Food, in brief

The US Environmental Protection Agency has ended a 20-year effort to estimate and limit air pollution from big livestock farms. [1]

Civil Eats, a US food news site, reported it on 5 November, and says the EPA announced it last week. [1]

The deal being thrown out dates from 2005. [1] The EPA agreed to stop all enforcement against farms that joined a study. [1]

14,000 farms signed up. [1] The EPA studied only 25 of them, for only two years. [1]

The 14,000 farms lose a shield too: the EPA's legal promise not to enforce ended with the deal. [1]

In US law this kind of settlement is called a consent agreement: terms signed with a regulator. [1]

Under this one, farms joined a study and helped pay for it, and in return the EPA stopped enforcing. [1] Standards were to follow from the study. [1]

A teacher stops giving detentions until a new rule is written, and then the rule never gets written.

This account rests on one report, by Civil Eats, which quotes an EPA press release and one critic. [1]

The livestock industry called the EPA's old estimating methods inadequate. [1] The EPA now calls the study's data too limited, and Miller calls the approach backwards. [1]

Miller hopes for better oversight "if not in this administration, then hopefully the next." [1]

The US EPA ended a 2005 deal with livestock farms without producing the air pollution standards it was meant to lead to, and a campaign lawyer says the agency still chooses not to enforce. [1]

The phrase "regulatory certainty" names what farmers get, and it does not mention the people living next to the barns. [1]

No US air standard will now come out of the study their members joined. [1]

The US standards that might have covered the air they breathe are no longer being written. [1]

What the EPA's own statement says in full.

We read Civil Eats's report of it and found no second report, and the report does not give the exact date or name the farm groups. [1]

Whether a later US government would actually enforce against these farms.

Emily Miller says ending the deal makes that possible, and the EPA says it has not changed how it applies the law. [1]

New World screwworm cases in New Mexico have tripled in recent days, to 30 since June. [10]

The screwworm is a parasitic fly: it lives off living animals, including livestock, horses, pets and wildlife. [10]

US officials found 20 new cases across 6 New Mexico counties. [10] One was the first in Catron County, in a cow. [10]

Across New Mexico, Arizona and Texas, the US farm department has now counted 99 infested animals. [10]

New Mexico used to draw a zone of at least 12.4 miles round each case. [10] It now draws them largely by county. [10]

Animals leaving New Mexico's zones need an inspection. [10] In Otero County, local vets say owners need a permit within 5 days of travel. [10]

Texas bars warm-blooded animals from leaving zones in parts of 14 counties without approval and inspection. [10]

Ranchers leaving a zone now need paperwork for trips to sales, breeding or vets. [10] Some US states ban certain animals from New Mexico. [10]

Insect scientists call the fight back the sterile insect technique: releasing large numbers of sterilized male flies. [10]

A wild female mates with a sterile male, and her eggs do not develop. [10] So over time the flies breed less. [10]

Fill a football team's sign-up sheet with players who never turn up, and no match gets played.

Vets need each animal's exact origin and destination, so a trip must be arranged well ahead. [10]

How far screwworm spreads.

Rules are changing as new cases are found, and Catron County had its first case only on Saturday. [10]

No person in the United States had caught screwworm inside the country as of 4 November, while 99 animals had.

A new Fairtrade report, Bananas: An Endangered Staple, says banana growers are being pushed to crisis point. [7]

It blames constant pressure on prices, last-minute cancellations and unfair penalties, on top of a worsening climate. [7]

The Ethical Trading Initiative found 2026 prices did not cover basic production costs for 66.7% of banana suppliers. [7] They did not cover profit margins for 83.3%. [7]

A pack of bananas in UK shops stayed at 1.12 pounds over the 12 months to 5 October. [7]

Last month Fyffes, a banana company, warned of "very significant pressure" as costs rose and prices stayed flat. [7]

In the 2023-24 El Nino, Fairtrade found banana productivity fell 22% in Ecuador. [7] It fell 13% in the Dominican Republic and 6% in Peru. [7]

Fairtrade wants a new UK law making companies answer for their buying. [7]

Colombian banana worker Ever Antonion Flores Munos says of the climate: "our wages will decrease." [7]

Supply chain researchers call this risk transfer: a buyer's choices move the danger of a loss onto the grower. [7]

A cancelled order or a late payment leaves the grower short of money for bills and debts. [7] A climate shock then hits a farm already weakened. [7]

A customer cancels a birthday cake on the morning it is due, and the baker already bought the eggs.

