Economic
Development
This
page provides links to assist in reporting on Economic Development.
It also includes older blog items that may be of interest to
those reporting on economic development. The blog items are
divided into two categories: general economic
development and broadband.
Economic development
issues in the this guide include, but are not limited to, municipal
broadband, urban sprawl, entrepreneurship, business reports,
state economics, and the job market.
COVERING BUSINESS
IN SMALL MARKETS
Ethics of Business
News, Here's a link
to a column written by Jim Pumarlo, a newspaper consultant with
Community Newsroom Success Strategies in Red Wing, Minn.
RESEARCHING BUSINESSES
Library of Congress
indexes, bibliographies
and guides to business research, both general and specific industries:
http://www.loc.gov/rr/business/index1.html
Bureau of Economic
Analysis
BEA produces economic accounts statistics that enable government
and business decision-makers, researchers, and the American
public to follow and understand the performance of the Nation's
economy: http://www.bea.gov/index.htm
ENTREPRENEURSHIP
AND ENTERPRISE
Association for
Enterprise Opportunity,
http://www.microenterpriseworks.org
404-581-1727 Natalie Keiser aeonk@earthlink.net
AEO is the national association of organizations committed
to microenterprise development.
Boomtown USA,
http://boomtownusa.blogspot.com,
is a Web log by Jack Schultz of Agracel Inc.,
of Effingham, Ill., who posts comments as he travels the country
helping rural communites recruit high-tech and manufacturing
jobs. Schultz has coined (and trademarked) a term for "propsering
rural towns with a tie to agriculture." They're "agurbs."
Center for Rural
Entrepreneurship, http://www.ruraleship.org
402-323-7339 Donald Macke don@ruraleship.org
North Carolina: 919-932-7762 Deborah Markley dmarkley@nc.rr.com
The Center supports rural entrepreneurship development through
research and outreach.
Corporation
for Enterprise Development, http://www.cfed.org
202-408-9788 415-495-7025 Jennifer Malkin Jennifer@cfed.org
CFED works with communities to help them envision, define and
build their own economic strategies, while preserving cultural
values and respecting natural resources.
Mountain
Association for Community Economic Development, Berea,
Ky. 859-986-2373 Justin Maxson x217 jmaxson@maced.org
MACED works to create economic alternatives in Eastern Kentucky
and Central Appalachia, and says, “We invest in good ideas
and help others move their good ideas forward.”
REGIONAL RURAL
DEVELOPMENT CENTERS
These centers coordinate
rural-development research and education throughout the U.S.
Each center links the research and extension capacity of regional
land-grant universities with local decision-makers to address
a wide range of rural development issues, so they can be important
connections to story ideas, sources and reliable economic information.
North Central
Regional Center for Rural Development, Iowa State Univ.,
515-294-8321 www.ag.iastate.edu/centers/rdev/RuralDev.html
Cornelia Flora,dir. cflora@ia
state.edu The center says
it “provides leadership in rural development regionally
and nationally by identifying, developing and supporting programs
on the vanguard of emerging issues.”
Northeast Regional
Center for Rural Development, Penn State University,
814-863-4656 www.cas.nercrd.psu.edu
(Send
e-mail to nercrd@psu.edu)
The center says small towns and rural places “are becoming
increasingly complex and multi-dimensional, resulting in an
ever-increasing number of public issues needing resolution.”
Southern Rural
Development Center, http://srdc.msstate.edu
662-325-3207 Lionel “Bo” Beaulieu, director
ljb@srdc.msstate.edu
SRDC says it seeks to strengthen the capacity of the region's
29 land-grant institutions to address critical contemporary
rural-development issues affecting communities in the rural
South.
Western
Rural Development Center, http://extension.usu.edu/wrdc
435-797-9732 John Allen, director johna@ext.usu.edu
The center offers a long list of sources on economic and
rural development at http://www.nal.usda.gov/ric/ruralres/economic.htm.
DEVELOPMENT
Asset Based Community
Development Institute, www.northwestern.edu/ipr/abcd.html
847-491-8711 John McKnight and John“Jody” Kretzmann,
co-dirs. abcd@northwestern.edu
The ABCD Institute conducts research on capacity-building community
development.
Electric Utility Database, http://www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/electricity/page/eia861.html
Housing Tracker,
http://www.benengebreth.org/housingtracker/
National Congress
For Community Economic Development, 202-289-9020
http://www.ncced.org
NCCED is is the trade association for community development
corporations (CDCs) and the community economic development (CED)
industry.
Rural Studies
program, University of Kentucky, www.rural.org
Conducts research into the economic opportunities and
problems of rural areas.
USDA Rural Development,
http://www.rurdev.usda.gov
This group of agencies in the U.S. Department of Agriculture
heldp finance water and sewer systems, housing, health clinics,
emergency-service facilities and, through the Rural
Utulities Service, electric and telephone service.
