A news release yesterday from USDA’s Farm Service Agency (FSA) stated that, “Agricultural producers who have not yet completed their crop acreage reports after spring planting should make an appointment with their local [FSA] office before the applicable deadline. July 15 is a major deadline for most crops, but acreage reporting deadlines vary by county and by crop. Contact your FSA county office for acreage reporting deadlines that are specific to your county.

“‘The first step to become eligible for many USDA programs is to file an accurate crop acreage report,’ said FSA Administrator Richard Fordyce. ‘To file your acreage report, call your local FSA office to make an appointment. Your local staff is standing by to help you.’

“Due to the pandemic, FSA has implemented acreage reporting flexibilities. FSA can work with producers to file timely acreage reports by phone, email, online tools and virtual meetings. Some FSA offices are open for in-person appointments, but you must call first to make an appointment.”

The FSA update added that, “Many FSA offices are using Microsoft Teams software to virtually meet with producers to review maps and documents for certification. Producers who want to schedule a virtual appointment can download the Microsoft Teams app on their smart phone or tablet and call the FSA office for an appointment. You may also use Microsoft Teams from your personal computer without downloading software.

“County offices can provide producers with maps along with instructions for completing and returning the maps through either mail, email or through commercially available free and secure online tools such as Box for file sharing and OneSpan for eSignature solutions. After planting is complete, producers should return completed maps and the acreage reporting sheet by the applicable deadline.”

Last month, Bloomberg writer Deena Shanker reported that, “By Saturday, March 14, even before Mayor Bill de Blasio announced the shutdown of all in-restaurant dining in New York City the next night, Viraj Puri, chief executive officer of the Brooklyn, N.Y.-based indoor urban farming company Gotham Greens, found his business had essentially changed overnight.

“His major restaurant customers were suspending all orders ‘until further notice,’ while the grocers, including Whole Foods Market, FreshDirect, and other major chains were doing the opposite, asking for huge increases in product and extra deliveries of the company’s locally grown greens and herbs. (Puri declined to share the food service-retail split for his business, but he says restaurants are the smaller piece.) ‘My phone was buzzing off the hook from the largest supermarkets, saying can you run extra trucks,’ he says. Gotham was ready—it had just opened three facilities in Baltimore, Chicago, and Providence and had another opening in Denver in May, almost tripling its production capacity. In the immediate days after the pandemic declaration, the company increased planting by more than 20%. ‘For me, it’s seed as much as you can,’ says Jenn Frymark, a managing partner who also serves as the company’s ‘chief greenhouse officer.'”

Ms. Shanker noted that, “Unlike typical field operations, with separate planting and harvesting seasons, Gotham Greens runs continual, year-round seasons in its hydroponic, urban greenhouses, often built on the sites of now defunct industrial businesses, including a former Bethlehem Steel Corp. plant in Baltimore and an old toy factory in Queens, N.Y. It focuses on such greens as butterhead lettuce, basil, and, especially since the many food-borne illness outbreaks that have come out of West Coast production, romaine lettuce. Packaged in chic 4.5-ounce plastic clamshells, the salad basics can go for more than twice the price of their direct competitors, which explains why Puri is so singularly focused on the greens market, at least for now.”

“When major farms around the country saw their food service business disappear almost overnight, many were left dumping produce and plowing it under while it was still in the fields. Puri says that Gotham, while it did donate some product that would have headed to food service, didn’t dump anything. Some of its customers, such as restaurant distributor Baldor Specialty Foods Inc. and lunch chain Just Salad, kept buying product but sold it retail,” the article said.

The Bloomberg article added that, “Startup costs for indoor farming operations can be very high, as are electricity bills, depending on the energy source, and supermarket prices often reflect that. Yet the benefits of longer shelf life, lower water use, and fewer (if any) pesticides and food-borne bacteria will continue to make these models attractive.”

A news release yesterday from USDA’s Farm Service Agency (FSA) stated that, “[FSA] will now accept applications for the Coronavirus Food Assistance Program (CFAP) through an online portal, expanding the options available to producers to apply for this program, which helps offset price declines and additional marketing costs because of the coronavirus pandemic. FSA is also leveraging commercial document storage and e-signature solutions to enable producers to work with local service center staff to complete their applications from home.

“‘We are doing everything we can to serve our customers and make sure agricultural producers impacted by the pandemic can quickly and securely apply for this relief program,’ said FSA Administrator Richard Fordyce. ‘In addition to working with FSA staff through the phone, email and scheduled in-person appointments, we can now also take applications through the farmers.gov portal, which saves producers and our staff time.’

“Through the portal, producers with secure USDA login credentials—known as eAuthentication—can certify eligible commodities online, digitally sign applications and submit directly to the local USDA Service Center. Producers who do not have an eAuthentication account can learn more and begin the enrollment process at farmers.gov/sign-in. Currently, the digital application is only available to sole proprietors or single-member business entities.”

The FSA update added that, “USDA Service Centers can also work with producers to complete and securely transmit digitally signed applications through two commercially available tools: Box and OneSpan. Producers who are interested in digitally signing their applications should notify their local service centers when calling to discuss the CFAP application process. You can learn more about these solutions at farmers.gov/mydocs.”

Ruth Bender, Laura Kusisto and Sara Randazzo reported on the front page of today’s Wall Street Journal that, “Bayer AG said Wednesday it would pay up to $10.9 billion to settle tens of thousands of lawsuits with U.S. plaintiffs alleging the company’s Roundup herbicide causes cancer, a milestone in the German company’s legal battle that has been weighing down its share price for nearly two years.

