Dust Storm Friday Was City’s Worst Since 1930s, Weather Service Says

(5/18/25) Block Club Chicago reports that on May 16 the city experienced its worst dust storm since the Dust Bowl of the 1930s. The dust originated from central Illinois farms. Highlights:

• A little before 7 p.m. on May 16, a wall of dust slammed into the city, propelled by 60 mile-per-hour wind gusts coming from the southwest, National Weather Service Meteorologist Zachary Yack said. A large storm system that produced tornadoes across four states — including Illinois — swept through Bloomington in central Illinois a few hours earlier Friday and picked up dust from surrounding farmland experiencing unusually dry soil conditions.
• Prior to the May 16 storm, Chicago hadn’t seen a dust storm of this size since May 10, 1934. That was during the Dust Bowl era, a series of environmental catastrophes that resulted from widespread erosion on agricultural lands.
• Global rising temperatures and subsequent desertification could increase the frequency of dust storms, according to the World Health Organization.

Check out LSP’s Soil Builder’s web page for information on building healthy soil profitably and keeping it in place. If you are a landowner who would like to set up a lease agreement with a farmer who is using soil-friendly methods, check out LSP’s Conservation Leases Toolkit. LSP’s Ear to the Ground podcast episode 321 describes one farm’s connection to soil erosion history in the community.

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What if a Grocery Store Was More Like a Farmers’ Market?

(5/17/25) The Argus Farm Stop in Ann Arbor, Mich., is an example of a new model of grocery store that is stocked only with locally grown and made food, reports the New York Times. The goal of these kinds of “farmers’ market stores” is to help small farms thrive by offering more favorable margins to small producers than supermarkets do. Highlights:

• Most typical grocery stores stock food from an average of 1,500 miles away. Stores like Argus Farm Stop usually source from within 200 miles, with a majority of the fresh produce coming from within 50 miles.
• Farm stops offer a hybrid between a farmers’ market and a grocery store, selling a variety of locally grown goods with the convenience of a supermarket, complete with refrigeration, freezers, and even vegetable misters. Typically open seven days a week, farm stops receive goods directly from farms, avoiding the grocery store’s complex web of wholesalers and distributors. By cutting out brokers, it gives more money back to growers.
• Argus’s profit margins are thin. Around 1.8% of its $6.9 million in sales was net income, which is similar to a typical supermarket’s profit. But farmers receive 70% of the final sale price, versus the grocery store average of 15%.
• Since Argus opened, farm stops have proliferated. A decade ago, there were three in the country. Now there are 18, clustered mostly in the Midwest and on the East Coast.

For more on how rural communities can build food systems that better serve eaters, farmers, and local economies, see LSP’s Community-Based Food Systems web page.

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Opinion: Big Ag’s Corporate Culture of Indifference has been Years in the Making

(5/26/25) Writing in the Star Tribune, Sonja Trom Eayrs describes how a “corporate culture of indifference” has taken over rural communities, paving the way for large-scale CAFOs and pushing out small and medium-sized farming operations. Highlights:

• “Thanks to decades of corporate propaganda, a corporate culture of indifference encourages farmers to look away as thousands of small farmers are forced out of business,” writes Trom Eayrs. “In the transition to a corporate nation, multinational giants such as Hormel, JBS, Smithfield, Tyson and others have created a closed system that is only open to those farmers willing to construct a factory farm to industry specifications.”
• Anyone who dares to speak out against or otherwise resist the corporate takeover of farming communities is vilified and labeled as an outside agitator that is out to destroy agriculture, says Trom Eayrs. Her family has experienced this kind of attack in their own community, even though they have been on the land for generations. Groups like the Land Stewardship Project, which works with local farmers and other rural residents to stand up for local democracy and to promote a sustainable way of farming, are also labeled as “outside special interests” by Big Ag and their supporters.
• “The gloomy shadow of corporate factory farms evaporates friendships, corporatizes the food system, annihilates independent farmers, breaks the animals’ connection to the land and shatters the joys that make up rural life,” writes Trom Eayrs.

For information on how LSP is working to protect local democracy in communities resisting large-scale CAFOs and other harmful developments, click here. A Land Stewardship Letter review of Sonja Trom Eayrs’s book, Dodge County, Incorporated: Big Ag & the Undoing of Rural America, is here.