It makes loans to businesses through banks and community-managed
lending pools, offers technical assistance and information to
help start and improve cooperatives get started and improve
the effectiveness of their member services. It also provide
technical assistance for community empowerment programs.
U.S. Economic
Development Administration, http://www.eda.gov
EDA helps rural and urban areas with high unemployment, low
income, or other severe economic distress.
ACCESS TO TECHNOLOGY
(high-speed or broadband Internet, etc.)
Federal Communications
Commission pages on rural service, www.fcc.gov/cgb/rural
Rural Broadband
Coalition, http://www.ruralbroadbandcoalition.net/
iTown,
http://www.itowncom.net/news.html
National Rural
Telecommunications Cooperative, http://www.nrtc.coop/us/main/index
NATIONAL JOB MARKET/ECONOMIC
SECURITY
JupiterResearch,
http://www.jupiterresearch.com/bin/item.pl/home
Site for business research
Congressional
Budget Office, http://www.cbo.gov/
Lots of publications and reports.
Center on Budget
and Policy Priorities,
http://www.cbpp.org
Yahoo! Finance
Search, http://finance.yahoo.com/search
Beginner's Guide
to Business Research, http://www.kognito.net/infolit/
"This interactive tutorial provides students with hands-on,
self-paced instruction on where and how to find the best, most
accurate information via the Web when conducting business research."
Liber8,
from the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis ,says
it is an "economic information portal for librarians and
students." It has much non-technical, easy-to-understand
data.
Consumer Price
Index, measure of inflation: http://www.bls.gov/cpi/;
also a site on the limits of the CPI and other measures of inflation:
http://www.bls.gov/cpi/cpifaq.htm
STATE-SPECIFIC
ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT GROUPS
Minnesotans for
an Energy Efficient Economy,
http://www.me3.org
651-726-7561 Dee Long long@me3.org
46 E. 4th St., Suite 600, St. Paul MN 55101
Montana Community
Development Corp., http://www.mtcdc.org
406-728-9234, ext. 205 Rosalie Cates rcates@mtcdc.org
110 East Broadway, #200, Missoula MT 59802
Nebraska Community Foundation, http://www.nebcommfound.org
402-323-7330 Jeff Yost, president jeffyost@nebcommfound.org
317 S 12th St., Suite 200, Lincoln NE 68508
(Nebraska) Center
for Rural Affairs, http://www.cfra.org
402-687-2103 Chuck Hassebrook chuckh@cfra.org
136 Main, Lyons NE 68038
(New Mexico) Regional
Development Corp., http://www.rdcnm.org
505-989-8004 cmcandless@rdcnm.org
428 Sandoval St, Suite 201, Santa Fe NM 87501
North Carolina
Rural Economic Developement Center, www.ncruralcenter.org
919-250-4314 Billy Ray Hall brhall@ncruralcenter.org
Leslie Scott lscott@ncruralcenter.org
4021 Carya, Raleigh NC 27610
North Carolina
Institute of Minority & Economic Development, http://www.ncimed.com
919-956-8889 Cynthia Clemons clemonsc@ncimed.com
114 W Parrish, Durham NC 27701
South Carolina
Association of Community Development Corporations,
843-579-9855 www.communitydevelopmentsc.org
Julia Dawson jd@scacdc.net
658 Rutledge, Charleston SC 29403
West Virginia
Grantmakers Inc., http://www.givetowestvirginia.org/index.html
304-428-4438 Judy Sjostedt judys@pacfwv.com
c/o PACF, Bx 1762, Parkersburg 26102-1762
(W. Va.) Center
for Economic Options, http://www.centerforeconomicoptions.org
304-345-1298 Pam Curry pcurry@economicoptions.org
214 Capitol, Charleston WV 25301
Past
Blog Items on Economic Development:
Saturday,
May 26, 2007
Where
do gas prices hit hardest? In places where people earn the least
A petroleum-market research service released data
this week comparing county-by-county gasoline prices to median
household income, revealing where high prices hit hardest. The
county with the lowest income, and the highest relative gas
prices, is Clay County, Kentucky, reports the Lexington
Herald-Leader.
The Oil Price Information Service reported
that people in the southeastern Kentucky county "shell
out 14.78 percent of their monthly income to buy gasoline costing
$3.156 a gallon, according to the index," the Herald-Leader
reports. "The county's average monthly income of $1,423.67
is the lowest in the nation, the agency said. Compare that to
San Juan County, Wash., where motorists pay the highest cost
in the nation -- $3.926 a gallon -- but the bite on their pocketbooks
is only 6.78 percent of their monthly income."
California has some of the highest gasoline prices,
but also higher income. The other example cited by the Herald-Leader
was San Mateo County, south of San Francisco, where residents
"use only 3.72 percent of their $6,410.17 monthly income
to pay for gas priced at $3.579 a gallon."
