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| News from Around the Farm World - April 22, 2009 |
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Texas ag chief wants Cuban trade embargo lifted
TEMPLE, Texas (AP) — Texas’ farm and ranch industries would greatly benefit if President Obama lifted the decades-old Cuban trade embargo to allow open commerce between the two countries, according to Texas Agriculture Commissioner Todd Staples.
The United States annually exports to Cuba $715 million in agriculture products. Staples wants Obama to expand on his recent memorandum calling for loosened travel restrictions between the two countries.
“I think these actions the president took signal a welcomed, new era for U.S-Cuba trade relationships,” Staples said in a story for the Temple Daily Telegram. “If these outdated guidelines are removed, there’s tremendous potential. If free market reforms are embraced the Cuban economy will grow and our ability for enhanced trade will grow along with it.”
Staples wants the U.S. to allow Cubans to visit more often to experience agriculture operations, food-processing capabilities, universities and the quality of life a balanced, free market economy can provide.
The White House announced last week that Americans will be able to make unlimited transfers of money and visits to relatives in Cuba. Under Bush administration rules, Cuban-Americans were eligible to travel here only every three years and send up to $300 to relatives every three months.
Last week’s action eliminated those limits in the hope that less dependence on their government will lead Cubans to demand progress on political freedoms.
Manure leak at dairy operation in NW Iowa
DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — State environmental officials are investigating a manure leak at a dairy operation near Granville in northwestern Iowa.
The Iowa Department of Natural Resources says livestock producer Brian Roorda of Roorda Dairy discovered the leak from an earthen basin used to store manure on April 15. The department says Roorda traced the leak to a tile line under the basin’s dike.
Roorda built three temporary dams to stop the manure. Officials don’t know how much manure was released, but some flowed through a ditch and reached a creek. The agency was testing the creek, but officials say there was no evidence of a fish kill.
Developer eyes NE Indiana for wind farm project
TOPEKA, Ind. (AP) — A developer is working on plans to build up to 75 turbines on several small wind farms in northern Indiana’s LaGrange County.
Fort Wayne-based Pioneer Wind Energy LLC says it has rented more than 4,000 acres, enough to build two of the wind farms with 10-15 turbines each. The company’s plans for LaGrange County are smaller than the wind farms being built in northwestern Indiana, near Lafayette, and northwestern Ohio.
Pioneer Wind managing director Steve Stroup says the area does not have enough wind to support a major project, but that it is less likely to draw competition from large-scale wind developers. The company hopes to have its first turbines operating by the end of next year.
Aurora ethanol plant won’t honor higher contracts
SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (AP) — The new owner of an Aurora ethanol plant will keep it operating at full capacity but doesn’t plan to honor contracts for higher-priced corn under agreements made by the former operator.
Valero Energy Corp. bought five VeraSun Energy Corp. plants and one development site after Sioux Falls-based VeraSun filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. Valero is the nation’s largest independent oil refiner.
A company spokesman said it bought the hardware of the ethanol plants but not the contracts, but will work with corn suppliers in the area. The loss of the contracts signed with VeraSun means farmers who sold corn when prices were at historic highs will get less money for their grain.
Developers say Indiana wind farm is operational
RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — The first phase of a wind farm being developed in Indiana by Richmond-based Dominion and BP Wind Energy is operational.
The companies said last week the 222 turbines at the Fowler Ridge Wind Farm in Benton County, Ind., generate 440 megawatts of electricity, enough to power about 120,000 average homes. Dominion Energy Marketing Inc. bought 200 megawatts and American Electric Power subsidiaries Indiana Michigan Power and Appalachian Power each purchased 100 megawatts under long-term contracts.
Dominion and BP Wind Energy said the wind farm could be expanded to 750 megawatts in the future.
Michigan farmer gets shock in five-lamb birth
VEVAY TOWNSHIP, Michigan (AP) — A farmer whose ewe gave birth to twins found himself carefully counting sheep when he later discovered three more lambs.
The Lansing State Journal reported April 14 that one of Paul Oesterle’s Suffolk-mix ewes gave birth to quintuplets two weeks ago. Michigan State University sheep expert Alan Culham says the chance of that breed bearing the multiple litter is one in 10,000.
Oesterle says he thought the ewe had given birth to twins but he found three more lambs when he checked the next day. The Michigan farmer says the ewe can’t produce milk enough for all five babies, so he has to help feed them every six hours. |
| 4/22/2009 |
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