Office of Communications (202) 720-8138 AgNews Summary for USDA Executives Wednesday, Dec. 31, 2008 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * COPYRIGHT NOTIFICATION * * * * * * * * * * * * * * AgNews is intended for use by authorized government personnel only. Redistributing AgNews by any means to any unauthorized person violates copyright on the source material. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * ** * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * To access AgNews on the USDA Intranet, go to http://agnews.usda.gov FARM & FOREIGN AGRICULTURAL SERVICES MEXICO LIFTS MEAT IMPORT SUSPENSION FROM 25 PLANTS (101 wires 12/30) Mexico has lifted the suspension on meat imports from 25 of the 30 processing plants it banned imports from last week, according to a list posted Tuesday on the USDA Web site. Mexican officials said last week they had concerns about the general condition of beef, pork and chicken products from the plants, along with sanitation issues and “possible pathogen findings.” Mexican officials said in a statement that 25 U.S. plants had given them information on measures they had taken to correct the alleged problems. Those plants can resume exporting meat to Mexico as long as they “comply with routine sanitary and health requirements,” the statement said. Mexico’s agriculture minister said in a news conference that the ban on the U.S. producers is part of a plan to tighten sanitary controls to keep contaminated meat out of Mexico. “We are strengthening our system,” he said. “There are more public funds now than ever to invest in specialists, laboratories and set up a network of controls at ports, airports.” MARKETING & REGULATORY PROGRAMS U.S. FIELDS ESCAPE DAMAGE FROM SOYBEAN RUST (102 Dow Jones 12/30) After years of tilting at the Asian soybean rust windmill, experts are increasingly skeptical of the ability of the disease to threaten the U.S. soybean crop. And despite record discoveries in 2008, government funding for the fight runs out today. “We can safely say we escaped almost completely unscathed with regards to soybean rust,” says a plant pathologist. Even so, the fungus was eventually found in 392 counties in 16 states, including fields as far north as Illinois. USDA’s most recent rust commentary said that is “the highest number of counties reporting the disease since it was first discovered in the continental U.S. in 2004.” Many of those detections were late in the growing season and did not affect final yields. USDA, through the Risk Management Agency, has provided more than $2 million in annual funding to support the extensive national scouting conducted for soybean rust. That funding runs out today, and no other funding source has been found to replace the program. NATURAL RESOURCES & ENVIRONMENT SPENDING TO FIGHT CALIFORNIA WILDFIRES SURPASSES $1 BILLION (103 L.A. Times 12/31) Wildfire spending in California continued its upward climb this year, driven by one of the worst fire seasons in the state’s history. Almost a quarter of all the wild land that burned across the country in 2008 was in California – roughly 1.4 million acres. The fires, fought at a huge cost to taxpayers, failed to translate into any meaningful reforms at the state or federal level, despite efforts in Sacramento and Washington. Lawmakers introduced a number of measures dealing with land use, fire prevention and protection, but the proposals stalled or were vetoed. In fiscal 2008, half of the $1.4 billion that the Forest Service spent nationally on wildfire suppression was spent in California alone. State fire expenditures topped $1 billion. PILOT KILLED FIGHTING COLO. FIRE HAD WARNED OF DANGEROUS WINDS (104 AP 12/30) A pilot killed last spring while fighting a fire in Colorado repeatedly warned officials that winds were too strong, but he was urged to push on, the National Transportation Safety Board concluded. Gert Marais was killed April 15 when his single- engine air tanker nose-dived into the ground. Officials with the Rocky Mountain Area Fire Coordination Center did not immediately comment on the NTSB report, which was released Dec. 18. Marais flew for an aviation company that contracted with the Department of Defense for firefighting. The NTSB report concluded that he cited high winds several times. CALIF. BRACES FOR WATER RATIONING AS SNOW LEVELS BELOW NORMAL (105 San Francisco Chronicle 12/31) Despite recent storms, state surveyors reported Tuesday that snow levels in the Sierra Nevada are below average for this time of year, making water rationing almost certain in 2009 with California’s water supply in crisis. The water content of the snow was 83 percent of normal in Tuesday’s survey, officials said, indicating a moderately dry start to the snow season after two consecutive dry years. The information will prove critical to water managers around the state because