Agriculture

"Every year, navel orangeworms eat through roughly 2% of California’s almonds before they can make it to grocery store shelves. With climate change threatening to make the situation worse, researchers are hoping to sterilize millions of moths a day with radiation and drop them from airplanes."

"The state estimates one or more pesticides are found in around 43 percent of 800,000 private wells in Wisconsin, and more than half of the pesticides detected aren’t regulated in groundwater by the state or federal governments."

"As Hurricane Milton pummeled Florida’s west coast with powerful winds and flooding rain, environmentalists worry it could scatter the polluted leftovers of the state’s phosphate fertilizer mining industry and other hazardous waste across the peninsula and into vulnerable waterways."

"Record emissions, temperatures and population mean more scientists are looking into possibility of societal collapse, report says"

"The destruction of global forests increased in 2023, and is higher than when 140 countries promised three years ago to halt deforestation by the end of the decade, an analysis shows."

"Rodent studies given to US regulators by insecticide makers close to 20 years ago revealed the chemicals could be harmful to the animals’ brain development – data worrisome for humans exposed to the popular pesticides but not properly accounted for by regulators, according to a new research report published this week."

"The Biden administration this week restored Obama-era farmworker protections from pesticides that were rolled back under the Trump administration."

"House Agriculture Committee Chair Glenn “G.T.” Thompson (R-Pa.) is meeting with congressional leaders on agricultural policy Thursday to try to secure a last-minute deal on passing the farm bill."

"Drought is devastating Brazil’s Amazon rainforest, and some rivers are falling to historic lows. Images of one of the Amazon River’s main tributaries, the Negro River, show just how dramatically water is dwindling."

"In 2017, two United Nations experts called for a treaty to strictly regulate dangerous pesticides, which they said were a “global human rights concern”, citing scientific research showing pesticides can cause cancers, Parkinson’s disease, Alzheimer’s, and other health problems. Publicly, the industry’s lead trade association dubbed the recommendations “unfounded and sensational assertions”.  In private, industry advocates have gone further."