The Baltimore County Council voted unanimously Monday to halt large-scale solar power projects on farmland for four months while the county considers rules for them. [node:read-more:link]

It’s a huge job to talk about what we are doing every day on the farm, in that back 40 acres, and what everyone else is doing in this fast-paced world, with so much change happening. We are starting to finally learn how to use Twitter.  It’s hard to connect but I have to earn your trust. I have to tell the story for farmers and ranchers. I have to explain to you what we’re doing and why, and how science influenced our decision to change. [node:read-more:link]

For the first time ever, the army of spinning white turbines that has sprouted across the lush countryside generated enough electricity to power all of Scotland. The exceptional output brought the country membership in a small but growing club of nations proving that the vision of a world powered by renewable fuels is closer than many realize. Long derided as a fantasy, a day’s worth of energy harvested purely from the sun and the wind has lately become reality in nations such as Portugal, Denmark and Costa Rica. [node:read-more:link]

Nick Clegg has claimed that quitting the European Union without staying inside the single market will devastate British farming. He said a hard Brexit would be followed by “punishing tariffs” on products including beef, cheese and wine, effectively pricing them out of their biggest export market. [node:read-more:link]

From the Minneapolis suburbs, Cargill Inc. runs one of the biggest food empires the world has ever seen, spanning the supply chain from farm to table—shipping fertilizer to farmers, buying the crops that are grown, processing grain into feed for livestock and poultry, and producing burgers and nuggets for the world’s biggest restaurant chains and retailers, including Wal-Mart Stores Inc. and McDonald’s Corp.  As consumer tastes shift, Cargill is striving to make its immense size an advantage rather than a hindrance. [node:read-more:link]

The publication makes the usual three-part argument about why we should all stop eating meat – animal welfare (“why not stop killing animals for the fleeting taste of their flesh?”), nutrition (“why not stop clogging our arteries with saturated fat and cholesterol?”), and the environment (“why not stop supporting water and air pollution and the waste of resources caused by factory farms?”).  The kit also gives tips for going to parties, suggesting that if other guests seem annoyed by conversation about being vegan, it is just “a reflection of an otherwise kind person’s conflicted feelings a [node:read-more:link]

Aerial tours indicate that some hog waste lagoons were inundated by floodwaters in North Carolina but did not show any confirmed breaches or overtopping, according to the state’s Department of Environmental Quality.  State environmental inspectors flew over farms in eastern North Carolina over the weekend to survey the impact of Hurricane Matthew.  “We are cautiously optimistic that North Carolina’s swine operations have survived the storm without experiencing the catastrophic damage we saw during Hurricane Floyd,” said Donald R. [node:read-more:link]

U.S. farmers, bogged down in one of their toughest patches in years, are looking for a little magic—in seeds. Some are returning to the old-fashioned variety, bred without genetic engineering, and back in fashion as farmers strive to save money following three straight years of falling prices for major crops like corn and soybeans.  Others, meanwhile, are joining new subscriber-based services that collect seed and other detailed crop-related data from their farmer members, who then use the data to determine which seeds and pesticides will work best on their fields and at the fairest price. [node:read-more:link]

As U.S. dairy producers are facing the business-crippling burden of multiyear price lows, some are seeking more direct assistance to give producers a boost. However, the National Milk Producers Federation (NMPF) is keeping its eye on the goal of fixing the Dairy Margin Protection Program (DMPP) in the next farm bill. Sen. [node:read-more:link]

Several leading U.S. farm groups are urging food companies to think twice about their sustainability goals, saying they may actually be causing more harm than good.  The groups, including the American Farm Bureau Federation, are responding specifically to Dannon's pledge to eliminate genetically modified ingredients from its yogurt products, which they noted was just the latest such promise from prominent food manufacturers and retailers in recent years.  In a letter sent today to Mariano Lozano, head of Dannon's U.S. [node:read-more:link]