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US crops left to rot as Mexicans leave the fields for better-paid jobs Low pay, harsh conditions and security checks force immigrant workers into other sectors Dan Glaister in Calexico Saturday February 4, 2006 The Guardian (UK) Standing in the early morning darkness just 50 metres inside the United States, Roberto Camacho is doing his best to ward off the cold. Dressed in a black bomber jacket with a baseball cap pulled low over his brow, he shuffles from foot to foot as he waits for a lift to work. After 15 years working in the fields of California for...

Zimbabwe crops fail despite good rain By Peta Thornycroft in Harare (Filed: 01/02/2006) Food crops in Zimbabwe have failed again despite ample rainfall. Zimbabwe is expected this year to grow less than half of what it needs to feed the population and the rains have denied President Robert Mugabe his standard explanation of poor weather for slumping production. Foreign exchange-earning crops, such as tobacco, flowers and coffee, are now almost too small to count. More than 20 million acres of Zimbabwe's well-developed agricultural land has been confiscated from about 4,000 experienced white farmers since 2000 and handed to Mr Mugabe's...

This month will be important for the future of agricultural biotechnology in Europe. A World Trade Organization panel is expected to deliver in the next few days its long-awaited verdict on a trade dispute brought by a coalition of countries, including the U.S., Canada and Argentina, against the EU over its continued resistance to the authorization of genetically modified seeds. And while that decision -- whichever way it goes -- will have far-reaching implications for the future of agricultural biotechnology on the Continent, when seen in the context of the global biotech landscape, Europe's continued ambivalence toward this technology seems...

For education and discussion only. Not for commercial use.Unilever will move work to its facility in Stockton The Unilever tomato processing plant on Ashby Road in Merced will close its doors next summer, leaving more than 100 employees without jobs. The plant, which has manufactured tomato paste and Ragu and Bertolli sauces since 1974, will stop production by June 30, 2006, according to the Netherlands-based corporation. The plant employs 124 full-time workers and 228 seasonal employees during the summer harvest season. "We will do everything we can to place them with other Unilever sites," Operations Manager Larry Pitts said. Unilever...

It's the middle of harvest season for California raisin grapes, and only half of the farmworkers needed are in the fields. What holds for raisin grapes is happening widely in California agriculture. In the Central Valley alone, there is a shortage of from 70,000 to 80,000 workers to bring fresh fruits, nuts and vegetables to market, according to an estimate by the trade association Western Growers. Some growers are planting fewer acres than normal as they scramble to save the season. Western Growers is worried that the lack of workers -- mostly immigrants from Mexico and Central America -- could...

On top of a severe drought, France is fighting a plague of hundreds of thousands of locusts. The locusts are devouring everything from crops to window-box flowers, reported the Observer. The French environment ministry said drought could be felt across most of France, but it mostly impacted from the Atlantic Ocean to Paris. "There is nothing we can do for the 700 or 800 farmers affected," said Patrice Lemoux, an agriculture official. "The locust has no known predator and the only insecticides which might make a difference are banned."

Scientists have begun mixing human genes with rice in an attempt to take genetically modified crops to the next level. Researchers have inserted into rice a gene from the human liver that produces an enzyme which is good at breaking down harmful chemicals in the human body. They hope the enzyme, CYP2B6, will do the same to herbicides and pollutants when combined with rice. But anti-GM campaigners say using human genes will scare off consumers worried about cannibalism and the idea of scientists playing God. Sue Mayer of GeneWatch UK said: 'I don't think anyone will want to buy this...

Cool summer, bright days led to the highest crop yields ever in the US. Not a good omen for the chicken little crowd. See the article at Science Daily.

The Congress of Racial Equality’s recent conference, video and commentary on agricultural biotechnology* presented personal testimonials from African farmers whose lives have been improved by GM crops, impressive data on progress, and a message of hope for poor, malnourished people in developing countries. The response has been overwhelmingly positive. But not from all quarters. Predictably, anti-GM zealots continue to offer a steady stream of unsupported and unsupportable invective. To hear them tell it, biotechnology is a "scourge" that will do nothing to save lives or reduce poverty and malnutrition. "Evil multinationals" like Monsanto are determined to impose "a new form...

Like Dr. Martin Luther King, Dr. Ruth Oniango has a dream. A member of Kenya’s parliament, she dreams of the day when the people of her poor country "can feed themselves." Congress of Racial Equality national chairman Roy Innis shares that vision. But he also knows the obstacles. "Over 70 percent of Africans are employed in farming full time," he points out. "Yet, half of those countries rely on emergency food aid. Within 10 years, Africa will be home to three-fourths of the world’s hungry people." Many of the continent’s farmers are women who labor sunup to sundown on 3...

