It's a curious feature of our culture that when we spell the word "Big" with a capital B, we often mean "bad." Big business. Big government. Big Ag. These Bigs aren't admiring adjectives. When we use Big like this, we are invoking our instinctive American fear of too much power being concentrated in too few hands.  By contrast, in our culture little is often good. We like small business. We root for the little guy. Increasingly we buy Little Food. Never heard of it? [node:read-more:link]

Joseph Gallo Farms, maker of Joseph Farms Cheese, unveiled a new two-megawatt (MW) solar array, the largest privately owned system ever installed on a California dairy. The fixed-array system supplies renewable energy on site for the family’s dairy farm. “Sustainable farming has been a core value in our family, starting with my grandfather, Joseph Gallo,” third-generation dairy farmer and cheese maker Peter Gallo said. [node:read-more:link]

All 50 states have at least one (most states have multiple) statute that offers limited liability to landowners in the event someone is injured on their property, so long as certain requirements are met.  The National Agricultural Law Center has a collection of various statutes for each state in their Reading Room. All 50 states have passed some version of a recreational-use statute. Recreational-use statutes are designed to encourage private landowners to enter private property for recreational purposes. [node:read-more:link]

 On an isolated 100 acres of farmland where corn and soybeans once grew, a different sort of crop has sprouted — one that hums quietly when skies are clear.  The garden of thousands of photovoltaic panels, creaking occasionally as each one pivots like a sunflower watching the sun cross the sky, this year began powering 13,000 homes as one of the largest solar farms in the state, for now. Energy companies, lured by a state policy that encourages renewable electricity generation and riding a larger industry boom, are flocking to Maryland farmland to build massive solar installations. [node:read-more:link]

Dr. Temple Grandin said that when it comes to setting welfare guidelines on things like outdoor access, poultry producers should make sure they are set in a way that consumers will recognize and accept.Whether the guideline addresses what constitutes outdoor access or cage free, the discussion can’t just focus on what is the most efficient arrangement. The system needs to look like it delivers what it promises. [node:read-more:link]

Nearly two-thirds of the U.S. layer flock will need to be housed in cage-free system by 2025 to meet anticipated demand, according to figures published by United Egg Producers. On October 7, the egg farmer cooperative published an updated report from the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Analytics Division estimating 213.8 million cage-free hens, about 74 percent of the 276 million layers in the U.S., will need to be cage free by 2026.  Currently, there are 16.6 million non-organic, cage-free layers in the U.S. [node:read-more:link]

In the 1930s, rural electric cooperatives brought electricity to the country’s most far-flung communities, transforming rural economies. In Western Colorado, one of these co-ops is again trying to spur economic development, partly by generating more of their electricity locally from renewable resources, like water in irrigation ditches and the sun. Local leaders say that’ll be good for the economy and the environment. The electricity will be clean and affordable, and the revenue from generating it will stay in their communities. But this prospect has started a high-stakes legal battle. [node:read-more:link]

Surrounded by international leaders focused on global food security, Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said that one of the biggest concerns he has about addressing future food challenges is “our ability to embrace science.” Vilsack said “we are now moving into a new era,” with tools like gene editing, and he expressed concerns that - without public understanding and support - future leaders won't be able to use all of the available new technology needed to boost food production by 50 to 60 percent by mid-century, in order to feed a growing and hungry world population. [node:read-more:link]

The state’s orange trees, which are mostly used to produce juice, have been devastated by disease and hurricanes, causing harvest totals to fall for five successive seasons. [node:read-more:link]

As lawmakers prepare to rush a $3.6 million bailout of the state's dairy industry through the Legislature, they have frequently been told that 19 of the state's 120 dairy farms have "gone out of business" in the past year. 
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