Quick Carbon News Today : Breaking News, Live Updates & Top Stories | Vimarsana

Jason Johnson, Stonyfield Organic’s farmer relationship manager, fires up the AgriCORE soil sampling tool in a pasture with sweeping views of central Maine’s rolling hillsides at Dostie Farm, an organic dairy. The auger bit whirrs as it slices through clover and grass, spiraling downward into the earth to retrieve a sample from the 650-acre (263-hectare) farm on a blustery October day.It takes Johnson three tries to get it right, and the auger emerges from the ground, encased in a thin layer of dark soil. Leah Puro, agricultural research coordinator at Wolfe’s Neck Center for Agriculture...

It wasn’t too long after clouds of desiccated topsoil from farmland in the Southern Plains darkened the skies over Washington, D.C. that Congress took decisive action. In 1935, in response to what would later be termed the Dust Bowl, lawmakers brushed soot off their jackets and created the Natural Resources Conservation Service within the Department of Agriculture. To reduce soil erosion—and keep skies blue—it incentivized farmers to adopt new farming practices, such as tilling less. Since then, the Department of Agriculture’s programs have expanded and the practices it encourages h...