The $13.7 billion purchase has the feel of something big, something that could mark the beginning of a downward spiral for grocery stores, not unlike what has happened to department stores. But for federal authorities to block t [node:read-more:link]
Drought conditions in the northern U.S. Plains that have propelled spring wheat prices to a three-year high worsened in the past week and there are forecasts for more hot and dry weather that could crimp the harvest. As the world struggles with a glut of grain that has filled inventories to record-highs and cast a wet blanket over the corn and bean markets, the shortage of high-quality spring wheat has taken markets by surprise. The drought in the United States has propelled prices for the high protein grain that is prized by bread makers to three-year highs. [node:read-more:link]
President Trump vowed to “unleash American energy” on Thursday, pledging to bolster the ailing nuclear industry, open up new offshore areas for drilling, and help seal deals for oil pipelines and coal exports.Riding a wave of shale drilling that doubled the country’s total oil and gas production during the Obama administration, Trump said: “We’re here today to usher in a new American energy policy, one that unlocks millions and millions of jobs and trillions of dollars in wealth.”But energy experts were not impressed with the measures Trump unveiled Thursday, saying they would have little e [node:read-more:link]
It doesn’t matter if you like them hard-boiled, scrambled or soaked in heart-clogging hollandaise sauce: when eggs are this cheap, it’s a good time to get cracking.Supplies in the U.S. have surged so much in recent months that prices are the lowest for this time of year in at least a decade. It will probably take awhile for consumers to eat through the surplus inventory, so the government is predicting egg costs will drop more than any other food group in 2017. [node:read-more:link]
Calm, careful, potentially revolutionary, "Food Evolution" is an iconoclastic documentary on a hot-button topic. Persuasive rather than polemical, it's the unusual issue film that deals in counterintuitive reason rather than barely controlled hysteria. [node:read-more:link]
State officials want hunters to shoot more deer in northeastern lower Michigan. Infected deer in the area spread a disease called bovine tuberculosis. It can kill cows, and it can be passed to people through unpasteurized dairy products.The state has already spent more than $150 million trying to eradicate the disease over the past two decades. But rates of bovine TB have spiked among the deer population in recent years, and several cattle herds have been newly infected. In April 2015, Jeremy Werth got the phone call that every dairy farmer in this area dreads. [node:read-more:link]
As the managed honey bee industry continues to grapple with significant annual colony losses, the Varroa destructor mite is emerging as the leading culprit. And, it turns out, the very nature of modern beekeeping may be giving the parasite the exact conditions it needs to spread nearly beyond control. [node:read-more:link]
