Last month in a special report, the Star Tribune newspaper revealed how much water pollution from agriculture is costing taxpayers. At $125 million in 2014 alone, the price of industrialized, monocrop agriculture is significant and only likely to grow. In north-central Minnesota, we have an opportunity during the next few weeks to prevent some of…  Read More →

I am tired of hearing about the negative role of government, especially as it relates to the Affordable Care Act. I lived for almost 20 years without health insurance and avoided the doctor except for an emergency. Unless you have experienced collection letters and the follow-up calls, you have no idea what they do to…  Read More →

It’s no secret that federally subsidized crop insurance makes it more attractive to till land that normally would be too wet, steep, lacking in fertility or otherwise “marginal” to raise a profitable crop on. But a recent study out of the University of Wisconsin attaches some solid numbers to just how much marginal land we’re…  Read More →

Hope Community, a development organization in the Phillips neighborhood of South Minneapolis, owns a community garden in the center of what they call the “Hope Block.” Hope owns 176 units of affordable housing, almost all of which are on one block of the corner of Portland Avenue and Franklin Avenue. In the center of this…  Read More →

If ever there was a shining example of a smart public investment in our food and farming future, Minnesota’s Sustainable Agriculture Demonstration Grant Program is it. This program has been an important driver of sustainable (and conventional) farming innovations in the state for almost a quarter-century. Farmers who qualify for these competitive grants are able…  Read More →