Natural Resources

Farm Bill Faces Battle As GOP Pushes To Strip Climate, SNAP Funding

"Congress appears unlikely to pass a new farm bill by the end of this year amid standoffs over Republicans’ push to extend subsidies to three specific Southern crops — at the potential cost of billions in both food aid and popular farm conservation programs."

Source: The Hill, 11/09/2023

"A Food Historian’s Hunt For Ingredients Vanishing From US Plates"

"In her new book, Endangered Eating, Sarah Lohman chronicles disappearing foods – and why they need protecting".

"The American buff goose. Amish deer tongue lettuce. The Nancy Hall sweet potato. The mulefoot hog. When food historian Sarah Lohman stumbled on these fantastical-sounding ingredients in a database of vanishing foods called the Ark of Taste, she set off on a journey across the United States to discover more ingredients and traditions that had been abandoned in the annals of history.

Source: Guardian, 11/07/2023

"In the Florida Everglades, a Greenhouse Gas Emissions Hotspot"

"Drainage has exposed the fertile soils of the Everglades Agricultural Area, a region responsible for much of the nation’s sugar cane."

"ORLANDO, Fla. — It used to be the water spilled over Lake Okeechobee’s southern shore, flowing eventually into the sawgrass prairies of the Florida Everglades. For thousands of years the marsh vegetation flourished and died here in an endless cycle, the plant remains falling beneath the slow-coursing water to form a rich layer of organic soil called peat.

Source: Inside Climate News, 11/07/2023

Reporting on Environmental Solutions and Equity — at a Watershed Scale

Reporting on interconnected ecosystems lends itself to better environmental stories, and so tracing how water moves across landscapes, communities, industries and regulatory schemes can help the public connect the dots. That’s how Annie Ropeik, who helps run the Mississippi River Basin Ag & Water Desk, sees the watershed beat. She shares expert views and offers insights for environment journalists to use in their reporting.

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Cover Crops Help The Climate And Environment, But Most Farmers Say No

"Called cover crops, they top the list of tasks U.S. farmers are told will build healthy soil, help the environment and fight climate change. Yet after years of incentives and encouragement, Midwest farmers planted cover crops on only about 7% of their land in 2021."

Source: AP, 11/06/2023

Seabed Mining May Dredge Up Real Minerals, Fishy Worries in 2024

The mining of the ocean floor has stirred up significant debate, much of which clouds the realities of whether and to what degree it would cause ecological harm to one of the world’s greatest resources. This week’s TipSheet looks more closely at the controversy, which may well come to a head in the coming year. The latest entry in SEJournal’s 2024 Journalists’ Guide to Environment and Energy.

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