2007-05-22 Demand for Ethanol Made From Corn Is Fueling Criticism
This is the VOA Special English Agriculture Report. This season, American farmers expect to plant their biggest corn crop since World War Two. Growing demand for ethanol fuel is the…
2007-05-15 Fighting Fire Ants With a Virus of Their Own
This is the VOA Special English Agriculture Report. Farmers in parts of the United States have struggled for years with an invasion of red imported fire ants from Brazil. These…
2007-05-08 Looking Behind the ‘Fairtrade’ Label
This is the VOA Special English Agriculture Report. Coffee drinkers are not the only ones willing to pay more for products marked with the words “Fairtrade” or “Fair Trade Certified.”…
2007-05-01 Seed Collection Effort Aims to Safeguard 21 Food Crops
This is the VOA Special English Agriculture Report. A new project will try to protect twenty-one of the world’s most important food crops by securing their seeds. Organizers say the…
2007-04-24 Officials Hunt for an Explanation of Pet Food Scare
This is the VOA Special English Agriculture Report. Melamine is an industrial chemical. So how and why did it get into pet food that caused kidney failure in cats and…
2007-04-17 Lonely Farmers Look for Love Online
This is the VOA Special English Agriculture Report. The Web site FarmersOnly.com calls itself an online dating and friendship finder. The idea started in the mind of a man in…
2007-04-10 Disappearance of Honey Bees a Mystery
This is the VOA Special English Agriculture Report. What has happened to America’s honeybees? Last fall, beekeepers from states with warm climates began to report a sudden loss of honey…
2007-04-03 Much to Be Said for Mulch
This is the VOA Special English Agriculture Report. Mulch is important to farmers. Mulch is a protective cover of material that is spread on top of soil. It is usually…
2007-03-27 Trying to Understand Food Labels
This the VOA Special English Agriculture Report. It can be hard to decide which foods to buy in an American grocery store these days. The information on many products makes…
2007-03-20 Americans Warned of Higher Food Prices as Corn Goes to Ethanol
This is the VOA Special English Agriculture Report. The United States Department of Agriculture says high demand for ethanol fuel made from corn will mean higher meat prices. In its…
2007-03-13 How This Little Piggy Goes to Market
This is the VOA Special English Agriculture Report. For Chinese, this is the Year of the Pig. So this is probably as good a time as any to talk about…
2007-03-06 Getting the Most Out of Marginal Lands
This is the VOA Special English Agriculture Report. To call something “marginal” means it is not very good. Farmers have their own way to define marginal land: It is the…
2007-02-27 Wind Farming Spreads in US
This is the VOA Special English Agriculture Report. For centuries, farmers have used windmills to pump water, crush grain and perform other tasks. Today, farmers can earn money with high-powered…
2007-02-20 Insect Threatens Ash Trees in US
This is the VOA Special English Agriculture Report. A beetle invasion in the United States has killed at least twenty million ash trees. The invasion of the emerald ash borer…
2007-02-13 Raising Goats for Their Hair
This is the VOA Special English Agriculture Report. Goats are raised not just for their milk and meat, and their ability to control weeds and help renew grasslands. They can…