The Grocer's report names no retailer or buyer behind these prices. [7] Fairtrade campaigns on this issue and wants the law. [7]

Prices may not cover their costs or a decent living, Fairtrade says, which leaves them less able to withstand climate shocks. [7]

The US farm bill now looks "very much in doubt", writes Coppess, an author at the site farmdoc daily. [13]

The US Senate has not taken up the bill its farm committee passed in September. [13]

The current US funding law runs out on 11 December. [13] The US Congress is expected to sit for fewer than 25 days. [13]

John Boozman and Amy Klobuchar, the US Senate farm committee's leaders, still say they want a deal this year. [9]

Klobuchar wants a delay before US states must help pay for SNAP, the US food aid scheme. [9] A fight over that cost threatens a deal. [9]

Coppess expects the US Congress to extend the expired parts and leave the rest to the next Congress. [13]

That Congress starts on 3 January 2027, with Democrats in control of both chambers. [13]

Boozman says family farmers "cannot afford another farm bill delay". [9] Some US food aid cuts begin in October 2027, leaving little time. [13]

In US politics this is called a lame duck session: the weeks after an election, before the winners arrive. [13]

The old US Congress can still pass laws until January. [13] But Coppess says it has too little time and will to finish a bill the Senate never passed. [13]

A class told it has a new teacher next term hands in little homework this term.

In 2018 a lame duck US Congress did pass a farm bill. [13] Both chambers had already passed their versions by then. [13]

Whether any farm bill passes before the new US Congress starts.

Committee leaders say they want one, and Coppess of farmdoc daily calls it very much in doubt. [9][13]

Once Upon a Farm, a US children's food firm, recalled all its Tractor Wheels toddler bars on 30 October. [14]

On 3 November the US regulator warned of children aged 1.5 to 2.5 who could not breathe after eating them. [14]

The FDA said chewed bars can form a dry, sticky mass. [14] Back blows and the Heimlich manoeuvre may not clear it. [14]

The firm now says the bars are about 18% of its net sales so far this year. [14]

Its shares fell from $15.91 on 30 October to about $9.20 on 5 November. [14]

BofA Securities, a big bank's research arm, cut its share price target from $21 to $10. [14]

Boss John Foraker says the firm has $106.4 million in cash and no debt. [14] It is studying its recall insurance. [14]

The firm will give its results on 12 November. [14]

Some shoppers on Reddit now ask whether other soft-baked bars carry the same danger. [14] The recall covers only Tractor Wheels. [14]

Marketers call this a brand extension: using trust in one product to sell others. [14]

Once Upon a Farm took the trust it earned in baby food into snack bars. [14] So a fault in one bar now tests the whole name. [14]

A bakery famous for bread starts selling cakes, and one bad cake makes people doubt the bread.

The company says it knows of no reported injuries. [14] The FDA says some children needed emergency help and hospital observation. [14]

Why the Tractor Wheels bars blocked children's airways.

The company had found no root cause by 2 November, and is checking ingredients and manufacturing. [14]

US government scientists tested whether shipping whole romaine lettuce across the country helps E. coli grow before processing. [2]

They followed romaine from one commercial field down two routes in 2022 and 2023. [2] Then they simulated both trips in a lab. [2]

They found no significant difference in how the dangerous E. coli strain survived or grew. [2] The agency's summary calls the method confirmed safe, a critic reports. [2]

The long-haul lettuce did arrive with far more bacteria overall, and it aged faster in storage. [2]

The publisher of Food Safety News is a lawyer who has sued over E. coli since 1993. [2] He says that conclusion leaves things out. [2]

He is filing 3 petitions with the US food regulator. [2] They ask for farm sampling, naming outbreak firms, and store lists in recalls. [2]

A 2024 romaine outbreak sickened 89 people and killed one. [2] He says the FDA closed the case "without telling the public who grew it". [2]

Food safety scientists use the term infectious dose: how few germs can make someone ill. [2]

For this E. coli it can be 10 to 100 cells, he writes. [2] So a germ that does not grow on the truck can still make people ill. [2]

A stone in your shoe hurts on any walk, and the walk did not put it there.

