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PAKTIKA PROVINCE, Afghanistan, Nov. 6, 2009 – Civil affairs members of the provincial reconstruction team hosted an Afghan-led agricultural training event in the Bermel district here. Afghan farmers gather around a garden while working a practical exercise during an agricultural training class in Bermel, Afghanistan, Nov. 1, 2009. Civil affairs members of the provincial reconstruction team in Afghanistan’s Paktika province hosted efforts in an Afghan-led agricultural training event. U.S. Army photo by Cpl. David Ferris  (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available. The training offered instruction and discussion on agricultural topics for seven Bermel area farmers. “Most of the people in...

Crops Headed For A Tough Harvest by: Jim Delaney November 03, 2009 Although it appears the prospects for the producers of porcine products have prettied, yes, lipstick included, that cannot be said for all of the ‘ole MacDonald’s in the country. The U.S. Department of Agriculture reported recently that due to a late planting season and a cooler and wetter fall than normal, only 20% of the corn crop is out of the fields vs. an average of 58% during the years of 2004-2008. “It’s getting scarier. The longer we go, the more mold keeps growing and the more ears...

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – Good news for men who farm U.S. fields. Regular exposure to pesticides used commonly on the farm does not appear to increase the risk of heart attack. As part of the Agricultural Health Study, between 1993 and 1997, researchers asked more than 54,000 male farmers what pesticides they used regularly, how much time they spent using tractors and other farm equipment, and whether they raised poultry or other livestock. Dr. Jane A. Hoppin, of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina, and colleagues surveyed roughly 32,000 of these men...

In Texas and across the Southwest, Hispanic farmers have been fighting the Agriculture Department for close to a decade. The farmers say the department's Farm Services Agency discriminated against them — denying or delaying loans, and refusing to investigate when they cried foul. The government settled a similar complaint brought by African-American farmers for $1 billion. And while the claims of discrimination and other factors are almost identical, the Hispanic farmers have gotten nothing. ..."I would go and apply, and it would take about two to three weeks," says Obregon. "Then they would turn me down, say it was a...

Finally acknowledging that there is a significant government-created crisis in the San Joaquin Valley, the Interior Department convened a public hearing Sept. 30, and Sen. Dianne Feinstein has announced she has asked her staff to begin assembling a major piece of legislation to address the water crisis facing the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar has issued a "memorandum of understanding" that will keep representatives from six federal agencies talking to various interest groups in California. The problem is that it will take months to make such decisions and years for results to be apparent. The crisis is...

The Texas Department of Transportation is pulling the last plug on the Trans-Texas Corridor, Gov. Rick Perry's embattled plan to build a toll-road network across the state. The agency said earlier this year it was scaling down the project and dropping the name "Trans-Texas Corridor." Now, transportation officials say it's fully dead. Transportation Commissioner Bill Meadows told the Fort Worth Star-Telegram of the decision in a report posted online Tuesday. The news comes a day after Perry's Republican primary opponent, Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, secured the coveted endorsement of the powerful Texas Farm Bureau — a vocal opponent of the...

The federal government must compensate two regional water authorities for water diverted to preserve the environment, a federal appeals court ruled this week in a landmark decision that could open the floodgates for agencies who contend the government is taking water from them for fish. After a 16-year legal battle, the 2-1 decision came down as California is coping with a drought and new environmental rules that are cutting into the water supplies of farmers and cities across the state. The ruling appears to create an opening for San Joaquin Valley farm districts that are lashing out at environmental regulations...

LAGHMAN PROVINCE, Afghanistan, Oct. 2, 2009 – The Kansas National Guard agribusiness development team here, along with local and provincial officials, participated in a ceremony to introduce a profitable crop to area farmers at the Laghman Agricultural Research and Development Center in Mehtar Lam district, Sept. 29. Mohammad Ismail Dowlatizai, director of agriculture for Afghanistan’s Laghman province, speaks to local farmers and provincial representatives about the benefits of growing saffron, Sept. 29, 2009. An agribusiness development team from the Kansas National Guard is working with farmers in Laghman province, Afghanistan. U.S. Army photo  (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available. Saffron,...

Environmentalism: Sen. Dianne Feinstein votes to deny water to California's drought-stricken San Joaquin Valley. Farmers, families and food are being held hostage to an endangered fish called the delta smelt. (snip) The Senate rejected the amendment by a largely party-line 61-36 margin, with Feinstein opposing the restoration of water deliveries to farmers. The California senator claimed she was blindsided by the amendment to the bill she was managing in the Senate, bizarrely comparing the move to a "Pearl Harbor." "No one from California has called, written or indicated they wanted this on the calendar," Feinstein protested.

