Austin Frerick’s ‘Barons’ follows the food-industry giants that have cornered giant portions of the market for everything from coffee to chicken thighs.
agriculture
Posted inMoney, Politics, and Power
The Return of the Koch Brothers
Koch Industries is buying an Iowa fertilizer plant built with taxpayer dollars. Will federal authorities block the deal?
Posted inEnergy and the Environment
Big Ag and Big Oil Team Up to Lobby for Clean Energy Credits
A coalition of companies like Cargill and Chevron hired new lobbyists as it works to convince policymakers that so-called ‘renewable natural gas’ should get government subsidies.
Posted inMoney, Politics, and Power
Best of 2023: Luke Goldstein
Our writing fellow offers his favorite stories of the year.
Posted inMoney, Politics, and Power
Lawsuit Highlights Why Meat Has Been Overpriced for 40 Years
Agri Stats lets meat processors coordinate their pricing. The Justice Department finally decided to go after what it calls collusion.
Posted inEnergy and the Environment
Big Ag Opens Another Vein of Public Funding
Money from the Climate-Smart Commodities program, designed to reduce agriculture emissions, is going disproportionately to multinationals.
Posted inWorking in America
Where Discrimination Flourished Like Mushrooms
Washington state fines a mushroom grower $3.4 million for firing women farmworkers and replacing them with male contract labor.
Posted inMoney, Politics, and Power
How Washington Bargained Away Rural America
Every five years, the farm bill brings together Democrats and Republicans who are normally at each other’s throats. The result is the continued corporatization of agriculture.
Posted inMoney, Politics, and Power
Farmers Pay Big Ag to Lobby Against Them
The checkoff program, intended for marketing promotion but used as a slush fund for consolidated agricultural interests, is facing pressure for reform.