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Coronavirus

More confidential Illinois outbreak reports show how COVID-19 spread over the summer

By Georgia Gee, Stabile Center for Investigative Journalism, Columbia Journalism School; Derek Kravitz, Brown Institute for Media Innovation; and Sky Chadde, Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting | November 23, 2020

Newly obtained confidential outbreak data shows how COVID-19 spread through communities this summer.

Agribusiness

Trump EPA removes tool states use to protect farmworkers, environment
By Johnathan Hettinger/Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting | November 20, 2020
The Trump Administration took a step on Friday to severely weaken state regulation of pesticides, taking away a tool that state regulatory officials say helps protect farmworkers and the environment.
Plagued by COVID outbreaks, the meatpacking industry could be forced to change under Biden
By Sky Chadde, Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting; Rachel Axon and Kyle Bagenstose, USA Today | November 20, 2020
While president-elect Joe Biden has not announced any specific plans to protect meatpacking workers, advocates believe there are things he could, and should, do.
Despite hundreds of millions in tax dollars, ADM’s carbon capture program still hasn’t met promised goals
By Johnathan Hettinger, Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting | November 19, 2020
Archer Daniels Midland, one of the world's largest agribusinesses, has yet to make good on its promise to capture a million tons of carbon a year at its Decature, Illinois, facility.

Coronavirus

Plagued by COVID outbreaks, the meatpacking industry could be forced to change under Biden
By Sky Chadde, Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting; Rachel Axon and Kyle Bagenstose, USA Today | November 20, 2020
While president-elect Joe Biden has not announced any specific plans to protect meatpacking workers, advocates believe there are things he could, and should, do.
‘They think workers are like dogs.’ How pork plant execs sacrificed safety for profits.
By Rachel Axon, Kyle Bagenstose and Kevin Crowe, USA TODAY; Sky Chadde, Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting | November 11, 2020
USA TODAY and the Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting spent five months piecing together the pivotal moments in the Triumph Foods outbreak, interviewing more than a dozen current and former workers and examining thousands of pages of government records.
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.

Dicamba on Trial

Federal judge upholds dicamba ruling but reduces damages owed to Missouri peach farmer
By Johnathan Hettinger, Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting | November 30, 2020
A jury awarded Bader Farms $250 million in punitive damages after finding Monsanto and BASF knew dicamba would harm crops. A judge reduced the amount.
EPA documents show dicamba damage worse than previously thought
By Johnathan Hettinger, Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting | October 29, 2020
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.
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.

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

USDA continues to fund companies with no food service experience to help feed needy families
By Frank Hernandez, Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting
The program recently entered its third round of funding.
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.
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
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 […]

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.