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Room to Grow? Brazil can Convert 5 ‘Nebraskas’ into Row Crops

(5/16/25) Between the 2015-16 and 2024-25 seasons, soybean plantings in Brazil ballooned from 82 million acres to 117 million acres, reports Farm Futures. And an additional 70 million acres could eventually become farmland in the country. Highlights:

• About 23% of Brazil, or almost 500 million acres — roughly the equivalent to 10 “Nebraskas” — is either grassland or pasture, according to Jose Rossato Jr., a director at Coplana, a Sao Paolo-based agricultural producer. About five of those Nebraskas can be converted to row crops.
• “The country’s grain production could rise 8% to 11% in the next two years, exceeding 8% area growth,” says Marina Cavalcante, a Bloomberg Intelligence analyst. “A tariff scenario favors greater expansion. In 2021-23, farmers planted 6% to 8% more soybeans and corn as prices jumped more than 120% due to the pandemic.” 

A recent LSP blog describes how three southern Minnesota farmers are working together to diversify out of the typical corn-soybean duo-culture.

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SNAP Spending at Farmers’ Markets Grew 431% Over a Decade and held Steady Post-Pandemic

(4/23/25) Nationally, spending at farmers’ markets using Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), formerly known as food stamps, rose from $13.3 million in 2013 to $70.6 million — a 431% increase — in 2023, reports Investigate Midwest. Highlights:

• • That growth surged during the COVID-19 pandemic. Spending through SNAP at farmers’ markets, farm stands, pick-your-own operations, and Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) saw the sharpest increase among all retail channels, rising 77% from 2020 to 2021. The spike was driven by a temporary federal boost in benefits that ended on Sept. 30, 2021, according to data from the USDA.
  • The rising use of matching programs helps encourage SNAP recipients to shop directly from farmers. Some farmers’ markets double SNAP benefits through federally funded initiatives, such as the Link Up program in Illinois, which began in 2011 in Chicago’s Woodlawn neighborhood and has since expanded statewide.
  • Congress is proposing deep cuts to the USDA’s budget to offset tax reductions, most of which would target SNAP funding. Advocates warn that such cuts could undo years of gains — not just in food access, but in building stronger ties between local farmers and the communities they serve.

Check out LSP’s Myth Busters on SNAP and the role local food systems can play in rural economic development. To find farmers’ markets that accept food stamps near you, use the SNAP Retailer Locator.

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Why Uncertainty Reigns with Carbon Programs

(5/20/25) Wallaces Farmer describes how despite the existence of a special tax credit for biofuel manufacturers who source feedstocks from crop producers using low-carbon production systems, economic benefits for farmers have not materialized yet. Highlights:

• The Section 45Z tax credit of the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 sets up a system to track the carbon footprint of the biofuels supply chain. Based on a manufacturer’s “carbon intensity” ranking, they can qualify for federal tax credits. This could spawn shareable payments that would be split between farmers, biofuel producers, grain merchandisers, third-party verifiers, and others.
• So far, though, 45Z’s potential for farmers and other supply chain partners hasn’t materialized. “We are still waiting for the critical details required to let 45Z get off the ground,” Mitchell Hora, a Washington, Iowa, farmer and founder and CEO of the software company Continuum Ag, told Wallaces Farmer.
• The 45Z situation sums up the uncertainty revolving around carbon farming and sustainability programs in general these days. An October 2024 report by McKinsey and Co. showed that among U.S. farmers: 11% used carbon programs, 7% plan to use carbon programs, 72% are not using or do not plan to use carbon programs, and 10% had not heard of carbon programs.

• Federal changes have heightened uncertainty over carbon markets. In mid-April, USDA Secretary Brooke Rollins canceled the Partnerships for Climate-Smart Commodities program that the Biden administration established.

Check out LSP’s Myth Buster on carbon trading and climate change.

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Current Farm Economy a ‘Tale of Two Farm Sectors’

(4/17/25) Ag economist Brent Gloy tells The Prairie Star that while crop farmers are seeing a downturn in income, livestock producers are experiencing significant profits. Highlights:

• “Right now, soy is down half of net cash income and corn is really low. Wheat is also about 60 percent of average, so the crop sector is really struggling,” Gloy said. “This makes it hard for farmers to cover the cost of production.”
• Conversely, ranchers are seeing an increase in revenue, with dairy incomes up 200% and cow-calf producers making 150% more than their average income.
• Inflation and a reduction of net income in the farm sector in 2025, as well as higher interest rates, are worrying some farmers. “The last time we saw inflation like now was the late 1970s,” Gloy said. “Debt levels are also higher than they have been for a long time, but in the 1970s we had debt on variable rate interest.”

Several installments in LSP’s “A Sense of Where You Are” blog series touch on how farmers are reintegrating livestock into their cropping operations.

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