Nobody who spoke at the San Luis Obispo County Board of Supervisors meeting on April 19 tried to argue that the problem hasn't gotten worse. As county and city leaders discussed the state of homelessness-and new ...

San Luis Obispo County's three candidates for clerk-recorder on the June 7 primary election ballot each come from different backgrounds, hold different views about the problem (or non-problem) of election fraud, and have different ideas for the county department.

California voters in November will decide if they want to ban single-use plastics and polystyrene food containers.

And it's heating into a battle that may line industry lobbyists behind a bill they once found repugnant but hope will cancel the ballot measure.

Illegal dumping on private lands in rural communities is an issue that has plagued farmers and ranchers for many years. Old mattresses, sofas, appliances, tires and household garbage are routinely discarded along roadways, causing an unsightly mess and bringing added costs to farmers...

Beginning next October, the Supreme Court session will have a food and agriculture theme going for it. The high court has already agreed to hear two blockbuster cases involving the Clean Water Act and California's Proposition 12.

In an effort to fulfill promises made on the campaign trail, the Biden administration rolled out a new Rural Partners Network to help ensure the many resources allocated under the American Rescue Plan and Bipartisan Infrastructure Law find their way to those who need it in rural America.

In the foothills of Mendocino County, where stretches of flat grazing land give way to thick brush and towering conifers, sits the community of Brooktrails. Idyllic, picturesque - and primed for burning. Most of its 3,800 residents fled their homes in 2020 when the Oak Fire ignited north of town.

Smoke billows over the forest like a slow-moving fog. Dried oak leaves singe, crackle and curl into ash. Neighbors, scientists and agency staffers rake the embers, directing the flames with calm, careful control. Ted Odell's grandson runs along his namesake trail, Henry's Hill, to adjust a hose.

Fire destroyed part of the Taylor Farms processing facility in Salinas, Calif., on April 13, just as the company was transferring production from its desert growing region across Southern California and Southwest Arizona. Cause of the fire has not been released. Sam Klemek, incident commander and deputy fire chief for the Salinas Fire Department, said at a press conference ...

So in a 2-week period in February I was getting calls and emails from growers asking about the black stuff forming on the green stems of avocado trees. I thought that it was just sooty mold that was the result of insect feeding and resultant...

PUBLISHED ON WASHINGTON - The American Farm Bureau Foundation for Agriculture has launched a first-of-its-kind online platform for K-12 and STEM educators who seek to bring science to life through the lens of agriculture.

From the Industrial Revolution to the Great Recession, labor markets and the nature of employment itself have been greatly altered during periods of both historical growth and stagnation. In early 2020, the world experienced a similar era-defining event with the onset of the pandemic.

With high biodiversity and rich farmland, San Diego County is exploring ways to put the region's land to use to cut carbon emissions. In an online public workshop Thursday, county officials explained ways to expand the use of wetlands, marshes, forests and agricultural lands to capture and store carbon through the county's Regional Decarbonization Framework.

Scheduled on Earth Day, April 22, for the first time Braga Fresh, home of Josie's Organics, will harvest and market a trial crop of regeneratively grown fresh vegetables. Regenerative agriculture is a variety of sustainable farming principles and techniques that seek to reverse climate ...

PUBLISHED ON WASHINGTON - U.S. farmers' and ranchers' world-leading sustainability efforts, including the U.S. beef community's commitment to reach carbon neutrality by 2040, the U.S. pork community's goal to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 40% by 2030, and the U.S.

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April 16, 2022 - Washington - Senators Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), Alex Padilla (D-Calif.), Cory Booker (D-N.J.) and Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.) on Friday called on Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack to support California's Proposition 12 before the Supreme Court. Read the full text of the letter here.

Nearly a dozen agricultural organizations are continuing to encourage the revising of gene editing regulations. Oversight of genetically engineered food animals is currently handled by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration ( FDA). Ag groups are pushing for the U.S. Department of Agriculture ( USDA) to assume responsibility of animal biotechnology.

The current outbreak of Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza (HPAI) has impacted more than 27 million birds, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The U.S. Department of Agriculture has confirmed the presence of the H5N1 strain of the virus in commercial and backyard birds in numerous states.

The U.S Department of Agriculture (USDA) recently announced that ranchers who have approved applications through the 2021 Livestock Forage Disaster Program (LFP) for forage losses due to severe drought or wildfire in 2021 will soon begin receiving emergency relief payments for increases in supplemental feed costs in 2021 through the Farm Service Agency's (FSA) new Emergency ...

As shipping companies concentrate on the most lucrative routes from China to California, almond growers are struggling to transport their wares.

Scott Phippen at his almond facility, stuffed with leftovers he can't ship: "Those almonds aren't worth squat in the warehouse. They are worth a lot of money in Dubai."

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) announced the launch of the Meat and Poultry Processing Capacity Technical Assistance Program (MPPTA) to provide technical assistance to meat and poultry grant applicants and grant-funded projects. ...

Valley groundwater agencies are mired in confusion and concern over Gov. Gavin Newsom's recent executive drought order, which added new steps for permitting agricultural wells, according to agencies' staff. As groundwater agency managers scramble to hash out exactly how to comply with the order, ...

In a dramatic shift from California's history of allowing landowners to freely pump and consume water from their own wells, Sonoma County's rural residents and many others will soon begin paying for the water drawn from beneath their feet.

In California's San Joaquin Valley, the land around the Tulare Basin has unique dips and rises. The culprit of these strange divots isn't the earthquakes that plague the West Coast. They are from the human-made wells used to unearth the area's groundwater-the water held in the area's soil.

Editor's note: This is the second in a two-part series on how unsustainable pumping is depleting Paso Robles' groundwater basin. Read the first part here. Around the city of Paso Robles, the hills are alive with the growing of wine grapes.

Editor's note: This is the first in a two-part series on how unsustainable pumping is depleting Paso Robles' groundwater basin. When Lloyd "Ed" Rickard moved to Paso Robles in 1986, he thought he lived on an oasis in the Mediterranean-like area of the Central Coast.