With spring knocking in the Northern Hemisphere, an award-winning floral showcase is returning for its 195th edition this March. The theme of the 2024 Philadelphia Flowers Show, America’s oldest and most prestigious floral event is ‘United by Flowers.” It will be uniting American organic flower growers and experts with flower enthusiasts. In extension, the 2024 theme will be all about spreading love, appreciation...

Two weeks after farmers’ protests in France forced the European Commission to rethink its climate terms, tractor demonstrations have lately shaken Spain and Greece. On February 21, 2024, Madrid looked like a ploughing field as hundreds of farmers drove tractors to the capital. The participants are agitating for the lowering of the cost of farm inputs such as fertilizer and better farm-gate prices. In...

Egypt is covering a juicing orange gap in Europe at a time when Brazil and the Iberian Peninsula are rushing their harvests. Hoping to hit 2 million tonnes for the December 2023 to July 2024 season, Egypt is counting on the low-supplied European market. The leading citrus exporter is looking forward to topping the record 1.6 million tonnes it exported in the 2022-23 season. The...

Vietnam is witnessing a wave of exports in three agricultural commodities, benefiting producers with high prices. For one, coffee is seemingly repeating the June 2023 pattern when exports diminished domestic supply with a corresponding price hike. A similar scenario is also staging around the currently pricey durian and rice in as early as February, 2024. After a lull in November...

As the Wisconsin sturgeon spearing season reaches its 16-day headway, harvesters have caught between 14 and 16% of capacity. Of this total, 2% consist of 8 sturgeon weighing a hundred pounds and above. This is lower than in 2023 but way better than 1969 which yielded only 8 fish, all below a hundred pounds. Most of the 100-pounders came from the Upriver Lakes, including...

It may look exactly like a typical Cavendish banana, but QCAV-4 is actually a genetically modified banana. It has become the world’s first  GM banana to gain approval as human food, in the Oceania region. Since the turn of the millennium, researches in Queensland have been developing QCAV-4.  20 years on, Food Standards Australia (FSA) as well as New Zealand’s...

30 years after the song “Gin and Juice” came out, Snoop Dogg and Dr.Dre have unveiled a cocktail line of four fruity drinks. They made the announcement on February 12, 2024. This release by the legendary musical and cultural stars includes four flavors namely apricot, melon, citrus and passion fruit.  The label of each canned drink reflects the corresponding color of the...

Australia’s barley sales have rebounded, with 90% of all barley exports going to China after Beijing relaxed import restrictions.  This good news is happening despite China retaining a high tariff on wine imports,  affecting barley profits. Spent barley contains grain residue, which features in beer and wine making. The December 2023 sales represent a rapid trade comeback, given China removed barley export...

Weeks after the UK popularised the world’s loneliest sheep, sheep rearing is back in the black, this time versus dog keeping.  It is lambing season in most of Britain, especially Cumbria, the hilly county to the northeast. Every winter and spring sees around 16 million ewes birth lambs. The spring lambing period usually coincides with the regrowth of new grass and colourful daffodils....

Horseshoe crabs might finally get their big break after surviving millennia of mass extinctions. On February 12, environmental lobbies petitioned the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) in Washington D.C. to list the crustaceans as “living fossils.” The “living fossil” attribute by the lobby groups fits the creatures as they have probably existed for 445 million years. Their main habitat are the...