Farming

Japan's domestic food supply faces plenty of threats, including nuclear radiation, a crippled distribution infrastructure and a shaky electric grid. But there's some good news for U.S. suppliers: A shortage of domestic beef and pork could increase the market for imported meat.

The Agriculture Department had predicted that U.S. cranberry production would rise 6% this year for the second-largest harvest on record. But the 2010 crop came in 5% below 2009. Still, things are going well for Ocean Spray, the largest U.S. co-op of cranberry growers.

A fungus is quickly wiping out most of North America's bats. Bats eat vast quantities of bugs that would otherwise eat crops, so if researchers can't save them, U.S. agriculture will suffer.

IBISWorld Research has identified four unfortunate industries that will likely be mired in recession-like conditions over the next three years. It's not a good time to be hog farmer or a postmaster.

Fighting the claim that illegal immigrants are taking jobs from Americans, the United Farm Workers Union of America offered its 1.8 million jobs back to American citizens. Only seven Americans took the union up on its proposal (that number doesn't include Stephen Colbert who spent a day picking...

The locavore, or local food, movement is gaining momentum, driven in part by increasing awareness about the importance of quality food. Nationwide, small, local farms have tapped into a growing market by selling meat and produce to nearby consumers and choosy restaurant chefs.

Hoping to stop more small ranches from failing, the Obama administration has proposed a new antitrust rule. But ranchers are divided about whether it will help or hurt them. At a workshop Friday, some argued the rule could end up reducing their earnings.

The floods in Pakistan caused 250 billion rupees ($2.9 billion) of damage to crops such as sugar cane, cotton and rice. The waters destroyed 700,000 acres of planted cotton and 200,000 acres each of rice and sugar cane, Mohammed Ibrahim Moghul, chairman of farmers' group Agri Forum Pakistan, told...

America's vanishing farmland isn't a new problem. But one county in Eastern Pennsylvania thinks it has a solution. It launched a program that teaches prospective farmers how to set up a farm, grow their own crops and keep the business afloat.

Taking a page from the playbook of the slow food movement -- which argues that fast food will ruin your health, local culture, and the environment -- the Slow Money Alliance suggests that "fast money" is doing the same thing.