AgClips
Recent AgClips
Injury rates jump at coal giant Murray's West Virginia mines
Reuters | Posted onOctober 25, 2018 in Energy NewsInjury rates have more than doubled at five West Virginia coal mines acquired by Murray Energy Corp. in 2013, according to a Reuters review of federal data, as the firm sharply increased the amount of coal produced per manhour.
New York Sues Exxon Mobil, Saying It Deceived Shareholders on Climate Change
The New York Times | Posted onOctober 25, 2018 in Energy NewsNew York’s attorney general sued Exxon Mobil claiming the company defrauded shareholders by downplaying the expected risks of climate change to its business. The litigation, which follows more than three years of investigation, represents the most significant legal effort yet to establish that a fossil fuel company misled the public on climate change and to hold it responsible.
FDA drops new produce guidance and wants to talk about it
Food Safety News | Posted onOctober 25, 2018 in Federal NewsCall it a little lite winter reading for America’s produce growers and processors.
Communities Want Trees Thinned. Timber Companies Want Contracts. So What’s The Problem?
Pew Trust | Posted onOctober 25, 2018 in Agriculture NewsMany of the trees that Ford’s Forest Health Company removes are too thin to turn into conventional lumber products, such as boards and planks. So he chips them. And now, six years into his 10-year tree thinning contract with the Forest Service, he has far more chips than he can sell. Four orange-brown heaps of wood chips, as high as 20 feet tall, loom around his small sawmill in the mountain town of Pagosa Springs, Colorado. The heaps collectively cover five acres, he calculates. They’re so vast that his company has halved the area it thins per year to between 500 and 600 acres.
FDA Releases Five-Year Plan for Supporting Antimicrobial Stewardship in Veterinary Settings
FDA | Posted onOctober 25, 2018 in Federal Newsthe U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s Center for Veterinary Medicine (CVM) unveiled its five-year action plan for supporting antimicrobial stewardship in veterinary settings. This plan builds upon the important steps CVM has taken to eliminate production uses of medically important antimicrobials (i.e., antimicrobials important for treating human disease) and to bring all remaining therapeutic uses of these drugs under the oversight of licensed veterinarians.
Ohio SARL member working on Ohio school funding fix
The Columbus Dispatch | Posted onOctober 25, 2018 in Rural, SARL Members and Alumni NewsOhio’s lowest-performing districts, with a performance index score under 70, had eight times as many low-income students on average as districts with scores over 100. Low income is defined as “economically disadvantaged” students with family income below 185 percent of the federal poverty level — $38,443 for a family of three. “There is stuff we know to do, and it takes money,” Fleeter said, pointing to universal preschool, summer programs and extended school days. “We need to get outside the box that school is six hours a day for 180 days of the year and it starts when you turn 5.
Fed says the new NAFTA isn't going to help US dairy farmers
CNBC | Posted onOctober 25, 2018 in Federal NewsThe renegotiated trade agreement between the U.S., Mexico and Canada is of little use to the dairy farmers President Donald Trump insisted on helping, Federal Reserve banks in the Midwest are reporting Gains from the new agreement are seen as "too small and too far in the future to help dairy farmers," the Chicago Fed reported in the central bank's periodic report on economic conditions across its 12 districts.The Minneapolis Fed reported that "a substantial number of dairy operations have exited the business since the beginning of the year." The report, called the "Beige Book," was release
Monsanto, DuPont cannot escape dicamba class action suits
Reuters | Posted onOctober 25, 2018 in Agriculture NewsThe federal judge overseeing lawsuits alleging dicamba-based weedkillers have caused crop damage has denied requests by defendants Bayer AG unit Monsanto and DuPont that he dismiss several class action claims broader than those contained in the multidistrict litigation master complaint. U.S. District Judge Stephen Limbaugh in Cape Girardeau, Missouri denied the companies’ motion to strike the claims from seven individual lawsuits, rejecting their arguments that allowing them to remain would harm judicial efficiency and violate civil procedure laws.
Culver's allows guests to support Wisconsin dairy farmers
Wisconsin State Farmer | Posted onOctober 25, 2018 in Agriculture NewsAnyone who knows a dairy farmer, knows things are tough right now as they deal with the ramification of trade wars, collapsed prices of milk and other commodities. Wisconsin lost 47 dairy farms in August, putting the state on pace for its worst year since 2013. Since 2017, more than 650 Wisconsin dairy farms have gone out of business. More than three decades ago, Culver's got its start with the help of Wisconsin dairy farmers and is committed to efforts that help dairy farmers today and into the future, according to a news release from Culver's.
Fighting to Breathe in the Shadow of a Coal Power Plant
Esquire | Posted onOctober 25, 2018 in Energy NewsA glimpse at a small Pennsylvania town in the middle of a health crisis, all while the Trump administration moves to relax what regulations there still are on how their nearby plants operate. ut there are also thousands of smaller casualties of this effort to dismantle the EPA. The Flint water crisis increasingly looks to have been a harbinger, not an aberration, something that will not improve with looser water standards.