One Size Safety Regs & Big Timber Deal

One Size Safety Regs & Big Timber Deal plus Food Forethought. I’m Greg Martin with today’s Northwest Report.

Yesterday Congressman Doc Hastings engaged in a discussion with House Agriculture Committee Chairman Frank Lucas regarding the one-size-fits-all food safety regulations that the FDA has proposed for fruit and vegetable growers.

HASTINGS: There’s no question that both consumers and growers want to ensure that we have the safest food supply in the world. However, Mr. Chairman, I have serious concerns with the one-size-fits-all regulations that the Food and Drug Administration has proposed to govern the way that all fruits and vegetables are grown and harvested. It only makes sense that these products should be evaluated based on how susceptible they may be to food safety risks, and subjected to regulations that reflect both that risk and the way they are grown.

Weyerhaeuser Co. has made a deal to acquire Longview Timber and its 645,000 acres of timberland holdings in Oregon and Washington for $2.65 billion. The deal is expected to close in July and would be the third-largest forestry acquisition in North American history. Weyerhaeuser said the deal will expand its reach in international markets. About 20 percent of its timberlands revenue comes from sales to Japan, China and Korea, and Pacific Northwest timberlands are strategically located for export to Asia.

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

I come from stubborn stock. That’s why I refuse to give up when it comes to fighting pests in my garden, “never give up, never surrender”. I need to remember though in my battle against whatever is eating my echinacea down to a nubbin that not all creepy crawlies in the garden are “bad bugs”. There are several insects more than happy to help me with my pest control. It’s fairly well known that lady beetles, aka lady bugs, are good when it comes to damage control in the garden. There are other beneficial insects however that don’t get the favored attention the lady beetle does. Green lacewings are the proud parents of larvae often known as aphid lions; voracious little buggers that love to chow down on aphids, caterpillars, and scales. Parasitic wasps really get a bum rap. Instead of swatting these when you seen them in your garden, back quietly away and let them get on with their work, which is attacking different host insects like stinkbugs, wood boring beetles, aphids, and caterpillars. In return for all their hard work make sure your garden is a welcoming habitat to these tenacious soldiers of the insect world.

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