Resilience Recap: Women Run a Quarter of Virginia’s Farms
Women farmers are on the rise! Check out Virginia's Public Radio special on farming.
Herman Ellison with the US Department of Agriculture sits in front of a huge and heavy book: the results of the latest agricultural census.
According to those numbers, over the past five years, there’s been a 70-percent jump nationally in the number of women who are principal operators of a farm. When you hone in on Virginia the jump is smaller but still drastic, 45-percent.
The case studies quantify key economic factors like increased crop yields, decreased input costs, and increases in annual net income experienced by the four farmers who have invested in practices that build soil health.
In the midwest, however the USDA declares agriculture disaster in Illinois
“Illinois farmers have experienced months of hardship due to extreme weather across the state, but today’s declaration means we can begin the road to recovery,” said Governor JB Pritzker. “I’m heartened that the USDA has approved my request for an agriculture disaster so a vital industry that supports so many working families across the state can rebuild and continue to thrive in our state.”
More than 100 years of Arctic sea ice volume reconstructed with help from historic ships’ logbooks
A new paper now extends the estimate of Arctic sea ice volume back more than a century, to 1901. To do so it used both modern-day computer simulations and historic observations, some written by hand in the early 1900s aboard precursors to today’s U.S. Coast Guard ships.