The Latest from AgMag

Tomorrow (Wed., Sept. 12), lobbyists for subsidized agriculture will hold a rally on Capitol Hill to urge Congress to pass a farm bill – any farm bill, even the terrible one produced by the House Agriculture Committee.

Key Issues: 

Farming

Subsidies

Farm Policy

Food

Healthy Eating

Are you looking for ideas for healthy, affordable and brown-bag-ready lunches?  As kids head back to school, the Environmental Working Group wants to help you get the year started right.

Key Issues: 

Food

Healthy Eating

The Environmental Working Group’s new food guide can help. The guide shows shoppers how to manage their grocery costs while reducing their exposure to toxic chemicals and rediscovering the savory pleasures of nutritious stews, soups and salads.

Key Issues: 

Food

Healthy Eating

High crop prices and unlimited crop insurance subsidies contributed to the loss of more than 23 million acres of grassland, shrub land and wetlands between 2008 and 2011, new research by Environmental Working Group and Defenders of Wildlife shows.

Key Issues: 

Farming

Subsidies

Farm Policy

Environment

Environmental Working Group released a statement today opposing the drought disaster package proposed by House agriculture committee leaders that would be paid for with damaging and unnecessary cuts to conservation programs. Livestock and fruit and vegetable farmers who don’t have access to federal crop insurance certainly need assistance during this historic drought. But the proposal would cut the very conservation programs that help farmers mitigate severe weather conditions. This is a shortsighted and counterproductive move.

Key Issues: 

Farming

Farm Policy

Environment

In an AgMag post today, Environmental Working Group’s Scott Faber urges the full House to reject a cynical one-year extension of the 2008 farm bill because it cuts vital conservation programs and extends wasteful direct payments.

Key Issues: 

Farming

Subsidies

Farm Policy

Last fall, House and Senate Agriculture Committee leaders tried to insert a “secret farm bill” in the super committee’s un-amendable deficit reduction package. They failed. Now some of those same leaders are trying to evade a floor vote by the full House by extending the current law for a year, as a pretense to negotiate a five-year farm bill with the Senate, which has already passed its version of the $1 trillion bill.

Key Issues: 

Farming

Farm Policy

A House proposal to extend the 2008 farm bill by one year is a repudiation of the Federal Agriculture Reform and Risk Management Act of 2012 (FARRM) produced by the House Agriculture Committee and would deny the full House the opportunity to debate meaningful and long-overdue reform of crop insurance subsidies.

Key Issues: 

Farming

Farm Policy

Sarah (not her real name), was usually one of the best students I met while teaching 8^th grade math in a New Orleans public school. When I asked a question, her hand darted into the air as she politely, and more importantly quietly, waited to be called upon. Her answers were rarely off-target. The questions she raised were thought-provoking. She understood what she read. She refused to be defeated by my most challenging math problems.

Key Issues: 

Food

Healthy Eating