Landowners
air concerns about high-speed rail [Fresno Bee]
About
100 property owners packed an open house Wednesday to learn how their farms,
homes or businesses could be affected by California's proposed high-speed train
system.…Farmers have been among the most vocal critics of the train system in
the San Joaquin Valley, and Farm Bureau organizations in Madera and Merced
counties are among those suing the rail agency to stop work on the
Merced-Fresno section approved by the rail authority this year.…"These
farmers are the ones whose property is being threatened," said Anja
Raudabaugh, executive director of the Madera County Farm Bureau. Raudabaugh
said farmers in Madera County are unified in fighting the loss of land to the
rail authority.…In a written statement, the Farm Bureau said that the rail line
will displace "hundreds of farms."
Colorado
River water report released in Vegas [Associated Press]
Rising
demand and falling supply have water managers in the arid West projecting that
the Colorado River won't be able to meet the demands over the next 50 years of
a population of 40 million people and growing. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar
on Wednesday issued what he termed "a call to action" along with a
three-year study of the river, its flows and its ability to meet the future
needs of city-dwellers, Native Americans, businesses, ranchers and farmers in
seven Western states. The study found the population in the West could double,
while today's drought-stricken Colorado River is expected to only recover about
85 percent of its historic flows.
Feds
designate habitat for Klamath sucker fish [Associated Press]
The
federal government has designated habitat critical to the survival of two
endangered species of sucker fish that have been at the center of bitter
battles over water in the Klamath Basin for decades. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife
Service on Tuesday designated critical habitat for Lost River suckers and
shortnosed suckers. A drought in 2001 forced the shut off of irrigation water
to most of the 1,400 farms on the Klamath Reclamation Project to conserve water
for the suckers in Upper Klamath Lake, the project's main reservoir, and threatened
coho salmon in the Klamath River.…The critical habitat designation came as a
result of a settlement with the conservation group Oregon Wild, which was not
happy the 241,438 acres of reservoirs and 282 miles of rivers in Oregon and
California is about 75 percent smaller than one proposed 24 years ago that
never became final.
Ag
secretary attends almond conference [Modesto Bee]
Tom
Vilsack's great-aunt in Iowa had a thing for almonds. "She believed that
if she consumed seven almonds a day, she would avoid cancer," the nation's
agriculture secretary said in a phone interview Wednesday. "She lived to
be 93." Vilsack spoke from the 40th annual conference of the Almond Board
of California, which moved to Sacramento this year after outgrowing Modesto
Centre Plaza.…U.S. exports of almonds and other tree nuts will hit a record $7
billion next year, the U.S. Department of Agriculture projected last month.
That would double the figure for 2009.…The USDA projected total farm exports
for the nation at $145 billion next year, up from $96 billion in 2009. Grains,
soybeans, meat and dairy products account for two-thirds of that.
View
from a farm [Chico News & Review]
At
face value, it’s easy to paint the fight over Proposition 37 in black-and-white
terms, as a grassroots movement based on people’s “right to know” and endorsed
by the likes of the Consumers Union and United Farm Workers, versus an
opposition most visibly backed by a collection of large food and pharmaceutical
companies, including Bayer and Monsanto. But opponents of the initiative, such
as Jamie Johansson, second vice president of the California Farm Bureau and
owner of Lodestar Farms in Oroville, insist that a closer look at Prop. 37
reveals flaws that would have negatively affected California’s agriculture
industry and its consumers.…“Though it was sold to the voters as a simple
consumer right-to-know labeling law, Proposition 37 actually went beyond the
simple labeling of GMOs,” Johansson contends. “The extra provisions that were
written into the proposition would have caused hardships and a greater
financial burden for consumers as well as farmers.”
For
farmers, estate tax drama builds on edge of 'fiscal cliff' [Kansas City Star]
Glen
Cope owns 500 head of cattle on about 2,500 acres near Aurora, Mo. Like most
farmers and ranchers he's worried about the weather, the price he gets for his
product, and the cost of fuel and feed needed to run his operation. But as 2012
winds to a close, Cope - and his neighbors - say they're more worried about
what might happen to their farms and families when they die. A significant
increase in the federal estate tax is possibly just days away. And without
quick congressional changes, the farmers say, their heirs could face crushing
taxes that could force the breakup of their decades-old family farms.…Much of
the nation's attention in recent weeks has focused on other parts of the
"fiscal cliff" - higher income tax rates and spending cuts - so the
changes in the federal estate tax that would take effect without a budget deal
have largely escaped notice. But they are dramatic.
Ag
Today is distributed to county Farm Bureaus, CFBF directors and CFBF staff, for
information purposes, by the CFBF Communications/News Division, 916-561-5550; news@cfbf.com.
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