Agriculture

Thursday

Gavin Mortimer

Why EU farmers would object to a South American trade deal

It was a weekend of mixed emotions for the European Union. There was the news from Donald Trump that he will impose a 10 percent tariff on eight European countries in retaliation for their opposition to his plans to take control of Greenland. But on a brighter note, the EU finally signed the Mercosur trade agreement with several South American countries. The European Commission hailed it as the creation of ‘a free-trade zone of roughly 700 million people’, one which they promise will save EU companies more than €4 billion a year in customs duties. Ursula von der Leyen, the Commission president, said: ‘We choose fair trade over tariffs, we chose a productive long-term partnership over isolation.

Friday

Charles Cornish-Dale

‘Corporate agriculture’ is wrong about cows and methane

In the 1960s, scientists discovered that halogenated compounds such as chloroform and bromochloromethane could inhibit methane-generating microorganisms, also known as methanogens. This was important because agricultural scientists were trying to make livestock farming more efficient. Ruminants (cows, sheep, goats, deer, giraffes) produce the gas methane when they digest plant matter. Scientists reckoned between 2 and 12 percent of all the energy from feed was being lost as gas. If they could reduce methane production, they could increase yields of meat, milk and other products. In one experiment, feeding chloroform to sheep reduced their methane emissions by between 30 and 50 percent. The results were even more dramatic with bromochloromethane: a reduction of 70 percent.

Wednesday

Robert F. Moss

Lamb is making a comeback on our barbecues

More and more Americans are turning to the barbecue pit when it’s time for holiday gatherings. Some eschew the oven and cook a pork shoulder or turkey on a backyard smoker or grill. Others outsource the work and bring home takeout trays from a local barbecue restaurant. A whole smoked brisket or pork shoulder makes for an impressive centerpiece, but this year I have a different suggestion. How about barbecued lamb? Bear with me. Lamb was once among the most popular barbecue meats. But after World War Two it all but disappeared from American pits. Over the past two decades, as aspiring backyard chefs have acquired ever-fancier offset smokers and pellet cookers, they’ve set their sights on mastering brisket, ribs and Boston butts. Lamb almost never makes it onto the menu.

lamb

Tuesday

Juan P. Villasmil

China has quietly taken over America’s food supply

For all the talk about artificial intelligence and quantum supremacy, the fate of civilizations still depends on breakfast. ChatGPT can’t grow corn. Empires rise on stomachs as much as on silicon. And America’s food system – long dismissed as safe and self-sufficient – has quietly become a front line in the US-China rivalry. We act as if lunch is inevitable, but Beijing knows that food is power. A new report from the America First Policy Institute should wake us up. Washington long treated agriculture as a post-political space where globalization could do no harm, and was therefore happy to let much of the nation ship its growth to China. As Ambassador Kip Tom and Royce Hood argue, China has thus taken over critical pieces of the US agricultural system and food supply.

china america food supply

Thursday

Teresa Mull

How China is trying to buy up American farmland  

China keeps buying property in the United States. Concern over this trend has been simmering for years, yet leading Democrats and left-wing media outlets dismiss it as harmless because, they say, China doesn’t own very much land in the grand scheme of things or compared to other nations. Also — racism. “No, China isn’t gobbling up America’s farms,” Bloomberg’s editorial board assured us in February as lawmakers across the country were introducing bills to prevent Chinese investors from buying more US land. (The Texas Senate passed such a bill last month, and Florida governor Ron DeSantis signed a series of such bills into law last week.

farmland

Tuesday

Amber Duke

Cut meat industry’s red tape, House Republicans argue

Republicans on the House Antitrust Subcommittee sent a letter to Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue on Tuesday urging deregulation of the meat industry. The members of the subcommittee argued that the consolidation of the industry has pushed out local meat processors and caused supply chain failures, according to a copy of the letter obtained by The Spectator. Americans faced meat shortages during the COVID-19 outbreak because of large processing plants closing down after workers contracted the virus. Meat packaging in the United States is largely controlled by just a few big corporations, so one plant closing down has a severe effect on supply across the industry. The subcommittee members, Reps.

Ground beef meat

Sunday

Ben Sixsmith

The conservative case for opposing ‘ag-gag’ laws

Activists from the animal welfare group Direct Action Everywhere (DxE) last week released photographs taken on an Iowa pig farm. They claimed they had walked through an open door, photographed pigs suffering from hideous rectal prolapses and open sores, as well as what appears to be overcrowding. The photographs were taken last April, and the activists have claimed that they withheld the pictures to avoid the accusation that they had contaminated the living conditions and endangered the pigs. Ironically, they have received criticism both for endangering the pigs and for withholding evidence.The owner of the farm is Republican State Sen. Ken Rozenboom.

ag-gag