H1N1 Vaccine Approved & Food Costing Less

 H1N1 Vaccine Approved & Food Costing Less plus Food Forethought. I’m Greg Martin with today’s Northwest Report.

I know a lot of people are making plans now for their holiday feasts and that includes all those extra goodies. If you have been to the grocery store lately you may have noticed a pleasant surprise. Ephriam Leibtag, USDA economist, says that almost all foods at grocery stores have seen price deflation this year. 

LEIBTAG: The whole year it has been dairy and eggs leading the way in terms of deflation. They 2 or 3 months the meat products and the fruit and vegetable products have joined in on the deflation side so both beef and pork are forecasting deflation for  the year and fresh fruits and vegetables are also going to be lower overall this year than they were last year.

Pfizer Animal Health said its swine influenza vaccine, a killed virus vaccine developed and made at its plant in Lincoln, Nebraska, has been approved by USDA for vaccination of healthy swine, including pregnant sows and gilts, three weeks of age or older against subtype H1N1. Pfizer becomes the first U.S. biologics manufacturer to receive a USDA conditional license for this new vaccine. Because the product license is conditional, efficacy and/or potency of this product have not been fully demonstrated.

Now with today’s Food Forethought, here’s Lacy Gray.

Ok, everyone take a deep breath and hold it, and keep holding it. Now that the U.S. Environmental Protection agency has determined greenhouse gases, mainly carbon dioxide, are endangering our very existence and should be regulated under the Clean Air Act the EPA has given themselves the go ahead to regulate greenhouse gases without Congress approval.  While the carbon dioxide the EPA is most concerned with is from burning fossil fuels the fear is that with such a decision the EPA will now make up for what they consider lost time in the climate control arena by imposing new and far stricter requirements and regulations upon factories, auto makers and power plants. In fact it would come as no surprise if their zeal for regulating greenhouse gases spilled over to include farms, ranches, small businesses and buildings. The Obama administration has assured that it does not intend to do that. But we have all been partners in that type of song and dance before. Most everyone would agree that we need to do what we can to protect the environment, but we would also have to ask at what great cost.

Thanks Lacy. That’s today’s Northwest Report. I’m Greg Martin on the Northwest Ag Information Network.