January 18, 2019 (Unity, ME) – The Maine Organic Farmers and Gardeners Association (MOFGA) announced unbridled enthusiasm for Amanda Beal, Governor Janet Mills' choice for State Commissioner of Agriculture, Conservation and Forestry (ACF). This was Mills' final nomination of dynamic individuals who will lead the major departments of Maine's state government. Beal has stepped down from her role as board member of MOFGA, where she served for 14 years including two as president, and will now transition from her role as president and CEO of Maine Farmland Trust.

February 14, 2019 – By Carey Gillam, The Guardian – A broad new scientific analysis of the cancer-causing potential of glyphosate herbicides, the most widely used weed killing products in the world, has found that people with high exposures to the popular pesticides have a 41% increased risk of developing a type of cancer called non-Hodgkin lymphoma.

February 13, 2019 – By Damian Carrington, The Guardian – Buying organic food is among the actions people can take to curb the global decline in insects, according to leading scientists. Urging political action to slash pesticide use on conventional farms is another, say environmentalists.

February 13, 2019 – Allison Johnson, Natural Resources Defense Council – Here at NRDC, we believe everyone should be able to eat safe, healthy, and sustainably grown food that nourishes our bodies and protects public health. That’s why we’ve advocated for decades to get the most toxic chemicals out of our food system—including dangerous pesticides like brain-toxic chlorpyrifos, cancer-linked glyphosate, and pollinator-threatening neonicotinoids.

February 13, 2019 – By Lydia Mulvany and Deena Shanker, Bloomberg – Monsanto Co. has been sued by thousands of farmers and others who blame their cancers on its massively popular Roundup weedkiller. Now Germany’s Bayer AG, which bought the agriculture giant last year, faces a claim that it deceived home gardeners about Roundup’s impact on their gut bacteria and their health.

February 13, 2019 – By Tom Philpott, Mother Jones – A new study confirms the presence of a gnarly group of substances in tap water in 24 states.

February 12, 2019 – By Gus Bova, Texas Observer – Late Monday evening, attorneys for the National Butterfly Center asked a federal judge to block the Trump administration from building a border wall at the refuge or using the center’s property as a pass-through to build elsewhere. The motion alleges that federal agents and contractors have been driving without permission through the Rio Grande Valley refuge’s property to access nearby federal land for the last week, and that they even replaced one of the butterfly center’s gate locks. The Trump administration plans to break ground on a 6-mile stretch of border wall as soon as this week, starting with a federal wildlife refuge tract just upriver from the privately-owned butterfly center.

February 12, 2019 – By Dave Sebastian, Boston University News Service – Rotating the types of crops grown in an area and enriching the soil with organic matter are some ways to reduce carbon emission. But farmers need more financial incentives to implement such strategies, agriculture executives and researchers said at a Feb. 9 panel at Boston University Questrom School of Business.

February 12, 2019 – By Mary Kuhlman, Cleveland Scene – A new food-safety report is underlining the need for increased supports to increase organic food production in Ohio.

February 11, 2019 – The Ellsworth American – Healthy Acadia’s Downeast Gleaning Initiative, a farm-based food collection and distribution project to address food insecurity and prevent food waste, captured 26,100 pounds of food from nearby farms, gardens and farmers markets across Hancock and Washington counties in 2018.