Climate Food and Agriculture
All Stories
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Big Ag is pissing away our nation’s rich topsoil
Midwest farmland is more scarred and eroded then previous reports suggested.Photo: Environmental Working GroupBad federal policy and intensifying storms are washing away the rich dark soils in the Midwest that made this country an agricultural powerhouse and that remain the essential foundation of a healthy and sustainable food system in the future. That’s the alarming […]
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Choose the right sweetener with this handy, snarky flowchart
From aspartame to ZSweet, the number of sweeteners available today is staggering. This flowchart gives you the Sweet’N Lowdown on which kind to use:
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Minnesota next up to pass law banning undercover farm videos
If Big Ag has its way, even possessing this undercover image of a factory chicken farm would be illegal.Photo: Humane Society of the United StatesNPR had a report today on the anti-whistleblower laws in Florida and Iowa that would make it illegal to take photos or undercover videos of livestock facilities. (It’s always nice to […]
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Faces of death (and flavor) [VIDEO]
WARNING: Video contains images that some may consider disturbing. Close to 10 billion animals are killed every year in the U.S. (100+ million are pigs). With that statistic in mind, only six pigs died during the making of this video … but it was tough. Killing animals is heavy business. After the deeds were done, […]
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How some Iowa farmers keep the land fertile, while others salt the earth
The Environmental Working Group (EWG) has a new study out about the sexiest subject ever — soil erosion! Wait, don't go, this is important: Topsoil takes forever to make, so as it washes off of fields, it's literally taking our ability to feed ourselves with it. Previously, scientists had estimated that Iowa fields were losing […]
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Hungry kids and the environment hit hard by USDA budget cuts
Hungry kids may be getting less cheddar.The House Appropriations Committee has released a detailed list of budget cuts as part of the deal to avoid a government shutdown, and it looks like agriculture and food programs are getting hit pretty hard. The USDA budget will be cut by $2.6 billion, down from the $108 billion […]
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Coming soon, to a city near you: open-source agriculture
Sharing the bounty of knowledge.Most people attempting to build a viable urban agriculture business are acutely aware of the enormously challenging and time-consuming process of navigating zoning regulations. Having worked in this sector, I can personally testify that the process is tedious and time-sucking. Over the past couple of years, a number of cities such as […]
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Big Ag demands right to pollute California’s Central Valley
A Central Valley field.Photo: calwestThe Los Angeles Times details a brewing skirmish over agricultural runoff being fought in California’s Central Valley. At issue are proposed regulations that would for the first time force farmers to address fertilizer and pesticide runoff from their fields. A group of environmental organizations is pushing for the regulations, as the […]
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Shark fin soup and sautéed kitten: the cultural politics of cuisine
Enjoy your dinner meow.Kitten photo: Art SiegelWhat garnishes a kitten best? One of the corners in the long-standing battles between cultural relativists and absolutists is the question of food consumption, or what the Princeton sociologist Michaela DeSoucey speaks of as “gullet politics.” Sometimes it is the smallest moments that serve to clarify debates that elsewhere […]
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Jamie Oliver has really pissed off Los Angeles
The Daily Show – Jamie Oliver Tags: Daily Show Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,The Daily Show on Facebook Hey look, Jamie Oliver can talk about improving school lunches for five whole minutes without saying something douchey about fat people! Keep it up, Jamie, because your campaign to increase the real-food content in school lunch […]
