The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) on June 8 began an emergency horse gather in the Winnimucca, NV, herd management area (HMA) based on concern for the health of the over 900 wild horses that are living on limited resources because of the drought and overpopulation.

“It is important that USDA continue to ensure the integrity of its report release process, particularly as global exchanges move closer to 24-hour trading,” said Glauber. “To this end, USDA is reviewing our procedures and will solicit public input to determine the needs of those who use our data.

After more than 15 years of backand-forth negotiations, threatened lawsuits, retaliatory tariffs and other barriers, the U.S. and Mexico agreed last October to the program that would allow big trucks to cross the border and operate on each other’s highways.

Responding to the surge in demand in 2011 from Russia, Turkey and Kazakhstan for live cattle exports from the U.S., US- DA’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) approved seven temporary export inspection facilities, or EIFs, in 2011 to supplement the work done at the agency’s approved permanent facilities.

“These projects are great examples of USDA working with partners to improve water quality in the Mississippi River Basin,” Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said.

Congressman Paul Gosar, R-AZ, was joined by 27 other U.S. House of Representative members in drafting H.R. 5744, or the “Catastrophic Wildfire Prevention Act of 2012” legislation. If passed, it would expedite the review and approval process for thinning and grazing projects near communities that are at risk from wildfires.

“We rely on animal experts to determine what is the best way to raise an animal that’s being used for food,” Domino’s spokesman Tim McIntyre said after the company’s shareholders unanimously rejected a request from HSUS for the company to stop using pork from suppliers who confine breeding pigs in gestation crates.

USDA published in the Federal Register a comprehensive rule for BSE on March 16, 2012. NCBA voiced support for the rule last Tuesday, the day before comments on the proposed rule closed. NCBA Vice President Bob McCan said the organization has been pushing for this rule since the first case of BSE was detected in the U.

According to Ag Secretary Tom Vilsack, U.S. agricultural exporters will now receive duty-free access on more than half of the products we currently export to Colombia, and virtually all remaining tariffs will be eliminated within 15 years. Estimates show that the tariff reductions in the U.

In a small win for agriculture, and a potential turn of events on the Equal Access to Justice Act (EAJA), a federal appeals court ruled that a judge awarded excessive attorneys’ fees to a conservation group following a dispute over federal grazing permits in Idaho.