Agriculture

Governor Andrew M. Cuomo announced that $18.4 million in grant funding is available to help New York livestock farms implement water quality protection projects. The funding will be provided through the final round of the Concentrated Animal Feeding Operation Waste Storage and Transfer System Program, a $50 million program launched in 2017. The program is part of the Governor's historic Clean Water Infrastructure Act, which would double under the 2019-2020 Executive Budget proposal to $5 billion. The application period is currently open and closes April 16, 2019. [node:read-more:link]

Director of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) Jim Carroll announced Anne Hazlett as the office’s Senior Adviser for Rural Affairs. Hazlett has served as the Assistant to the Secretary for Rural Development at the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) since June 2017. [node:read-more:link]

The Chesterfield Township (N.J.) planning board has approved plans for a small USDA-inspected meat processing plant.Located on a 14-acre site, the facility initially will process and warehouse meat for the owner’s Altoona, Penn., wholesale store. Once upgrades such as a new cooler are made, the plant will kill about 60 head of lamb and 10 head of cattle per day, according to the report. [node:read-more:link]

In theory, closing off China’s soybean market due to the trade dispute with the U.S. on top of generally low prices for the commodity should affect all industry players, big to small. Agriculture economist Pat Westhoff begged to differ. “The impact on total revenue may be very similar across the scale of production,” according to Westhoff, who’s an ag economics professor at the University of Missouri. “But sometimes the effect on net revenue can be very different. [node:read-more:link]

The United States will resume an anti-dumping investigation into Mexican tomatoes, the Commerce Department said on Thursday, withdrawing from a 2013 managed trade deal that U.S. growers and lawmakers say has failed. [node:read-more:link]

The state House voted 58-51 on Wednesday to reject a sweeping environmental executive order signed by Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, in a move Whitmer denounced as an irresponsible vote against clean drinking water. The party-line vote in the House followed an earlier 3-2 vote in the Government Operations Committee.The resolution now moves to the Senate, if the Senate also votes to reject the order, that would kill it. The action by the House is a sign that talk about a bipartisan working relationship between Michigan's new Democratic governor and the Republican Legislature is quickly evaporating. [node:read-more:link]

The Oklahoma Board of Agriculture is set to consider measures Tuesday that would establish regulations for the location of poultry operations. Most important among the new proposals is one that requires poultry houses with more than 30,000 birds to be at least a quarter-mile (0.4-kilometers) from any home, The Tulsa World reported. Operations with 30,000 or fewer birds would have a 1,000-foot (300-meter) setback. [node:read-more:link]

Retaliatory tariffs imposed by China and Mexico caused declines in U.S. pork exports to steepen in November, according to USDA statistics compiled by the U.S. Meat Export Federation (USMEF). November pork exports totaled 206,852 metric tons, down 8 percent year over year, while value fell 12 percent to $538.7 million. [node:read-more:link]

A new bill seeking country-of-origin-labeling on meat products has been introduced in the Montana legislature.  Senate Bill 206 generally would require COOL placarding on beef and pork at Montana supermarkets.Specifically, the bill would require retailers to differentiate between 1) meat that is born, raised and processed in the United States, [node:read-more:link]

When it comes to awe-inspiring public lands, Pennsylvania is home to some of the nation’s best hidden gems. Millions of acres of federal, state, and local public lands provide Pennsylvanians with a superior quality of life and enhance our economy. In fact, Pennsylvania’s outdoor recreation economy is the fifth largest in the nation. Continued, sustained investment in these outdoor assets is needed to assure that they remain ready to enjoy. The recently-ended federal shutdown – the longest of its kind in U.S. [node:read-more:link]