Author: staff

“This story was originally published by Grist. Sign up for Grist’s weekly newsletter here.” In the United States, farmers have access to federally subsidized crop insurance — a backstop that affords them some peace of mind in the face of extreme weather. When droughts, floods, or other natural disasters ruin a season’s harvest, farmers can rely on insurance policies that will pay out a certain percentage of the expected market value of the food, saving them from financial ruin. But that insurance program could become strained as global warming worsens, bringing more uncertainty to the agricultural sector. A new study…

By Ryan Hanrahan Politico’s Grace Yarrow reported Wednesday night that “the House Agriculture Committee voted 29-25 along party lines to advance legislation that would cut as much as $300 billion in food aid spending to pay for Republicans’ domestic policy megabill and some farm bill programs.” “The Wednesday vote sends the measure to the House Budget Committee for consideration before a full floor vote in the chamber on the bill,” Yarrow reported. “The GOP proposal would create the largest overhaul in decades to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), which helps more than 42 million people in the U.S. pay…

In The Last of Us, a television and video game series, survivors of an apocalyptic fungal pandemic struggle to survive after the collapse of society, fighting other survivors and the feral humans who have been infected with cordyceps, a mind-altering fungus that turns those it infects into murderous zombies. In real life, an insect-infecting relative of cordyceps might save Virginia farmers from an “apocalypse” of another kind. Hadi Farrokhzadeh, a visiting scholar at Virginia Tech’s Southern Piedmont Agricultural Research and Extension Center (AREC), is conducting new research using a fungus in the Cordycipitaceae family to control populations of corn earworm…

By Jonathan Coppess, Gary Schnitkey, Nick Paulson, Bruce Sherrick, and Carl Zulauf Budget reconciliation has begun in the House of Representatives, with multiple committees releasing text and holding business meetings to mark-up the legislation. As part of that process the House Agriculture Committee released legislative text on Monday, May 12, 2025, and began its mark-up on Tuesday, May 13, 2025 (House Agriculture Committee, Business Meeting; Yarrow, May 12, 2025). This article provides an initial overview of its provisions.  Further analysis will be provided as more information becomes available, including official information from the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) on changes in Federal outlays…

The used baler market is affected by many things, not the least of which is herd size and forage production conditions. Currently, drought in parts of the U.S. has made baler sales slow down as producers are evaluating the next steps for their operations. This can mean deals for those in the market, if you know what to look for. Carefully inspecting used machines can uncover great opportunities at auction. Timing is also important as certain pieces of equipment, like balers, tend to follow predictable seasonal sales patterns. Andy Campbell and Dave Mowitz discuss factors affecting used baler sales, as…

By Nick Paulson, Gary Schnitkey, and Carl Zulauf The National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS) of the USDA recently released 2024 county yield estimates for corn and soybeans. Following typical patterns, corn and soybean yields were highest in the Midwest Corn Belt region and south into the Mississippi Delta region. While NASS yields are not the primary source used to determine ARC-CO payments, they can be used with current MYA price projections to estimate potential ARC-CO payments for 2024. Given that MYA prices are expected to be slightly more than 10% below the respective ARC benchmarks for corn and soybeans, ARC-CO payments…

By Leah Douglas WASHINGTON, May 13 (Reuters) – Unions representing staff in the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s research, animal health, and nutrition agencies warned lawmakers of political interference and irreparable damage to their work from President Donald Trump’s efforts to shrink the federal government in a letter sent on Monday night. More than 15,000 USDA staff have been fired or accepted Trump’s financial incentives to leave the agency, leaving fewer experts to respond to an ongoing outbreak of bird flu and draining technical staff from local offices that serve farmers. Trump’s proposed budget would cut $4.5 billion from the USDA, including from conservation and research programs. Agriculture Secretary Brooke…

By Leah Douglas WASHINGTON, May 13 (Reuters) – The U.S. Department of Agriculture restored on Tuesday some climate change-related webpages that the agency had deleted since President Donald Trump’s inauguration, after being sued by farm and environmental groups, one of the groups said. The Trump administration has frozen and canceled some funding to farmers for climate-friendly agriculture, arguing the work does not align with administration priorities. Agriculture accounts for about 11% of U.S. emissions. A USDA official directed staff on January 30 to take down any webpages focused on climate change, which resulted in the removal of material on some loan and funding opportunities, information about investments through the…

July corn ended the day up 3¢ at $4.45½ per bushel. July soybeans closed up 5¼¢ at $10.77¾ per bushel. July wheat contracts closed mixed. CBOT wheat ended the day up 7½¢ at $5.24¾ per bushel. KC wheat was up 11¼¢ at $5.23. Minneapolis wheat was down 3¾¢ at $5.77. “Corn and soybeans spent much of the session fractionally mixed in lethargic trade,” said Karl Setzer, partner at Consus Ag Consulting. “Spread trade dominated the early part of the session and generated this mixed trade, as did conflicting supply and demand data. … Corn also benefited from technical buying as…

Nearly 20 percent of children across the country are experiencing food insecurity and in some rural counties, child food insecurity rates are estimated to be as high as 50 percent, according to Feeding America’s annual Map the Meal Gap study. While most children in the U.S. live in urban metropolitan areas, over 80 percent of U.S. counties with the highest estimated rates of child food insecurity (in the top 10 percent of all counties) are rural. Map the Meal Gap, now in its 15th year, is the only study that provides local-level estimates of food insecurity and food costs for…