“Their eyes tell their sad stories as ghostly white irises give way to vacant stares. We can look at them but they can’t look back at us. They’ve gone blind because of malnutrition.,” V. Ravichandran, a farmer in Tamil Nadu, India, describing children suffering from vitamin A deficiency. [node:read-more:link]

People forced to avoid gluten could soon have their bread (and cake) and eat it. Now there are strains of wheat that do not produce the forms of gluten that trigger a dangerous immune reaction in as many as 1 in 100 people. Because the new strains still contain some kinds of gluten, though, the wheat can still be used to bake bread. “It’s regarded as being pretty good, certainly better than anything on the gluten-free shelves,” says Jan Chojecki of PBL-Ventures in the UK, who is working with investors in North America to market products made with this wheat. [node:read-more:link]

U.S. Food and Drug Administration officials say genetically modified mosquitoes are not "drugs" and should be regulated by environmental authorities. According to guidelines posted online Wednesday, federal officials have decided that mosquitoes engineered by the biotech firm Oxitec will be regulated from now on by the Environmental Protection Agency.The guidelines clarify that products intended to function as pesticides to control mosquito populations should fall under the EPA. [node:read-more:link]

The Trump administration will repeal the Clean Power Plan, the centerpiece of President Barack Obama’s effort to fight climate change, and will ask the public to recommend ways it could be replaced, according to an internal Environmental Protection Agency document. The draft proposal represents the administration’s first substantive step toward rolling back the plan, which was designed to curb greenhouse gas emissions from the power sector, after months of presidential tweets and condemnations of Obama’s efforts to reduce climate-warming pollution. [node:read-more:link]

The Southern Maryland Agricultural Development Commission has issued a request for proposals for an entity to develop, manage and operate a meat processing facility for the region's farming community. The facility is planned to be a public-private partnership with minimum processing capability of 500 bovines and 2,000 sheep/goats/hogs and an optional ability to process additional livestock species including poultry. The ideal capacity is 3,000 animals per year, the group said. The contract will be awarded for a term of up to 9 years. [node:read-more:link]

Today’s global food system faces the challenge of feeding a population of 7.4 billion that is expected to grow to 11.2 billion by 2100 while supplying an important and perhaps increasing proportion of our fuel needs. [node:read-more:link]

The agricultural economy is in a constant state of adjustment, having undergone several major adjustments over the last 40 years ranging from the farm financial crisis of the early 1980s— a relatively long period of stability and low to moderate levels of profitability—to a period of high profitability from 2007 through 2014, to a recent period of low profitability with average net farm income for some Midwestern states close to or below zero. During this period, the number of farms in the United States has declined and average farm size has steadily increased. [node:read-more:link]

For 21 years Hector Alejandro Santiago spread joy throughout Puerto Rico with the poinsettias, orchids and other ornamental plants he raised and sold to major retailers including Costco, Walmart and Home Depot. In a matter of hours Hurricane Maria wiped it away. The greenhouses and other buildings on the 40 acres where he grew the plants and prepared them for customers lie in tatters, ripped to shreds by 155 mph winds and driving rain. Trees are flattened. [node:read-more:link]

Maryland is suing the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency for failing to act on a petition requiring power plants in five upwind states to reduce pollution, the state’s attorney general and an official in Gov. Larry Hogan’s administration said. The Hogan administration says 70 percent of Maryland’s ozone problem originates in upwind states. [node:read-more:link]