VT Digger: Pandemic, new consumer outlook create new markets for Vermont produce. “Community-supported agriculture operations reported a huge surge in memberships this spring; grocery stores, unable to get shipments from some of their traditional suppliers far away, started buying more local produce. Sales of canning supplies and freezers soared; even home gardeners stepped up their game, buying out the inventory of seed suppliers.”
Agriculture
India Today: Google turns farmer with project Mineral, its robots are growing soybeans and strawberries
India Today: Google turns farmer with project Mineral, its robots are growing soybeans and strawberries. “The current venture Mineral focuses on sustainable food production and farming at large scales, with a focus on ‘developing and testing a range of software and hardware prototypes based on breakthroughs in artificial intelligence, simulation, sensors, robotics and more,’ according to project lead Elliott Grant.”
Mississippi State University: What Can Google Searches Tell Us About Changes in Consumer Behavior Toward Food and Plants Beyond COVID-19?
Mississippi State University: What Can Google Searches Tell Us About Changes in Consumer Behavior Toward Food and Plants Beyond COVID-19?. “If pre-pandemic trends are any indication, it is possible that search interest in Local Food, Cottage Food, and Food Waste will continue to rise after the pandemic, maybe fueled by the recent interest in short local supply channels, the expansions to some states’ cottage food laws, and the growth in the upcycled food products industry. While search interest in Online Groceries has seen an upward trend since 2004, interest after COVID-19 might not grow as fast and dramatic as 2020 levels might suggest.”
Aberdeen News: Website’s new weather tool to aid farmers in 12 states
Aberdeen News: Website’s new weather tool to aid farmers in 12 states. “Iowa State University Extension and Outreach has debuted a new tool on the Forecast and Assessment of Cropping Systems (FACTS) website that displays weather summaries for every crop reporting district in 12 Midwest states. The weather summaries include data from 1984 through today, updated every month and with information on temperature, precipitation, radiation and other weather indicators — like the number of days with extreme weather rain events, or the number of warm nights.”
Horizon: Post-coronavirus, how can we achieve food justice?
Horizon: Post-coronavirus, how can we achieve food justice?. “The coronavirus pandemic disrupted the global food system and emphasised its structural inequity – from unequal food distribution to workers in the system going hungry. Experts are calling for a reimagining of the way we produce and distribute food so that everyone can access quality food. Despite producing more food by volume than humanity has to date, millions of people remain food insecure. Agriculture is also a major contributor to environmental degradation and climate change.”
ReliefWeb: Google and FAO launch new Big Data tool for all
ReliefWeb: Google and FAO launch new Big Data tool for all. “Earth Map is an innovative and free-to-use Web-based tool to provide efficient, rapid, inexpensive and analytically cogent insights, drawn from satellites as well as [Food and Agriculture Organization]’s considerable wealth of agriculturally relevant data, with a few clicks on a computer. Earth Map has also been designed to empower and provide integrative synergies with the federated FAO’s Hand-in-Hand geospatial platform, a more comprehensive tool to provide Members, their partners and donors with the means to identify and execute highly-targeted rural development initiatives with multiple goals ranging from climate adaptation and mitigation to socio-economic resilience.”
Harvest of shame: Farmworkers face coronavirus disaster (Politico)
Politico: Harvest of shame: Farmworkers face coronavirus disaster. “Within days of the coronavirus pandemic taking hold, the Trump administration had to confront a reality it had long tried to ignore: The nation’s 2.5 million farmworkers, about half of whom the government estimates are undocumented, are absolutely critical to keeping the food system working. It was a major shift for a president who continues to reduce any debate about immigration to stoking fears about border defense and crime. But the Trump administration and Congress have done little to help keep farmworkers safe on the job.”