California’s water system is crumbling under the pressure of a booming state population, aging infrastructure, ongoing environmental battles and a two-year drought that has left reservoirs at rock-bottom levels and forced water cutbacks among farms and cities. SNOWPACKS IMPROVE IN CALIFORNIA, UTAH (106 AP 12/30) Separate articles report increased snowpacks in California’s Sierra Nevada and in Utah. California officials on Tuesday reported a deeper Sierra snowpack than last year, but they cautioned that the state needs a much wetter winter to recharge its water supplies. The state Department of Water Resources reported that its first snow survey of the season measured 41 inches, compared to 29.2 inches a year ago, while the water content was 83 percent of normal. Electronic sensor readings taken throughout the Sierra show the overall water content of the snowpack at 76 percent of normal, compared to 60 percent last year. In Utah, recent snowstorms boosted the statewide average of snowpack and precipitation to 106 percent of normal. The article quotes a Natural Resources Conservation Service official who says he’s optimistic that Utah’s lakes and reservoirs, with a few exceptions, will fill with the spring snowmelt. RESEARCH, EDUCATION & ECONOMICS NO SURPRISES EXPECTED IN TODAY’S YEAR-END COMMODITIES REPORTS (107 Reuters 12/30) A group of USDA end-of-year commodities reports set for release today at 3 p.m. EST are seen as routine releases, and are not expected to contain any surprises, traders and analysts said Tuesday. There had been talk that USDA was going to release a revised report ahead of its scheduled 2008 final production report on Jan. 12, but the data to be released today was listed on the National Agricultural Statistics Service’s calendar on the agency’s Web site. HOG DATA HINTS HERD REDUCTION IS OVER (108 Reuters 12/30) A sharp drop in feed grain prices during the latter half of 2008 apparently ended hog producers’ plans to pare herds, a move that could mean more hogs in 2009 than previously expected, analysts said after reviewing Tuesday’s USDA hog herd data. As a result, some Chicago hog futures could trade lower today, they said. USDA reported the U.S. hog herd as of Dec. 1 at 98 percent of a year ago, or 66.708 million head; the breeding herd at 98 percent, or 6.081 million; and the market hog supply at 98 percent, or 60.627 million. USDA -- MULTI-MISSION CALIFORNIA SUES TO BLOCK REVISIONS TO ENDANGERED SPECIES ACT (109 AP 12/30) California is suing the Bush administration to block last-minute endangered species regulations that are intended to reduce input from federal scientists, state Attorney General Jerry Brown announced Tuesday. Brown said the president is trying to gut the Endangered Species Act before he leaves office next month. The Interior Department issued the revised rules this month. They allow federal agencies to issue permits for mining, logging and similar activities without getting a review from federal wildlife biologists if their own research shows the project will not affect plants and animals. The changes also block agencies from using the act to consider the effects of greenhouse gas emissions on ecosystems when reviewing projects such as new roads or coal plants on federal land. The lawsuit was filed Monday in U.S. District Court in San Francisco. COLONY COLLAPSE MAY CAUSE 60 PERCENT OF BEE LOSSES, STUDY SAYS (110 Bloomberg 12/30) Three-fifths of U.S. honeybee deaths may be the result of colony collapse disorder, the malady of unknown cause that has devastated hives since at least 2006, according to a study. U.S. beekeepers lost about 36 percent of their hives between September 2007 and March 2008, and in 60 percent of those cases, the hives were found without any bees inside, according to a study released Tuesday by an online publisher of scientific research papers. Bee disappearance is a telltale sign of colony collapse disorder. The findings show how the disease is devastating U.S. beekeepers, forcing them into expensive hive replenishment, said an author of the study. Left unchecked, he said, CCD could force some beekeepers out of business and harm production of crops. CHINESE BEEKEEPERS PAY PRICE FOR USE OF POTENT ANTIBIOTIC (111 Seattle Post-Intelligencer 12/30) The U.S. imports most of its honey, and for years China was the biggest supplier. But in 1997, a contagious bacterial epidemic raced through hundreds of thousands of Chinese hives, infecting bee larvae and slashing the country’s honey production by two-thirds. Chinese beekeepers had two choices: They could destroy the infected hives or apply antibiotics. They chose the latter. That was a mistake, says an authority on bees and honey. The Chinese opted to use chloramphenicol, an inexpensive, broad-spectrum antibiotic that’s so toxic it’s used to treat only life-threatening infections in humans – and