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Despite the initial hype, insect agriculture is facing the economic realities of competing with the traditional meat industry.

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USDA research points to viruses spread by pesticide-resistant mites, indicating a worrying trend

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Olive trees
7 May 2025
atlasobscura.com

A fast-spreading bacteria could cause an olive-oil apocalypse.

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Making Old Orchards New Again
4 Apr 2024
modernfarmer.com

Wherever you find an old homestead—a house and barn with a little bit of land that has stood from sometime in the 1800s or early 1900s—you’ll find an

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Ethanol is a comically inefficient form of solar energy—and a toxic one. Putting regular solar panels on some of that land would be better.

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The Ancient Order of Bali
28 Mar 2023
damninteresting.com

In 1970s Bali, a sudden rice crisis prompted an unexpectedly far-reaching scientific discovery

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A tiny town in Wisconsin faces a lawsuit from an industry heavyweight, a growing trend when citizens try to regulate CAFOs in their backyards.

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The Vineyard Falcon Does Not Suffer Fools
15 Nov 2022
punchdrink.com

Master falconer Alina Blankenship and her mélange of raptors have become the protectors of some of Oregon's top vineyards.

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The area devoted to growing the three top crops is bigger than the size of Texas. But even on that podium there’s only one king.

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I sell onions on the Internet - Deep South Ventures
23 Jun 2022
deepsouthventures.com

Vidalia Onions to be exact. They’re classified as a sweet onion, and because of their mild flavor (they don’t make your eyes tear up), some folks can eat them like an apple. Most of my customers do. During a phone order one season – 2018 I believe – a customer shared this story where he ... Read more

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Tobacco Country’s Dirtiest Open Secret
28 Apr 2022
getpocket.com

Capitalism, corruption and exploitation created the broken system of ‘insurance farming’—and the biggest loser is the American taxpayer.

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Cody Easterday wagered hundreds of millions of dollars on the price of beef. He lost.

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Growers of New Mexico’s iconic crop wrestle with drought, water rights and labor shortages.

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The Untouchables
11 Jun 2020
getpocket.com

Why it’s getting harder to stop multinational corporations.

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Cropster started as a tool to lift coffee producers out of poverty. Now it has a bigger mission: to save the entire global food supply.

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One method, the slow, methodical work of traditional hybridization, is long familiar. The other, genetic engineering, is more controversial.

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Betting the Farm on the Drought
22 Aug 2019
longreads.com

Farmers like sixth-generation Illinois farmer Ethan Cox can't wait for policymakers to protect them from climate change. To survive, they have to adapt their operations now, if they can.

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In an isolated Northern California community, the last remnants of the counterculture are confronting the future of cannabis.

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The Super Bowl of Beekeeping
20 Aug 2018
longform.org

Almond growing in California is a $7.6 billion industry that wouldn’t be possible without the 30 billion bees (and hundreds of human beekeepers) who keep the trees pollinated — and whose very existence is in peril.