Embracing the latest technologies, diversifying their operation and pioneering new markets are just part of life today for Angela and Kerry Knuth, who farm more than 3,000 acres of corn and soybeans near Mead, Nebraska.
Rural communities are part of the vanguard of new ideas promoting small-scale sustainable production and use of energy and food. One of the challenges in expanding and scaling up these ideas is getting success stories out there and allowing others to benefit from their experience. At the Midwest Rural Assembly this afternoon, four communities shared their stories.
In the U.S. we are experiencing areas with too much water or outright drought. Each crisis gives us yet another opportunity to examine and challenge the issues we need to find solutions for: unfettered development, water intensive energy production, inefficient agricultural water use.
A study by CE, a Dutch research agency, about the impact of first generation biofuels on food availability and biodiversity. The study was commissioned by Unilever.
Rural Minnesota is well positioned for substantial gains from a growing bioindustrial economy based on the production of energy and products using plant matter, according to a new report by the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy.
What's good for Minnesota's corn and soybeans can be deadly to crabs and shrimp in Louisiana. A national task force meeting in St. Paul last week heard that fertilizer from farm fields washing down the Mississippi River continues to help create a seasonal "dead zone" that this year extends across 5,800 square miles of the Gulf Coast.
Innovative marketing strategies are crucial to the success of sustainable and organic agriculture. Gaining insights from successful strategies is the purpose of the publication Marketing Sustainable Agriculture: Case Studies and Analysis from Europe.