Delta smelts: Preferred over humans. Environmentalism: Sen. Dianne Feinstein votes to deny water to California's drought-stricken San Joaquin Valley. Farmers, families and food are being held hostage to an endangered fish called the delta smelt.There was a time when the San Joaquin Valley was the most productive agricultural region in the world. It was a large part of what made the Golden State golden.Now it's a place where farmers no longer farm, but instead line up at food banks to feed the families of those who once fed the rest of the country and a good chunk of the...

Six Colorado dairies have filed for bankruptcy protection this year amid banking problems and low milk prices. Four of the banks had loans from Greeley-based New Frontier Bank, which collapsed in April... Bob Winter, a member of the Colorado Farm Bureau, says he believes more Colorado dairies are preparing to file for bankruptcy protection

“Turning the water off is not just bad politics, it’s an act of domestic terror.” - Former Fresno, California Mayor Alan Autry Forgive me if I am less than diplomatic here. I am not a fan at all of the radical environmental movement. I’m even less of a fan of radical, Big Government. Let’s cut to the chase here. The rabid environmentalists have destroyed the economy in the San Joaquin Valley of California. Not only have they destroyed the economy, they have destroyed the lives of tens of thousands of farmers, as well. According to the California Farm Water Coalition...

As FNC's Sean Hannity devoted his show Hannity on Thursday evening to the plight of California farmers who are suffering unemployment because the federal government is withholding water from their crops in favor of saving endangered fish, Hannity began the show, specially titled "The Valley That Hope Forgot," by interviewing comedian and former Democrat Paul Rodriguez, chairman of the California Latino Water Coalition. Rodriguez, who last year supported Barack Obama but famously turned GOP after Democrats refused to help him and other farmers obtain water for their crops, made a plea for help to President Obama on Hannity's show: Mr....

Here's a clip of the water shutdown to California farmers. Alan Autry calls it domestic terrorism.

The Old Farmer's Almanac has joined its competitor, the Farmer's Almanac, in predicting a cold 2009-2010 winter. For sunspot theory mavens and and global warming doubters, its on - - time to unpack the sweaters and toboggans.

FARMERS in north India are selling their wives to survive, it has been revealed. Left without money due to failing crops, farmers in Bundelkhand, Uttar Pradesh, have reportedly sold their wives to money lenders for 4,000-12,000 rupees (€55-€170). The more beautiful the woman, the higher the price, it was claimed. The deals are allegedly being settled on a legal stamp paper under the heading Vivaha Anubandh (marriage contract). Most of the women are illiterate and cannot read the "contract".

According to Gunny G Online: “This astounding control will include the elimination of organic farming by eliminating manure, mandating GMO animal feed, imposing animal drugs, and ordering applications of petrochemical fertilizers and pesticides. Farmers, thus, will be locked not only into the industrialization of once normal and organic farms but into the forced purchase of industry’s products.” HR 2749 creates severe criminal and civil penalties, including prison terms of up to 10 years and/or fines of up to $100,000 for each violation. Does it include judicial review, Congressional oversight, a defined and limited set of penalties and punishments for a...

The agony of the San Joaquin Valley farmers continues. They’re losing their homes and life savings because the lunatics in the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and a heartless judge care more about a fish than human beings. The EPA has dammed off 90% of the Valley’s water supply because they want to protect the Delta Smelt. The Obama Administration simply doesn’t give a damn that they are killing these people. This can end today if California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger stops wimping out, man’s up and acts decisively. If Schwarzenegger shows the fighting spirit that made him a champion body builder...

California has a new endangered species on its hands in the San Joaquin Valley—farmers. Thanks to environmental regulations designed to protect the likes of the three-inch long delta smelt, one of America's premier agricultural regions is suffering in a drought made worse by federal regulations.

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NORTH ROSE – Border patrol officers can’t break the law to enforce it, the Wayne County Farm Bureau is asserting. Farm Bureau is in the process of gathering information for a formal complaint to the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Buffalo, asking for an investigation into the circumstances of the stop of four migrant farm workers on Route 414 in front of Barbara Jean’s Furniture Store Aug. 17. Also, U.S. Sen. Kristen Gillibrand was made aware of the incident last week and indicated she will write a letter to Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napalitano regarding border patrol activity in...

