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February 3, 2011
· Feds back off strict ag youth labor rules
· DuPont sets goals to feed a hungry world
· Monsanto will not sell GM corn in France
· UC launches hands-on conservation program
· Punxsutawney Phil isn’t always right
Feds back off strict ag youth labor rules
(The Washington Times) – Bowing to an angry backlash from agriculture groups and family farmers across the country, the Obama administration this week said it would scale back proposed new rules that would have sharply limited the amount of work young people can do on farms.
Communities across the rural heartland had attacked the rules, saying they threatened a traditional way of life and could undermine the viability of many family farming operations.
The Labor Department announced Wednesday it would “repropose” the new regulations, allowing for more public comment on whether children could engage in farm jobs, including working with livestock and equipment.
Department officials said they were seeking a balance between protecting child workers in hazardous conditions and “respecting rural traditions.”
The “parental exemption” rule, which is covered by the department’s Wage and Hour Division, sets the rules on which children may be allowed to work on family farms.
The rule’s original language exempted youths only on farms wholly owned or operated by their parents, but did not include thousands of farms owned by closely held corporations or partnerships of family members and other relatives.
The change sparked outrage last fall, particularly across the Midwest, where such summer jobs as corn-detasseling, where teens hand-strip the tops off of stalks to help cross-pollinate future crops, has long been seen as a way for teens to make some spending money and to forge a strong work ethic.
“It’s a positive step,” said Paul Schlegel, director of public policy for the American Farm Bureau of the modifications. “We felt that what they were doing was wholly inconsistent with the way the law had been interpreted for decades.”
Paul Zimmerman, executive director of governmental relations for the Wisconsin Farm Bureau Federation, also welcomed the announcement, but said his group still was wary of what the final rules could entail.
The Labor Department move “does not resolve the long list of concerns that our organization has with the entire rule package,” Mr. Zimmerman said in a statement.
The Farm Bureau led a coalition of more than 70 agriculture organizations that pressured the Labor Department to reconsider what would be the first major rewrite of farm labor standards since the 1970s.
Mr. Schlegel said the backlash against the initial proposal was significant from farm families across the nation, many of whom were protecting a way of life.
“There was a great deal of anxiety and concern when these changes were first announced,” he said. “The way they were narrowing their interpretation of the law to the point that … there was a real question of whether any children could grow up working on the family farm. In a lot of ways, it was going to be a real challenge for people to handle the values they wanted to instill in their children.”
The Labor Department said in a statement that revisions to the child labor laws will be published for public comment by early summer. It had said that it was updating its regulations based on studies that had shown youth were more likely to be killed doing agriculture jobs than work in all other industries combined.
Two
The new rules would ban power-driven equipment use by children younger than 16 as well as keep those younger than 18 from work in stockyards, grain bins and feed lots.
More than 30 lawmakers from farm states had called on the department to rescind the rules, warning they would have a negative impact on rural employers and interfere with parents’ ability to train the next generation of farmers.
Sen. Jerry Moran, Kansas Republican, called the decision Wednesday “promising news” but said the overall proposal remains “a threat to the future of agriculture.”
He said the new rules still would prohibit children from performing common farm tasks like rounding up cattle on horseback, operating a tractor, or cleaning out stalls with a shovel and wheelbarrow.
DuPont sets goals to feed a hungry world
(Wire
Services)
"No one company, country or non-profit organization can meet the challenge of feeding the world alone. But each of us can commit to doing our part and hold ourselves accountable to make a meaningful contribution to this global challenge," said Ellen Kullman, DuPont Chair and CEO. "Establishing specific, measurable goals for what we can do to address that challenge is key to turning talk into results."
DuPont's food security goals – which address innovation, education and rural community development – will be tracked along with DuPont sustainability goals. DuPont was one of the first companies to establish sustainability goals in the 1990s and has consistently surpassed its commitments.
The DuPont food security goals, to be achieved by the end of 2020, include:
•Innovating to Feed the World: Investing $10 billion in research and
development and introducing 4,000 new products centered on producing more food; enhancing nutrition, food and agriculture sustainability and safety;
boosting food availability and shelf life; and reducing waste.
