More jams, jellies and baked goods could end up in farmers markets if an ordinance to reduce permit fees for "cottage food" vendors passes the Anchorage Assembly.Those producers, who typically are small in scale and sell items like baked goods, jams, jellies and fermented food made in home kitchens, pay $310 under current municipal rules to operate. [node:read-more:link]
To protect the environment, relieve hunger and save money, states are trying to reduce those numbers. California, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Vermont already restrict the amount of food and other organic waste (such as soiled and compostable paper and yard waste) that can be dumped in landfills. [node:read-more:link]
The Ohio Department of Agriculture recently introduced two new nutrient management tools intended to help farmers track planting conditions, and conserve nutrients.The Ohio Applicator Forecast is a new online tool designed to help nutrient applicators identify times when the potential nutrient loss from a fertilizer or manure application is low.Secondly, the Ohio Agricultural Stewardship Verification Program is a pilot certification for farmers who protect farmland and natural resources by implementing best management practices on their farms.Both programs are voluntary. [node:read-more:link]
In Missouri, advocates quietly defeated another bill that would have created hurdles for municipal broadband providers. In Tennessee, a new law gives electric cooperatives the authority to go into the broadband business in their service areas. Unlike battles occurring in Virginia and Tennessee between activists and large communication companies, the struggle in Missouri didn’t seem to attract a lot of attention. [node:read-more:link]
State milk regulators requested that the U.S. Food & Drug Administration work with them to enforce the proper use of milk and milk product labeling terms, especially those meant to distinguish between real dairy products and plant-based imitators – a development the National Milk Producers Federation (NMPF) hailed as “the strongest statement yet that the abuse of dairy terms has gone too far.”“It’s time for FDA to work with state agencies in defending standards of identity for dairy products,” said Beth Briczinski, NMPF vice president of dairy foods and nutrition. [node:read-more:link]
Whether it is the promise of industry that never materializes, the loss of existing factories and plants, or any of a number of other reasons, many of Georgia’s rural communities are suffering. The newest effort from state government to identify the challenges facing rural Georgia, and potential solutions, gets under way. The House Rural Development Council will have its first meeting. [node:read-more:link]
The dairy industry and environmental groups have come up with 19 legal challenges to the Washington Department of Ecology’s new manure-control law.The Pollution Control Hearings Board, the forum for appealing Ecology actions, has scheduled a week-long hearing for Dec. 4-8 in Tumwater on the state’s Concentrated Animal Feeding Operation permits. The appeals did not keep the rules from taking effect in March.“Ecology developed these permits with the best available science and broad stakeholder input,” department spokeswoman Jessica Payne wrote Monday in an email. [node:read-more:link]
With laughter, hugs and tears — and the requisite death-defying stunts — the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus received its final standing ovation Sunday night as it performed its last show. "We are, forevermore, the Greatest Show on Earth," boomed Johnathan Lee Iverson, who has been the ringmaster since 1999. His son, who also performed, stood by his side. It was an emotional 2 1/2 hours for those who worked on the circus. Many of Ringling's employees are second, third and even fourth-generation circus performers, while others met their spouses while touring. [node:read-more:link]
Before the ink was dry on a US Department of Transportation pledge to give $10 million for the replacement of a still smoldering collapsed portion of I-85 in Atlanta, metro legislators were criticizing a well-thought-out, hard-fought-for, and long overdue measure designed to help revitalize rural Georgia.The “Georgia Agribusiness and Rural Jobs Act” (GARJA), which passed minutes before the expiration of the 2017 legislative session, opens the door for small businesses in rural Georgia, approximately 130 counties, to have access to much needed growth capital. [node:read-more:link]
A line-item veto by Gov. Terry Branstad on May 12 means the Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture at Iowa State University remains alive, but it has no money. Officials at Iowa State University and at the Leopold Center were left scrambling to figure out what happens next and how the center will change in the coming months and years.“It’s better than what it was before (the veto),” says Doug Gronau, a farmer who represents the Iowa Farm Bureau on the Leopold Center’s advisory board. “I think there definitely is going to be a reorganization. [node:read-more:link]
