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August 4, 2011
· Budget axe threatens farm economy
· New research to combat onion diseases
· China nabs 2,000 in food safety crackdown
· Healthy bee hives are thriving in big cities
· Cyclists tour and learn about sustainable ag
Budget axe threatens farm economy
CHICAGO (Reuters) - Agriculture is poised to drive economic growth and job creation led by the dynamic north central region but proposed budget cuts may threaten that outlook, a study by an Ohio-based research firm said.
"Cuts are proposed in forthcoming budgets: cuts that will ripple through a system that leverages federal funding with state and local matching financial support," Battelle, a Columbus, Ohio, research group, said in the study.
"Ideally, recognition of the large-scale market opportunities in the agbioscience space should spur increased investment," the Battelle study said.
"Using just bio-based products as an example, it is estimated that there is a potential to replace up to two-thirds of petro-based chemicals with agricultural-based materials, representing 50,000 different products - a $1 trillion global market," the study stated.
The report, sponsored by 12 large universities in the north central U.S. who benefit from publicly funded agricultural research, said Europe, India, China and Korea also see agriculture as a driver of economic development, investing in research to reach food security, including biobased projects.
"With funding challenges coming across multiple fronts
we have a system at risk -- a system in which the
The region - Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, North Dakota, Ohio, Indiana, South Dakota, Illinois, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, and Wisconsin - accounts for a fifth of the nation's land mass but 45 percent of farm exports, led by grains and meat.
The farming industry in the region was valued at $125 billion accounting for 2.4 million jobs, with 10 of the top 25 food and beverage manufacturers based in the region, top seed and equipment companies, and 90 percent of ethanol production.
The region's 800,000 farms are supported by about 88,000 companies in the "agribusiness value-added chain," it said.
Battelle said the driver behind the region's world-leading farm productivity had been the land-grant universities, with their "extension" services that work with farmers and business on everything from crop breeding and soils to developing new markets in health, biofuels and biobased products.
"These institutions should be considered priorities for
further strategic investment and development given their importance in
realizing the intrinsic growth potential of agbiosciences
for the
In 2009, colleges and universities in the north central region attracted $3.6 billion in funding for academic research in agbiosciences and related disciplines, the report said.
"The issues addressed by agricultural sciences are strategic to the nation," Wendy Wintersteen, dean of the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences at Iowa State University, said in a statement on Wednesday about the study.
"In challenging budget times, funding support is
critical to maintaining and expanding
New research to combat onion diseases
(ScienceDaily) — Research led by the Warwick Crop Centre
in the
The work on onions, in this research funded by Defra (The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs), is being carried out by Dr Andrew Taylor a Research Fellow in the University of Warwick's School of Life Sciences, who has tested and recorded key traits of 96 varieties of onion from Europe, Australia, New Zealand, Africa , India, the US and Japan. The data provides information that will be crucial to growers seeking to create onion varieties that can resist Fusarium oxysporum (which causes basal rot in onions), and which also respond well to Arbuscular Mycorrhizal Fungi -- beneficial fungi. An improved interaction with these fungi assists nutrient uptake in onions potentially decreasing the amount of fertiliser required. These fungi can have other beneficial effects such as increased disease resistance and drought tolerance.
This research will not only help individual commercial growers and seed producers but will also contribute significantly to global food security, particularly in situations where rising temperatures are an issue. Enhanced resistance to Fusarium oxysporum will be of importance in dealing with rising temperatures as basal rot is more active and acute in warmer conditions.
Dr Andrew Taylor will present his work at the Onion Global
2011 conference in Deidesheim
Dr Andrew Taylor from Warwick Crop Centre said: "We have developed a unique onion diversity set from material sourced from across the globe. We now have a extremely useful library of the variation in traits including resistance to Fusarium oxysporum (the cause of ), response to Arbuscular Mycorrhizal Fungi (beneficial fungi which help nutrient uptake) and seed/seedling vigour, all of which will be extremely useful to growers and seed producers dealing with changing conditions and threats to onion crops."
Warwick Crop Centre Director Dr Rosemary Collier said: "I am delighted that VeGIN is already providing results that can have a direct impact on the global efforts to enhance food security. This is just the first of what will be a range of outputs from this Defra funded work at the Warwick Crop Centre that will be of significant benefit to growers across the planet."
A Defra spokesperson said: "This important research shows how farmers can farm smarter -- producing crops that are naturally resistant to rot and disease can help them reduce the amount of fertiliser and pesticides they need in our changing climate."
China
Nearly six million food businesses have now been investigated and more than 4,900 shut down for "illegal practices", the government's Food Safety Commission said in a statement.
Police have also destroyed "underground" food production and storage sites, and arrested around 2,000 suspects, it said, adding that anyone found breaking the law would be severely punished.
In 2009 the country passed a food safety law to try to allay public concern.
But authorities have continued to discover bean sprouts laced with cancer-causing nitrates, steamed buns with banned chemical preservatives, and rice laced with heavy metals, prompting the latest crackdown.
Healthy bee hives are thriving in big cities
CHICAGO (AP)
-- Among the wildflowers and native grasses in the garden atop
The bees are storing honey that will sustain them through the bitter winter and be sold in a gift shop just blocks away.
