Till end 2023, the minimum price for India’s onion exports will stop at $800/ton, the government warned October 28, to bolster home supplies.  From October 31 to December 31, 2023 all freight-on-board (FOB) onion shipments will have to adhere to the new regulation. Delhi cites the insufficient harvest from the rabi crop (winter season) as inadequate to meet home demand, hence...

Two new apple hybrids by Maryland researchers may turn around the falling production of the fruit by the year 2026. This is even as Washington state awaits a six-year record-breaking 2023 apple harvest.  These crosses will help recoup the glut of American apples, whose 2022 harvest was the smallest in 10 years.  The two inventions include a yellow apple crossed from Goldrush and...

Leading fishmonger of Atlantic Halibut, NOHAL, more popular as Nordic Halibut reports that Quarter 3’s halibut prices hiked by 2% over the 2022 equivalent. The Norwegian firm said that its sales clocked to Norwegian Krone (NOK) 147 ($13.15) a kilogram in the quarter ending September 30.   Additionally, there has been a year-on-year 14% price surge in 2023 whose average is NOK 160 ($14.32)...

U.S. President Joe Biden will kick off 14-day rural farm tours focusing on water, meat and market price issues.  The President will initiate his farm calls in Minnesota. Though unconnected with the tour,  the state recently produced the first Democratic Presidential challenger to Biden for the 2024 poll. Senator Dean Phillips of Minnesota announced last week that he’d run for president. At his...

Food and non-alcoholic beverage inflation in Australia rose by the weakest margin  since September 2022 at 0.6% in quarter 3, 2023. Data by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) on October 25, 2023 groups food and non-alcoholic beverages among 6 other sectors that eschewed a general inflation rise of above 1.2% between July 1 and September 30, 2023. The other sectors’ rises include home...

650 bean varieties, up from the official 450 new cultivars by a research body have come to redefine African legume farming.   The Pan-Africa Bean Research Alliance (PABRA) says that its cultivars have reached 32 African nations. This comes at a critical time when cheap protein sources have become mandatory in Africa amid degrading soils. A 2016 research states that 60% of the continent’s bean...

Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg’s suggestion to import hormone-injected beef into the UK to beat inflated meat prices has riled Somerset farmers. “I’ve eaten beef from Australia,” went Sir Rees-Mogg’s opinion, describing it as quite sumptuous and worthy of importing.  Beef producers termed the comments by the member of parliament for Northeast Somerset constituency as shameful. The farmers wondered how the MP from their...

Pomfret, Vermont, home to Sleepy Hollow Farm, reopened its picturesque feeder roads on October 16 after mid-fall closure. As one of the most photographed places in New England, the town had recently restricted non-resident viewing of its colorful maple trees.  Locals crowdsourced to force the authorities to ban interstate visitors from coming here between September 23 and October 15, 2023. The town’s administration had...

China on October 23, 2023 inked separate agricultural import deals with the United States and Russia. The U.S. ceremony in Des Moines, Iowa was a contractual agreement between private Chinese importers and American grain suppliers.  Multiple firms signed 11 purchasing deals during the China-U.S. Sustainable Agricultural Trade Forum, which U.S. Soybean Export Council (USSEC) organised. The deal will see China, the world’s largest soybean...

The UN reports that Punjab in northern India is facing acute water shortage, with farmers digging expensive boreholes 18 meters deep.  Despite living in a bountiful geographical landscape courted by five rivers, Punjabi famers are increasingly depending on depleted ground water. Industrialisation, drought and pollution account for the scarcity of water in this region, which is India’s bread basket.  Punjabi rice growers...