He sues for sick people, so he has a side. [2] The research was paid for through the produce industry's own research group. [2]

Why a fine stops nobody if no one expects to pay it

Someone sees what breaking a rule would save them

They set that against the possible penalty

That cost is the fine times the chance of paying it

A fine of 1,000 at a 1 in 100 chance counts as 10

The same fine at a 1 in 5 chance counts as 200

So a bigger fine or a likelier one both make the rule stronger

A penalty is two numbers multiplied: the fine, and the chance of paying it. Make the chance small enough and a huge fine works like a small one.

These numbers are made up. The fine is the same in both lower bars, and only the chance of paying changes.

A court ordered $1bn and about $1m has been paid so far, so the sum a firm faces depends on what can be collected, not only on what is ordered.

A machine logged 116 to 144 bushels where a form said 67 to 90, and a record like that raises the chance of a false claim being found.

The angling club says the usual fines are too small to deter anyone, which is a complaint about the other number in the sum, the size of the fine.

US investigators have no direct right onto private livestock land, a lawyer writes, so the chance of tracing an outbreak to a feedlot stays low there.

Most people never do this sum. Many keep a rule because they think it is right, so the sum explains who breaks a rule when checks fade, not everyone.

The sum is done alone, in a barn, an office or a shipping company's boardroom.

Pasture mealybugs, tiny invasive insects, appeared in South Texas in 2022. [11] They have since spread to Louisiana, Georgia and Florida. [11]

In one Texas hayfield so many were chopped up that a mower seemed on fire. [11] Pest specialist Danielle Sekula said: "that's pasture mealybug." [11]

They inject a toxin into grass and suck its sap. [11] The grass turns yellow, then red or purple, then dies. [11]

David Kerns, a Texas A&M University entomologist, estimates they could cost Texas farmers and ranchers $2 billion a year. [11]

In Florida, sugarcane stalks have turned rubbery, a University of Florida entomologist says. [11]

The EPA, the US environment agency, has approved several pesticides, but none is a complete answer. [11] They cost more than some farmers want to pay. [11]

It adds to the high fertilizer and diesel bills already pinching farmers and ranchers. [11]

Entomologists, who study insects, call this an invasive pest: new to a place, and spreading before much is known. [11]

Mealybugs are so small that ranchers mistake them for a white mould. [11] So the first sign can be dead grass. [11]

Head lice spread round a class for weeks before the first child starts to itch.

The $2 billion is one scientist's estimate. [11] Kerns says of the pest: "we don't know a whole lot about them." [11]

French officials are investigating a woman's death, possibly linked to dried morel mushrooms sold at a B&M shop. [15]

She felt ill on 2 November, a few hours after eating them, and died on 3 November. [15]

Local media report she was 27 and lived in Montpellier. [15] She had no underlying health conditions. [15]

Shops are recalling 60-gram jars of the Champibon brand dated 1 December 2029. [15] They may stay toxic even after cooking. [15]

France's food safety agency counted nearly 500 wild mushroom poisoning cases in September and more than 200 in October. [15]

Most French cases come from mistaking a species, poor storage or undercooking. [15] A smartphone app can also get a mushroom wrong. [15]

Health officials call this toxicovigilance: poison centres count cases so that danger shows up early. [15]

France has watched all year round since 2025. [15] Officials were told of her death, and shops then began withdrawing the jars. [15]

A school nurse who writes down every stomach ache can spot when one lunch made a whole class ill.

Tests are still under way, so no one has yet shown the jars caused her death. [15]

What was in the French jars of morels.

