Author: staff

“Sugar is poison and Americans need to know that it is poisoning us.” Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., made that statement during a press conference on April 22. It’s a point he has made multiple times at other events and in X posts. That same day, Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins was visiting an American Crystal Sugar facility in North Dakota. The cooperative is owned by some 3,000 sugar beet growers in that state and neighboring Minnesota.  “North Dakota is rich in agriculture,” Rollins said during the tour. “Wheat, potato, sugar beet, and cattle farmers…

Every year, my family travels to a Christmas tree farm in western North Carolina to choose our own tree. After the holidays, we put the tree out on the curb so the city can turn it into mulch. Recently, I found out about a unique recycling program for live Christmas trees at Fort Macon. The pre-Civil War era fort sits along the beach in the southeast part of the state. My boys and I walked from the fort to the beach, and when coming back up a different path in the dunes, we noticed Christmas trees lying on the sand. When I…

The “windshield phenomenon” has long caught people’s attention. Ecologists welcome everyday observations like this but caution against oversimplifying the global insect decline narrative. They point to a multitude of drivers, and emphasize that impacts vary widely across regions. Bugs are the battle of the ecosystem — benefiting some, bothering others, and equalizing the system of prey and predator at the smallest scale. Ask an entomologist for their opinion, and they will tell you agriculture’s relationship with insects is complex. Modern research and markets focus on pollination, pest control, and beneficial insects — not just for crops, but also for natural…

Ahead of 9 a.m. CT, July corn was up 1¾¢ at $4.77¼ per bushel. July soybeans were up 1½¢ at $10.46 per bushel. July wheat contracts were mixed. CBOT wheat was up 5½¢ at $5.36¼ per bushel. KC wheat was up 2¼¢ at $5.31¾. Minneapolis wheat was down less than a penny at $5.96½. This morning, USDA released the weekly U.S. Export Sales report. “Corn sales were at the higher end of pre-report estimates, with over 1 million metric tons sold for old crop and nearly 250,000 metric tons sold for new…,” said Angie Setzer, partner at Consus Ag Consulting.…

When farm pressures mount and one difficulty after another hammers your operation, your stress levels rise. Emotions run ragged. Your business can suffer, and even your health can deteriorate if the stressors are prolonged. Stress and Burnout are Real “When we are stressed, the cortisol levels in our blood go up and can potentially affect blood pressure and heart health,” said Monica McConkey, a Minnesota-based counselor who works with farmers face-to-face and by phone. “Uncontrollable variables, like weather, commodity prices, and natural disasters, cause stress. When farmers suffer stress for a number of years, burnout can result. As a result, they…

By Maximilian Heath BUENOS AIRES, April 29 (Reuters) – Argentine farmers’ soybean sales hit the slowest sales pace in 11 years despite the easing of exchange controls that President Javier Milei hoped would speed soy sales up, data from the Agriculture Ministry showed on Tuesday. The oilseed sales reached 24% of the 49 million metric tons estimated for the 2024/25 harvest in Argentina, the world’s largest exporter of soybean oil and soybean meal. The ministry data was collected up to April 23 and showed that during the seven days prior farmers sold 713,800 metric tons of soybeans from the 2024/25 harvest. Uncertainty regarding the exchange…

Corn planting got off to an uneven start this April across top corn-growing states. Near-perfect conditions pushed some growers ahead, while persistent rain left others stuck on the sidelines.  Even within the same Corn Belt state, conditions have varied widely, creating a patchwork of progress across the region. Here’s a look back at April, drawing on USDA’s first four Crop Progress reports of the season and insights from agronomists. Iowa Although corn planting in Iowa tracked with the five-year pace for the first couple weeks of April, the state’s corn planting surged the week ending April 20. Progress continued to…

The International Trade Commission (ITC) issued a final ruling on April 29, 2025, that imports of the herbicide 2,4-D from China and India have harmed domestic producer Corteva Agriscience, resulting in antidumping and countervailing duties at rates yet to be finalized. In testimony to the ITC on April 1, Cynthia Ericson, vice president of Corteva’s weed control segment, said, “Over the past 3 years, a large majority of the imports of 2,4-D into the United States came from China and India. We have witnessed a tremendous increase in imports coupled with a significant decrease in price of those same imports.…

WARREN COUNTY, Iowa — Tom Vilsack, former Iowa governor and the U.S. secretary of agriculture during the Obama and Biden administrations, spoke Tuesday with farmers and rural Iowans about his ideas to grow rural communities.  In the pine-paneled Middleswart Lodge, looking out over Lake Ahquabi State Park, Vilsack explained policies he started, and hoped would continue, that make a farm — rather than a farmer — work harder.   This means programs like the Climate Smart commodities program, which pays farmers a premium for using sustainable agriculture tools, or practices that make use of other farm products, like an anaerobic digester…

The National Sorghum Producers is now accepting entries for the 2025 National Sorghum Yield Contest. State and national winners will be selected from contestants in East and West regions across the Irrigated, Dryland No-Till, and Dryland Tillage divisions, with one overall winner chosen in the Food Grade category. New this year, growers can choose between two protocol options for verifying yields. A market-based verification option allows growers to verify yields based on grain delivered and ticketed at an approved scale, while the traditional on-farm verification option allows for supervised weigh-backs at harvest. The added flexibility aims to accommodate a wider…