The index used by the newspaper is from The
Best and Worst County Ranking Report, which OPIS promotes
as a guide for fuel marketers, saying, "Find out which
areas are ripe for expansion and which
are dogs you want to avoid." A report for one state costs
$2,495 and additional states are $500. The entire national report,
for the 48 contiguous states, is $12,995. More information may
be available from OPIS Retail Pricing Manager
Glen Falk at 800-275-0950, extension 2538.
World's
population becomes mainly urban tomorrow, researchers say
Scientists from North Carolina State University
and the University of Georgia say
they have pinned down a landmark date in human history, the
first time the earth's population will be more urban than rural.
It will happen tomorrow, they say.
"Working
with United Nations estimates that predict
the world will be 51.3 percent urban by 2010, the researchers
projected the May 23, 2007, transition day based on the average
daily rural and urban population increases in 2005-2010. On
that day, a predicted global urban population of 3,303,992,253
will exceed that of 3,303,866,404 rural people," reports
PhysOrg.com, a scientific news service.
The researchers acknowledge that the date is highly symbolic,
and "advise avoiding the urge to interpret this demographic
transition to mean that the urban population has greater importance
than the rural," the news item says, paraphrasing Dr. Ron
Wimberley, distinguished professor of sociology at N.C. State.
"Urban and
rural populations, they say, rely heavily on each other. Cities
refine and process rural goods for urban and rural consumers.
But if either cities or rural areas had to sustain themselves
without the other, Wimberley says, few would bet on the cities."
PhysOrg.com adds, "Although
rural natural and social resources are necessary for urban people
and places, the researchers say rural people do not fare well
relative to their urban counterparts. Maps of U.S. quality-of-life
conditions show that poverty and low education attainment are
concentrated in rural areas – especially the rural South
– where the nation’s food, water and forest resources
exist. Over much of the globe, rural poverty is much worse than
in the United States." To read the whole story, click
here.
Rural
mail carriers being squeezed by record-high gasoline prices
Record-high gas prices are a big problem for mail
carriers on rural routes, who have to provide their own vehicles
and fuel, reports Steve Berg of Tulsa's KOTV.
Amid sound bites from a carrier, Berg reports, "He says
they get about 49 cents per mile from the Postal Service.
But he says adjustments are only made every 3 months,
and a lot can happen to prices during that time. . . . He says
there's a shortage of carriers right now, and he believes it
could have something to do with gas prices." (Read
more)
Sunday,
May 20, 2007
Phone
companies may bring rural telecom redlining by selling land
lines
Maine, Vermont and New Hampshire could be victims
of “rural telecom redlining,” a growing national
trend, if Verizon is able to sell $2.7 billion worth of local-access
lines in the region, The Nation reports.
“Labor and consumer activists, joined by
some public officials, are organizing against this move, in
a high-stakes regulatory and political battle with consequences
for the future of telecommunications in all of rural America,”
Steve Early writes. “Everywhere it can, Verizon is trying
to abandon ‘low value’ landline customers and is
focusing instead on building its wireless customer base and
investing billions of dollars in a new ‘FIOS’ service.
FIOS provides voice, video and high-speed broadband connections
on a single fiber-optic cable network, now being extended directly
to homes and businesses in big cities and affluent suburbs.”
An economist for the Communications Workers
of America has told the Federal Communications
Commission that FairPoint Communications --
“a small, largely nonunion North Carolina firm,”
Early notes -- is so heavy with debt that it would not be able
to extend high-speed Internet service as quickly as Verizon
could. Early explains the deal has tax advanatges for Verizon.
(Read
more)
“Only 60 percent of Verizon's 1.5 million
customers in Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine have access to
broadband Internet service -- a level of service that the telecommunications
industry newsletter, DSL Prime, recently called
one of the lowest broadband access rates in the developed world,”
The Brattleboro Reformer noted in an editorial.
“FairPoint has committed to beating Verizon's promise
to extend DSL (basic high-speed Internet technology) to at least
80 percent of Vermont by 2010. With the recent passage of a
bill in the Vermont Legislature requiring 100 percent access
by 2010, can FairPoint deliver? Experts in the telecom field
are saying that DSL -- which uses copper phone line technology
that's been around for more than a century -- will be obsolete
within a decade.” (Read
more)
Monday,
May 14, 2007
Gas
prices can have an effect well beyond the wallet, researcher
says
The surge in gasoline prices can have a disproportionate
effect on rural areas, especially those who commute from them
to jobs in metro areas. It's a story for rural news media, and
a study by a Florida State University professor
illustrates some points of examination you might not have considered.
Wayne Hochwarter, a professor of management in
FSU’s College of Business, found that
"60 percent of employees confirmed that the price of gas
has significantly reduced the amount of money they have to spend
on other things, while 45 percent reported the need to pay off
debts more slowly or not at all . . . and 26 percent indicated
that the cost of gas has necessitated going without basics such
as heat or air conditioning, or even cutting back on food purchases,"
reports Newswise,
a research-reporting service.
