News about sustainable, organic, local and ethical food and farming from around the web, as well as about the icky stuff.

Happily, our friends at the Center for Rural Affairs have contributed this round-up of important news regarding farm and rural news contributed by Ethanol Helps, Not that Much: The benefits of ethanol production to rural communities are real, they just aren’t that significant. New research by Iowa State University Economist David Swenson details the gap between the actual number of jobs and economic activity created and the claims ethanol’s proponents make…. Now a powerful coalition of 153 liberal House members are threatening to pull their support for the final bill unless it makes significant and permanent increases in anti-hunger and nutrition programs…. (The Hill) Revolutionizing Africa: One Holstein at a Time: Uganda is the native home to the Ankole cattle, a breed uniquely adapted to the region. But the Ankole isn’t the grain-eating, milk-producing, manure-spewing machine that the American Holstein is, so now everyone from the World Bank to Heifer International is doing their best to supplant the graceful and native Ankole with the (more familiar to them) Holstein.

The Farm Bill is back. (Admit it — you’d been missing it.) House and Senate ag staffers have taken to lurking in each other’s offices and furrowing their brows over what could be a protracted conflict between members of the conference committee, that group of reps and senators assigned to turn the meat grinder on […]

Editorials and op-eds about sustainable agriculture (or its opposite) from newspapers and websites big and small.

Editorials and op-eds about sustainable agriculture (or its opposite) from newspapers and websites big and small.

These days, votes in the Senate are usually either along party lines (51-49), or lopsided like 98-2 or 100-0. However, the vote on the Dorgan-Grassley amendment, which would have set a $250,000 limit for farm subsidy payments to any one farm, was unusual. The No votes were cast by 31 Republicans, 11 Democrats and […]

Advocates for farm bill reform have worked for well over a year in an effort to secure meaningful payment limits on farm program subsides. On Thursday we lost a vote in the U.S. Senate on the Dorgan-Grassley payment limits amendment despite garnering 56 votes. (Find out how your senator voted here.) The leadership had previously consented to an agreement that required all reform amendments to obtain a super-majority of 60 votes to pass. Here’s a round-up of the responses from various reform groups.

An amendment passed in the Farm Bill stops the FDA from approving food from cloned animals until more studies have been done and consumer acceptance has been examined.

The Farm Bill has passed the Senate, and I’m the last one who’s going to say it doesn’t make me want to cry. But despite some extremely disappointing losses — including the failure of the Dorgan-Grassley payment limitations amendment — the Sustainable Agriculture Coalition reminds us that there were some important wins, too (and yet […]

Parke Wilde’s U.S. Food Policy blog has an update on the status of the Dorgan-Grassley amendment, which would have put a $250,000/recipient cap on subsidy payments. The status: dead. The kicker: the amendment failed despite the fact that a majority of senators voted in support of it. What is this madness, you ask? Ken Cook […]

I’ve recently learned (thanks to a little birdie from Capitol Hill) that Tyson, Smithfield, and pals are on the rampage this morning, circulating memos and e-mails against two important livestock amendments to be offered today on the Farm Bill. These amendments — the Grassley competition amendment and the Tester amendment — would help make it […]

Breaking news and developments, such as contaminated-food outbreaks, Farm Bill milestones, and how the farming community is faring around the world.

Breaking news and developments, such as contaminated-food outbreaks, Farm Bill milestones, and how the farming community is faring around the world.

Breaking news and developments, such as contaminated-food outbreaks, Farm Bill milestones, and how the farming community is faring around the world.

This ad appeared in yesterday’s Congressional newspaper Roll Call:

Hat tip to Gristmill