Harvest Public Media

Even though the use of antibiotics in livestock feed has been linked to an increase in drug-resistant bacteria, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration recently backed away from a 30-year-old proposal that would ban the use of antibiotics tetracycline and penicillin in livestock feed.

Walk into your neighborhood grocery store looking for healthy food and you might get lost amid a sea of confusing labels and dubious claims. Consumers looking to eat right may get the wrong ideas.

HyVee, like many grocery chains, is trying to part that sea and simplify nutrition for consumers who may not want to read the fine print on their food.

At HyVee stores, you’ll find NuVal. It’s a scoring system on a scale of 1 to 100. The healthier the food, the higher the score.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s first crops supply report of the new year surprised some analysts Thursday, because it didn’t lower the estimate for corn in storage. Predictably, that led to a drop in corn prices by about 50 cents a bushel.

That price drop doesn’t just affect corn farmers. It has ramifications for the entire food system, from corn farmers to cattle ranchers to grocery store shoppers.

Some farmers groups and consumer advocates are concerned that the U.S. Department of Agriculture's plan to close 259 offices nationwide could hurt farmers and food safety.

North Kansas City took the first step toward creating a new sprawling business development Thursday, when a demolition crew began destroying a century-old Archer Daniels Midland mill.

The hulking gray mill sits on 58 acres of prime land at the intersection of 210 highway and I-35. The city hopes a developer will re-tool the land and create a large mixed-use development that could include medical offices, retail stores and possibly even some residential units.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture announced Monday that it will close 259 of its facilities as part of an effort to save about $150 million.

The closings will encompass offices, labs and other operations. The plan will affect the USDA's Washington D.C. headquarters, facilities in 46 states and its international operations. The USDA’s budget is currently about $145 billion.

The Food and Drug Administration is clamping down on the off-label use of certain antibiotics in food-producing animals. 

In an order published today, the FDA said meat producers can no longer use the class known as cephalosporins in ways not approved by the agency. While curbing use won’t change much in the meat industry, the order signals a bigger concern about antibiotics regulation, some farmers say.

Hedging by way of the commodities market often comes in mighty handy for many of the nation’s farmers.

But in the aftermath of derivatives trader MF Global’s recent bankruptcy —in which $1.2 billion in customer funds, much of it from Midwest farmers, went missing — some observers are questioning whether farmers and other investors might reconsider their options.

Opinions differ on the effects of the Wichita Boeing shutdown, the Missouri Legislature talks K-12 budgets, KU defeats K-State & more: A daily digest of headlines from KCUR.

Whoever wins, the 2012 presidential election is sure to change the country, and the farm.

The eventual Republican nominee will have to address numerous farm-related issues. In this era of shrinking budgets, what will happen to crop insurance, agricultural subsidies and the farm bill? With a renewed national focus on the environment and foreign oil dependence, what role will ethanol play in the future? With high land prices, how will family farmers continue to pass their farms to the next generation? How will changes in immigration policy affect farmers?

The most popular menu choice at Amigos restaurant in Lincoln, Neb., is the soft taco. The combo meal with a soft taco, a 20-ounce Pepsi and mexi-fries, which are like tater tots, adds up to 1,100 calories.

While you can find that calorie count on the Amigos web site, it’s not on the menu — yet.

After finding success and controversy in other states, horizontal fracking is bringing a new angle to the oil and gas business in Kansas, along with environmental concerns.

“It’s just now starting here in Kansas. We probably have a handful of horizontal drilling operations currently going on, but we anticipate that to grow,” said Doug Louis, director of the conservation division with the Kansas Corporation Commission, which regulates the state’s oil and gas industry.