"Hochwarter found that those most affected
by gas prices were prone to experience stress both on and off
the job. Specifically, negative views of work and the company,
sluggishness, antagonistic behavior, feeling overwhelmed and
sadness were significantly higher for those indicating gas-price-related
effects on spending behavior. . . . The research also indicated
much higher levels of family conflict for those required to
modify spending habits. . . . Hochwarter’s research is
being prepared for presentation and publication."
Tuesday,
Jan. 30, 2007
Ethanol
also might disappoint as a cure-all for Farm Belt economies
Ethanol plants may have less direct benefit to
rural communities than they once did. The plants have been seen
as a way to keep rural profits local, but as the size of the
plants increase, fewer are farmer-owned. Between 1995 and 2005,
70 percent of ethanol plants being built belonged to farmers;
in 2006, only 10 percent were farmer-owned, report Nancy Novack
and Jason Henderson of the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas
City. in The Main Street Economist.
Growers of other crops have been tempted to switch to corn,
likely to cause over-production in the future. The cost of animal
feed has risen and livestock industries could be drawn out of
other regions to the Corn Belt for easy access to the dried
distillers grain s that are by-products of ethanol and make
excellent livestock feed.
“Ethanol production may offer some bright
opportunities for rural America,” write Novack and Henderson.
“In reality, though, ethanol profits in the future will
be highly variable, given the volatility of prices for corn,
ethanol and other energy products. At the same time, its opportunities
could quickly fade with changing markets, environmental policies,
and technological advances.” (Read
more)
Friday,
May 11, 2007
A graying
rural Virginia seeks to attract a younger workforce
As the population of rural America ages nationwide,
the University of Virginia is looking at how
to attract young people to come back to the rural areas of the
state. Young people tend to move out of rural areas for education
and more job opportunities, while older people stay in small
towns or retirees move there for a more relaxed pace of life,
reports Faiza Elmasry of Voice of America.
However, a younger working population is necessary
to support these older people, reports Elmasry. “It is
crucial because, as we know, older populations need more health
care. They need more social services and all those are paid
by the taxpayer's dollar. And if you have a small number of
workforce, the younger ones are moving out, your resources are
limited but your demands are high,” Qian Cai, a population
studies expert at U.Va. told Voice of America.
Changing demographics are changing the nature
of the economies of these rural areas, reports Elmasry. Affluent
retirees are creating more demand for shopping, home-building,
and other services in rural Virginia. Local communities are
trying to attract young entrepreneurs with other innovative
ideas such and wineries and breweries. The Internet may also
help young people to work in small towns, allowing them to conduct
business with other cities and the rest of the world. (Read
more)
Friday,
May 4, 2007
Crop
insurance: Taxpayers take most risks, insurers make big profits
"Private companies are taking advantage of
a poorly designed crop insurance program for farmers to reap
'excessive' profits while taxpayers absorb most of the costs
and risks, investigators told a House committee yesterday. Republican
and Democratic members of the House Oversight and Government
Reform Committee reacted with calls for major changes in the
insurance program," reports The Washington Post.
Reporters Dan Morgan and Gilbert Gaul were following
up on some of their own work. They reported in October that
the 16 government-approved firms writing crop insurance made
$3.1 billion in profits in the past eight years, while the government
lost $1.5 billion. The Government Accountability Office
found that the companies "had rates of return
averaging 30 percent in 2005 and 24 percent in 2006," compared
with a 'benchmark' of 6.4 percent for property and casualty
insurers, Gaul and Morgan report.
Here's a local angle for you: The Agriculture
Department "paid the companies $6.6 billion to
cover administrative costs in the past decade. Much of that
has been passed on to local crop insurance agents -- some of
them farmers -- who constitute an influential lobby that has
fought changes in the program."
USDA sets premiums to insure crops against weather
losses and falling prices, and "charges farmers only about
a third of what it costs to pay the claims, and it covers most
costs on policies for farms with the worst weather risk,"
the Post notes. "Congress expanded crop insurance subsidies
in 2000, promising that the subsidies would end other 'emergency'
farm payments. But last week Congress approved $3.4 billion
in drought and weather relief, ignoring a White House veto threat."
(Read
more)
Thursday,
April 12, 2007
Rural
institutions should cooperate regionally for economic success
A new report outlines recommendations of what
rural areas must do to survive in today’s global economy.
“Unlocking Rural Competitiveness: The Role of Regional
Clusters,” a federally funded study conducted by Purdue
University, Indiana University and
the Strategic Development Group Inc., says
that rural decision makers should take advantage of nearby urban
areas, cooperate within regions to group local industries into
clusters and realize that more than agriculture drives their
economies.
Rural business succeeds through creating industry
clusters, “broad networks of companies, suppliers, service
firms, academic institutions, and organizations in related industries
that, together, bring new products or services to market,”
according to the report. Through this system, educational institutions
create knowledge, businesses use that knowledge to create services
and products, suppliers provide necessary equipment to create
them and marketing distribution brings the product to the consumer.
