Climate Agriculture
All Stories
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Big Ag doesn’t want you to care about pesticides
Power to the people pesticide industry!The produce lobby is livid that consumers might be concerned about pesticides. They are taking their fury out on the USDA for its annual report on pesticide use (via The Washington Post): In a recent letter to Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack, 18 produce trade associations complained that the data have […]
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Produce industry wants Americans to eat their pesticide-laden veggies
For years, the Environmental Working Group has warned consumers away from "The Dirty Dozen," the 12 fruits and vegetables that contain the most trace pesticides. But the produce industry has had enough of this anti-vegetable propaganda! A consortium of food groups, from the American Mushroom Institute to the National Watermelon Association Inc., is mounting a […]
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How does my garden grow? With the aid of a pretty good digital planner
Steph Larsen’s digital farm plan takes shape in the material world.Photo: Steph LarsenWhat’s black and white and dirty all over? My garden plan! Last year’s was, anyway. Most farmers I know will say that keeping good records and plans is fundamental to farming success. By no means am I what you might call a natural […]
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Digging deeper into that NYT Room for Debate on farm-animal cruelty
A horrific scene from a Humane Society undercover video.Photo: Humane Society of the United StatesI was privileged this week to participate in a New York Times Room for Debate discussion on the government’s vs. consumer’s role in “Preventing Cruelty on the Farm,” inspired by the paper’s coverage of the spate of ag-gag laws pending in […]
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Too chicken: Why and how to raise chickens in the city
No matter how broke you are, chickens can help you keep some dignity about you.Photo: Stu MayhewWhen last we fetched up, babydolls, Broke-Ass was waxing pedantic about the primacy of stocking the pantry as nutritiously and cheaply as possible. One alert soul commented: “Where are the eggs? Nature’s most perfect food with as many ways […]
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Critical List: Oil industry clinging to subsidies, Monsanto continues world takeover
Oil industry leaders will testify before Congress today. Their message: Cutting oil subsidies is discrimination! Expand oil and gas production, instead, because that’s somehow good for everybody. And, anyway, oil companies pay more than enough taxes, if you ask the oil companies. If you ask anyone else, they pay a lower rate than the average […]
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Factory farms the only way to ‘feed the world’? Not so, argues Science paper
To “feed the world” by 2050, we’ll need a massive, global ramp-up of industrial-scale, corporate-led agriculture. At least that’s the conventional wisdom. Even progressive journalists trumpet the idea (see here, here, and here, plus my ripostes here and here). The public-radio show Marketplace reported it as fact last week, earning a knuckle rap from Tom […]
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Jack in the Box surprise: How E. coli became a household word
Double your trouble.Photo: theimpulsivebuyFor most of us working in food policy, it’s hard to remember a time when food outbreaks of bugs like E. coli didn’t happen pretty much weekly. But reading the new book Poisoned by Jeff Benedict made me realize that bacteria-contaminated hamburgers are a relatively recent phenomenon. It’s a striking reminder of […]
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Bounty hunting: an inside look at a successful farmers market operation [VIDEO]
Last spring, I had the pleasure of following the farm-to-market process with one of the “successful” upstart organic farms in Minnesota. Laura and Adam from Loon Organics let me film and work through their Friday-Saturday operation. I had been idealizing the idea of starting a farm: seeing the beautiful produce stacked up at the market made me […]
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Real-life Farmville kills the same amount of time, actually does some good
We knew things were going to get weird once we found out there was a real-world Angry Bird. Now a farm in England is turning itself into live-action Farmville. For a £30 ($49) annual fee, members of MyFarm will get to weigh in on every decision made at Wimpole Estate Farm in Cambridgeshire. They'll vote […]