LONDON (Reuters) – The deaths of no fewer than four people after being trampled by cows in the past two months has prompted Britain's main farming union to issue a warning about the dangers of provoking the normally docile animals. Cows can become aggressive and charge, especially when calves are present and walkers are accompanied by dogs, said the National Farmers Union (NFU). The union and the Ramblers' Association both advise that walkers release dogs from their leads when passing through a field of cows. "The cattle are interested in the dog, not the walker," said Robert Sheasby, Rural Surveyor...

Already, 20 companies have agreed to pull advertisements from Glenn Beck's television show, within weeks of the Fox host calling Obama "a racist" and saying the president "has a deep-seated hatred for white people or the white culture." Now, Farmers Insurance can be added to that list, a Farmers spokesperson confirms to POLITICO.

This spring we wanted chicken manure spread on the pastures because it is incredibly rich in nutrients, the best “natural” fertilizer known to man, and quite inexpensive, comparatively speaking. So I asked one of my truck driver friends, who cleans out houses for Sanderson Farms affiliates, to bring me several dump truck loads. “No can do, because they aren’t having it done, this year,” quoth he. How odd. I mulled that over off and on for months, and today I got the answer. The greenies are at it again! THIS time they are claiming that litter (sawdust and, ah, processed...

A farming town in California claims that it may disappear due to the United States federal government shutting off water pumps, though the government states the actions are necessary to save several marine species. In July 2009, action by the Federal Bureau of Reclamation to protect threatened fish stopped irrigation pumping to parts of the California Central Valley causing canals leading into Huron, California and the surrounding areas and the farms that rely on them to lose their primary irrigation source. Unemployment has reached 40% in some areas as the farms have dried up.

WASHINGTON, July 22, 2009 – U.S. forces aided Afghan farmers and villagers recently in operations aimed at cultivating a brighter future in Afghanistan. Army Capt. Jeffrey Mann shows students from Nangarhar University how to test for nutrients in soil samples during an agricultural development class on Forward Operating Base Mehtar Lam in Afghanistan’s Laghman province, July 9, 2009. Mann is a Kansas National Guardsman with Task Force Mountain Warrior’s agribusiness development team. U.S. Army photo by Pfc. Elizabeth K. Raney  (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available. Farmers in Panjshir province’s Dara district will be able to store their produce from...

Agriculture's role in reducing greenhouse-gas emissions could take a backseat to debate about the higher costs farmers could face under the climate legislation as the Senate Agriculture Committee hears from farm groups and key officials in the Obama administration on Wednesday. Republican senators throughout the ranks of the Agriculture Committee have made it clear since last week that Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack and Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lisa Jackson had better come armed with detailed data on what kind of costs farmers may face. Some senators want detailed information broken down by commodity and state. The climate bill passed...

BAGRAM AIRFIELD, Afghanistan, July 17, 2009 – Members of the Nebraska National Guard's Task Force Warrior agribusiness development team visited several villages in Afghanistan’s Kapisa province July 13 to assess grain bins that once occupied farmlands in Imperial, Neb. Army Sgt. 1st Class Eldon Kuntzelman, center, meets with local farmers in Afghanistan’s Kapisa province, July 13, 2009, to discuss issues concerning grain-bin assembly and grape vineyards. U.S. Army photo by 1st Lt. Lory Stevens  (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available. Development team members relocated and reconstructed the bins to help Afghan farmers with grain-storage issues. “These completed grain bins are...

Dairy farmers in Northeast Wisconsin are feeling the pain at the pump...the milk pump that is. Mark Petersen, a third generation farmer ... tells that prices for his milk have plummeted on the market, and he's really feeling the pinch. Petersen says he's only getting around ten dollars per hundred pounds of milk produced right now. He was getting 20 dollars per hundred pounds not too long ago. And his operational costs exceed his revenue. Not good, of course. consumers have seen milk prices at the store come down, but it's not proportionate to what farmers are losing.

For those of you who have not heard, HR 2749 the Food Safety Enhancement Act of 2009, is a bill in congress that would basically eliminate Organic farming, and pretty well wipe out your back yard organic garden. For heaven’s sake, don’t even consider selling your homemade jam at a Farmers Market or the Saturday Market! Not unless you are willing to pay the 1000$ licensing fee anyway. With the stated purpose of making the Food system in the United States safer, the liberal Washington DC Government has decided in its wisdom to make the entire industry formulaic and regulated....

