MINNESOTA

Reginaldo Haslett-Marroquin, owner and founder of Regeneration Farms LLC, and founder and president of the Regenerative Agriculture Alliance, talks about what regenerative means to him, and how his experience farming in the Guatemalan rainforest informs his life today.

Volunteer corn is more prevalent in the 2022 growing season and can cause some yield losses, but Bruce Potter, an integrated pest management specialist at the University of Minnesota Southwest Research and Outreach Center at Lamberton, Minnesota, said the bigger issues are the insects and diseases that the corn can bring. Of particular concern is the corn rootworm.

About 35 representatives of foreign governments spent a week touring farms, research sites and agribusinesses across Minnesota. Visits ranged from Hormel and soybean farms in the southeast to sugarbeet farms and processing in the Red River Valley.

A Halstad, Minnesota, family has created a business of producing early-generation potato seed for potato seed producers. The business is a two-generation effort, with numerous employees here on H-2A visas.

United States Sugar Corp., a Florida company that markets sugar cooperatively with Red River Valley sugarbeet growers through United Sugars, wants to purchase Imperial Sugar Co. The U.S. Department of Justice was suing to block the purchase.

Minnesota feedlot operators must apply for a permit with the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency.

Iowa-based Summit Carbon Solutions says its $4.5 billion pipeline project will help ethanol plants, including the Green Plains Ethanol plant at Fergus Falls, Minnesota, lower their carbon scores. The project aims to capture greenhouse gas emissions and pipe the CO2 to western North Dakota for underground storage.

Cannon Falls Winery is the third stop for a statewide tour of Town Halls on emerging issues in Greater Minnesota.

Excellent growing conditions and good soils could result in top-end soybean yields in Southeast Minnesota this year, according to Ryan Miller, educator with the University of Minnesota Extension.