The purpose of FreeRepublic.com's multiple message boards is to limit the topics for each board to particular topics. Posting the same message on all the boards defeats the purpose of multiple-boards for special topics. It is very annoying to see the same message on every bulletin board. PLEASE! DO THE READERS A FAVOR. STOP CROSS-POSTING YOUR MESSAGES!

WASHINGTON, Nov 23, 2004 (United Press International via COMTEX) -- The harvesting was wrapping up across much of the United States this week although rain across Texas and the South kept the cotton harvest behind schedule. The Agriculture Department's weekly crop report said Tuesday the cotton harvest was 72 percent complete compared to the 5-year average of 80 percent. Heavy rain did not halt field work but caused some degrading of the quality. Nevertheless, New York cotton futures were trading about 44 points lower Tuesday. Live cattle futures were up sharply on concerns about mad cow disease and stress on...

Boulder climate researcher Michael Glantz predicts that future historians will look back on the 21st century as the Climate Century. "Climate will dominate the news, now and then, throughout this century," Glantz said Sunday at a meeting of the Geological Society of America. Food production, water resources, energy needs, infectious-disease outbreaks, wildfires and the frequency and severity of extreme weather events will be altered in unknown and surprising ways by climate changes, said Glantz, a social scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research. And humans will help shape future climate by their actions - or by failing to act....

Juan Alba had been feeling the squeeze from soaring tomato prices for nearly three months. Something had to give. "We had new menus printed and just started using them today," Alba, the owner of El Campesino restaurants in Ross and Monroeville, said Friday. New prices will help cover Alba's weekly produce bills, which have swelled by $200. Blame that on tomatoes. With planting delayed in Florida because of hurricanes and heavy rains drenching hundreds of acres of crops in California, the juicy red fruit that is the staple of salsa and sauce suddenly is in short supply. The result: A...

The four hurricanes that recently struck the southeastern United States left a lingering imprint on the national economy by pushing up oil prices, wiping out jobs and disrupting shipments of fruits and vegetables to grocery stores. . . . Insurance payments from the four storms combined will total as much as $23 billion, . . . Through Sept. 10, nearly 13,000 workers in Florida alone had filed new claims for unemployment benefits because of job losses related to Hurricanes Charley, Frances and Ivan, . . . After combining the employment losses and gains, the hurricanes probably eliminated 15,000 jobs nationally,...

Since most FReepers are personally responsible, hard-working, well-prepared, self-sufficient individuals, I thought it would be nice for us to get to brag about the fruits of our labor--whether it be traditional county-fair fare (canning, crochet, quilting, crops, cheeses) or FReeper-oriented fare (political slogans, FReep posters, FReep ideas, breaking news, opus posts, FR handles, FR profiles, posts-of-the-day, etc.) I'm not sure who the judges will be, but you all are welcome to post your entries here.

The clamor over genetically enhanced crops has reached a fevered pitch in France. In the last few months, a group of neo-luddite radicals have crisscrossed the countryside razing fields and sowing baseless paranoia. In one evening alone, more than 1,500 people -- led by anti-globalization militant Jose Bove -- tore the crops out by their roots as police stood by and watched. "For us," Bove has exclaimed, "this combat will not stop."

Sewage waters a tenth of world's irrigated crops 12:01 18 August 04 NewScientist.com news service A tenth of the world’s irrigated crops - everything from lettuce and tomatoes to mangoes and coconuts - are watered by sewage. And much of that sewage is raw and untreated, gushing direct from sewer pipes into fields at the fringes of the developing world’s great megacities, reveals the first global survey of the hidden practice of waste-water irrigation. And, however much consumers may squirm, farmers like it that way. Because the stinking, lumpy and pathogen-rich sewage is rich in nitrates and phosphates that fertilise...

<p>If marijuana were legal, it would replace oranges as the second most valuable crop in Tulare County.</p> <p>And if marijuana were legal, Tulare County also would lead the state in the plant's cultivation.</p> <p>Figures released Wednesday from the state Attorney General's Office revealed more than a quarter of all marijuana plants seized in California this year have been found in Tulare County.</p>

GRANTS PASS, Ore. (AP) -- More water flowing down the Klamath and Trinity Rivers in Northern California is giving the Yurok Tribe and California state biologists hope they will not see a repeat of last year's massive salmon kill. The tribe, however, is moving ahead with a lawsuit against the federal government claiming authorities violated treaty obligations by allowing the deaths of 33,000 adult salmon in the lower Klamath last September. And the tribe is pressing for higher flows at other times of the year. "While we are not as concerned about the flows (in August and September), we do...