DETROIT (AP) - A former aide to U.S. Rep. John Conyers has been arrested in Africa after skipping his sentencing on a federal fraud conviction, federal authorities said. DeWayne Boyd, 49, formerly of Detroit, was arrested Friday in Accra, Ghana, said Daniel D. Roberts, special agent in charge of the FBI's Detroit Field Office. Boyd is a former aide to Willie Brown when he was the speaker of the California Assembly. Boyd was arrested on a warrant for failing to appear at the April sentencing hearing on convictions of mail fraud, making false declarations under oath, making false statements to...

Fiscal Policy: The House of Representatives is preparing to vote on an anti-stimulus package that in the name of saving the earth will destroy the American economy. Smoot-Hawley will seem like a speed bump...As we've said before, capping emissions is capping economic growth. An analysis of Waxman-Markey by the Heritage Foundation projects that by 2035 it would reduce aggregate gross domestic product by $7.4 trillion. In an average year, 844,000 jobs would be destroyed, with peak years seeing unemployment rise by almost 2 million. Consumers would pay through the nose as electricity rates would necessarily skyrocket, as President Obama once...

WASHINGTON -- House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has scheduled a vote Friday on a sprawling climate-change bill, signaling the Democratic leadership's confidence that it can overcome objections from Farm Belt Democrats.

MAHAWIL, Iraq, June 17, 2009 – After two years of planning and building, the Central Euphrates Farmers’ Market here is open for business after a June 12 grand opening. Left to right, Army Brig. Gen. Jerry Lang, 34th Infantry Division deputy commanding general for support; Sheik Khodaer Abdlhosaen, director of the Central Euphrates Farmers’ Market; and Deputy Gov. Iskander Witwit of Iraq’s Babil province discuss how the market will help the region excel in agriculture. U.S. Army photo by Spc. Darryl L. Montgomery  (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available. “The fact that this market is here today demonstrates the...

The goal seems to be nothing short of eradicating American farms and self-sustainability. Even DEMOCRATS are opposing the Obama Energy Bill. Climate change legislation will be utterly devastating for American farmers. Rep. Leonard Boswell (D-IA) of the House Agriculture Committee says that not only will he not vote for it, but no one else on his committee will support it either. The bill would increase the cost of everything that farmers depend on, such as diesel fuel, gasoline, fertilizers, pesticides, and a host of other things. It would raise taxes on energy by $846 billion over the next ten years....

A new Federal Opinion puts salmon - steelhead - sturgeon and delta smelt ahead of Valley Farmers. For many valley farmers crippled by a three year drought the opinion means: No Water - No Food - No Jobs. The plan would – provide more water for spawning fish.

While consumers are loving the low price of milk and ice cream, Utah dairy farmers are scared. "the perfect storm": They are being paid less for raw milk, while feed and transportation costs are unusually high. And the lines of credit that help them weather rough patches are uncertain at best as financial institutions wrestle their own economy-related demons. "I've never seen anything close to this," Kohler said. "People who had had generations of farming are losing their farms … eating equity that took years to build." the number of dairy farmers is shrinking. Utah now has fewer than 250....

The phone calls usually come in the evening after the machinery goes silent on farms across the country. The callers speak of dwindling cash flows, crumbling marriages. Some admit they're holding a loaded gun. Across a wide swath of rural America, increasing numbers of farmers are considering taking their lives. The nation's largest network of crisis hotlines for agricultural workers reports a spike of 2,000 calls through May compared with the same period last year — a 20 percent increase. In Colorado, the number of suicides among farmers and ranchers has risen in the past five years: Fourteen took their...

Novena to St. Isidore the Farmer Life of St. Isidore and S. Maria de la CabezaSt. Isidore, the Farmer, was born in Madrid, Spain, about the year 1110. He came from a poor and humble family. From childhood he worked as a farm hand on the De Vargas estate. He was very prayerful and particularly devoted to the Mass and the Holy Eucharist. He loved the good earth, he was honest in his work, and careful in his farming practices. It is said that domestic beasts and birds showed their attachment to him because he was gentle and kind to...

Saint Isidore the FarmerFeast May 15th National Catholic Rural Life Conference  +  Our Trip to Madrid    Born in Madrid, Spain, 1070; died there in 1130; canonized in 1622; feast day formerly on May 10 and March 22, and October 25 in the U.S.A. Saint Isidore's feast is celebrated in Madrid, Spain, with ringing church bells and streets decorated for a procession in his honor. The saint was born .into a peasant family.  He was baptized Isidore in honor of the famous archbishop of Seville. His unreliable biography was written about 150 years after his death.  Much of it deals with...