Projecto Matéria: Putting Portugal’s “Tomato Whisperer” On the Map (Culinary Backstreets)
New-to-me, from Culinary Backstreets: Projecto Matéria: Putting Portugal’s “Tomato Whisperer” On the Map. “[Hortelão do Oeste] is by no means a secret – it supplies tomatoes and peppers to some of the best restaurants in Lisbon. The brothers’ produce is so good that it has earned them a place in João Rodrigues’ Projecto Matéria, an online database that promotes Portuguese farmers and celebrates them as fundamental elements of Portuguese culture.” The site is in Portuguese, but translates without issue. The writeups I looked at were extensive and y’all, the photography.
Philadelphia Inquirer: A virtual Pennsylvania Farm Show without manure or milkshakes — but maybe a butter sculpture
Philadelphia Inquirer: A virtual Pennsylvania Farm Show without manure or milkshakes — but maybe a butter sculpture. “Manure won’t pack the same punch when the annual Pennsylvania Farm Show goes online this January. The odor’s one of the first things that visitors, particularly city dwellers and suburbanites, notice when entering the labyrinthine exhibition complex in Harrisburg, along with bleating sheep and squealing pigs, the collective din of thousands of animals from every corner of the state.”
The Citizens: Old issues of Farmers and Consumers Market Bulletin offer glimpse of agriculture in bygone times
The Citizens: Old issues of Farmers and Consumers Market Bulletin offer glimpse of agriculture in bygone times. “Agriculture in Georgia has changed a lot over the years, but one thing that has remained constant is the Farmers and Consumers Market Bulletin as the go-to resource for buying and selling livestock, farm supplies and equipment, handcrafted and homegrown items, as well as the latest agriculture and consumer news. Now, thanks to a partnership with the Georgia Department of Agriculture, the University of Georgia Map and Government Information Library (MAGIL), and the Digital Library of Georgia, Georgians can take a look back at the history of the Market Bulletin. More than 1,712 issues of the Farmers and Consumers Market Bulletin dating from 1926-1963 are now available in the Georgia Government Publications online database.”
Phys .org: Examining the potential of home food growing during lockdown
Phys .org: Examining the potential of home food growing during lockdown. “A new study, involving researchers from the University of Liverpool, Lancaster University, and Cranfield University, has been launched to examine the potential of home food growing to confer health, wellbeing and sustainability benefits in the light of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. This is part of the two-year Rurban Revolution project, which is funded by the UKRI program Global Food Security.”
WWLP: Locally sourced foods find platform on state exchange
WWLP: Locally sourced foods find platform on state exchange. “Pints of cherry tomatoes grown in Beverly, hundreds of pounds of salmon and haddock from a Boston pier, jars of curries and chutneys prepared by a Newton retailer, and communications support for local farms and fisheries are among the kaleidoscope of options up for sale on a new state-run online marketplace. The new MassGrown Exchange platform publicly launched [August 10] and offers a wide range of options to farmers, fishers, restaurants and anyone else linked to the Massachusetts food production industry, aiming to bring together and support both in-state producers and shoppers.”
KGMI: Eat Local First Washington Directory launched
KGMI: Eat Local First Washington Directory launched. “Advocacy groups Sustainable Connections and Eat Local First have launched the ‘Eat Local First Washington Directory’. The online database allows you to find local farmers statewide through a variety of sources.”
ABC News (Australia): Australia needs a soil database to prepare for future fires, scientists say
ABC News (Australia): Australia needs a soil database to prepare for future fires, scientists say. “The academics recently wrote a paper saying last summer’s bushfires had ravaged soils, damaging agricultural and environmental recovery.”
EurekAlert: Smartphones prove to be time-saving analytical tools
EurekAlert: Smartphones prove to be time-saving analytical tools. “Seemingly everyone has a smartphone in their pocket, and we find new uses for them every day. They can help us avoid traffic jams or connect us to family from afar. They can even translate languages on the fly. Now, scientists have figured out a new trick. Using a regular smartphone camera and some 3D-printed tools, they’ve developed an easier way to measure soil density.”