However, Knight concedes that whatever sense of urgency existed among livestock producers is on the wane four years after the first mad cow case. For evidence of congressional frustration or lack of interest, look no further than the USDA budget for 2008 as passed by the House. The idea was to enable investigators to trace the whereabouts and history of any animal within 48 hours of a disease outbreak. And the revised plan the Bush administration is due to release soon seems to bear less...

shearer@onlineathens.com . Story updated at 11:11 PM on Monday, October 15, 2007 A project to empower agriculture officials to respond quickly to serious animal disease outbreaks still is little more than a paper plan nearly four years after it was proposed. shearer@onlineathens.com . Story updated at 11:11 PM on Monday, October 15, 2007 A project to empower agriculture officials to respond quickly to serious animal disease outbreaks still is little more than a paper plan nearly four years...

capital markets business to Oppenheimer Holdings Inc as it focuses on its core operations. The strong debut gave PetroChina a market value of around $1 trillion, double the world's second biggest company, rival oil giant Exxon Mobil , at $488 billion, although only 2 percent of its shares are traded on the Shanghai market. Kraft and Ralcorp were considering a stock-based deal to spin off the Post business, then merge it with Ralcorp, leaving Kraft holders with equity in the merged entity,...

I raised cattle but that was made illegal 10 or 12 years ago because of mad cow disease, at least for cattle but I assumed for all livestock. Today's higher prices for feed corn, fueled by increased ethanol production, are causing livestock producers to supplant more of their animals' diets with fat. Biodiesel production provides added cost to the commodity, benefitting farmers, still provides an alternate feed for livestock through the by-product from the production process. That animal...

Department of Agriculture purchased 300 tons of pink salmon in 1-pound cans earlier this fall, and there should be another 300-ton purchase of canned pinks soon. Wild Alaska pink salmon, purchased through federal food aid programs, now feeds hungry people in Cambodia and Guatemala, and pilot programs are in the works to provide salmon to those who have contracted AIDS. It's very important for us to have markets for (all) product. The effort by ASMI to promote use of pink canned salmon in...