then only when other alternatives have been exhausted. Now, 11 years later, some of the honey buyers who take the trouble to test for it still find the banned antibiotic in some of their imported honey. The Food and Drug Administration says tainted honey from China is on the top of its watch list and has been for six years, since the agency released the first of three “import alerts” targeted at banned substances in honey. VERASUN PROBLEMS HIGHLIGHT RISKS OF FORWARD CONTRACTS (112 Omaha World-Herald 12/29) The article looks at a Nebraska farmer who contracted to supply corn to his local ethanol plant. His hopes of cashing in on last summer’s record corn prices vanished after VeraSun, which owns the Nebraska plant, filed for bankruptcy in October. The farmer said he figures the bankruptcy cost him $60,000 in potential earnings, including the bounced check he got for corn delivered in September. Forward contracts, in which farmers agree to deliver corn or other agricultural products to purchasers on a certain date for an agreed-upon price, have become an increasingly popular risk management tool in recent years. But although few farmers have actually lost grain in the VeraSun bankruptcy, many have lost anticipated income, an agricultural economist said. CHINESE DAIRIES TO PAY $160 MILLION TO VICTIMS OF TAINTED MILK (113 N.Y. Times 12/31) A group of Chinese dairy companies blamed for selling contaminated milk that killed six children and sickened nearly 300,000 others has agreed to pay $160 million in compensation to the victims and their families. A spokeswoman for the China Dairy Industry Association said Tuesday that a fund has been established for the victims and that the payments would be made. China’s state-controlled media reported earlier this week that a group of 22 dairy companies would make one-time payments to the families of the victims. The settlement would amount to about $550 per victim. EDITORIAL AND OPINION A FOOD AGENDA FOR OBAMA (114 Christian Science Monitor 12/26) A commentary says critics of the nomination of Tom Vilsack to be agriculture secretary believe he is too close to “Big Farm” interests, and many had hoped for “someone more progressive who would promote sustainable food and farming.” The writer says the need for sweeping change “could not be clearer when it comes to food: At taxpayer expense, current policy subsidizes large corporate farms and destructive industrial agriculture.” The current system, he says, produces unhealthful food, generates “a sizable portion of America’s greenhouse gases,” and is based on dwindling and volatile oil supplies. The writer calls on President-elect Obama to include “new funding streams” in a stimulus package that would promote sustainable food. Among other suggestions, he urges a moratorium on new genetically modified products; a moratorium and gradual phasing out of concentrated animal feeding operations; and expanded food safety and meat industry enforcement and staffing in USDA and the Food and Drug Administration. AGRICULTURE AND TRADE PRESS AGRICULTURE ONLINE 12/30 (115) Where will farm incomes go in 2009? (116) Crazy grain markets top list of big ag stories of 2008 BROWNFIELD 12/30 (117) USDA withdraws premises registration requirement (118) Farmers paid a little less and were paid a little less in December USAGNET 12/30 (119) USDA cancels mandatory premises registration DTN 12/30 (120) Grassley calls on new administration to tighten farm program eligibility MEATINGPLACE 12/30 (121) U.S., Mexico to meet on new meat packaging restrictions (122) USDA nixes mandatory premises registration AND ALSO… SIGN OF THE TIMES: PET FOOD PANTRY OFFERS AID TO ANIMAL OWNERS (123 Buffalo News, N.Y. 12/28) In a sign of the recessionary times, a pet food pantry is being started in Buffalo, N.Y., to help low-income residents keep their animals fed and out of shelters. It is one of a growing number of pet food banks cropping up around the nation, as layoffs and cutbacks put a financial squeeze on more Americans. In Buffalo, the non- profit group Buffalo CAN already operates a handful of animal rescue programs, including one that provides free dog or cat food to many disabled or housebound Meals on Wheels recipients. The new pet food pantry was established after its coordinator visited homes recently as part of a program that assists owners with veterinary bills. She said she was “rattled” when she saw animals being fed unsuitable food or very little food. To obtain a USDA release, access USDA’s Home Page at http://www.usda.gov To access AgNews on the USDA Intranet, go to http://agnews.usda.gov * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * ** * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * DISCLAIMER -- AgNews content is derived from major wires, news magazines and mass distribution press. 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