Investigate Midwest (https://investigatemidwest.org/category/opinion/)
Tofurky was suing Missouri over its first-in-the-nation state law banning labeling products with meat names if it doesn't contain traditionally harvested poultry or livestock. A meeting to settle the suit
A Supreme Court decision over the summer reduces government transparency in how it interacts with business, writes Dave Dickey.
About two years ago Maplevale Farms, Inc filed a civil lawsuit against the nation's largest chicken processors – Tyson Foods, Pilgrim's Pride, Perdue Farms, Koch Foods and Sanderson Farms are all plaintiffs – alleging the companies conspired together between 2008 and 2016 to fix poultry prices.
But as Dave Dickey writes, billions of dollars are at stake here. And things are not always as they seem.
If the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development and the United Nation’s Food and Agriculture Organization are to be believed, U.S. farmers are in for a very, very bumpy ride over the next decade.
Spearheaded by big ag lobbyists and enabled by big-ag friendly state legislatures, numerous laws have made it illegal to use deception to secretly videotape treatment of animals at private livestock and meatpacking facilities.
There's a difference between corn syrup and high fructose corn syrup.
How this corn syrup question is ultimately decided can have potential implications for other food products made with corn syrup and how they are advertised before the public.
The question is: Will the Impossible Burger (and other
competitors eventual entries including Beyond Meat, Memphis Meat and Cargill)
be a craze, or is this the future?
The nation's top meat producer Tyson Foods has gazed into
the crystal ball and thinks it’s coming up meat substitutes.
The last major independent U.S. cattle trade organization, the Ranchers-Cattlemen Action Legal Fund (R-CALF), says enough is enough. R-CALF has filed a class action lawsuit alleging four beef packers manipulated the cash market. R-CALF Chief Executive Officer Bill Bullard pulled no punches in suggesting the Big 4 is dirty.
As Dave Dickey writes, the chicken industry says consolidation has benefited consumers through increased productivity. But chicken farmers say weakening of the Packers and Stockyards Act had done little beyond lining Big Ag's pockets at their expense. And this could mean some voters may change their mind in 2020.
Federal Research and Development dollars are crucial to help farmers produce more food, fiber and fuel while at the same time consuming fewer natural resources and protect public health.
It's a huge job.
You would think funding for this sort of stuff would be a no brainer. But federal agriculture research and development funding has stagnated in recent years.