Dairy Policy
Agricultural Law Weekly Review—Week Ending September 23, 2022
Dairy Policy: Pennsylvania’s Over-Order Premium Continues But ‘Should be Modified’ 🌾
On September 21, 2022, the Pennsylvania Milk Marketing Board (PMMB) entered a new 90-day over-order premium (OOP) order (OGO No. A-1014), as opposed to its customary 180-day order. The order continues Pennsylvania’s OOP at $1.00 cwt for the period October 1, 2022 through December 31, 2022. The order followed an August 30, 2022, hearing on a petition to consider the “level and duration” as well as the “existence” of the OOP. The current OOP mandates a producer price premium over the federal order price through a calculation intended […]
Agricultural Law Weekly Review—Week Ending September 2, 2022
Agricultural Data: USDA Announces 2022 Census of Agriculture Details 🌾
On August 29, 2022, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS) announced that the agency will soon be mailing and accepting questionnaires for the 2022 Census of Agriculture. The Census of Agriculture includes all sizes of urban and rural farm operations that produced and sold at least $1,000 worth of agricultural products. The census will survey producers on multiple issues, including land use and ownership, producer characteristics, farming practices, and income and expenses. The 2022 survey contains new questions on hemp production, hair sheep, […]
Agricultural Law Weekly Review—Week Ending July 15, 2022
Enacted Pennsylvania 2022-23 Budget Includes $25 Million in HPAI Poultry Grower Assistance Grants and $220 Million in New Clean Streams Fund; Last HPAI Quarantine Control Zone Released 🌾
On July 8, 2022, Pennsylvania Governor Tom Wolf signed into law Act No. 1A of 2022, formerly known as Senate Bill 1100, titled the “General Appropriation Act of 2002” and Act No. 54 of 2022, formerly known as House Bill 1421, commonly referred to as the “2022-2023 Fiscal Code Bill,” both of which together provide the primary state fiscal year 2022-23 budget for the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania government. The most succinct summary of […]
Agricultural Law Weekly Review—Week Ending June 24, 2022
Pesticides/Herbicides: U.S. Supreme Court Declines to Hear Bayer RoundUp Verdict Appeal ⚡
On June 21, 2022, the U.S. Supreme Court denied the August 16, 2021 Petition For Certiorari filed by Bayer (purchaser of Monsanto’s glyphosate-containing RoundUp product line and successor to its product liabilities) seeking to appeal the May 14, 2021, decision of the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals holding that products liability claims for failure-to-warn of the risk of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma from the products’ use are not preempted by the federal pesticide/herbicide labeling regulatory scheme set forth in the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA) and […]
Agricultural Law Weekly Review—Week Ending April 15, 2022
Avian Influenza: USDA Confirms HPAI in Pennsylvania Commercial Layer Flock 🌾
On April 16, 2022, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) confirmed highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) in a commercial layer premise in East Donegal Township, Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. The positive sample was taken on April 14, 2022, at a Kreider Farms-operated facility housing approximately 1.4 million layers, tested positive at the Pennsylvania Veterinary Laboratory and then confirmed by the National Veterinary Services Laboratory in Ames, Iowa. PDA announced that it has quarantined, through an order of special quarantine, the affected farm […]
Agricultural Law Weekly Review—Week Ending March 11, 2022
Avian Influenza: Detections Now in Sixteen States 🌾
The United States Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) has confirmed highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) detected in domestic poultry in the following states: Indiana—Feb. 8, 16, 23 (two separate premises) and 24 and Mar. 2 in commercial turkeys; Kentucky—Feb. 12 in commercial broiler chickens (broilers) and Feb. 15 in commercial turkeys; Virginia—Feb. 12 in mixed backyard poultry; New York—Feb. 19 and 24 (two separate premises) in various non-commercial poultry; Maine—Feb. 19 and 23 in backyard poultry; Delaware—Feb. 22 in broilers and laying hens (layers) and Mar. […]
Agricultural Law Weekly Review—Weeks Ending December 24 & 31, 2021
Pesticides/Herbicides: EPA Publishes 2021 Dicamba Report and Addresses 2020 Growing Season 🌾
On December 21, 2021, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) published a report titled “Status of Over-the-Top Dicamba: Summary of 2021 Usage, Incidents and Consequences of Off-Target Movement, and Impacts of Stakeholder-Suggested Mitigations.” The report is published to a “nonrulemaking docket” at Regulations.gov titled “Dicamba for Use on Dicamba-Tolerant Cotton and Soybeans”—an official repository for documents not part of a formal EPA rulemaking process but which impact EPA’s October 2020 five-year product registrations for dicamba-containing products. EPA announced that “[d]espite the control measures implemented in EPA’s […]
Agricultural Law Weekly Review – Week ending November 5, 2021
COVID 19: OSHA Vaccination Mandate Issued and Immediately Stayed by Federal Court 🌾
On November 5, 2021, the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL), Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) published in the Federal Register, “COVID-19 Vaccination and Testing; Emergency Temporary Standard (86 FR 61402), an interim final rule that consists of an emergency temporary standard (ETS) immediately effective requiring employers of 100 or more employees by December 5, 2021, to “develop, implement, and enforce a mandatory COVID-19 vaccination policy, with an exception for employers that instead adopt a policy requiring employees to either get vaccinated or elect to undergo […]
Agricultural Law Weekly Review – Week Ending September 24, 2021
WOTUS: Supreme Court Petition Seeks Review of Rapanos Case Analysis 🌾
On September 24, 2021, Priest Lake, Idaho landowners Michael and Chantell Sackett filed a petition for writ of certiorari in the U.S. Supreme Court seeking to revisit the court’s 2006 Rapanos decision attempting to define jurisdictional “waters of the United States” under the Clean Water Act (CWA). Michael Sackett, et ux. v. EPA, No. 21-454. In Rapanos v. United States, the plurality opinion, in which four justices joined, determined that the CWA regulates surface waters only when they have a “continuous surface water connection” to […]
Agricultural Law Weekly Review – Week Ending September 10, 2021
Antitrust: White House Announces Intent to Address Effects on Consumers, Farmers and Ranchers of Meat Processing Industry Consolidation 🌾
On September 8, 2021, The White House published a policy outline on its official website titled “Addressing Concentration in the Meat-Processing Industry to Lower Food Prices for American Families” and conducted a Press Briefing with Agriculture Secretary Vilsack and National Economic Council Director Brian Deese in support. According to the document and Press Secretary Jen Psaki, the administration will address the following: (a) a “corporate consolidation problem with meat-processing giants;” (b) measures to reduce consumer prices and increase farmer and rancher […]
