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Dicamba on Trial

EPA documents show dicamba damage worse than previously thought

By Johnathan Hettinger/Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting | 11 hours ago

The pesticide harmed tens of thousands of farmers, overwhelmed state agriculture departments and damaged research plots across the United States, according to documents the federal agency released Tuesday. Wide swaths of natural areas and rural communities were also poisoned.

Agribusiness

GRAPHIC: Facing challenges, honeybees’ production has dropped in the U.S.
By Pramod Acharya, Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting | October 22, 2020
Honeybee colonies' average yearly production has dropped 30 percent since 1995.
GRAPHIC: The U.S. still uses many pesticides banned in other countries
By Pramod Acharya, Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting | October 14, 2020
About 150 agricultural pesticides that the World Health Organization considers “hazardous” at some level to human health were used in the United States in 2017, according to U.S. Geological Survey data.
EPA takes steps to allow continued use of pesticides linked to cancer, brain development issues in children
By Johnathan Hettinger, Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting | September 24, 2020
The Trump administration in recent days took steps toward continuing to allow the use of two popular pesticides linked to developmental issues in children. In both cases, the agency weakened its metrics for assessing human health protections. On Sept. 18, the EPA approved the continued use of atrazine, the second most commonly sprayed herbicide in […]

Coronavirus

Meatpacking workers say attendance policy forces them to work with potential Covid-19 symptoms
By Heather Schlitz, Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting | October 20, 2020

In April, despite his fever, a meatpacking worker continued to carve neck bones out of pig carcasses at a JBS plant in Iowa.

Two weeks later, he would test positive for COVID-19. But in the meantime, he said, he kept clocking in because of a punitive attendance system widely used in meatpacking plants: the point system.
‘Either I Risk It All Or Nothing At All’: Migrant Workers’ Need To Work Outweighs COVID-19 Concerns
By Dana Cronin and Christine Herman, Illinois Newsroom | October 12, 2020
Since June, there have been 21 COVID-19 cases linked to the hotel where an entire crew of migrant workers are living, according to the Champaign-Urbana Public Health District, which tracks COVID-19 cases across Champaign County. The hotel is tied for third largest outbreak in the county, based on internal statewide public health data from July through September obtained by the Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting.
USDA continues to fund companies with no food service experience to help feed needy families
By Frank Hernandez, Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting | October 8, 2020
The program recently entered its third round of funding.

Dicamba on Trial

EPA allows use of dicamba through 2025, with new restrictions
By Johnathan Hettinger/Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting | October 27, 2020
Environmental groups pledge legal action to challenge decision.
Conservation groups push EPA to deny dicamba registration over wildlife concerns
By Johnathan Hettinger, Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting | August 12, 2020
A new report from conservation groups says that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency should not re-approve the herbicide dicamba for use on genetically modified crops until the agency can prove it doesn’t harm wildlife.
In Roundup settlement, Bayer reaches $400 million deal with farmers over dicamba
By Johnathan Hettinger, Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting | June 24, 2020
Bayer has reached a $400 million settlement with farmers whose crops have been damaged by drift from the herbicide dicamba, the company announced Wednesday. The settlement was announced alongside the company’s $10 billion settlement over claims that the herbicide Roundup causes cancer.

Wellness on the Farm

After #MeToo, This Group Has Nearly Erased Sexual Harassment in Farm Fields
By Vera L. Chang

Nely Rodríguez stands in front of 43 farmworkers and supervisors who sit side by side at picnic tables wearing various protective workwear—hats, ski masks, bandanas, socks as sleeves.

Rodríguez, a member and worker-leader of the Florida-based Coalition of Immokalee Workers (CIW), points to a drawing of a female farmworker bent over picking tomatoes while a male supervisor stands over her saying, “¡Mamacita, qué rico te vez!” or “Hot momma, you look so sexy!”
Homegrown relief: Farming communities tackle rise in suicides
By Stephanie Hanes
This story was originally published by the Christian Science Monitor LIME RIDGE, WIS. One humid afternoon this past July, on the gravel driveway of Lime Ridge Ag Supply in the rolling green heart of America’s dairy land, a small group of masked volunteers delivered sugar cones and goody bags to farmers in big trucks. The […]
Minnesota has figured out a way to help stressed farmers. Can it be replicated?
By Marissa Plescia, Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting
When Pam Uhlenkamp separated from her husband earlier this year, she knew the person to call. As a farm business management instructor, Uhlenkamp mentors farmers one-on-one. When she notices they’re stressed, she refers them to the man who’s been the go-to counselor for Minnesota farmers for decades. The morning after the separation, she called him, and, by the afternoon, she sat opposite Ted Matthews. “Today sucks. Tomorrow is going to suck. The next three weeks are going to suck,” Uhlenkamp remembered Matthews telling her in their first session. “He was very honest with me,” she said. “Sometimes in life you kind of need the two-by-four across the head that says, ‘Yep, this is awful and this is the reality.’”

Government

Find Illinois COVID-19 outbreaks in your area
By Midwest Center Staff
Confidential Illinois data reveals where about 2,600 separate COVID-19 outbreaks have occurred across the state.
Trump administration launches second round of coronavirus money to farmers as critics question long-term impact
By Johnathan Hettinger/Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting
“He took actions that cost U.S. farmers a lot of money, and potentially have a lot of long-term downsides,” said Joseph Glauber, a former USDA Chief Economist and senior research fellow at the International Food Research Center. “But you can have as bad of policy as you want, if you can silence the critics by giving them a bunch of money.”
U.S. Department of Labor cites Smithfield Packaged Meats Corp. for failing to protect employees from coronavirus
By U.S. Department of Labor
September 10, 2020 U.S. Department of Labor Cites Smithfield Packaged Meats Corp. For Failing to Protect Employees from Coronavirus SIOUX FALLS, SD - The U.S. Department of Labor's Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has cited Smithfield Packaged Meats Corp. in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, for failing to protect employees from exposure to the coronavirus. […]

Environment

EPA Inspector General: Covid-19 could affect agency’s ability to communicate health risks to communities
By Samuel Trilling, Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting | June 25, 2020
Covid-19 could hamper the EPA’s ability to inform communities of health risks, according to a report released this month from the agency’s Office of Inspector General. Specifically, the inspector general’s office worried the EPA might not be able to inform residents who live near facilities with emissions that could cause cancer. In a separate report […]
EPA sidesteps normal public process to approve BASF’s cancer-linked pesticide
By Johnathan Hettinger, Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting | April 3, 2020
This week, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced that soybean farmers in 25 states are now able to spray a pesticide that the agency has determined is likely to cause cancer and drift hundreds of feet from where it is applied.
As sales of the pesticide chlorpyrifos ends in California, maker Corteva announces it will stop producing it.
By Sky Chadde/Gannett Ag Data Fellow | February 7, 2020
Corteva Agriscience – the main manufacturer of chlorpyrifos, a pesticide that has been linked to brain damage in children – said it would stop its production by the end of this year.