Healthy food a luxury for some budgets
Kennebec Journal - 3/29/2009.Op-ed by Mark Winne – Let me say from the outset that I eat well. Not well in a maternal, "please finish your broccoli, dear" sense. I mean very well. I cultivate a large organic garden, buy grass-fed beef from a local rancher, and when I'm feeling particularly flush with cash, frequent my local Whole Foods. |
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Priced out of the barn?
Maine Sunday Telegram - 3/29/2009. By Beth Quimby – CORNISH: Dairy farming has never been easy, but in the past year, it has grown a lot harder at Highland Farms on Towles Hill Road. First, energy prices spiked, pushing up the costs of production, fertilizer and feed. Then, just when those costs began to moderate, wholesale milk prices collapsed. "We are at a break-even point. I don't know how long that can go on," said Libby Bleakney, who operates the farm with her brother and two cousins. |
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Breaking the mold
Bangor Daily News - 3/28/2009. By Sharon Kiley Mack – TROY, Maine: Eight feet underground, in a bunkerlike cave, a solitary light bulb illuminates wooden shelves filled with wheels of cheese. Some have a light mold scattered across their tops – small puddles of white or green; others are enveloped in a featherlike mold of silver threads. It’s just about 40 degrees and 96 percent humidity. It took artisanal cheese maker and farmer Robert Perol two years to construct his cheese cave, which is accessible only by a crude homemade elevator from his cheese room above. “This cave needs no refrigeration and provides an incredible rind,” he says. |
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Monsanto planting cyber seeds
Common Dreams - 3/28/2009.By Jeffrey Tomich – Earlier this month, a blogger named Brad fired a virtual salvo at Jeffrey Smith, the author of "Seeds of Deception" and one of the most vocal crusaders against genetically modified foods. More than 30 comments followed in the next few weeks. On one level, the exchange was just another online debate about GMOs. But this one was notable because of who initiated and hosted it: Monsanto Co. |
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