"FRESNO, Calif. -- Federal regulators who shut down a Central California slaughterhouse after receiving an animal welfare video were investigating whether beef from sick cows reached the human food supply."

" ... wouldn't it be lovely if somebody came up with a biofuel that didn't take food out of people's mouths? A few years ago, some people thought they'd found it: A miracle tree called Jatropha. Unfortunately, the miracle turned out to be a mirage."

Lawyers who won hundreds of millions suing tobacco companies have now set their sights on a big payday from food manufacturers. They are filing suits alleging that food companies are "misleading consumers and violating federal regulations by wrongly labeling products."

"Beside Seattle’s notoriously polluted Duwamish River, an excavator scoops up small pieces of waste metal and slings them onto a rusty mountain at Seattle Iron & Metals Corp. A pile of flattened cars and trucks squats nearby amid vast sheets of scrap metal. For at least the last four years, this auto-shredder and metal recycler has dumped more pollutants into the river than allowed under the federal Clean Water Act, government records show. The levels have ranged higher than 250 times above what’s known to harm salmon that migrate through the river."

"AZTEC, N.M. — The land is parched, the fields are withering and thousands of the nation’s horses are being left to fend for themselves on the dried range, abandoned by people who can no longer afford to feed them."

"ST. LOUIS -- The worst drought in the U.S. in decades may be leveling off or even be easing ever so slightly in some lucky locales, federal weather forecasters announced Thursday in a report of little comfort for farmers and ranchers who already have begun tallying this year's losses."

"President Barack Obama moved to stem the impact of the worst drought in 50 years as he directed the department of agriculture to buy up to $170m of pork, lamb, chicken and catfish."

"An El Nino weather pattern is underway and will last until winter, Japan said on Friday, foreshadowing disruptive conditions that could harm crops from Australia to India at a time of rising fears about global food supplies."

"In southern Illinois, farmer Jim Unverfehrt steered his pickup beside a corn crop already lost, then hopped out to search for the soybeans he planted six weeks earlier."

"WASHINGTON, DC -- Eight U.S. biofuel industry organizations have formed a new coalition to defend the nation’s Renewable Fuel Standard and to advocate for domestic production of advanced biofuels. Their first fight is against a movement by members of the House of Representatives who are pressuring the Obama Administration to waive the federal Renewable Fuel Standard."

"LOS ANGELES -- A Los Angeles Superior Court judge has dismissed a lawsuit brought by nearly 3,000 Filipino workers claiming injury from pesticide exposure while worked for Dole Food Co."

"LONDON -- The world is depleting underground water reserves faster than they can be replenished due to over-exploitation, according to scientists in Canada and the Netherlands."

"As the worst drought in more than 50 years withers the Midwest corn crop, 25 senators urged the Environmental Protection Agency to cut the mandate that requires fuel blenders to add grain-based ethanol to gasoline."

"The worst drought in half a century is slashing U.S. crop and livestock production, President Obama said on Tuesday as he called on Congress to pass a farm bill that will send disaster aid to more farmers and ranchers."

"In a lawsuit filed in federal district court, the North Carolina Environmental Justice Network, the Waterkeeper Alliance and Neuse Riverkeeper Foundation accuse a Jones County hog farmer of illegally disposing of and discharging animal waste into creeks, rivers, ditches and lands surrounding the farm."