The US wind industry installed an impressive 7 gigawatts of new power capacity in 2017 and drove $11 billion worth of new private investment, according to a new report published by the American Wind Energy Association. Even more impressive was the 29 new wind farms totalling 4,125 MW (megawatts) that came online across 16 states in the fourth quarter alone.The American Wind Energy Association (AWEA) published its U.S. [node:read-more:link]

The Association of Equipment Manufacturers (AEM) joined the Equipment Dealers Association (EDA) on Thursday in making a joint industry commitment to provide comprehensive service information tools to end users of farm equipment for tractors and combines in model year 2021. [node:read-more:link]

State lawmakers got their first glimpse at Gov. Jim Justice’s legislation to combat the opioid epidemic in West Virginia Tuesday, giving the bill high marks but cautioning that it could penalize honest doctors. The bill, which aims to reduce the number of pain pills prescribed, would allow medical licensing boards to more quickly suspend doctors if their prescriptions appear “abnormal or unusual.” The state Board of Pharmacy would flag the suspect prescriptions. [node:read-more:link]

Haitians will no longer be eligible for U.S. visas given to low-skilled workers, the Trump administration said, bringing an end to a small-scale effort to employ Haitians in the United States after a catastrophic 2010 earthquake.

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House Bill (H.B.) 2671, which he introduced last week. Its aim? [node:read-more:link]

When stricter federal guidelines on the use of some antibiotics for food animals went into effect last year, producers all over the nation, including Jerry Meek in Ada, had a decision to make. Should he spend the time and money to get a Veterinarian Feed Directive authorization from his veterinarian to continue treating his herd of about 30 cows? The tightened guidelines, which went into effect Jan. [node:read-more:link]

U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Sonny Perdue today unveiled Farmers.gov, the new interactive one-stop website for producers maintained by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA). Farmers.gov is now live but will have multiple features added over the coming months to allow agricultural producers to make appointments with USDA offices, file forms, and apply for USDA programs. [node:read-more:link]

The background to this new tax law is an example of what is wrong with Washington. At the last minute, concerned that the new tax law would eliminate a benefit that co-ops had been using in previous law, two senators got language inserted that they now appear to regret. The language gives a 20 percent deduction of the net proceeds for any commodities sold by farmers. That is huge. It gives a 20 percent deduction of the gross proceeds for any commodities sold by farmers to a co-op. That is gigantic.Just do the math. Farmers are not making a 20 percent margin at current prices. [node:read-more:link]

Using a mixed-methods approach, we conducted in-depth interviews with up to 10 families in each case study state in 2015–2016 and surveyed randomly sampled producer households in these states in 2017, yielding 1,062 responses. Mixed-methods research that includes both qualitative and quantitative methods offers better crosschecking and triangulation of data (Guba and Lincoln, 1981) and ensures the reliability and validity of analysis (Janesick, 1994). [node:read-more:link]