The authors advise that contrary to how some think about rural
areas, few are dependent on agriculture. Of 2,000 non-metropolitan
counties, only 420 get 15 percent or more of their earnings
or employment from farming.
“The researchers created a database, analytical
tools and processes to help rural regions throughout the United
States assess their economic competitiveness and create developmental
strategies. The study also created the Index of Relative Rurality,
a numerical value calculated for each of the nation's 3,108
counties. This value shows where each county falls on a rural-urban
continuum and helps to identify locations where rural and metro
areas connect,” said a press
release. For the 227-page report, click
here.
Monday,
April 9, 2007
Biofuel
boom looks likely to raise food prices, and not just corn and
meat
The ethanol boom has driven up corn prices, raising
the prospect of higher costs for meat and other foods for which
corn is a feedstock, but less attention has been focused on
a spike in prices for soybean oil, a key ingredient in many
foods, including replacements for trans fat, and the source
of a major alternative to diesel fuel. Also, "Economists
say the diversion of acreage from soybeans to corn is shorting
supply and raising prices," reports Alicia
Karapetian of MeatingPlace.com, a news
service for the red-meat industry.
"The price of soybean oil has shot up more
than 50 percent since last fall. That, coupled with a dramatic
doubling of corn prices during the same period, has left companies
throughout the food chain feeling the pinch," Karapetian
writes. "Prices for soybeans, wheat, cotton and rice will go
up as we plant more and more acres out of those crops and into
corn," Ron Plain, an agricultural-economics professor at the
University of Missouri, told Delta
Farm Press.
"Soybean oil is used in many cooking oils,
including trans-fat-free oils now being used by some of the
nation's largest restaurant chains, such as Louisville, Ky.-based
KFC," Karapetian writes. Bob Evans
Farms Restaurants Purchasing and Commodities Director
Sam Cox told Karapetian that the company, which uses soybean
oil for cooking and salad dressings, will have to charge customers
more:"We won't be able to pass 100 percent of the price on,
but we will have to pass some on soon." (Read
more)
Friday,
April 6, 2007
Most
USDA Rural Development money goes to areas not really rural
More than half the $70 billion that the U.S.
Department of Agriculture's "sprawling but little-known
Rural Development program" has loaned or granted since
2001 "has gone to metropolitan regions or communities within
easy commuting distance of a midsize city, including beach resorts
and suburban developments," Gilbert Gaul and Sarah Cohen
of The Washington Post report today.
Their object examples are the coastal resort of
Provincetown and the island resorts of Martha's Vineyard and
Nantucket, in Massachusetts -- all of which meet the department's
definition of "rural." Provincetown (in Chamber
of Commerce photo above) got grants and loans to refurbish
a city dock and a historic home, and add space to a gallery.
A business in the Vineyard got a loan to refinance and expand,
and families in Nantucket who are priced out of the rental market
by the island's strong tourist trade get housing subsidies.
Such aid was "originally intended for farmland
and backwoods areas that were isolated and poor, struggling
to keep their heads above water," the Post notes. Its investigation
found that "More than three times as much money went to
metropolitan areas with populations of 50,000 or more ($30.3
billion) as to poor or shrinking rural counties ($8.6 billion).
Recreational or retirement communities alone got $8.8 billion.
. . . An Internet provider in Houston got $23 million in loans
to wire affluent subdivisions, including one that boasts million-dollar
houses and an equestrian center."
Rural Development has more than 40 programs, with
varying rules. "In some programs, awards are limited to
towns with populations of less than 2,500. In others, it's 5,000,
10,000, 20,000 or 50,000. In still other cases, the USDA bases
its decisions on individual streets or blocks, using census
data." J. Gregory Greco, a business specialist in the Rural
Development office in Harrisburg, Pa., told the Post, "Nobody
understands it. I don't understand it." It's a long story, but
worth reading. Click
here. For a USDA release on Agriculture Secretary Mike Johanns
discussing proposed changes in the program, in the Farm Bill,
click
here.
Saturday,
March 10, 2007
Dozens
of coal-fired power plants being built, scores more on the way
More than a dozen coal-fired generating plants
are under construction, mainly in the Midwest, "and about
40 others are likely to start up within five years --
the biggest wave of coal plant construction since the 1970s,"
reports Steven Mufson of The Washington Post.
"The coal rush in America's heartland is
on a collision course with Congress. While lawmakers are drawing
up ways to cap and reduce emissions of greenhouse gases, the
Energy Department says as many as 150 new coal-fired plants
could be built by 2030, adding volumes to the nation's emissions
of carbon dioxide, the most prevalent of half a dozen greenhouse
gases scientists blame for global warming. . . . Utility executives
say that the coal expansion is needed to meet rising electricity
demand as the U.S. population and economy grow. Coal-fired plants
provide half the electricity supply in the country."