Farmers in California are mad. Wine prices set to rise as farmers scramble to find alternative sources of water. Food prices next. http://www.butasforme.com/2009/03/31/abc-judge-cuts-water-to-california-farmers-to-save-endangered-fish/

I have changed my mind about participating in the carbon credit program. And have resolved to give the money I received to St Jude’s Children’s Hospital. Here is why. Recently I sat in the fire hall with a few dozen farmers. We had been invited to hear how we can get paid for carbon credits. The speaker explained how their satellites can measure the carbon in our land individually and how much money we could get. Then asked for questions. I asked “what is the source of this money”? The presenter said it comes from big companies that pollute. I...

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — Like the virus itself, the name "swine flu" is spreading quickly. For the pork purveyors and hog farmers who make up the nation's $15 billion pork industry, that's a disaster. It doesn't seem to matter that the strain may not come entirely from pigs and cannot be spread by eating pork. Hog prices are already dropping as financial markets worry people will have second thoughts about buying "the other white meat." "It's killing our markets," said Francis Gilmore, 72, who runs a 600-hog operation in Perry, outside Des Moines, and worries his small business could...

The state’s largest farm organization is in favor of legislation that would terminate the Trans-Texas Corridor (TTC) in both name and concept. Texas Farm Bureau President Kenneth Dierschke expressed support for HB 11 by State Rep. David McQuade Leibowitz (D-San Antonio), which repeals the authority for the establishment and operation of the massive transportation project. “We hope you will agree with us that it is finally time to kill the Trans-Texas Corridor,” Dierschke testified before the House Transportation Committee on April 21. Although the farm organization recognizes the need to build and maintain Texas’ infrastructure, Dierschke said Texas Farm Bureau...

WASHINGTON -- As a senator, Barack Obama led the charge last year to pass a bill allowing black farmers to seek new discrimination claims against the Agriculture Department. Now he is president, and his administration so far is acting like it wants the potentially budget-busting lawsuits to go away. The change isn't sitting well with black farmers who thought they'd get a friendlier reception from Obama after years of resistance from President George W. Bush.

Over 1,500 farmers in an Indian state committed suicide after being driven to debt by crop failure, it was reported today. The agricultural state of Chattisgarh was hit by falling water levels. "The water level has gone down below 250 feet here. It used to be at 40 feet a few years ago," Shatrughan Sahu, a villager in one of the districts, told Down To Earth magazine "Most of the farmers here are indebted and only God can save the ones who do not have a bore well." Mr Sahu lives in a district that recorded 206 farmer suicides last...

One might imagine that the old adage about something too good to be true would have sunk in by now. But in the realm of biofuels, hope springs eternal. With more than $240 million in Department of Energy funding, six pilot projects using "cellulosic materials" to produce biofuels are under way. Despite the prospect of technical breakthroughs, none have produced biofuels on commercial terms. This is especially unsettling given the federal order to blend 36 billion gallons of biofuels by 2022, of which 21 billion are mandated to be cellulose-based. Advocates of making these fuels from anything and everything abound:...

Nine years ago, Zimbabwe had more than 4,000 white-owned commercial farms. In a fresh wave of invasions, farmers keep their guns close at hand as ZANU-PF thugs lay siege to many of the 300 that remain . Many of the invaded farms are sitting idle or neglected despite a desperate need for food in Zimbabwe, where three-quarters of the population is dependent on food aid from foreign donors. Largely because of the invasions, Zimbabwe's farm output has dropped by 50 to 70 per cent in the past seven years, and most people subsist on one meal a day. Mr. Mugabe...

What this will do is force anyone who produces food of any kind, and then transports it to a different location for sale, to register with a new federal agency called the “Food Safety Administration.” Even growers who sell just fruit and/or vegetables at farmers markets would not only have to register, but they would be subject inspections by federal agents of their property and all records related to food production. The frequency of these inspections will be determined by the whim of the Food Safety Administration. Mandatory “safety” records would have to be kept. Anyone who fails to register...

BAGRAM AIRFIELD, Afghanistan, March 12, 2009 – As the noon sun crept toward the mountains west of Janquadam, children ran from all corners of the village, greeting the group of soldiers from the 28th Forward Agribusiness Development Team. Army Sgt. Allen Abbott, left, and Army Staff Sgt. Joseph McMurtrey, with the 28th Forward Agribusiness Development Team, use a compass and measuring tape to accurately measure and mark a local farmer’s field for the future planting of a vineyard west of Janquadam, Afghanistan, Feb. 28, 2009. U.S. Army photo by Capt. Michael Greenberger  (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available. On...