The federal Farm Bill is currently under discussion, and though its fate is uncertain, part of what is on the table is increasing government subsidization of insurance companies through a crop insurance program created to reduce the risk of farming. The latest report by the Food & Environment Reporting Network, published by msnbc.com, takes a [...]
Stett Holbrook reports at msnbc.com about a program designed to protect farmers, but which could cost taxpayers $9 billion annually if the current version of the Farm Bill under debate now in the Senate passes. Read the full investigation here.
New Report Highlights Ubiquity of Controversial Chemicals in the Food System
On the heels of the decision last month by the U.S. Food & Drug Administration (FDA) to allow continued use of the chemical bisphenol-A (BPA) in food packaging, a new report today, “If Food is in Plastic, What’s in the Food?” in the Washington Post, produced in collaboration with the Food & Environment Reporting Network, [...]
Editor’s Note: FDA Response to Reporting on Controversial Animal Drug
In response to the January 25, 2012 article by the Food & Environment Reporting Network, “Dispute Over Drug in Feed Limiting US Meat Exports,” the Food and Drug Administration said it reviewed its data on “adverse drug experience” related to the use of ractopamine in pigs. Previously, the FDA had published on its web site [...]
CA Water Board Votes Unanimously for New Rules on Pollution from Agriculture
Just two days after the University of California at Davis released a highly anticipated report on nitrate contaminated groundwater and the agriculture industry’s culpability therein, the Central Coast Regional Water Quality Control Board Thursday unanimously approved a hotly contested set of rules aimed alleviating water pollution caused by farming. But the new regulations won’t cover [...]
New Report: Nitrate Contamination Threatens California’s Drinking Water
Today, the Food & Environment Reporting Network published its third report, “Farming Communities Facing Crisis Over Nitrate Pollution, Study Says,” on msnbc.com. Reporter Stett Holbrook takes a deep dive into a new study by UC Davis that reveals that nitrate contamination is severe and getting worse for hundreds of thousands of people in California’s farming [...]
Ractopamine and Pigs: Looking at the Numbers
Due to a number of inquiries, we’ve decided to post the documents referred to in our January 25 report on msnbc.com “Dispute over drug in feed limiting US meat exports.” The numbers used in our reporting came from a March 2011 summary Cumulative Veterinary Adverse Drug Experience (ADE) Reports, which were previously publicly available on [...]
Our Latest Reporting, Around the Web
On Wednesday morning, the Food & Environment Reporting Network’s second article, “Dispute over drug in feed limiting US meat exports,” was published on msnbc.com. The article is available here in our archive, where you can find additional reporting on the international body that is currently discussing the drug, ractopamine, as well as details about the [...]
Our Latest Report: A Controversial Animal Feed Additive Gets a Closer Look
In our latest report, Helena Bottemiller investigates a controversial feed additive ractopamine hydrochloride, which has become the focus of a long-running international trade dispute that centers on concerns about its effect on human health. The story, “Dispute Over Drug in Feed Limiting US Meat Exports,” appears today on msnbc.com, one of the top three global news sites [...]
Food & Environment Reporting Network Launches
Welcome to the Food & Environment Reporting Network, an independent, non-profit, non-partisan news organization. We produce investigative reporting on food, agriculture, and environmental health for distribution to major media outlets…