One of North Dakota's largest high-value crop farms has filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Fargo. McM, Inc., based in St. Thomas, N.D., north of Grand Forks, filed a voluntary petition for bankruptcy. The farm is one of the largest farms of high-value specialty crops in the region, including about 39,000 acres, with about 2,000 acres of sugar beets and about 4,200 acres of non-irrigated potatoes in 2016.
Western Growers, which represents farmers in Arizona, California, and Colorado who produce half the nation’s fresh fruits, vegetables, and tree nuts, advises its members to begin preparing for increased worksite enforcement and renewed emphasis on Form I-9 audits. Employers should be proactive to recognize and correct Form I-9 problems before U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) comes knocking on the door. Now is the time to audit all Form I-9s to ensure they are completed fully and accurately. [node:read-more:link]
Three judges on the Patent Trial and Appeal Board have ruled that lucrative patents on the gene editing technology known as CRISPR belong to the Broad Institute of Harvard and MIT. CRISPR was first developed by Jennifer Doudna from the University of California, Berkeley, and Emmanuelle Charpentier, then at the University of Vienna and now at the Max Planck Institute in Germany. The University of California filed a patent in May 2012 for ownership of the technology as it applies to all of its uses, in all types of cells. [node:read-more:link]
There is an economic argument to limiting immigration to the U.S.: Cut down on the supply of foreign labor, and wages will improve for native-born Americans. But new research shows the equation isn’t that simple. A team of economists looked at the midcentury “bracero” program, which allowed nearly half a million seasonal farmworkers a year into the U.S. from Mexico. The Johnson administration terminated the program in 1964, creating a large-scale experiment on labor supply and demand. The result wasn’t good news for American workers. [node:read-more:link]
Ethanol production has changed significantly over the past ten years. U.S. production has ramped up from 3.9 to 14.8 billion gallons per year between 2005 and 2015. As demand for corn ethanol has increased, corn production in the US expanded from 11.8 billion bushels in 2004 to 13.6 billion bushels in 2015. In addition to the gains from reduced levels of land conversion, the ICF report shows that the reductions in GHG emissions from corn ethanol are continually driven by a variety of improvements in efficiency, from the corn field to the ethanol refinery. [node:read-more:link]
The process for writing what was expected to be the 2012 farm bill started in a fairly routine way: staff discussions, member meetings and hearings to gather input from farmers and consumers. Ranking Member Frank Lucas, R-Okla., described that hearing as “two-and-a-half hours to kick off two-and-a-half years.” If only it had been so simple and so quick. That’s not to say that previous farm bills – beginning with the Agricultural Adjustment Act (AAA) of 1933 – had any less drama and lacked political intrigue. [node:read-more:link]
New Hampshire already lags behind most of its neighbors in expanding its use of renewable energy but that hasn't stopped several groups from using this legislative session to attack those nascent efforts. Led by the Americans for Prosperity, these groups support a bill that would pull New Hampshire out of the nine-state Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative. The program has reduced carbon dioxide emissions from electrical generation in those eight states by 40 percent over the last decade. [node:read-more:link]
The former president is leasing part of his family's farmland for a project that is both cutting edge and homespun. The solar panels — 3,852 of them — shimmered above 10 acres of Jimmy Carter’s soil where peanuts and soybeans used to grow. The panels moved almost imperceptibly with the sun. And they could power more than half this small town, from which Carter rose from obscurity to the presidency. [node:read-more:link]
Everyone loves a cheap eats list. A treasure map to $1 tacos! $4 banh mi! $6 pad Thai! More often than not, the Xs that mark the cheap spots are in the city's immigrant enclaves. Indeed, food media is never so diverse as when it runs these lists, its pages fill with names of restaurateurs and chefs of color. These lists infuriate me. Restaurant workers are already among the lowest paid workers in America. Many full-time workers rely on public assistance to make ends meet. Often enough, restaurant workers could not afford to eat at the restaurants where they work. [node:read-more:link]
Nearly two years ago, Brian Levin found himself in Japan, covered head-to-toe in beef and posing for a photograph with John F. Kennedy’s daughter. It was all part of a plan to get his product, a high-end beef jerky, into the Japanese market. Wearing a Velcro suit that allowed people to rip packages of beef jerky off it, Levin, the chief executive of a brand called Perky Jerky, appeared beside Caroline Kennedy, the U.S. ambassador to Japan, at a trade show promoting U.S. food. It was a big opportunity for the brand, and others like it. [node:read-more:link]