“Investors have long been waiting for a settlement to bring clarity over how much the litigation will cost Bayer, following its 2018 purchase of U.S. agricultural giant Monsanto Co.

“The deal brought the company thousands of Roundup-related lawsuits. Three jury-trial losses tanked shares and sparked a revolt among shareholders angry at Bayer’s management for plunging the company into one of the worst crises in its history with the $63 billion Monsanto acquisition.”

The Journal writers noted that, “Wednesday’s deal, which follows months of heated talks between Bayer and plaintiffs’ attorneys, doesn’t change anything in Bayer’s view that glyphosate, the active ingredient in Roundup, is safe and doesn’t cause cancer.

“Bayer didn’t admit to any wrongdoing as part of the settlement and continued to defend its decision to purchase Monsanto. The company will continue to sell Roundup.

“The agreement, however, leaves open the potential of more lawsuits being filed against the company in the future, an issue investors have been particularly concerned about.”

Bender, Kusisto and Randazzo added that, “As part of the deal, Bayer said it has set aside between $8.8 billion and $9.6 billion to settle claims brought by lawyers representing some 95,000 plaintiffs, as well as some 30,000 more claims that haven’t yet agreed to the settlement. The company said it would set aside another $1.25 billion to work toward a resolution of future claims, including funding a panel to evaluate whether the product causes cancer. The findings from that panel are geared to help shape the outcome of litigation going forward.

“Separately, Bayer largely resolved two other legacy Monsanto cases Wednesday, involving a toxic banned chemical and a different weedkiller.”

DTN writer Todd Neeley reported earlier this month that, “A federal judge [on June 12th] ruled North Carolina’s so-called ‘ag-gag’ law is unconstitutional, in yet another loss for laws across the country designed to prevent animal-rights groups from conducting undercover investigations of livestock operations.

“A number of animal-rights groups, including People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, or PETA, filed the lawsuit claiming the state’s law would make it legally risky to conduct undercover investigations of animal-research laboratories at the University of North Carolina and Chapel Hill.

“The North Carolina General Assembly passed the law on June 3, 2015, denying then-Gov. Patrick McCrory’s veto.”

The DTN article noted that, “The North Carolina law prohibited anyone from intentionally gaining access to non-public areas and ‘engages in an act that exceeds the person’s authority to enter those areas is liable to the owner or operator of the premises for any damages sustained.’

“The North Carolina Farm Bureau was an intervenor in the case.

“Unlike similar laws in other states, violating the North Carolina law could result in civil penalties, as opposed to violations of criminal code in other states.”

Mr. Neeley explained that, “Similar laws also have been found unconstitutional in Kansas, Idaho, Utah and Wyoming.

“Laws currently remain in effect in Montana, North Dakota, Missouri, Arkansas and Alabama.

“[Earlier in June], Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds signed into law the state’s third ag-gag law, as the state continues to fight in court for its second version of the law aimed at stopping undercover animal rights groups from entering livestock facilities.”

Associated Press writer Seth Borenstein reported yesterday that, “American honeybee colonies have bounced back after a bad year, the annual beekeeping survey finds.

“Beekeepers only lost 22.2% of their colonies this past winter, from Oct. 1 to March 31, which is lower than the average of 28.6%, according to the Bee Informed Partnership’s annual survey of thousands of beekeepers. It was the second smallest winter loss in the 14 years of surveying done by several different U.S. universities.

“Last winter’s loss was considerably less than the previous winter of 2018-2019 when a record 37.7% of colonies died off, the scientists found. After that bad winter, the losses continued through the summer of 2019, when beekeepers reported a 32% loss rate. That’s much higher than the average of 21.6% for summer losses. Those summer losses were driven more by hives of commercial beekeepers than backyard hobbyists, said bee partnership scientific coordinator Nathalie Steinhauer.”

The AP article added that, “While the summer losses are bad, winter deaths are ‘really the test of colony health,’ so the results overall are good news, Steinhauer said. ‘It turned out to be a very good year.'”

A news release yesterday from USDA’s Farm Service Agency (FSA) stated that, “[FSA] announces that Dairy Margin Coverage (DMC) safety-net signup for 2021 coverage will begin October 12 and will run through December 11, 2020. DMC has already triggered payments for two months for producers who signed up for 2020 coverage.

“‘If we’ve learned anything in the past six months, it’s to expect the unexpected,’ said FSA Administrator Richard Fordyce. ‘Nobody would have imagined the significant impact that current, unforeseen circumstances have had on an already fragile dairy market. It’s during unprecedented times like these that the importance of offering agricultural producers support through the delivery of Farm Bill safety-net programs such as DMC becomes indisputably apparent.’

“The April 2020 income over feed cost margin was $6.03 per hundredweight (cwt.), triggering the second payment of 2020 for dairy producers who purchased the appropriate level of coverage under the Dairy Margin Coverage(DMC) program. The April margin reflects a more than a $3 drop from the March $9.15 cwt. income over feed cost margin.”

The FSA update added that, “As of June 15, FSA has issued more than $100 million in much-needed program benefits to dairy producers who purchased DMC coverage for 2020.

“Authorized by the 2018 Farm Bill, DMC is a voluntary risk management program that offers protection to dairy producers when the difference between the all-milk price and the average feed price (the margin) falls below a certain dollar amount selected by the producer. Over 13,000 operations enrolled in the program for the 2020 calendar year.”