EWG and the National Black Farmers Association are pleased with the introduction of the Pigford Claims Remedy Act today. Introduced by Representatives Scott (D-VA) and Chabot (R-OH) and Senators Grassley (R-IA) and Obama (D-IL), the act will help thousands of African American farmers who were denied entry in the Pigford v. Glickman settlement.

In a step toward creating a peaceful union between farming and conservation, the Ballance Farm Environment Awards of New Zealand announced their acceptance of nominations for farmers w

Autism: The continuing debate over whether vaccines play a role in neurodevelopmental disorders is more than academic, with children's health and industry wealth hanging in the balance. British billionaire Sir Richard Branson said yesterday he plans to invest $3 billion in technologies to help combat global warming. The investment, valued in 2006 dollars, will be made over the next 10 years in biofuels and other environmentally friendly ways to replace oil and coal.

Purdue University has agreed to host one of a series of debates on farm subsidies and the next farm bill that EWG president Ken Cook has proposed to former House Agriculture Committee Chairman Larry Combest. Professor Otto Doering, an internationally respected agricultural economist, policy expert and educator would be serving as moderator.

From The Huffington Post: "No, not the Stephen King novel. It's no work of fiction, but a growing horror just the same. Every spring, polluted waters from the Mississippi watershed drain into the Gulf of Mexico, bringing a feast of nitrates for algae, which literally take up all of the available oxygen in the process, killing any bottom-feeding sealife and driving away any other critters capable of moving, e.g. commercially attractive fish and seafood."

For over 20 years, scientists have documented the appearance of a summertime "Dead Zone" that all but obliterates marine life in what is arguably the nation's most important fishery, the Gulf of Mexico. Each year the Dead Zone grows to an area that is roughly the size of New Jersey - ranging from 5,000 to 8,000 square miles.

This year, the New York Times reports, both farmers and the federal government are covering corn at potentially record levels. Farmers are struggling to store this year's bountiful corn harvest, even buying massive tarps to cover mountains of corn that must be left outdoors.

Courtesy of U.S. taxpayers, a few hundred California farms in Fresno and Kings counties annually get enough water to supply every household in Los Angeles, at pennies on the dollar of the price paid by urban water users.

The federal government is about to make a deal to give a few hundred California farmers control of more water than Los Angeles, San Francisco and San Diego combined use in a year — at pennies on the dollar of the price paid by urban water users.