- Author: Suanne Klahorst
Inspired by an uptick of diet-related diseases and emerging antibiotic-resistant microbes, doctors are overdue when they insist that hospitals practice their prescriptions for healthy diets and healthier agricultural practices. Anything less would be a violation of their ethic to “first, do no harm.
However, transitioning hospital food service to what they would like their patients to eat has been a two-year struggle. Many institutions do not systematically provide higher budgets for food procurement just because their doctors insist. Organic or antibiotic-free foods are consistently more costly and seldom available in the form that foodservice facilities have grown dependent on: prewashed, precut and...
- Author: sarah yang
Fields with diversified, organic crops get more buzz from wild bees, concludes a synthesis of 39 studies on 23 crops around the world published March 11 in the journal Ecology Letters.
The study found that wild bees were more abundant in diversified farming systems. Unlike large-scale monoculture agriculture, which typically relies upon pesticides and synthetic fertilizers, diversified farming systems promote ecological interactions that lead to sustainable, productive agriculture. Such systems are...
- Contributor: Alison Gang, UCTV Prime Cuts
California’s scenic Marin County is home to two thriving industries that were once in conflict – oyster farming and dairy farming.
In order to grow healthy and marketable oysters, the farmers depended on clean water in Tomales Bay. But regulations meant to protect the bay from cattle runoff were so strict that dairy farmers feared they could no longer stay in business.
Now, with help from David Lewis, director of UC Cooperative Extension in Marin County, these two communities have found creative solutions that allow both kinds of farmers to share this beautiful and fertile region. Find out how in a four-minute report by Kristen Simoes on UCTV Prime Cuts,...
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
During the 2000s, organic milk production was one of the fastest growing segments of organic agriculture in the United States, according to a USDA Economic Research Service publication Characteristics, Costs, and Issues for Organic Dairy Farming. In 2008, about 3 percent of the nation's cows were managed organically.
Among the conditions necessary for a cow to produce organic milk, she must eat only organic feed or browse on organic pasture for at least the previous 36 months. However, dairy producers have found that producing or sourcing organic feed – which must be grown with no synthetic fertilizers, insecticides or herbicides – is...
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
Poets have romantically suggested that a “weed is no more than a flower in disguise.” But when burning nettle, pigweed and purslane rob water, sunlight and nutrients from vegetables you are growing to make a living, weeds are a despised nemesis.
For conventional growers, chemical herbicides have taken the drudgery out of weed control. For organic farmers, weeds continue to be a perennial headache.
Many large-scale organic growers have turned to mechanical cultivators to dislodge weeds. However, standard cultivation systems leave an untouched band of soil around the seedlings that must be cleared by hand. This hand labor often represents a large part of total production expenses.