"Already this season, one hive has produced 200 pounds of surplus honey, which is really a huge amount of honey," said beekeeper Michael Thompson after checking the hives one July morning. "The state average is 40 pounds of surplus honey per hive."
The
Beekeeping is thriving in cities across the nation, driven by young hobbyists and green entrepreneurs. Honey from city hives makes its way into swanky restaurant kitchens and behind the bar, where it's mixed into cocktails or stars as an ingredient in honey wine.
Membership in beekeeping clubs is skewing younger and
growing. The White House garden has beehives. The city of
"I've seen hives set up on balconies and in very, very small backyards," said Russell Bates, a TV commercial director and co-founder of Backwards Beekeepers, a 3-year-old group that draws up to 100 mostly newcomers to its monthly meetings in Los Angeles.
The group is "backwards" because its members rely on natural, non-chemical beekeeping practices. All their hives are populated by local bees they've captured -- or "rescued" as the group's members like to say -- from places they're not wanted.
"We don't use mail-order bees," Bates said. "Local bees have adapted to this environment. They're the survivors."
City governments, won over by beekeepers' passion, are
easing restrictions. In recent years,
The mysterious disappearance of honeybees, first reported in 2006 by commercial beekeeping operators who lost 30 to 90 percent of their hives, led some state agriculture departments to encourage hobby beekeeping. The U.S. Department of Agriculture estimates about one-third of the nation's diet directly or indirectly benefits from honeybee pollination.
Researchers have yet to determine a cause for "colony collapse disorder," but they say likely culprits include pathogens, parasites, environmental strains and bee management practices that cause poor nutrition.
In Washington, a biology professor who is studying whether pollen richer in protein makes bees healthier plans to compare urban bees' protein intake with that of bees in the country.
"Pollen contains a lot of protein. The amount varies
from plant species to plant species," said Hartmut
Doebel,
The university is partnering with the restaurant Founding Farmers a few blocks away. The restaurant recently put six beehives on the roof of an academic building, and Doebel and his students will study the bees, tracking their pollen sources and their health. The restaurant will use the surplus honey on its menu.
"We don't expect honey this year," said Valerie Zweig, Founding Farmers' honey director. "We hope for next summer. One of our signature dishes is corn bread with honey butter. We'll use it in that and maybe in marinades or maybe a cocktail. We may showcase it on its own in a little honey pot with some iced tea."
Greg Fischer of Wild Blossom Meadery
and Winery in
Fischer once worked with a company that trucked bees around
the country to pollinate sunflowers in
"You're putting them on a semi and throwing a net over them," Fischer said. "You're on the road three or four days. It kind of stresses them out."
For some city residents, beekeeping represents a return to
the family farms of their childhoods.
"My husband and I are first generation off the farm," Ioder said. "Some people just come by and shake our hands and say thank you because they're so curious and they've never seen it and their children have never seen animals or chickens or goats before."
Urban beekeepers may be biased, but they contend their honey tastes better than country honey since it takes on essences from plants the bees visit.
Thompson stuck a toothpick into a small jar of
"I guess it tastes more complicated now," he said.
Cyclists tour and learn about sustainable ag
(democratherald.com) – Jack Blarowski of Kelowna, British Columbia, wanted to get away from his job as a hospital nurse for a short vacation, but he didn’t want to waste gas traveling somewhere to just sit around.
So this week, Blarowski is one of
22 people from across the United States and Canada who are learning about
sustainable agriculturein New York state as they
pedal their way through the mid-valley on bicycles. They are camping overnight
at local farms, including Matt-Cyn Farms on
“It’s a vacation with education,” the 33-year-old Blarowski said.“I’m into biking and organic farming. We’re learning about farms with a community focus.”
The program is operated by San Francisco-based Common Circle
Education and has operated for seven years.
Tour leader Vladislav Davidzon said participants from around the world pay from $1,000 to $2,000 for the seven- to 16-day excursions. They range in age from 8 to 85.
Davidzon said Common Circle Education’s main programs focus on sustainable living, building and permaculture — sustainable land use design.
Matt Borg and Cyndee Ross left
corporate jobs in electrical engineering and business planning 10 years ago
when they bought 33 acres on the
About 3˝ acres is intensively managed, hand planted and semi-organic with no chemical sprays. The couple grow 80 to 100 crops that are sold primarily at the Corvallis Farmers Market.
“We think it’s important that people learn where their food comes from,” Ross said. “We like having people come to the farm because we never get a vacation. Sharing our knowledge about food with other people is like a vacation for us.”
Ross said she hopes the visitors take away an understanding “that getting food to their tables takes a lot of hard work.”
Rosemary MacAdams, 25, works with
young people in
Monday morning, after she and the other bicyclists spent a couple hours learning about Matt-Cyn’s farming program, they went to work hand-harvesting barley as a community service project. Some of that barley was prepared for that evening’s dinner.
“I interned on an organic farm last summer,” MacAdams said. “I believe we need to return to how things were done 100 years ago in terms of how food is grown. Industrial agriculture is not sustainable. We need to regenerate how my grandparents got their food through small-scale agriculture.”
MacAdams said this philosophy is summed up nicely in a refrigerator magnet someone gave her, “Organic food — what our grandparents called food.”
End Transmission