Agriculture News
Dairy- Descending prices and a monstrous amount of cheese
Edairy News | Posted on January 22, 2019Last year started off on a promising note for dairy exports and was projected to possibly set new records. Tariff wars with China and Mexico along with a drop in cheese consumption, however, weighed heavy on prices. Milk sales were down 2.2% over the first 10 months of 2018. As for exports, during the first 10 months, the U.S. exported 16.3% of milk solids, most of which occurred before the tariffs. Experts say there were 30,000 few cows on average during August through October. Looking ahead, the 2019 average all milk price prediction stands at $16.20 per cwt., the lowest price since 2009.When cheese prices drop, so do Class III milk prices. Currently, the U.S. is sitting on a 1.4 billion lb. mountain of cheese. This large inventory is mostly due to the consumer’s appetite shifting away from processed cheeses and towards more natural cheese varieties.Due to the decrease in cheese consumption, stock piles are growing at a faster rate.
Groups provide new guidance on antimicrobials
AVMA | Posted on January 22, 2019The AVMA, Canadian VMA, and Federation of Veterinarians of Europe are calling for continuous monitoring of antimicrobial use and resistance at a global level. The AVMA also has created definitions of antimicrobial use for treatment, control, and prevention. A new joint statement from the AVMA, CVMA, and FVE "describes broad steps and strategies veterinarians around the world can take to preserve the effectiveness and availability of antimicrobial drugs while safeguarding animal, public and environmental health," according to a Dec. 6 announcement. The AVMA Board of Directors adopted the joint statement and the AVMA definitions of antimicrobial use during a November 2018 meeting.According to the introduction to the new definitions, "AVMA believes antimicrobial stewardship can be achieved whether the intent is prevention, control, or treatment, and attempts to prioritize antimicrobial stewardship by therapeutic purpose are misguided. Stewardship is better demonstrated by the clinical rationale for antimicrobial therapy."
PETA, Other Organizations Respond to Video of Local Farm Employee's Actions
We are Green Bay | Posted on January 22, 2019A Marinette County farm is receiving backlash after a video surfaced of an employee using an electrically heated hot iron to burn the horn buds of the heads of calves. The video shows an employee using the hot iron on approximately 12-week-old calves without giving the calves an anesthetic or giving them pain relief afterwards. During the incident, the calves were kicking their legs, bellowing, flinching and attempting to pull their heads away from the hot irons. The employee also used metal restraints on them. Since then, PETA (People For the Ethical Treatment of Animals) has requested the Marinette County Sheriff to investigate Heifer Solutions and their use of electrically heated hot irons.
What does 2019 hold for milk prices?
Edairy News | Posted on January 20, 2019The dairy market has been a tough market says Bryan Doherty, Vice President of Stewart-Peterson.Doherty relates that monthly increases in milk production and efficiency per cow still climbing have made the market difficult to turn around, largely because of the high supply of milk. However, things appear to be changing.“Prices are low enough where demand is on the grow,” Doherty says.Global dairy prices have continued to pick up steam through the New Year and beef prices are higher, too.
Virginia announces over $600,000 in farmland preservation grants
Aigista Free Press | Posted on January 20, 2019Gov. Ralph Northam announced Thursday the recipients of fiscal year 2019 farmland preservation grants. Six localities have been awarded a total of $633,831 from the Virginia Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services’ Office of Farmland Preservation. The funds will be used to permanently preserve working farmland through local Purchase of Development Rights (PDR) programs. PDR programs compensate landowners who work with localities to preserve their land permanently by voluntarily securing a perpetual conservation easement.
Tyson, nonprofit partner on sustainable land project
Meating Place (free registration required) | Posted on January 20, 2019Tyson Foods and the nonprofit Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) announced a partnership to develop initiatives aimed at accelerating sustainable food production. The partnership will focus first on helping Tyson meet its land stewardship goal, announced in April 2018, to work with farmers to improve practices across two million acres of corn production by 2020. A pilot project will focus on reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions on 500,000 acres of corn, improving water quality and maximizing farmer profitability.The pilot will use cloud-based agricultural technologies from MyFarms and Farmers Business Network to collect data for analysis of agricultural production practices. Farmers will have an opportunity to use a new method for calculating nitrogen loss. Excessive nitrogen application is a primary water quality concern, contributes to GHG emissions and is a source of lost income for farmers, according to Tyson and EDF.
Farm Bureau Adopts Policies on Government Shutdown, Trade, Opioids, Cell-Based Food and Broadband
Farm Bureau | Posted on January 20, 2019Delegates urged the administration and Congress to work together to end the government shutdown as soon as possible. The current shutdown means farmers and ranchers are being delayed in securing loans and crop insurance as well as disaster and trade assistance. Delegates voted to favor negotiations to resolve trade disputes, rather than the use of tariffs or withdrawal from agreements. They also voted to support the United States’ entry into the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership.Delegates adopted a comprehensive policy to support innovation in cell-based food products while ensuring a level playing field for traditional protein. Delegates supported improved broadband coverage maps through better data and third-party provider verification.
Horses let loose at Stark County Fair, one drowns
Farm and Dairy | Posted on January 20, 2019A Mansfield man was arrested Jan. 14, after he admitted to setting more than a dozen race horses loose from the Stark County Fairgrounds, along Wertz Avenue.One horse ventured onto Meyers Lake, which was partially frozen, and drowned while first responders attempted a rescue effort.
US Forest Service builds pen for possible horse slaughter
Capital Press | Posted on January 20, 2019The U.S. Forest Service has built its first corral for wild horses, which could allow it to bypass federal restrictions and sell the animals for slaughter. The agency acknowledged in court filings in a potentially precedent-setting legal battle that it built the new pen in Northern California for mustangs gathered this fall on national forest land along the Nevada border because of restrictions on such sales at other federal holding facilities.The agency denies claims by horse advocates it has made up its mind to sell the more than 250 horses for slaughter. But it also says it may have no choice because of the high cost of housing the animals and continued ecological impacts it claims overpopulated herds are having on federal rangeland."While slaughtering wild horses does not present a pleasant picture, the reality of this dire situation is not pleasant," Justice Department lawyers representing the agency wrote in its most recent filing last month. "The Forest Service is taking a step to reduce what is universally recognized as a natural catastrophe."
‘Dairy farmers are eroding their profits for the pleasure of producing extra milk’
The Bull Vine | Posted on January 17, 2019Speaking at the Irish Grassland Association’s (IGA) Dairy Conference on January 9 in Co. Cork, John Roche from Down to Earth Advice presented on the topic of producing marginal milk to the large crowd in attendance on the day. “In the Irish system of milk production, base milk is cheap and marginal milk is very expensive to produce. Many dairy farmers are eroding their profits for the pleasure of producing extra milk; ego farming is what I like to call it,” the Kerry man explained.Touching on what marginal milk is, John said: “Marginal milk is the addition or reduction in milk production when you make a change to a farming system according to the reports published in agriland.ie.