"The world is losing almost 1 million square kilometres (386,000 square miles) of productive land a year to sand and dust storms made worse by human activities, the United Nations body in charge of fighting desertification warned on Wednesday."

"Groundwater pollution in Umatilla and Morrow counties is growing worse, leading to dangerous levels of nitrates in water pumped up from what used to be safe wells."

"On a bright day this fall, tractors crisscrossed Gayle Goschie’s farm about an hour outside Portland, Oregon. Goschie is in the beer business — a fourth-generation hops farmer. Fall is the off-season, when the trellises are bare, but recently, her farming team has been adding winter barley, a relatively newer crop in the world of beer, to their rotation, preparing barley seeds by the bucketful."

"After decades of unrestricted pumping in the rain-starved northwestern corner of the Mojave Desert, the Indian Wells Valley Groundwater Basin Authority has the distinction of managing one of the most critically overdrawn aquifers in California."

"With few job opportunities and food harvests hit by climate change, more young Guatemalans are leaving poor farming communities in search of a better life in the United States".

"Tens of millions of people — and millions of acres of farmland — rely on the Colorado River’s water. But as its supply shrinks, these farmers get more water from the river than entire states."

"Forest fires may get more attention, but a new study reveals that grassland fires are more widespread and destructive across the United States. Almost every year since 1990, the study found, grass and shrub fires burned more land than forest fires did, and they destroyed more homes, too."

"A three-year drought that has left millions of people in Syria, Iraq and Iran with little water wouldn’t have happened without human-caused climate change, a new study found."

"Congress appears unlikely to pass a new farm bill by the end of this year amid standoffs over Republicans’ push to extend subsidies to three specific Southern crops — at the potential cost of billions in both food aid and popular farm conservation programs."

"India's Supreme Court ordered authorities in the states surrounding New Delhi on Tuesday to stop farmers burning crop residue, as the air quality from smog engulfing the world's most polluted capital during the past week reached hazardous levels."