by Courtney Llewellyn

Big news was announced in the dairy world earlier this month, with Nestlé offering its support – in the form of $10 million over a five-year period – for the Net Zero Initiative, a new industry-wide effort that will help U.S. dairy farms of all sizes implement new technologies and adopt economically viable practices. The initiative ties into the dairy industry’s environmental stewardship goals of achieving carbon neutrality, optimized water usage and improved water quality by 2050. (more…)

by Sally Colby

It’s a fact: Consumers are several generations removed from the farm and don’t understand agricultural production. While farmers have worked hard to garner consumer trust, there’s still a gap between what happens on the farm and what consumers believe. Despite education campaigns and increased farm transparency, many consumer distrust issues are centered on animal welfare and antibiotic use. (more…)

by Deborah Jeanne Sergeant

While most farmers seek to keep animals away from their crops, Nathan and Sarah Anderson work at ways to integrate wildlife into natural habitats on Bobolink Prairie Farms, their Aurelia, Iowa, farm, to increase overall profitability. Practical Farmers of Iowa offered “Using Conservation to Improve Farm Profitability” as a recent webinar in which Nathan Anderson spoke about their edge-of-field conservation on marginal lands to provide water quality and wildlife benefits while improving return on investment on farmed acres. (more…)

by Deborah Jeanne Sergeant

If you want to finish your beef cattle on grass, Jamie Hostetler of Rolling Meadows Farm in Bellevue, Iowa, offered some expert insights during “The Art of Grass Finishing Cattle,” a recent shared learning call hosted by Practical Farmers of Iowa. Hostetler profits $500 per acre from selling his beef cattle. (more…)

by Sally Colby

Between thinking about crop yields, weather and commodity prices, farmers sometimes ponder the unthinkable: the possibility of a foreign disease reaching the U.S.

One such disease is foot-and-mouth disease (FMD), which was in the news in the early 2000s when it hit Great Britain. Throughout that outbreak and to this day, the USDA works tirelessly to ensure that FMD and other disastrous diseases don’t enter America. (more…)