Testing is under way, and the report gives no result yet. [15]

Nearly 75% of US farm lenders report falling farm profits among their borrowers in 2026, a new survey found. [9]

The American Bankers Association and Farmer Mac, a farm loan firm, ran the survey. [9]

Lenders still expect nearly 60% of borrowers to make a profit, partly because of government payments. [9]

They rank ready cash as farmers' top worry. [9] For their own banks they worry most about bad farm loans. [9]

US retail diesel averaged about $5.60 a gallon in late October, against about $3.70 a year before. [4]

Iowa farmer Kelly Garrett says trucks haul everything he buys. [16] He says: "Everything is higher when energy goes up." [16]

Garrett expects seed and fertilizer for 2027 to cost more too. [16]

Bankers call ready cash liquidity, and lenders rank it first among farmers' problems this year. [9]

Diesel near $5.60 takes cash out of a farm with every load. [4] Wisconsin dairy farmer Raymond Dietrich says: "I still got to pay to haul that milk to town." [4]

Someone with an expensive bike and no bus fare is rich on paper and still stuck at the stop.

The survey asks lenders, not farmers. [9] The report gives no figure for how many loans are in trouble. [9]

A monthly survey of 400 US farmers by Purdue University and CME Group rose 3 points to 126 in October. [17]

The part on present conditions jumped 16 points. [17] The part on future expectations fell 2. [17]

Just 35% now think more tariffs will help US farming in the long run. [17] Earlier surveys found 49% to 70%. [17]

In January 75% said their farm's finances were strong. [17] In October 62% did. [17]

Only 20% called this a good time for big spending on machinery and buildings. [17]

Purdue's Michael Langemeier says many "remain uncertain about how future policy decisions could affect agriculture". [17]

Statisticians call this confounding: two things happen together, so a survey cannot say which one moved the answer. [17]

The survey ran on 12 to 16 October, just as government farm payments went out. [17] It did not ask whether those payments lifted farmers' mood. [17]

You feel better after lunch and a nap, and cannot say which of them helped.

Some UK egg lines have risen by as much as 19.2% since 5 October, The Grocer's data shows. [5]

A fifth of the 134 egg lines in UK shops rose in the last month. [5] 7 lines rose more than 10%. [5]

Over a year, eggs are up only 2.9% on average. [5] 1.1% of that came in the last month. [5]

Costs on UK farms rose 7.8% in the year to September, the highest since early 2023. [5]

Jason Gittins of ADAS, a farm advice firm, says feed is egg producers' biggest cost. [5]

He says young hens ready to lay cost about 40p more per bird than six months ago. [5] Quick relief looks unlikely, he says. [5]

Waitrose says prices changed on only a small number of eggs. [5] Tesco and Morrisons were asked for comment. [5]

Economists call it cost pass-through: how much of a rise in costs reaches the shelf price. [5]

Free-range feed is up about 25 pounds a tonne, Gittins says. [5] Each 5 pounds adds about a penny per dozen eggs. [5]

A pizza shop pays more for cheese, and the slice goes up a little later.

H5N1 bird flu has been confirmed in commercial poultry near Brigg, in North Lincolnshire, England. [12] It was confirmed near Biggar, Scottish Borders, on 2 November. [12]

Each farm now has a 3km protection zone and a 10km surveillance zone round it. [12]

All poultry on both farms will be culled. [12] Movements of birds, eggs and poultry products are limited inside the zones. [12]

England's rules allow no vaccination of poultry against bird flu. [12] Only licensed zoos can apply to vaccinate birds. [12]

Animal disease vets call this stamping out: kill the infected flock, then stop movement around it. [12]

The zones stop birds, eggs and poultry products moving, to limit spread. [12] The zone at Ness, Isle of Lewis, ended on 30 October after control work and checks. [12]

Throw out the mouldy fruit, and keep the rest of the bowl away from it.

The bird flu protection zone at Ness on the Isle of Lewis ended on 30 October, after disease control work there was finished.

US farmers raised an estimated 198.5 million turkeys in 2026, up 5 million, the American Farm Bureau says. [6]