Harkin isn't proposing to gut the current commodities programs, which are projected to cost about $7 billion a year if current market conditions continue. Giving money to farmers to grow those crops, "would be something like direct payments," he said. But Harkin seems to be looking at some of the $26 billion that would be spent over the next five years on direct payments as a source of money for supporting crops that could eventually produce ethanol from cellulose, crops that include...

Agencies New Delhi, May 18: India raised on Thursday the minimum price it would pay for the purchase of winter-harvested rice paddy and oilseeds from farmers to boost rural incomes and ensure the government is able to build stocks. It said the support price for superior quality of rice paddy will be increased by the same margin to 675 rupees for 100 kg. The government buys some farm products from farmers at a fixed price, which it then sells to the poor at subsidised rates or uses to...

The suit was brought on behalf of rice farmers based upon economic damages they suffered from contamination of their crops with an unapproved genetically modified strain of rice seed produced by Bayer Cropscience, a German-based agriculture company. Downing originally filed suit last suit on behalf of 279 rice farmers in Missouri and Arkansas. Discovery of the contamination in the farmers rice supply led to a dramatic drop in U. He has obtained a multimillion dollar settlement for a class...

Over the past three years, the company's plans to plant its rice have drawn protests from anti-biotech groups and some rice farmers -- first in California, then Missouri. Those groups worried that Ventria's rice would mix with commercial and weedy rice varieties. But Ventria has for several years grown its rice in test plots in North Carolina and over the past year has been welcomed by economic development groups in Kansas. Ventria has genetically engineered a strain of rice that produces...

Indonesian rice farmers in Java and Bali must invest in hardier crops and better water storage methods if they hope to maintain harvests in the face of man-made climate change and weather systems such as El Nino, according to a new study. The warm El Nino weather system has already been shown to wreak havoc with the region's rice production by delaying monsoon rains, disrupting the planting of the main rice crop and prolonging the "hungry season" before the main rice harvest. The...