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Shining Light on Farm & Food Policy for 20 Years.
Thursday, January 02, 2025
Dry weather has helped speed Midwestern and Southern farmers through most of this fall’s corn and soybean harvest while also limiting the amount of grain they could send down the Mississippi River. As many park their combines for the year, they are hoping rain storms can replenish soils parched and waterways shrunk by months of drought.
Election results should start coming in tonight, with control of the White House, Senate and House all very much up in the air. But keep in mind it could be days before we know which party controls the White House and U.S. House, given the time it will take to count votes.
Soil conservation has always been the foundation of the Natural Resources Conservation Service, which for nearly 60 years was known as the Soil Conservation Service. But NRCS is having trouble finding candidates with the right set of qualifications to fill its ranks.
The hog industry says the U.S. pork supply is safe following detection of H5N1 in a pig from a backyard farm in Oregon, but concerns remain about possible mutations in the virus.
Nine Republican lawmakers are seeking additional insight into the USDA’s $45.6 million investment in Pure Prairie Poultry, which closed early this month, and the steps the agency has taken to help growers.
All eyes are on Montana as Republicans attempt to wrest control of the Senate out of Democratic hands in next week’s election, though the scales could also be tipped by a handful of other competitive races.
USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service is rapidly staffing up to help farmers with their conservation challenges, and that brings with it the need to train the new employees. However, the agency is finding that many of these new conservationists didn’t grow up on a farm and need help understanding the different types of farming systems they will encounter.
With hundreds of new NRCS employees coming onboard, agency officials must now grapple with how to effectively train up and keep on a generation of younger workers while simultaneously rolling out billions of new farm conservation dollars.
A Wisconsin poultry grower who contracted with Pure Prairie Poultry tells Agri-Pulse to expect lawsuits to be filed today over the company’s closure. The shutdown has resulted in roughly 2 million chickens left without fed and growers without a processor able to take them.
Ag Secretary Tom Vilsack is going after Donald Trump in a podcast aimed at rural residents, specifically pointing to Trump’s plan to impose across-the-board tariffs.
