Morning listens: on the farm
A few nice farm pieces to start your day.
Essex County’s own Kristen Kimball – and her book, The Dirty Life – was featured last night on All Things Considered (thanks to on-site help from Brian Mann). Kimball is a city girl who had never farmed before in her life. Now she and her husband run a CSA for 150 families. Don’t forget, Todd Moe had it first!
It’s good times for Midwest crop farmers, with prices soaring. But that may spell bad news for us consumers in the supermarket.
Meanwhile, cattle farmers are being left out of the party, and they’re suspicious. It’s a similar concern many dairy farmers cry foul about. Dairy processing is concentrated in the hands of a very few large corporations. When milk or cheese prices go up in the grocery store, farmers don’t necessarily get a corresponding hike in their milk price. The federal government is investigating potential anti-competitive practices in the dairy industry.
Finally, two of the above stories aired on NPR, but I linked them through a new public broadcasting partnership in the Midwest called Harvest Public Media. They’re doing great reporting on agriculture in the heartland. make them a regular stop if you’re following agriculture…
Tags: agriculture, economy
Actually, there was a great article in an edition of Adirondack Life magazine a few months ago about Kristen and her husband’s farm. So I guess they had it first. I absolutely love the concept that they and others in the North Country are advocating.
Gee, someone is finally catching on about the dairy monopolies? Wow, that only took 30 years.
If there enough book sales, will it be time to sell the farm and move back to Manhattan?