Environmentalists worry that large coal plants,
"built to last 40 to 50 years, will saddle the country
with high greenhouse-gas emissions for decades. Peabody
Energy, for instance, has proposed two giant 1,500
megawatt plants, one for western Kentucky and one for southern
Illinois. . . . Environmentalists prefer integrated gasification
combined cycle (IGCC) plants that they say will make it easier
later to capture carbon dioxide and store it underground. Only
a handful of those are being planned. But the IGCC plants can
add as much as $200 million to construction costs; only two
are operating today." (Read
more)
TXU Corp. said yesterday it would
use IGCC at two new Texas plants. The decision by the company,
which shelved eight of 11 proposed plants in a buyout deal,
"may signal a shift in the thinking of utilities that depend
on coal to generate energy to try to develop a challenging technology
that is accompanied by high construction costs," write
Clifford Krauss and Matthew Wald of The New York Times.
(Read
more)
Tobacco
migrating off mountains in N.C.; a local story in several states
The end of the federal tobacco program is concentrating
production among large-scale growers and reducing the amount
grown in hilly areas where large tracts are more difficult to
assemble. That trend is illustrated by figures on production
of burley tobacco in North Carolina and its Watauga County,
reported by Scott Nicholson of The Watauga Democrat
in Boone, N.C. This is a story that can be done by
any news outlet in a tobacco-growing county, with data from
the local office of the federal Farm Service Agency.
“Local tobacco production continued to decline
even though last year the state had a historic high production
of burley tobacco, the kind most often grown in the High Country,”
Nicholson reports. “Statewide burley tobacco production
totaled 6.46 million pounds last year, a 31 percent increase.
Yield per acre averaged 50 pounds more than the 2005 crop, suggesting
large-scale farmers were achieving more efficiency.” Those
boys down East ... picked up the slack,” FSA man Bud Smith
told Nicholson. “Burley just migrated off the mountain.”
Eastern North Carolina production has been almost entirely flue-cured,
but the end of federal quotas has allowed growers in the region
to adopt burley, which is in higher demand by cigarette companies.
Those growers were already large-scale, making it relatively
easy for them “to find barns and other covered, dry buildings”
for burley, which is air-cured, Nicholson explains, quoting
Smith. “They’re not growing two or four or six acres
like we did up here. They have 50 or 80 or 100 acres.”
(Read
more)
Thursday,
March 8, 2007
Energy
Department jump-starts six cellulosic ethanol plants with funds
Six biorefinery projects will split Department
of Energy grants of up to $385 million as part of an
effort to jump-start commercially viable ethanol made from cellulose,
reports Agri-Pulse. The Rural Blog previously
noted funding for Broin Companies of Sioux
Falls, S.D., which will expand a plant in Emmetsburg, Iowa,
to make ethanol from corn fiber, cobs and stalks. Here are the
other grantees and their feedstocks:
•Abengoa Bioenergy Biomass of Kansas,
LLC of Chesterfield, Mo.- proposed plant in Kansas.
Feedstock: corn stover, wheat straw, milo stubble, and switchgrass.
• ALICO, Inc. of LaBelle, Fla.- proposed
plant in LaBelle, Fla. Feedstock: yard, wood, and vegetative
wastes and eventually energycane.
• BlueFire Ethanol, Inc. of Irvine, Cal.-
proposed plant in Southern California. Feedstock: sorted green
waste and wood waste from landfills.
• Iogen Biorefinery Partners, LLC
of Arlington, Va.- proposed plant in Shelley, Ida. Feedstock:
wheat straw, barley straw, corn stover, switchgrass, and rice
straw.
• Range Fuels (formerly Kergy
Inc.) of Broomfield, Colo.- proposed plant in Soperton,
Ga. Feedstock: wood residues and wood based energy crops.
UPDATE, March 30: Broin
has changed its name to Poet, reports the Argus Leader of Sioux
Falls.
Wednesday,
March 7, 2007
FCC
orders rural phone companies to connect calls using Internet
The Federal Communications Commission
has ruled that rural telephone companies must connect calls
for customers who use voice-over-Internet protocol (VoIP). The
order was a victory for cable-TV operators who depend on VoIP
for revenue, reportsBroadcast Engineering magazine.
"The decision breaks down of one of the last
barriers preventing VoIP to fully compete with traditional phone
carriers," letting them offer national phone service, BE
reports." The commission ordered rural service providers
in Nebraska and South Carolina to connect telephone calls made
by customers of Time Warner's VoIP service.
State regulators had argued that because the FCC had not classified
VoIP providers as telecom services, the local telephone companies
did not have to honor their phone calls."
