Agriculture

On average, U.S. farmers received 14.8 cents for farm commodity sales from each dollar spent on domestically-produced food in 2016, down from 15.5 cents in 2015. Known as the farm share, this amount is at its lowest level for the period 1993 to 2016, and coincides with a steep drop in 2016 average prices received by U.S. farmers, as measured by the Producer Price Index for farm products. 2016 was the fifth consecutive year that the farm share has declined, though the 4.5-percent drop in 2016 was below 2015’s 9.9-percent fall. [node:read-more:link]

An Increase In Bankruptcies Compounds Economic And Emotional Woes.  As the dairy industry struggles with low prices in the face of a long-mounting milk glut, more farmers are finding that their woes are escalating. Over the spring of 2017, a pricing dispute with Canada, Wisconsin's large export market, along with ongoing fears of additional trade issues, have helped crystallize what is turning out to be a serious crisis in dairyland.Cow-feed suppliers can offer a measure of how dairy farmers are holding up. [node:read-more:link]

The weekend blizzard has some farms looking for places to shelter their cows. About ten farms with collapsed or structurally-compromised barn roofs in a 150 mile stretch of central and northeastern Wisconsin. [node:read-more:link]

Large wildfires in western Oklahoma continue to burn more than 400,000 acres and growing. “Hay is the number one need right now,” said Dana Bay, Woodward County OSU Extension Educator. “Ranchers that were able to save their cattle but lost their grass and hay of their own are in desperate need of hay to sustain those animals.”If you would like to donate hay, please contact Extension coordinators at one of the three phone numbers:(405) 590-0106,(405) 496-9329, (405) 397-7912. A second relief fund has been established by the Oklahoma Cattlemen's Foundation (OCF) with. [node:read-more:link]

The Hendricks County Superior Court ruled in favor of a group of hog farmers and their cooperative when it dismissed a lawsuit against them. The Lawsuit was filed by neighbors who argued that the hog farm was a nuisance, that the farm's location was rhe result of negligent siting and that the farm would release odors which would trespass on neighbor's property.  The plaintiffs argued the farm itself had been negligently sited, so the RTFA should not apply. [node:read-more:link]

 Less than eight months after Hurricane Harvey pelted the Texas Gulf Coast with torrential rainfall, drought has returned to Texas and other parts of the West, Southwest and Southeast, rekindling old worries for residents who dealt with earlier waves of dry spells and once again forcing state governments to reckon with how to keep the water flowing. Nearly a third of the continental United States was in drought as of April 10, more than three times the coverage of a year ago. [node:read-more:link]

A meat-cutting school on the Sandy Bay First Nation reserve on the western shore of Lake Manitoba is training workers for jobs at the area’s HyLife pork processing plant and beyond. The first-of-its-kind partnership brings together a Canadian meat processor, an indigenous community and the federal government, The Western Producer reported. HyLife Ltd. [node:read-more:link]

Since the Rhea Wildfire began more than 400,000 acres have burned in western Oklahoma. Drought conditions paired with wind gusts of up to 40 mph are helping the fire spread. According to the Oklahoma Department of Emergency Management, two people have died because of injuries. As of Monday, the fire is roughly 3 percent contained, according to Oklahoma Forestry Services. Ranchers are caught in the crosshairs as the state catches fire. [node:read-more:link]

Canadian imports of milk protein substances (MPS) declined in 2017, after reaching a peak in 2016. Canada’s cheese production, which has used increasing volumes of MPS, and cheese consumption have grown twenty percent over the past five years, reaching approximately 475,000 metric tons in 2017. In February 2017, Canada introduced class 7, a milk price class that provides Canadian manufacturers access to milk for ingredient processing. [node:read-more:link]

Water has been a major focus of Dayton's tenure in office. He pushed for Minnesota's first buffer law and held town hall meetings across the state to talk about how to improve water quality. But finding agreement on solutions hasn't been easy.The governor set an ambitious goal of improving Minnesota's water quality 25 percent by 2025. But consensus on how to achieve that goal has been elusive."I think the 25 by 25 initiative is a great example of how people's desires and their intentions are not yet matched up," said John Linc Stine, commissioner of the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency. [node:read-more:link]