Agriculture

"Not the environmentalists. Not the ranchers. Not the public employees. In some cases, not even the cows."

"Over the past few years, as the U.S. organic market has surpassed $60 billion in sales, organic farmers, businesses, and advocates have been engaged in a heated debate about the strength and integrity of the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Organic standards. Now, the agency has finally started taking action to address some of the loopholes long pointed to by advocates."

"The seven states that rely on water from the shrinking Colorado River are unlikely to agree to voluntarily make deep reductions in their water use, negotiators say, which would force the federal government to impose cuts for the first time in the water supply for 40 million Americans."

"The Colorado River begins as melting snow, trickling from forested peaks and coursing in streams that gather in the meadows and valleys of the Rocky Mountains. Like arteries, its major tributaries take shape across Colorado, Wyoming, Utah and New Mexico, coming together in a great river like no other — a river that travels more than 1,400 miles and has defined the rise of the American Southwest over the last century."

"The United States is facing a shortage of the native seeds it uses to restore natural habitats damaged by wildfire and other weather events made worse by climate change, according to a report released on Thursday by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM)."

"The gene bank can hold as many as 120,000 varieties of plants. Many of the seeds come from crops as old as agriculture itself. They're sown by farmers in the Fertile Crescent region, where cultivation began some 11,000 years ago. Other seeds were deposited by researchers who've hiked in the past four decades through forests and mountains in the Middle East, Asia and North Africa, searching for wild relatives of wheat, legumes and other crops that are important to the human diet."

"Growing numbers of people in Asia lack enough to eat as food insecurity rises with higher prices and worsening poverty, according to a report released Tuesday by the Food and Agricultural Organization and other United Nations agencies."

"It's not possible to remove all traces of lead from the food supply, because the heavy metal is found throughout the environment and can be absorbed by plants. So traces are found in the vegetables, fruits and grains that are used to make baby food. But as toxic metal exposure can be harmful to developing brains, the Food and Drug Administration is issuing new guidelines to reduce children's exposure to the lowest level possible."

"A chaotic start to the new Republican-led House may spell trouble for the 2023 farm bill."

"The letter from Arizona Sen. Mark Kelly was greeted like an act of war in California’s Imperial Valley."