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Minneapolis More than 50 development, religious and sustainable agriculture groups are demanding that Congress reject the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) because of its potential impacts on small scale farmers and food production, especially those in developing countries.
Twenty years ago, on April 17th, 19 members of the Brazilian Landless Workers Movement (MST) were killed during a peaceful action to obtain land for farming and other livelihoods.
Its campaign seasona time when the pervasive influence of money in our political system seems to slap us in the face with each new political ad.
Appendices for the Farm to Childcare Highlights and Lessons Learned
Join IATP and Common Good Books for the launch of IATP-advisor Rob Wallace's new book Big Farms Make Big Flu: Dispatches on Infectious Disease, Agribusiness, and the Nature of Science
Using the wide-angle lens of political ecology, Rob Wallace demonstrates the central roles of the factory-farming and fast-food industries in the evolution of avian flu and other pandemics that threaten the entire planet.Mike Davis, author of City of Quartz and Planet of Slums
Thanks to breakthroughs in production and food science, agribusiness has been able to devise new ways to grow more food and get it more places more quickly. There is no shortage of news items on hundreds of thousands of hybrid poultry, each animal genetically identical to the next, packed together in megabarns, grown out in a matter of months then slaughtered, processed and shipped to the other side of the globe. Less well known are the deadly pathogens mutating in, and emerging out of, these specialized agro-environments. In fact, many of the most dangerous new diseases in humans can be traced back to such food systems, among them Campylobacter, Nipah virus, Q fever, hepatitis E and a variety of novel influenza variants. Agribusiness has known for decades that packing thousands of birds or livestock together results in a monoculture that selects for such disease. But market economics doesn't punish the companies for growing Big Flu; it punishes animals, the environment, consumers and contract farmers. Alongside growing profits, diseases are permitted to emerge, evolve and spread with little check. That is, writes evolutionary biologist Rob Wallace, it pays to produce a pathogen that could kill a billion people.
Lisa R. Barton
Secretary to the Commission
U.S. International Trade Commission (Commission)
500 E Street SW
Washington, DC
Investigation No. TPA105001:TransPacific Partnership Agreement: Likely Impact on the U.S. Economy and on Specific Industry Sectors (and Consumer Interests)
Tuesday, April 5
1:00 p.m. CDT / 2:00 p.m. EDT
Register now for this webinare from the Environmental and Energy Study Institute
In the United States, coal is being supplanted by cheap domestic natural gas, rising renewable power generation, and a growing energy efficiency sector. The decline of the U.S. coal industry has had significant negative impacts on the communities and industries traditionally supported by coal. However, if managed properly, coal's sunset also opens up new economic and social opportunities for regions to grow diverse economic sectors with renewable energy, manufacturing, tourism, agriculture, and technology as drivers of economic redevelopment.
Hosted by the Environmental and Energy Study Institute (EESI), this webinar that will explore how traditionally coal-reliant communities can transition, diversify and strengthen their economies as the United States moves toward a cleaner, more sustainable energy future. Join us as we discuss the funding opportunities and work being done at the local, regional and federal levels to help these communities grow vibrant local economies. This webinar will highlight the range of actions being taken by various coal-reliant regions to diversify and develop new jobs and sources of revenue.
Speakers
Tara Ritter
Program Associate, Climate and Rural Communities, Institute for Agriculture & Trade Policy
Julie Lawhorn
Infrastructure Program Analyst, Appalachian Regional Commission
Brett Schwartz
Program Manager, National Association of Development Organizations Research Foundation
In this season of political speeches and debates, a harmful myth continues to surface: taking action on climate change will ravage the economy. Recently, this myth has been applied to the Clean Power Plan, the first regulation in the U.S. to limit carbon emissions from existing power plants.
Minneapolis The success of the Obama Administrations Clean Power Plan will depend largely on state-level engagement with rural communities who are most directly affected by shifts in energy production, finds a new report from the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy (IATP).
Rural America has long produced much of the nations energy. Most power plants, mines, gas drilling sites, wind turbines and dams are in rural areas, as are the farms and forests that provide the materials for biomass production. In many cases, these industries contribute greatly to rural economies.
Every day of the school year, more than 80,000 meals are served in the cafeterias of the Minneapolis and St. Paul Public School Districtsthats over 1.3 million meals a year.
While civil society groups around the world raise a variety of concerns about the substance of free trade agreements, for the most part their criticisms begin with the lack of transparency.
Northeast Nebraska News Agency, November 19, 2006
As there are more and more calls that public water authorities rebuild their water infrastructure and improve the quality of water supply and sanitation services, the first module of a new Water Justice Toolkit has just been released to celebrate this World Water Day: March 22, 2016.
While civil society groups around the world raise a variety of concerns about the substance of free trade agreements, for the most part they begin their critiques with the lack of transparency.
The farm economy is beyond struggling. Farm income was 50 percent lower in 2015 than in 2013 and is expected to drop further in 2016, reports the USDA.