America’s Rural Opportunity is a six-part series that invites policymakers, economic and community development practitioners, and business and philanthropic leaders to engage in real dialogue around advancing a rural opportunity agenda. This second America’s Rural Opportunity panel will focus on a group of innovators that drive the American economy – entrepreneurs and the organizations that support them. [node:read-more:link]
Lancaster, Ohio, was once a thriving city of glass-makers, shoe factories, natural gas operations and more. By way of culture, it had a music festival, a county fair and the Sherman House (birthplace of the Civil War general). Cozily nestled just west of the Appalachian foothills, it had something in addition to its churches, parks, taverns and bowling alleys. [node:read-more:link]
After a federal court shot down the efforts of individual counties, advocates of more regulation have only the Legislature to turn to. A week ago, two legislative committees approved a slew of bills aimed at banning certain pesticides, funding studies and requiring large agricultural companies to disclose when and where they apply the chemicals. But activists pushing for more regulation of large farms aren’t celebrating yet. Some lawmakers on other committees aren’t planning to call hearings for the bills or say that they haven’t made up their minds. [node:read-more:link]
Marshall, along with representatives and members of the American Seed Trade Association, are working with gene editing to edit out and edit in traits and qualities in plants and beyond. Long-form, CRISPR is Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats. Cas9 is a nuclease that is used with another element to “cut” a cell’s genome and allow the editing, consisting of the addition of or deletion of specific genes. [node:read-more:link]
When people don’t seem to use science to make decisions, it is tempting to assume that it’s because they don’t understand the underlying science. In response, scientists and science communicators often just try harder to explain the science in the hope that eventually the facts will persuade people to change their behaviours or beliefs. [node:read-more:link]
Between 2008 and 2013, Iowa landowners received $6.3 million in tax credits for donating $19.4 million in land or conservation easements. In all, they gave away 9,200 acres. Even with those donations, Iowa ranks second-to-last nationally in the amount of publicly owned land, experts say. But that's still too much for the tax credit's opponents. The state's largest agriculture group contends that the land donations shrink local property taxes and idle acreage in a state where competition for farmland is intense. [node:read-more:link]
The Legislature moved to sidestep utility regulators and approve a new Xcel Energy power plant in central Minnesota. The natural gas-fired plant in Becker is meant to offset losses from two coal-fired generators when they close in 2023 and 2026. The Minnesota Public Utilities Commission sidelined Xcel's proposal in October. However, bills passed in both chambers of the Legislature mean the plant can move forward without fulfilling the regulator's request to research renewable energy options. [node:read-more:link]
An Indiana Senate panel gave preliminary approval Thursday to a bill backed by the state's investor-owned power utilities that critics contend is an effort to muscle out smaller companies from the emerging solar energy market. The measure by Republican state Sen. Brandt Hershman was approved by thte Senate Utilities committee.Currently, solar panel owners who feed surplus energy into the power grid are compensated at a retail market rate, which supporters say enables them to pay off the expensive investment in solar within its useful life. [node:read-more:link]
A bill that would require country of origin labels on beef is headed to the Senate floor of the South Dakota legislature. The bill, SB 135, passed out of the state Senate Agriculture and National Resources Committee on Feb. 15 after a 5-to-3 vote in favor of the legislation. SB 135 states that all beef and ground beef sold for retail within the state must bear a country of origin label. [node:read-more:link]
McKay, backed by other Western Maryland lawmakers, is asking the General Assembly to extend the same level of protection to bees that it now gives calves, goats, chickens and other animals. A person defending himself, other people or livestock is exempt from a state law that makes shooting a black bear without a permit punishable by a $1,500 fine and six months in jail for a first offense. [node:read-more:link]
