Agriculture News October 2 2012
Colorado Sunflower Field. Photo by Brittany Seydel.
Here are my chosen news links for this week….
● Why is Brazil the new America? Hint: water. While the US farm belt is mining its groundwater, Brazil is expanding production and lowering the cost of raising food. (CSM)
● US farmers using more pesticides on ‘superweeds’ …the annual increase in the herbicides required to deal with tougher-to-control weeds on cropland planted to genetically modified crops has grown from 1.5 million pounds in 1999 to about 90 million pounds in 2011. (Reuters) K.M. Note: 1.5 to 90 ??
● How do we solve our agricultural problems? (Minnesota Daily) K.M. Note: Yes, Brittney, I hate to break it to ya but you need to change your major to political science.
● This year’s Prairie Festival in Salina, Kansas (Salina.com) AND As the annual Prairie Festival in Salina, Kansas takes place this weekend, NYTs Green interviews Wes Jackson. K.M. Note: I went to the Prairie Festival the last two years, but skipped this one.
● Growing farm industry needs high-tech workers (The Detroit News)
● Useful facts and scuttlebutt from the Algae Biomass Summit (Biofuelsdigest)
● Algae Biomass Summit: producers say commercialization is close (Biodiesel Mag)
● Dennis Gartman on oil and agricultural commodities (Credit Writedowns)
● As water levels drop in Kansas lakes, tempers rise – Some question why reservoirs were drained to help barge traffic that has been disappearing from the Missouri River. (Kansascity) K.M. Note: Trying to uphold barge traffic on the Missouri River in a drought year is crazy. Instead, the Mighty Mo should be allowed to return to a more natural state.
● Ethanol plant in UK to boost biofuel output (FT)
● Syngenta’s Enogen hybrid corn receives 40 cents/bushel premium as ethanol hybrid (Farmindustrynews)
● IDB eyes investment in Kazakh, Central Asia energy, farming – Al-Aboodi said the ICD’s agribusiness fund was considering grain, meat and dairy projects in Kazakhstan, one of the world’s top 10 wheat exporters, for sharia-compliant investment. (Reuters)
● US farmers scramble to buy Brazil’s farmland (AlJazeera)
● How to improve India’s Agriculture Economy (The Atlantic)
● U.S. Research Advances Sustainable Water Use in Agriculture – Nebraska is expected to end its 2012 summer growing season with its eighth-largest grain yield in history while drawing down its aquifer just 1 percent. (AllAfrica) K.M. Note: Sigh.
● Early harvest overflowing North Dakota grain elevators with soybeans (The Republic)
● EIA releases ethanol stats for first half of 2012 (Ethanol Producer Mag) K.M. Note: And, yes, ethanol exports are still going strong, or they were through the end of June.
● IGC cuts further corn and wheat stocks estimates (IGC)
● Sheep reportedly buried alive in Pakistan (New Zealand Herald)
● Saudi Agriculture 2012 attracts 24,000 visitors and more than 400 exhibitors from 23 countries (AMEInfo)
● Path to the 2012 Farm Bill: Farm Bill Expires on Monday — What Does It Mean and What Happens Now? (NSAC)
● The process of urbanization in India (The economist)
● Agriculture causes 80% of tropical deforestation (mongabay.com)
● The growing popularity of New Zealand’s farmed salmon is a driver of new employment in the Mackenzie Basin. (Otago Daily Times)
● Scottish scientists develop ‘see-through’ soil (BBC)
● Feeding the World Sustainably: Agroecology vs. Industrial Agriculture (Infographic by the Christensen Fund) (Nourishing the Planet)
Slideshow from Lester Brown’s latest book… Full Planet, Empty Plates: The New Geopolitics of Food Scarcity
Could food become the weak link for us as it was for so many earlier civilizations? This slideshow presentation, based on Lester Brown’s latest book, Full Planet, Empty Plates: The New Geopolitics of Food Scarcity, explains why world food supplies are tightening and tells what we need to do about it.
Grow Fish Anywhere
Grow Fish Anywhere has developed and implemented a unique fully closed, Zero Discharge Intensive Aquaculture system that is suitable both for fresh and sea water fish.
[quote]● How do we solve our agricultural problems? (Minnesota Daily) K.M. Note: Yes, Brittney, I hate to break it to ya but you need to change your major to political science.[/quote]
+1
Actually I’d go for a double major, AG/PolySci.
Brittney, you catch on quick, go for it !!