The National Telephone Cooperative Association,
a lobby for rural phone companies, called the order "piecemeal
regulation that gives VoIP providers a distinct competitive
advantage by providing them with local-number portablity without
requiring them to pay for the costs they impose on telecom networks,"
creating "an inequitable playing field that favors Time
Warner and the cable industry." (Read
more)
Monday,
March 5, 2007
Railroad
seeks big expansion to tap into Wyoming coal country
Dakota, Minnesota & Eastern Railroad
wants to create the biggest U.S. rail expansion in
decades in order to create easy access to Wyoming's Powder River
Basin. The company proved unsuccessful in getting a $2.3 billion
loan from the Federal Railroad Administration but
is seeking out private investors. If it manages to expand, it
would benefit the utilities of that region, creating another
coal carrier for power plants, reports The Associated
Press.
“It's been almost 10 years since DM&E,
a regional carrier with an east-west line across Minnesota and
South Dakota, said it wanted to add 260 miles of new track to
extend its line into Wyoming coal country,” reports AP.
DM&E had hoped to be hauling 100 tons of coal a year by
now but have encountered difficulties in environmental and regulatory
approvals.
“Much of the attention on DM&E has been
focused on environmental issues and whether its tracks through
Rochester are dangerously close to the Mayo Clinic,” reports
AP. “But its financial impact would be major, too. Utilities
are major buyers of coal from Wyoming's Powder River Basin,
but two-thirds of coal's cost is transportation. And that is
controlled by the Burlington Northern and Union
Pacific duopoly on coal hauling there.” (Read
more)
Thursday,
March 1, 2007
$365
million in grants given for cellulosic ethanol; first commercial
plant?
Six companies have received a total of $365 million
from the U.S. Department of Energy to develop
commercially viable distilleries that make ethanol from cellulose
rather than corn. The process of extracting ethanol from fibrous
plant matter is still difficult and expensive, but if perfected
it would open vast opportunities for fuel sources, reports Ben
Shouse of the Argus Leader in Sioux Falls,
S.D.
Broin Companies of Sioux Falls
will get $80 million for what it says will be the nation's first
commercially viable plant to make cellulosic ethanol. “Broin's
share will go toward a $200 million expansion of its existing
corn-ethanol facility in Emmetsburg, Iowa,” writes Shouse.
“It could start accepting stalks, leaves and cobs in addition
to grain by 2009. And it could spawn similar plants as early
as 2011, said Chief Executive Officer Jeff Broin.” The
facility will still use corn but will utilize “stover
and portions of the kernel that are currently wasted as feedstocks
for the cellulosic process,” writes Peter Shinn of Brownfield
Network.
Unlike corn, cellulose resists breakdown and has
to be freed from a complex of other molecules. Hydrolysis, the
process of breaking down cellulose into sugars with enzymes,
has not yet been perfected and researchers are still working
on the microorganisms used to ferment the sugar. The technology
to harvest the materials is also under development. If the technology
expands it could create revenue for farmers growing corn, who
could then sell the waste parts of their corn in addition to
the kernels, switchgrass or nearly any crop, Shouse reports.
Wednesday,
Feb. 28, 2007
Pay
and incentives increase as miners worldwide come into demand
“From the pits of Australia to the coal
fields of Wyoming, mining companies . . . are hunting for people
to address a dire shortage of workers,” reports The
New York Times. “A decade ago, with prices slumping,
the sense of mining as a sunset industry left it with a work
force with a lot of gray hair under its hardhats. But these
days the industry is struggling to meet rapidly growing global
demand for iron, copper and other essential commodities.”
“Skills shortages have become a common feature
of the global economy, particularly in aging countries,”
write Wayne Arnold and Heather Timmons. “Nurses are scarce;
engineers, too. What makes the mining industry’s shortages
so severe is that the commodities boom caught it more or less
by surprise… As commodity prices languished, students
pursued better-paying careers elsewhere. Mining schools shrank.
The average age of a production worker in mining crept up to
50.” However, growing countries with booming populations
such as China and India have driven up demand for ore and other
commodities.
“Mining recruiters say industry salaries
have climbed 20 percent in the last two years,” the Times
says. “Yet mines are so short of workers that projects
are being delayed as production costs rise.” Need for
skilled workers to run mining equipment has exacerbated the
problem. Mining companies are offering scholarships to recruit
employees. More women have entered mining, attracted by bigger
pay, and guest workers are brought in on temporary visas. In
Australia, miners who might be reluctant to live on remote sites
in harsh weather work alternating weeks and are flown back and
forth to their families at home. (Read
more)
Saturday,
Feb. 24, 2007
Farm
wives supplement family income; 80 percent comes from off farm
Throughout the Midwest, women are supplementing
their families’ agricultural incomes by taking off-farm
jobs. “In an industry where income relies on unpredictable
weather, harvest seasons and competing larger farms, a second
paycheck can mean the difference between thriving and just surviving,”
reports Reuters. For farm families, 80 percent
of their income comes from off-farm employment, estimates the
American Farm Bureau Federation, and women
work off the farm more often than men, writes Dianna Heitz.
According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture's
2005 Family Farm Report, their extra income averages about $30,000
per year.
