Ag News Briefs

The following are news briefs on issues affecting agriculture from around the nation and world.

(LAST UPDATED: 11/28/2018 AT 4:09 p.m. CDT)

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Steer Too Beefy to Become Burgers Reprieved to Life on Farm

(AP) -- Knickers the steer is huge on the internet -- for being huge. The black-and-white Holstein Friesian won social media fame and many proclamations of "Holy Cow!" after photos surfaced of the 194-centimeter (6-foot-4-inch) steer standing head and shoulders above a herd of brown cattle in Western Australia state.

Owner Geoff Pearson said Knickers was too heavy to go to the slaughterhouse. "We have a high turnover of cattle, and he was lucky enough to stay behind," Pearson said.

Australian media say Knickers is believed to be the tallest steer in the country and weighs about 1.4 tons. Instead of becoming steaks and burgers, 7-year-old Knickers will get to live out his life in Pearson's fields in Lake Preston, southwest of Perth.

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New Joint Venture Formed to Convert Pig Poop to Power

(AP) -- The world's largest pork company is teaming up with a major energy company to turn pig manure into renewable natural gas.

Smithfield Foods and Dominion Energy announced a joint venture partnership Tuesday to trap methane from hog waste and convert it into power for heating homes and generating electricity.

Smithfield previously announced that its company-owned and contract farms over the next decade will cover waste-treatment pits to capture the gas and keep out rainwater. The gas will be channeled to processing centers and converted into natural gas.

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Swiss reject plan to entice herders to save cow, goat horns

(AP) -- Swiss voters on Sunday rejected a national referendum on a cattle farmer's proposal to have the government subsidize herders of goats and cows if they let their animals keep their horns, official results showed.

The Swiss federal chancellery said 54.7 percent of voters opposed the measure, which proponents had said would improve the happiness and well-being of the animals, while 45.3 percent cast ballots in favor. Opponents, like a key federation of cattle raisers as well as the federal government, said the measure would cost as much as $30 million a year, and drain funds from other activities.

Armin Capaul, the small-scale cattle herder who had spearheaded the proposal, told Swiss public television RTS that he had "achieved something great, by making people sensitive to the condition of cows. It's sensational."

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Monsanto Appeals $78M Verdict in California Weed Killer Suit

(AP) -- Agribusiness giant Monsanto on Tuesday appealed a $78 million verdict in favor of a dying California man who said the company's widely used Roundup weed killer was a major factor in his cancer.

The company filed a notice of appeal in San Francisco Superior Court challenging a jury verdict in favor of DeWayne Johnson. In August, the jury unanimously found that Roundup caused Johnson's non-Hodgkin's lymphoma and awarded him $289 million.

Last month, Judge Suzanne Bolanos slashed that award to $78 million. Monsanto had sought a new trial or judgment in its favor.

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Deere's Profit Rises, Helped by Stronger Machinery Sales

(Dow Jones) -- Deere & Co. said sales and profits in the latest period were lifted by demand in its construction and farming markets.

Deere reported fourth-quarter net income of $784.8 million, or $2.42 a share, up from $510.3 million, or $1.57 a share, a year earlier. Excluding a tax benefit, the company earned $2.30 a share, while analysts expected $2.45 a share.

Total revenue rose 17% to $9.42 billion from a year ago, boosted by rising sales in farm machinery in the Americas and construction-equipment sales due to its road-building business, Wirtgen Group, which was acquired in December 2017.

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Meat Producer Agrees to $4 Million Payment to Settle Labor Claims

(AP) -- The U.S. branch of the world's largest meat producer will pay $4 million in back wages and other monetary relief as part of a consent decree settling allegations by federal labor officials.

The Greeley Tribune reports the U.S. Department of Labor claimed in two actions that JBS USA discriminated based on race and gender against applicants for laborer positions at its facilities in Hyrum, Utah, and Cactus, Texas.

The company with U.S. headquarters in Greeley, Colorado, has agreed to pay 12,625 class members at those facilities and hire 1,664 of the applicants.

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Salmonella Infections Tied to JBS Beef Double

(Dow Jones) -- Illnesses have doubled in a nationwide salmonella outbreak linked to ground beef, according to the CDC. The agency says 246 people in 25 states are now part of the outbreak tied to meat-packing behemoth JBS, twice the number of people in the CDC's update last month. The company has recalled more than 6.5 million pounds of ground beef after potentially contaminated products were shipped to more than 100 retailers across the country, the agency says

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Farm Animals May Soon Get New Features Through Gene Editing

(AP) -- Cows that can withstand hotter temperatures. Cows born without pesky horns. Pigs that never reach puberty.

A company wants to alter farm animals by adding and subtracting genetic traits in a lab. It sounds like science fiction, but Recombinetics sees opportunity for its technology in the livestock industry.

But first, it needs to convince regulators that gene-edited animals are no different than conventionally bred ones. To make the technology appealing and to ease any fears that it may be creating Franken-animals, Recombinetics isn't starting with productivity. Instead, it's introducing gene-edited traits as a way to ease animal suffering.

"It's a better story to tell," said Tammy Lee, CEO of the St. Paul, Minnesota-based company.

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DowDuPont Plans New Gene-Edited Crops

(Dow Jones) -- Crop-seed company DowDuPont is selling its inaugural batch of gene-edited seeds to farmers this fall, a variety of waxy corn enhanced using the Crispr-Cas9 technology. Jim Collins, head of the company's agriculture division, says next in line is a soybean DowDuPont believes can be gene-edited to produce vegetable oil that is much less unhealthy for the human heart, though that's not yet ready for commercial sale. Beyond that, Collins says in an interview he sees potential for disease-resistant wheat varieties, and rice requiring less water. Seed companies see gene editing as a faster, cheaper and potentially more consumer-friendly way to develop new crops, versus established GMO technology.

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Bayer Hit by More Lawsuits Over Safety of Roundup Weedkiller

(Dow Jones) -- Bayer AG on Tuesday disclosed another jump in the number of lawsuits alleging the German company's recently-acquired weed killers cause cancer in a sign that an issue that has wiped billions off Bayer's market valuation isn't fading away.

Lawsuits from 9,300 plaintiffs were pending at the end of October, compared with 8,700 at the end of August, Bayer said. Plaintiffs claim that Roundup weed killers, which Bayer acquired in its takeover of Monsanto Co., made them ill and that Monsanto knew or should have known of the risks but failed to warn adequately.

Bayer rejects the allegations, arguing there are hundreds of scientific studies and regulatory authorities that demonstrate glyphosate, the compound contained in the weed killers, is safe to use.

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Activist Adds to Bunge Stake

(Dow Jones) -- Bunge shares are down about 7% since the agricultural company last week named several activist investor-backed directors to its board, and now one of those firms, Continental Grain, is adding to its bet. The agriculture-investing specialist disclosed the purchase of 155,000 Bunge shares this week, boosting its total position to 3.4 million shares, or about 2.4% of the company's outstanding stock, according to FactSet. Continental and hedge fund D.E. Shaw have pressured Bunge to improve operations and look at other ways to boost its value, and Bunge appointed directors representing those firms to a new strategic review committee.

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