Rokala Public Affairs President Mark Rokala, says someone is needed at USDA with the budget about to be done.?Everyone is anticipating a 10 percent cut across all of these programs. Congress has to finish the fiscal year 2017. The continuing resolution runs out April...
Red River Farm Net
Bringing Issues to Light
The Minnesota Farmers Union is hosted a series of rural issues discussions across the state. At a meeting in Moorhead last week, nearly 50 farmers expressed their concerns on state and national legislation. In addition to buffer legislation, Minnesota Farmers Union...
House Plea
House Agriculture Committee Chairman Mike Conaway and Ranking Member Collin Peterson have sent a letter to Senate leaders encouraging the swift confirmation of Governor Sonny Perdue as the next Secretary of Agriculture. The letter says America?s farmers, ranchers and...
Help
The House Ag Subcommittee on General Farm Commodities and Risk Management held a public hearing last week on the next Farm Bill, hearing from cotton, rice, peanut, canola, sunflower and sugar producers. Much of the discussion had to do with cotton, and the need to get...
No Suprise
A year ago, North Dakota farmers planted 50,000 more acres of soybeans than spring wheat. According to USDA?s Prospective Plantings report, farmers plan to plant 1.5 million more beans than wheat this year. Money Farm President Luke Swenson isn?t too surprised with...
MN Ag Policy Bill Passes 109-25
The Minnesota House has passed the omnibus agriculture policy bill. One of the most controversial measures in the bill is a proposal to protect feedlot operations from nuisance lawsuits. Representative John Lesch, who represents St. Paul, said this becomes a private...
Confirm Perdue, Please
Sixteen farm organizations have written to Senate leadership urging them to confirm Sonny Perdue?s nomination as agriculture secretary before the two-week Easter recess, which begins Friday. The National Corn Growers Association?s vice president of public policy, Jon...
Regulators Approve ChemChina-Syngenta Deal
The Federal Trade Commission has approved ChemChina?s purchase of Syngenta. The decision comes with the call for ChemChina to divest of three pesticides that have overlap between Syngenta and ChemChina. Those products include the burndown herbicide, Paraquat. The...
Conaway to Oversee Investigation into Russian Interference in U.S. Elections
Texas Congressman Michael Conaway will now oversee the House Intelligence Committee investigation into Russian involvement in the 2016 presidential election. California Representative Devin Nunes is facing accusations of possible ethics violations and will no longer...
DTN Has a New Owner
Telvent DTN is being sold to TBG AG, which is a private holding firm based in Switzerland. For the past six years, the agriculture information service has been owned by a French company, Schneider Electric. This transaction also includes Progressive Farmer magazine....