•Engaging and Educating Youth: Facilitating 2 million engagements of young people around the world in educational opportunities.
•Improving Rural Communities: Improving the livelihoods of at least 3 million farmers and their rural communities through targeted collaboration and investments that strengthen agricultural systems and make food more available, nutritious and culturally appropriate.
This is in addition to the work already being done to enhance the lives of hundreds of millions of farmers through DuPont's normal business practices.
Making a Measurable Difference
The DuPont food security goals were developed following a
report issued last year by the DuPont Advisory Committee on Agriculture
Innovation and Productivity for the 21st Century, chaired by former U.S.
Senator Thomas A. Daschle of
"I'm pleased that DuPont is marshalling its resources to address key issues from the committee's findings. We need to follow the lead of organizations like DuPont, who commit to doing something about global food security, because they know hunger is at the heart of all other global issues," said Daschle.
DuPont – one of the first companies to publicly establish environmental goals more than 20 years ago – has broadened its sustainability commitments beyond internal footprint reduction to include market-driven targets for both revenue and research and development investment. The goals are tied directly to business growth, specifically to the development of safer and environmentally improved new products for key global markets.
DuPont has been bringing world-class science and engineering to the global marketplace in the form of innovative products, materials, and services since 1802. The company believes that by collaborating with customers, governments, NGOs, and thought leaders we can help find solutions to such global challenges as providing enough healthy food for people everywhere, decreasing dependence on fossil fuels, and protecting life and the environment. For additional information about DuPont and its commitment to inclusive innovation, please visit www.dupont.com.
Monsanto won’t sell GM corn in France
(Reuters)
-
"Monsanto considers that favorable conditions for the
sale of the MON810 in
The French government said earlier this month it would uphold its ban on the insect-resistant strain of maize, despite the court's decision to annul the ban after finding that it had not produced enough evidence that Monsanto's MON810 posed a significant risk to health or the environment.
The farm ministry said
Monsanto's statement follows an action by anti-GMO activists
in one of its plants in southwestern
Genetically modified organism (GMO) crops are widely used in
countries such as the
Monsanto, which stressed that it had not sold nor tested MON810 in
UC launches hands-on conservation program
(Fresno
Bee) – Hoping to encourage the use of conservation practices, the
University officials, farmers, scientists and agriculture
professionals recently gathered in
About 100 people attended the meeting at the Veterans'
Based out of the West Side Research and
Farmers using the practices say they have seen positive benefits.
Dino Giacomazzi, a
"It holds water and nutrients better, and I end up using less fertilizer and less water," Giacomazzi said. "And by using the tractor less, we are reducing diesel emission particulates."
Research trials studying reduced tillage in processing tomatoes and cotton have also shown increased yields, said Dan Munk, a UC cooperative extension farm adviser.
Jeff Mitchell, a UC cooperative extension cropping systems
specialist, is a longtime advocate of reduced tillage and conservation systems.
He said the
"We are going to face increased demands to produce more in a way that is less damaging to the environment," Mitchell said.
To further its goals, the institute will create an awareness campaign aimed at the general public, private business and environmental groups. It will also continue to study the best available practices and make that information available to farmers.
"This is not going to be business as usual anymore," Mitchell said. "And it's not just about making a profit; it is about optimizing yields and looking at the sustainability of our production methods."
Punxsutawney
(abcNEWS) – Nearly five thousand revelers hoping for an early spring were disappointed Thursday morning after Punxsutawney Phil saw his shadow.
But those winter jackets may be able to go in the closet sooner than the forecasting groundhog has to say.
It turns out the ultimate prognosticator- and his copycat counterparts- are wrong more often than they are right.
An analysis by the
But don't tell that to the members of the Groundhog club's
"I would argue with the comments he doesn't have a great track record," Jon Johnston, Phil's "Chief Healthman" told ABCNews.com. "They're missing the point then. It's always winter somewhere."
And more often than not, Phil agrees.
The well-fed, revered groundhog also has a penchant for seeing his shadow. Ever since the tradition began in 1887, Phil (and his ancestors) saw their shadows 99 times, while predicting an early spring only 16 times. There was no record for nine of the years.
End Transmission