By American Farm Bureau The Health Insurance Tax will hurt small business employees the hardest, according to congressional testimony today by New York Farm Bureau President and dairy owner Dean Norton. Testifying before the House Small Business Subcommittee on Health and Technology, Norton, also a board member of the American […]

By Oregon Department of Fish & Wildlife ODFW fish biologist Ben Walczak with one of the rainbow tagged with entries in Cabela’s “Fish for Millions” contest. Anglers who catch one of these fish can redeem the tags at Cabela’s for prizes up to $2 million. The contest runs from May […]

By Rick Sohn, Umpqua Coquille LLC Wood products set records in April and pushed all prices higher, as log shortages still are  an issue.  Housing starts finally broke through 1 million for the first time in 5 years.  Seven-year trend of lumber, logs, housing, and mortgage statistics are shown below. […]

  By Oregon State University Extension Office The spotted wing drosophila lays eggs in small and stone fruits, creating cosmetic blemishes. (photo by Vaughn Walton.) The spotted wing drosophila fly, which lays its eggs in fruit and makes it unmarketable, could reach record population levels in the Pacific Northwest this […]

  By Daily Digger Oregon Association of Nurseries U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) gave the OAN and its members prominent mention last week while testifying against <A href=”http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d113:SN743:” target=”_blank”>S.873</a>, which would require retailers to collect sales taxes for remote jurisdictions in a greater number of instances. Wyden said it would […]

National Cattlemen’s Beef Association The National Cattlemen’s Beef Association (NCBA) is appalled to learn that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) continues to illegally release information on cattle operations to the activist groups Earth Justice, the Pew Charitable Trust and the Natural Resources Defense Council. In this latest action, the agency […]

National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition Agriculture Committee leaders announced plans for starting the 2013 Farm Bill process.  Because a new Congress started this year, Congress cannot pick up where it left off with the farm bill last year and must start the process over again.  Currently, USDA is operating under an […]

  By American Farm Bureau Sequestration. We keep hearing about it, but now more than 300,000 farmers will be feeling it directly unless something changes. American Farm Bureau farm policy specialist Mary Kay Thatcher explains the situation in this story from AFBF’s Johnna Miller. Miller: Sequestration is proving to have […]

Timber Workplace Safety Bills Pass Oregon House Representative Wayne Krieger, A pair of bills aimed at enhancing timber workplace safety passed the Oregon House of Representatives today on wide, bipartisan margins. House Bill 2595 makes the illegal obstruction of forest management activities a class “A” misdemeanor for the first offense […]

Forest Industry Urges Comprehensive Solution for Federal Forests –Requests that Wilderness Legislation Not Advance Separately American Forest Resource Council, A group of forest products industry associations sent a letter to Oregon Senators Ron Wyden and Jeff Merkley urging enactment of a meaningful legislative resolution to the paralysis affecting federal forest […]