Category Archives: Farming

First Nations farmers to get traditional lessons of the land in Victorian pilot scheme

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State government to launch program to improve skills of Aboriginal agricultural workers and develop business opportunities

Mick Buckworth, like many of his ancestors, loves being on the land.

The farm manager of Rumbalara Aboriginal Cooperative in Shepparton, in regional Victoria, said the skills he has developed – from knowing how to plant “kangaroo tails” to carefully putting traditional beehives together – were both valuable and satisfying.

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Eden Project creators tee up to open ‘edible’ and green golf course

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Team admit Gillyflower is not the first but hope it encourages a more sustainable approach to golfing

The views are spectacular, taking in a lovely Cornish river, a ruined castle and the rooftops of an ancient town while the golf is pleasantly challenging, with tight fairways and undulating greens.

But what makes Gillyflower golf course in Lostwithiel different is that every square metre of non-playing surface will be used to grow fruit and vegetables or encourage flora and fauna.

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European fruit with traces of most toxic pesticides ‘up 53% in nine years’

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Analysis of nearly 100,000 samples found residues in a third of apples and half of blackberries

Contamination of fresh fruits by the most hazardous pesticides has dramatically increased in Europe over the past decade, according to a nine-year study of government data.

A third of apples and half of all blackberries surveyed had residues of the most toxic categories of pesticides, some of which have been linked to illnesses including cancer, heart disease and birth deformities.

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Tiny Texas community shaken by arrest of official over cattle rustling

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Loving county judge and top official, Skeet Lee Jones, 71, is alleged to have taken stray cattle and sold them

A senior county official in west Texas has been arrested over cattle rustling in a case that has stirred up anger in the tiny community of Loving.

Skeet Lee Jones, 71, a judge and chief elected official in the county, faces three counts of theft of livestock worth less than $150,000 and one of engaging in organised criminal activity after his arrest on Friday, the sheriff of neighbouring Winkler county, Darin Mitchell, said on Sunday.

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India’s wheat farmers count cost of 40C heat that evokes ‘deserts of Rajasthan’

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The ban on wheat exports highlights the effect a rapidly warming planet has on food security – and livelihoods

It was his buffaloes that he was first worried about. As temperatures in the small village of Baras, deep in the Indian state of Punjab, began to soar to unseasonably hot levels in April, farmer Hardeep Singh Uppal noticed that his two buffaloes, essential for his family’s livelihood, became feverish and unwell.

A few weeks later and the buffaloes now seem fine, flicking their tails leisurely as an icy breeze blows down from an air conditioning unit, a luxury that once sat in Uppal’s parents house but now has been installed in an otherwise run-down cowshed, running all day at great expense. “The vet told me I need to keep them cool in this heatwave otherwise they will die so this is the only way,” said Uppal.

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Tesco to pay out more to pig farmers as industry warns of ‘critical’ situation

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Extra £6.6m in support takes total to £10m, after criticism supermarket was not paying ‘fair price’ for pork

Tesco is to hand pig farmers £6.6m in additional support, taking the total to £10m, after warnings that a slew of producers could go out of business.

The UK’s biggest supermarket said farmers would get £6.6m until August on top of £3.4m handed out since March under an “accelerated and enhanced payment plan”, after being criticised for not paying a “fair price” for its pork.

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India bans all wheat exports over food security risk

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Move imposed with immediate effect in attempt to control prices after heatwave damages crops

India, the world’s second largest producer of wheat, has banned all exports with immediate effect after a heatwave affected the crop.

A notice in the government gazette by the directorate of foreign trade, dated Friday, said a rise in global prices for wheat was threatening the food security of India and neighbouring and vulnerable countries.

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‘Holy cow’: scientists successfully grow plants in moon soil for the first time

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Researchers at the University of Florida planted thale cress in harsh lunar dirt returned by Apollo 11 astronauts

For the first time, scientists have grown plants in soil from the moon collected by Nasa’s Apollo astronauts.

Researchers had no idea if anything would sprout in the harsh moon dirt and wanted to see if it could be used to grow food by a new generation of lunar explorers. The results stunned them.

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‘Forever chemicals’ may have polluted 20m acres of US cropland, study says

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PFAS-tainted sewage sludge is used as fertilizer in fields and report finds that about 20m acres of cropland could be contaminated

About 20m acres of cropland in the United States may be contaminated from PFAS-tainted sewage sludge that has been used as fertilizer, a new report estimates.

PFAS, or per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, are a class of about 9,000 compounds used to make products heat-, water- or stain-resistant. Known as “forever chemicals” because they don’t naturally break down, they have been linked to cancer, thyroid disruption, liver problems, birth defects, immunosuppression and more.

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Ukraine’s wheat harvest may fall by 35%, raising fears of global shortage

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Satellite imagery ‘illustrates spectre of rising food prices and hunger’ due to invasion of world’s sixth-largest wheat exporter

Wheat production in Ukraine is likely to be at least a third lower than in normal years, according to analysis of satellite images of the country.

Ukraine is one of the world’s biggest exporters of wheat, but the war is taking a toll on the country’s agriculture and food supplies, sparking fears of shortages or higher prices around the world.

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Greens and animal welfare groups push for Labor to give timeline for live export ban

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Opposition says it will recommit to phasing out live sheep exports from Western Australia but has not indicated when it will do so

The Greens and animal welfare groups have called on Labor to commit to a timeline for phasing out live sheep exports, after the opposition said it still intended to ban the trade.

