Friday, November 20, 2009
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Ag and Trade

Ag and Trade | Politics and Government
Small Farm Infatuation Misses Reality, Delta Writer Says
01/26/2009

The Yonder's Richard Oswald would love to see Chuck Hassebrook at deputy secretary of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Down in the Mississippi Delta, there is a different opinion. Forest Laws of the Delta Farm Press writes that "with some reluctance...I don't think Chuck Hassebrook would be a good choice for deputy secretary."

Laws says he's been a long-time reader of Hassebrook's writings, "and I know he is deeply concerned about the future of rural America and of family farmers." But Hassebrook's vision of the family farmer is someone working 400 acres with one or two hired hands and he's been "lobbying Congress to limit farm payments to those size operations for years." Law writes that what Hassebrook "refuses to recognize — we’ve had this debate before — is the larger farming operations he denigrates are the norm in the Sunbelt and probably more the rule in states like Nebraska and in Iowa. (Iowa probably has more 2,000-acre farming operations than the 300- to 400-acre ones by far.)" Farms got that big, Law writes, "so they could stay in business."

The deputy secretary plays a "much bigger role" in USDA today than in years past, Law writes. And deputy secretaries often end up as acting secretaries. Law says there have been "hatchet" men who have ended up as acting secretaries before and indicates that Hassebrook could be another.

Ag and Trade | Politics and Government
Letter from Langdon: A Vote for Chuck
01/25/2009

The team that takes over the Department of Agriculture needs a working knowledge of small towns and a realization that power is too concentrated.

Ag and Trade | Food
Obama Suspends Food Labeling, Gray Wolf Regs
01/22/2009

Ranchers and farmers are already seeing the effects of having a new boss in Washington, D.C. On his first day on the job, President Barack Obama held up regulations that would govern COOL, the Country of Origin Labeling system. Farmers and ranchers have long wanted labels that would tell consumers where their food was produced. The Bush Administration issued rules governing COOL, but many grower groups found them to be weak.

Obama froze several pending regulations issued by Bush in his last days in office. One suspended rule would have made it easier for factories and refineries to expand without applying for a new pollution permit. Another rule would have removed gray wolves in the Northern Rockies and Great Lakes from the endangered species list.

As for COOL, Bloomberg reports: "The freeze also halts an Agriculture Department rule that sets requirements for country-of-origin labeling on meat and other perishable food items. Opponents of the measure said the Bush rule would let meat produced in a domestic facility that also processes animals from abroad carry a multicountry designation, blurring the distinctions between U.S. and imported meats."

Ag and Trade
Recession? What recession? We're Monsanto!
01/07/2009
The seed producer and Roundup bottler Monsanto announced that its profits had doubled in the quarter ending on November 30. The company also raised its full-year per-share earnings expectation. The combination of good earnings and high expectations pushed the company's stock up 18% in after hours trading. Monsanto stock was down 37% in 2008.

Purchases of corn seed — particularly by Brazilian farmers — and sales of the weed-killer Roundup were at the heart of the company's increases in profits. The company's CEO said the company would maintain high prices for seed because the company believes farmers will pay for a product that increases yield.

Monsanto hopes to double profit by 2012. The company is developing a new drought-tolerant corn, which is in the final stages of research. Monsanto is seeking clearance from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. U.S. farmers will plant about 90 million acres of corn this year, and as many as 35 million will be sown with Monsanto seed, an approximately 20% increase from last year. Monsanto expects to grab as much as 2 percentage points of additional U.S. market share in corn, the ninth consecutive yearly gain, according to the company.
Ag and Trade | Food
Glut of Cheese and Milk Drops Dairy Prices
01/05/2009
For a while in 2007, milk prices were so high people were calling it "white gold." Emerging economies liked milk and bought more of it. No longer.   Now it's not white gold but a white glut.

