On Maryland's Eastern Shore, both the Chesapeake Bay and the chicken farming industry are sacrosanct. Now a PR and fundraising war has broken out over a lawsuit pitting chicken farmers against Bay advocates.
"What was killing all those honeybees in recent years? New research shows a link between an increase in the death of bees and insecticides, specifically the chemicals used to coat corn seeds."
"Dow AgroSciences LLC is asking the Department of Agriculture to sign off on a new genetically engineered corn seed that is resistant to not only glyphosate, but also 2,4-D, a World War II-era chemical that has been associated with a host of serious health problems."
"FRESNO, Calif. -- Nitrate contamination of drinking water is a pervasive problem in California's agricultural heartland and is bound to intensify in the coming years, according to a University of California, Davis study released Tuesday."
"A team of Australian scientists has bred salt tolerance into a variety of durum wheat that shows improved grain yield by 25% on salty soils. Using 'non-GM' crop breeding techniques, scientists from CSIRO Plant Industry have introduced a salt-tolerant gene into a commercial durum wheat, with spectacular results shown in field tests."
"The world's water supply is being strained by climate change and the growing food, energy and sanitary needs of a fast-growing population, according to a United Nations study that calls for a radical rethink of policies to manage competing claims.
"Freshwater is not being used sustainably," UNESCO Director-General Irina Bokova said in a statement. "Accurate information remains disparate, and management is fragmented ... the future is increasingly uncertain and risks are set to deepen."
"In large sections of America's farmland, new strains of weeds are making life miserable for farmers. They've developed resistance to the country's No. 1 weedkiller, Roundup. Now farmers face a choice: Do they go for yet another kill-all-the-weeds chemical, or go back to more complicated, labor-intensive ways of fighting weeds?"
"Every day, inspectors in white hats and coats take up positions at every one of the nation's slaughterhouses, eyeballing the hanging carcasses of cows and chickens as they shuttle past on elevated rails, looking for bruises, tumors and signs of contamination."