Labor told the Alliance for Animals that it will recommit to its policy of phasing out the live sheep export trade, which it announced in 2018 in response to whistleblower videos of a deadly voyage in which 2,400 sheep died.

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Pigs can pass deadly superbugs to people, study reveals

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Research into C difficile found antibiotic resistance is growing as a result of overuse on farm stock

Scientists have uncovered evidence that dangerous versions of superbugs can spread from pigs to humans. The discovery underlines fears that intensive use of antibiotics on farms is leading to the spread of microbes resistant to them.

The discovery of the link has been made by Semeh Bejaoui and Dorte Frees of Copenhagen University and Soren Persson at Denmark’s Statens Serum Institute and focuses on the superbug Clostridioides difficile, which is considered one of the world’s major antibiotic resistance threats.

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‘It will be hard to find a farmer left’: Sri Lanka reels from rash fertiliser ban

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Harvests have collapsed, and the way President Rajapaksa introduced the policy angered even organic farmers

Driving through the verdant landscape of Rajanganaya, a rural district in north Sri Lanka where the hibiscus flowers pop out of rich green foliage and the mango trees are already weighed down by early fruit, it is hard to imagine this is a community in crisis. Yet for many of those who have farmed this land since the 1960s, mainly with rice and banana crops, the past year has been the toughest of their lives.

“If things go on like this, in the future it will be hard to find a farmer left in Sri Lanka,” said Niluka Dilrukshi, 34, a rice paddy farmer.

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Queensland government acknowledges subsidence caused by CSG could affect farmland

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Farmers in the Darling Downs say even minuscule changes to the flat black soil plains could disrupt soil drainage and farming methods

A Queensland government technical study has acknowledged for the first time that subsidence caused by coal seam gas drilling could have potential consequences for farmers in the fertile Darling Downs.

Relationships between some farmers and CSG companies have become strained in the past few years, amid claims that one company, Arrow Energy, drilled diagonally beneath farmland without notifying landholders.

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Millions of bird deaths as US hit by avian flu outbreak

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US officials believe nearly 24m poultry birds, mostly chickens and turkeys, have died of flu since virus strain identified in February

Millions of birds have died in the US in recent weeks, because of a contagious strain of highly pathogenic avian influenza, popularly known as bird flu.

The bird flu has also led zoos across the US to temporarily close aviary exhibits and move birds away from the public. At zoos from Colorado to Maryland, species ranging from ostriches to penguins have been moved indoors.

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As Britain learns to live with Covid, it faces a new pandemic of disruption

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Staff shortages, delays and rising prices are playing havoc with the healthcare, education, farming, hospitality and travel sectors

Although the UK no longer faces the threat of lockdowns or intensive care units being imminently overrun, coronavirus is still disrupting much of society and the economy.

As Britain learns to live with Covid, the virus is still playing havoc with our daily lives, and these difficulties have been compounded by post-Brexit chaos in some in sectors.

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Coal seam gas company Arrow Energy fined $1m for breaching Queensland’s land access rules

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Investigation began after discovery of ‘deviated’ wells drilled from neighbouring properties

The Queensland government has fined coal seam gas company Arrow Energy $1m for breaches of land access rules over four years, after an investigation into allegations the company drilled diagonally beneath farmland without notifying the landholders.

The fine is among the most significant non-compliance penalties ever issued to a resources company in Queensland. Groups that have raised concerns against the rapid spread of the coal seam gas wells in Queensland’s farming communities say the penalty is a “small start”, but that landholders’ rights to object to gas drilling must now be strengthened.

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‘It is unsustainable’: soaring inflation squeezes budgets of UK dairy farmers

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Milk production is starting to fall as sharp rises in cost of fuel, feed, and fertiliser outstrip increases in farm-gate prices

“Something has to give and if the milk price doesn’t give, then the producers will,” says Oxfordshire dairy farmer David Christensen in a stark assessment of the peril his industry is facing as soaring costs push farm finances into the red.

Christensen, whose family business manages a herd of about 1,000 cows, says costs were already going up as a result of the upheaval caused by the pandemic and Brexit, but the war in Ukraine has “turbocharged inflation to levels the like of which I’ve never seen in 30 years of farming”.

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Conservationists call for ban on explosives to scare seals at salmon farm in federal waters off Tasmania

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Federal government has not ruled out the use of underwater explosives and ‘bean bag rounds’ in trial off north-west Tasmania

Environment groups have called on the federal government to rule out the use of explosives and guns loaded with “bean bag” rounds to scare seals at a proposed salmon farming trial in commonwealth waters off the north-west coast of Tasmania.

Under Tasmanian laws, the companies are allowed to use underwater explosives, known as “seal crackers”, to deter predators at farms in state waters. Other authorised measures include shooting seals with fabric coated plastic shells containing lead shot, known as bean bag rounds and darts with blunt tips known as “scare caps”. Official documents show some seals have been killed.

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Indian spiritualist Sadhguru on 100-day motorbike mission to save soil

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Yoga guru will visit dozens of countries en route from London to India to raise awareness of plight of one of nature’s greatest resources

One of India’s best-known spiritual leaders is embarking on a 100-day motorbike journey from London to India to raise awareness of one of nature’s most undervalued resources.

Sadhguru, or Jaggi Vasudev, is setting off on Monday on a 30,000km (18,600-mile) trip through Europe and the Middle East in an effort to “save soil”, meeting celebrities, environmentalists and influencers in dozens of countries along the way.

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