Agriculture

Surrounded by mountains in a remote part of southwestern China, Xinguangan’s first large-scale, modern pig farm is getting ready to produce its first offspring.By the end of the year, 10,000 sows will live inside two huge barns on this 73-hectare (180-acre) site, producing up to 280,000 piglets annually, or about 20,000 tonnes of pork.The farm, big even by American standards, is one of a record number of large-scale projects that will be built in China this year as it shifts a big chunk of its pork production from backyard pig pens to automated, intensive hog barns of the kind widely used i [node:read-more:link]

Bad things tend to happen when the ground isn’t covered, Johnson said, so it is important to do practices such as no-tilling, growing cover crops, leaving the stover or managing the grazing. By keeping soil covered, it protects the soil from wind, rain and temperature fluctuations.“When those intense rainfall events come and the ground is not covered, we can see mud running down the ditch and we know there are nutrients in that mud,” Johnson said. “We are giving our topsoil away when we let it wash away.”Armoring the soil will reduce evaporation. [node:read-more:link]

 Global food prices dipped in August, mainly as the prospect of bumper cereal harvests pushed up expectations for larger grain inventories. The FAO Food Price Index declined 1.3 percent from July, averaging 176.6 points in August.The drop was largely driven by a 5.4 percent decline in the FAO Cereal Price Index, reflecting a sharp fall in wheat prices as the outlook for production in the Black Sea region improved.FAO raised its forecast for global cereal production to 2 611 million tonnes, an all-time record. [node:read-more:link]

 Oregon’s top federal prosecutor said Friday the state has a “formidable” problem with marijuana overproduction that winds up on the black market and that he wants to work with state and local leaders and the pot industry to do something about it. U.S. Attorney Billy Williams convened the unprecedented summit of influential federal law enforcement representatives, state officials and marijuana industry scions after Attorney General Jeff Sessions withdrew an Obama administration memo that had guided states with legalized weed on how to avoid federal scrutiny. [node:read-more:link]

But the decline of dairy is not just a loss of landscape and heritage; it is a real economic loss too. Few people realize that the economic impact of one dairy farm goes far beyond the farm lane. In many cases, a dairy will have several full-time employees representing multiple families’ incomes, but it goes even beyond employee salaries. A dairy almost always has a plumber or electrician on speed dial, a veterinarian they regularly have out, a nutritionist they consult, a feed or seed salesman, the trucking company that hauls the milk, and on and on. [node:read-more:link]

Bills introduced last week in the Kansas House and Senate would require countywide public votes on large-scale poultry project proposals like the one Tyson Foods abandoned amid public opposition in Tonganoxie. Rep. Jim Karleskint, R-Tonganoxie, and Sen. Tom Holland, D-Baldwin City, said the bills would expand to poultry operations existing state law allowing public scrutiny of hog and dairy facilities. [node:read-more:link]

Back in October, the Environmental Protection Agency placed dicamba on its list of restricted use pesticides, which means it now has to address some specific requirements. Among those are that dicamba may not be applied except either by the manufacturer of the product or by someone trained to use it correctly. (Monsanto has long claimed that any drifting, and destruction caused thereof, is the fault of those applying it incorrectly. [node:read-more:link]

China’s Commerce Ministry said Sunday that it initiated an anti-dumping and anti-subsidy investigation after preliminarily finding that heavy volumes and low prices of American exports of sorghum, bolstered by U.S. government subsidies, hurt Chinese growers. In announcing the action, the Commerce Ministry didn’t mention the Trump administration’s recent ruling to place tariffs on imports of Chinese solar panels. Chinese officials have told representatives of U.S. [node:read-more:link]

The Association of Equipment Manufacturers (AEM) joined the Equipment Dealers Association (EDA) on Thursday in making a joint industry commitment to provide comprehensive service information tools to end users of farm equipment for tractors and combines in model year 2021. [node:read-more:link]

House Bill (H.B.) 2671, which he introduced last week. Its aim? [node:read-more:link]