Financial incentives are commonly used to promote voluntary adoption of agricultural best management practices (BMPs), but little is known about farmer preferences among alternative incentives. Using experimental procurement auctions, we evaluate how different conservation incentives affect farmer willingness to adopt BMPs that reduce phosphorus (P) runoff, a major driver of harmful algal blooms in Lake Erie. We rank incentives (e.g., payment, BMP insurance, tax credit, and certification price premium) by the cost per pound of P runoff reduction. [node:read-more:link]

Low-interest loans for projects that help prevent pollution are being expanded by the state to include larger livestock operations. Minnesota Department of Agriculture is expanding the Agricultural Best Management Practices – better known as AgBMP – loans under an agreement with the Barataria-Terrebonne National Estuary Program in Louisiana. [node:read-more:link]

House Speaker Shawn Jasper, R-Hudson, won confirmation as commissioner of agriculture today, setting up a battle to replace him as the New Hampshire Legislature heads into the 2018 legislative session.The two Democrats on the council, Andru Volinsky of Concord and Chris Pappas of Manchester, helped deliver this appointment to Sununu, a first-term Republican. “I think if the person is qualified, you get your choice, governor,” Volinsky said.  Republican Councilors David Wheeler and Joseph Kenney said they could not support voting for Jasper until the end of the 2018 session. [node:read-more:link]

Ike Horst raises 22,000 turkeys a year on his farm in the rolling hills of south-central Pennsylvania, selling them to a processing company that was providing him with enough of a nest egg that he hoped he could sell the farm and retire. But a Trump administration decision to block proposed agriculture regulations may blow up those plans, preserving the multibillion-dollar meat industry’s power over the smaller turkey farmers whose birds will grace the tables in millions of American homes this Thanksgiving. [node:read-more:link]

Although most state legislatures are currently out of session, a number of state proposals related to animal welfare came forth this month from D.C., Michigan, New York, and Ohio. In Michigan, a new bill would prohibit any person from leaving or confining an animal in an unattended motor vehicle under conditions that endanger the health or well-being of the animal. The District of Columbia proposed a bill that would allow food establishments to permit dogs in outdoor dining areas and unenclosed sidewalk cafes. [node:read-more:link]

An animal activist group sneaked into a Utah turkey farm and documented deplorable conditions, claiming the farm was housing diseased birds. Direct Action Everywhere is taking aim at a farm that supplies turkeys for Norbest. The plant, located at 306 W. 300 South in Moroni, provides 5 million turkeys to 34 states and 26 countries.The video, shot over a nine-month period in 2017, shows the turkeys living in deplorable conditions at a nearby farm that supplies birds to Norbest. On Nov. [node:read-more:link]

EU countries approved on Monday the use of weed-killer glyphosate for the next five years after a heated debate over whether it causes cancer. [node:read-more:link]

While modernizing the 23-year-old NAFTA makes sense, withdrawing from the agreement would be a blow for the United States — one that would hit some states particularly hard. Ironically, those likely to suffer most would be Midwestern industrial states, heartland farm states, and border states like Texas and Arizona — nearly all of which voted to elect President Trump. Which leads to the following list, a projection of the states that would suffer most if the United States withdraws from NAFTA. 1. [node:read-more:link]

The key to food “sustainability,” consumers believe, has much more to do with food safety than with traditional environmental concerns such as global warming, according to Oklahoma State University’s most recent Food Demand Survey. Consumers responded to a question included in the survey about the importance of various factors in determining food sustainability. [node:read-more:link]