There's too much milk. Cheese prices dropped 40 percent in the last week.   Government warehouses are busting at the seams with milk powder. "The thing is, they are going to produce it because they have to milk the cows," one milk powder warehouse owner told the New York Times. "It's like a river. It keeps coming."

Trouble is, the cost of milk production hasn't dropped as fast as the price of the product. Feed is still high. So is fertilizer. That has some farmers looking to reduce their herds. The boom and bust cycles are coming close together, say New York dairymen. Prices were historically low in 2005 and '06. 2007 brought high prices, but not high enough to make up for losses. No prices are down again and dairymen are looking for some sense of stability.
Ag and Trade | Food
Mexico Stops U.S. Meat Imports Because of Sanitation...Maybe
12/29/2008
Mexico has suspended purchases of meat from 30 U.S. plants and the question is why. The plants are located in 14 states. Shipments were turned back at the border last Wednesday, surprising producers and the U.S. government.

The initial speculation was that Mexico was retaliating for COOL, the regulation that requires meat (and other products) to have their country of origin on the sales label. Canada has filed a complaint with the World Trade Organization saying the Country of Origin Labeling (COOL) regulation violates trade treaties. Mexico joined that complaint the week before turning away the meat shipments.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture says the shipments were turned back because of Mexican concerns about sanitation at the plants.   Mexican officials denied that COOL was behind the dispute. Reports this morning said the banned U.S. meat production plants could be reinstated today. Mexico buys 27% of the beef exported from the U.S.
Ag and Trade | Politics and Government | Racing For '08/Archive
Cotton Production in 1860 and the Election of a President, 2008
12/22/2008

Take one map from 2008 and another from 1860 -- and you can see how the country has changed both a lot and a little in nearly a century and a half.

Ag and Trade | Politics and Government
So It's Vilsack After All!
12/17/2008
First, for a good review of what Tom Vilsack (above) will mean to rural America as the next Ag Secretary, go to Richard Oswald's article from a few weeks ago. For the best report on how the nomination came about, go to this story in the Des Moines Register. As for what others say....

The National Farmers Union is happy. (NFU President Tom Buis presents a good list of projects to be undertaken by the Obama administration, saying the new president's "rural vision is right on target.") So are the fresh fruit and vegetable folks. The Farm Bureau said that Vilsack and Sen. Ken Salazar (who was nominated for the Interior Department post) have demonstrated "experienced, steady judgment" on ag issues. And the cattle raisers.

There will be opposition from the political left. The Organic Consumers Association issued a blunt statement: "Vilsack has a glowing reputation as being a schill for agribusiness biotech giants like Monsanto." The Nation magazine listed all the other people it would prefer to see in the Ag job, concluding that Vilsack is, "at best," a cautious pick. We can only hope that the new secretary of agriculture will break with some of his old friends in agribusiness..."
Ag and Trade | Politics and Government
Letter From Langdon: Secretary of Food? How About a Real USDA
12/15/2008
Instead of a Secretary of Food — a New York Times suggestion — what we need is a Secretary of Agriculture who respects farmers and rural communities.
Ag and Trade | Growth and Development
In the Courts: Katrina Aid and Fixing Food Prices
12/11/2008
We have two unrelated actions in court today that affect different parts of Yonder. The first comes from Sacramento, California, where federal prosecutors announced that a key figure in an investigation of food price fixing had agreed to plead guilty. The owner of a New Jersey-based food wholesaler routinely paid bribes to purchasing agents to ensure customers paid an inflated price for food and bought food from a particular vendor. According to the Sacramento Bee newspaper, "The investigation has raised concerns within the government that collusion among farmers, processors and retailers may be driving food prices higher."

Meanwhile, a few thousand miles away, groups in Mississippi have sued the federal government to stop the distribution of nearly $600 million in Hurricane Katrina relief aid from being spent to expand the Port of Gulfport, Mississippi. Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour had sought to redirect the aid from building affordable housing to reconstructing and expanding the seaport.
Daily Yonder | Keep It Rural
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