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Farmers & SNAP Recipients Gather at MN Headquarters of NAU Insurance to Call for Crop Insurance Changes in 2018 Farm Bill

March 12, 2018

New Report Calls for Reforms to Nation’s Biggest Ag Safety Net RAMSEY, Minn. — The nation’s biggest farm “safety net” has evolved into a program that harms family farms, the land and rural communities, while bolstering profits for major insurance companies, including one headquartered in Minnesota, said farmers and Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) recipients…  Read More →

Crop Insurance: A Safety Net Becomes a Threat

By Brian DeVore
April 12, 2012

When it comes to the crop insurance sweepstakes, southwest Minnesota farmer Darwyn Bach is a winner. But he concedes that his good fortune presents a quandary, since the way the program is implemented these days creates significant losers: the soil, beginning farmers and Main Street businesses that suffer when the number of families in a…  Read More →

The Farm Kid & the People’s University

By Brian DeVore
August 14, 2015

Just about halfway through Dennis Keeney’s slim memoir on his life in agriculture, the author’s tone changes dramatically. For 54 pages, The Keeney Place: A Life in the Heartland, delivers on its title—it offers a somewhat nostalgic glimpse at growing up during the mid-20th Century on a diverse family farm east of Des Moines, Iowa.…  Read More →

Land Line: Farm Finance Crisis, Mental Health, Inflated Inputs, Crop-Livestock Synergy, Bread Bloat, Pesticides in Water, Soil Health & MAHA

By Brian DeVore (editor)
August 9, 2025

Minnesota Farmers Seek State Aid as Foreclosure Crisis Looms (8/8/25) Financially strapped Minnesota farmers are asking the state to intervene with their lenders at a midsummer rate not seen in almost a decade, reports the Star Tribune. Highlights: In June, 197 farmers filed notice for help from the University of Minnesota Extension’s Farmer-Lender Mediation program.…  Read More →

Land Line: Meat Giant, Farmland Access, Food Banks, Greenhouse Gases, Immigrants & the Economy, Swampbuster, King Oak

By Brian DeVore (editor)
April 29, 2025

The World’s Biggest Meat Company Gets the Greenlight to Go Public on the New York Stock Exchange (4/25/25) Despite a long history of corruption and connections to illegal deforestation, the largest meatpacker in the world has been granted a listing on the New York Stock Exchange by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), reports…  Read More →

The Non-Tragedy of the Commons

Cooperative Ownership of Farmland Offers Alternative Access to Acres

By Robin Moore
January 6, 2022

Meet Sasa Organic Farms, a collective of Kenyan farmers. Sasa is five family farms: Dawn2Dusk Organic Farms, Lisaviole Farms, Lisaviole Organic Farms, Green Joy Farm, Gedef Organic Farm, and Laurens Organic Farm. They provide Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) shares, produce, and seedlings to customers in and around Minnesota’s Twin Cities. Like many beginning farmers, their goal…  Read More →

Land Line: Soil Health, Hunger, Govt. Accountability, Ag Recession, Slaughterhouse Speeds, Checkoffs

By Brian DeVore
April 1, 2025

Improving Soil Health Not Just Feel-Good Endeavor (4/1/25) Indiana Prairie Farmer describes how Rodney Rulon’s 30-year soil health journey utilizing no-till and cover cropping is paying dividends not just environmentally, but economically as well. Highlights: The National Association of Conservation Districts and the Soil Health Institute performed a budget analysis on 29 farms across the…  Read More →

The King of Cover Cropping

By Brian DeVore
January 19, 2016

An Indiana initiative has made the state a national leader in getting continuous living cover established on crop acres. Can it change the way farmers view soil? Michael Werling is, literally, a card-carrying connoisseur of soil health. “I call it, ‘My ticket to a farm tour,’ ” says the northeastern Indiana crop producer, showing off…  Read More →

Land Line: Food Systems, Funding Freeze, John Deere, Immigration, Regenerative Farm Family

March 3: An LSP Round-up of News Covering Land, People & Communities

By Brian DeVore
March 3, 2025

Surrounded by Crops in Minnesota Farm Country, but with Little to Eat (2/26/25) Star Tribune columnist Karen Tolkkinen writes about the paradox plaguing rural communities in western Minnesota: despite massive amounts of land being devoted to agricultural production, little fresh, affordable food is available for local residents. Highlights: A recent study of the food system in…  Read More →