By any measure, California’s San Joaquin Valley is one of the preeminent farming regions in the world. The agriculture industry’s seemingly bottomless thirst gives the Valley another distinction: It is losing its groundwater.
By George Kimbrell
On Sept. 9, the Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) Commission released its long-awaited “Make Our Children Healthy Again” Strategy Report, which was supposed to set policy recommendations that would address the urgent public health crisis caused by our industrial food system. Unfortunately, but perhaps predictably, and as foreshadowed by a leaked draft report in August, at the end of the day the MAHA commission utterly betrayed the grassroots MAHA movement, and anyone else that cares about creating a healthier future for our food, serving up only a few crumbs instead of the healthy new meal promised.
By Bill Walker
For decades, California has been on the cutting edge of US environmental policy. The state has enacted landmark measures to regulate air and water pollution, protect residents from exposure to toxic chemicals, and combat the climate crisis. Many of its groundbreaking policies have spread to other states.
By Keith Schneider
President Donald Trump’s campaign to carve up federal environmental agencies and paralyze statutes that cleared the air, cleaned US waters, and protected wildlands marks the opening of MAPA, the new era to Make America Polluted Again.
By Bill Walker
Last year California shipped more than 156 million pounds of plastic waste to poor countries, with almost three-fourths sent to Mexico and another 44 million pounds sent to developing nations in Asia, Latin America, and Africa. That’s the reality behind the blue recycling bins Californians fill with plastic waste for curbside pickup. We may think we’re recycling, but we’re really sending much of our waste out of sight, out of mind.
Iowa is currently facing an unprecedented drinking water crisis. Recent reports indicate alarming nitrate levels in the Raccoon River; so high that city officials enacted emergency measures such as lawn water bans, to ensure water treatment facilities could comply with regulatory standards for safe drinking water. Unfortunately, at least for pregnant women, any level of nitrate in drinking water appears unsafe.
By Dr. Ryan Schmid
In our race to “feed the world”, farmers and ranchers have been pressed into a system that manufactures food for a growing global population. Farmers have met these challenges head-on, producing an abundance of crops and meat; however, our production of abundance has not come without costs.
By Stephanie Reese
Juneteenth and environmental protections share something fundamental — they represent hard-fought acknowledgment of systemic harms, and they both underscore the urgent need for a more just, sustainable, and equitable future.
FEMA’s denial of funds and the state’s lagging response have left toxics experts and homeowners fearful of what lies beneath the thousands of burned lots.
At a time when climate-related headlines often read like obituaries for our planet, Earth Day 2025 offered something rare – a reason for hope. Not the naïve optimism that suggests salvation is assured, but rather compelling evidence that we can make people act for good when we get the messaging right.