For the second time this year, congressional Republicans have used behind-the-scenes trickery to weaken organic-labeling standards. Powerful Alaska Sen. Ted Stevens, chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, tacked a measure onto the recently passed $79 million war-spending bill that directs the U.S. Department of Agriculture to come up with a plan for certifying and labeling wild seafood as organic. Stevens hopes the move will boost sales and prices of salmon and other seafood. "Alaska salmon is as wholesome, if not more, than any other organic product on the market," said Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), who backed the rider. Organic advocates …

You don't know smelly until you've been in the vicinity of a massive factory farm, or, as they say in the biz, a "concentrated animal-feeding operation." State and local air-quality officials fear that the stench and, more importantly, the accompanying air pollution from such facilities won't get under control anytime soon because the U.S. EPA is considering an industry-proposed plan to study the problem for at least two years before taking concerted action to address it. If the EPA takes this route, large farms would get amnesty from state and federal enforcement actions while the study was underway as well …

Efforts to restore Florida's Everglades hit a snag yesterday, when the state's top environmental regulator suggested delaying by 20 years the cleanup of phosphorus from South Florida waters. David Struhs, secretary of the Florida Department of Environmental Regulation, had previously backed a plan to reduce the presence of phosphorus from a whopping 300 parts per billion to just 10 ppb by 2006, as mandated by the 1994 Everglades Forever Act. Yesterday, though, he encouraged lawmakers to revise that act to extend the deadline to 2026, a move he said simply acknowledged the "political reality." Translation: The sugar industry, which is …

Dear Umbra: When my garbage disposal died recently, I replaced it with a clever new design that uses no electricity (just water pressure), but it led me to wonder which is really kinder to the environment: putting kitchen waste in the disposal or just trashing it? I compost whenever possible, of course, but there are always scraps that are mixed with animal fat and shouldn't be added to a compost pile. How does the damage of this organic waste taking up space in a landfill and emitting methane to speed global warming compare to whatever happens to it when sent …

In a major win for the biotech industry, the U.S. government yesterday gave Monsanto the green light to sell corn that has been genetically modified to resist rootworm disease, the most significant threat to the crop. The effort to combat rootworm has been the single biggest reason farmers use pesticides, so the decision will be a test case of whether genetically modified crops will benefit the environment by reducing use of toxic chemicals, as the industry claims. That possibility was cited by the U.S. EPA as a major factor in its decision to approve Monsanto's corn -- a decision it …

The world's population is growing, yet world hunger is on the wane -- a testament to the success of agriculture. But with the global population expected to increase 50 percent by mid-century, many doubt whether our current food system can continue to provide. The problem isn't the ability to keep producing more food; the problem is the potentially serious ecological consequences of doing so. The last agricultural revolution, begun three centuries ago, resulted in the deforestation of much of the Earth and the cultivation of nearly a third of the planet's land surface; it also resulted in polluted water from …

Here's another provision to watch out for in the national spending bill: $3.1 billion in disaster assistance for farmers in the wake of this summer's (and, in many places, this winter's) drought. Sounds good -- but if the spending bill is approved, the money will come at the expense of a national conservation program. The brainchild of Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), the Conservation Security Program was approved last year as one of the very few environmentally redeeming components of the national Farm Bill; it set aside $7 billion to provide payments of up to $45,000 per year to farmers who …

Friday is Valentine's Day, but while you're buying bonbons and bouquets, be sure to be sweet to the planet, too. If Hershey's, Hallmark, and FTD aren't your idea of romance, never fear: Eco-friendly options smell good, taste good (well, maybe not the flowers), and just might land you a date. Flowers In 2001, Americans spent an estimated $50 per capita on flowers, garden plants, and nursery crops, and floricultural grower receipts topped $13 billion. But some industry costs remained hidden. The floral industry uses the highest level of pesticides of all agricultural sectors. And since most of the flowers we …

Six states whose waters feed the lower Mississippi River agreed this week to work together to reduce the dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico. Fertilizers, sewage, and other nutrient-rich pollution flowing from 42 states into the Mississippi produce the annual dead zone at the mouth of the river -- a stretch of water with oxygen content so low that it drives off or kills most sea life. Last year, the dead zone was bigger than the state of Massachusetts. Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Tennessee, and Texas -- which together contribute about 7 percent of the nutrient pollution -- are …

California Attorney General Bill Lockyer is suing five major grocery store chains to force them to warn customers that tuna, swordfish, and shark may contain dangerously high levels of mercury. In the suit, Lockyer claims that Safeway, Kroger, Albertson's, Trader Joe's, and Whole Foods are violating Proposition 65, which requires companies to provide "clear and reasonable" warnings before exposing people to known carcinogens and reproductive toxins. Mercury has been linked to cancer, birth defects, and reproductive, neurological, and behavioral problems. If the court rules in Lockyer's favor, the stores would be prohibited from selling fish without posting warnings; they could …