Judith Wittner, a sociology professor at Loyola
University Chicago, said competition from commercial
farming has driven members farming families to enter the workforce.
“Family farms have all but disappeared in this country,
and farmers have been reduced to working for pay on their former
land or working in available wage labor jobs in the area,”
Wittner told Reuters. “This is especially true of women,
who take work in factories and offices to make ends meet when
farm incomes decline or disappear.”
Friday,
Feb. 16, 2007
Rural
cooperatives partner with for-profit utilities; takeover targets?
Rural electric cooperatives are not-for-profit,
but may be attractive targets for those that are. “Some
rural cooperatives are sitting in prime locations within a stone's
throw from major metropolitan areas and within the grasp of
the local investor-owned utility (IOU). And while there may
be a strong argument to be made that a not-for-profit might
become more efficient if it were owned by shareholders, the
odds of that happening any time soon are quite small. While
rural electrics are well equipped to fend off takeovers, many
of them are entering into partnerships with the IOUs to procure
long-term power contracts,” writes Ken Silverstein of
EnergyBiz Insider.
“The National Rural Utilities Cooperative
Finance Corp. estimates that over the next five years
there will be about $1.5 billion to $2 billion per year spent
by the generation and transmission cooperatives to build new
power plants,” writes Silverstein. “Other rural
co-ops will form strategic alliances with wholesale power suppliers
and specifically IOUs.… Critics of rural electric cooperatives
say that they are inherently inefficient and that their business
plans are outdated. IOUs, by comparison, don't just have greater
economies of scale but they are also positioned to participate
in debt and equity markets to gain the much needed capital for
future expansion. The biggest cooperatives, they add, are on
the periphery of major cities where private utilities could
do a better job of serving customers and modernizing their infrastructure.”
Members of at least one rural electric co-op,
in Louisiana, sold out to an IOU after the co-op performed poorly
during and after a disaster. “The idea may sound good,”
Tom Siegrist, a vice president with the consulting group EnerVision,
told EnergyBiz Insider. “But rural electric cooperatives
are not low-hanging fruit, and pursuing hostile takeovers is
not a successful strategy. Co-ops are not-for-profit. They make
a small margin and return that to the customers. Customer service
levels are also much higher and much stronger. The trend now
is for the two to partner.” (Read
more)
Thursday,
Feb. 15, 2007
Organic
farming is small, but is growing fast, including livestock
“It’s still a small proportion of
farm land, but organic farming continues to be one of the fastest
growing segments of U.S. agriculture,” writes Sara Wyant
of Agri-Pulse. “The U.S. had under a
million acres of certified organic farmland when Congress passed
the Organic Foods Production Act of 1990. By the time USDA implemented
national organic standards in 2002, certified organic farmland
had doubled, and doubled again between 2002 and 2005, according
to a recent report by USDA’s Economic Research
Service. For the first time, all 50 states in the U.S.
had some certified organic farmland in 2005. California ranked
first in terms of acreage, with over 220,000 acres and North
Dakota came in second. U.S. producers dedicated over 4 million
acres of farmland -- 2.3 million acres of cropland and 1.7 million
acres of rangeland and pasture -- to organic production systems
in 2005.”
“Many U.S. producers are embracing organic
farming in order to lower input costs, conserve resources, capture
high-value markets, and boost farm income, according to ERS,”
writes Wyant. “However, the overall adoption level is
still low — only about 0.5 percent of all U.S. cropland
and 0.5 percent of all U.S. pasture was certified organic in
2005. ... Only a small percentage of the top U.S. field crops
-- corn (0.2 percent), soybeans (0.2 percent), and wheat (0.5
percent) -- were grown under certified organic farming systems.
On the other hand, organic carrots (6 percent of U.S. carrot
acreage), organic lettuce (4 percent), organic apples (3 percent)
and other fruit and vegetable crops were more commonly organic
grown in 2005. Organic livestock was beginning to catch up with
produce in 2005, says ERS, with 1 percent of U.S. dairy cows
and 0.6 percent of the layer hens managed under certified organic
systems.”
Tuesday,
Feb. 13, 2007
A weak
dollar can be a strong advantage for U.S. agricultural exports
American farm exports may benefit from a weak
dollar and the prosperity of other nations, giving produce grown
stateside a competitive advantage when pitted against those
in other countries. “Between February 2002 and May 2006,
the U.S. dollar depreciated almost 18 percent against foreign
currencies. When the dollar appreciates against foreign currencies,
U.S. exports cost more in foreign local currencies and thus
demand for them declines. Conversely, a depreciation of the
dollar increases U.S. agricultural competitiveness by lowering
prices of U.S. products in foreign markets,” write Mathew
Shane and William Liefert of Amber Waves, a
publication of the Agriculture Department's
Economic Research Service.
“The decline in the U.S. exchange rate since
2000 has helped boost U.S. agricultural exports to an all-time
high of close to $70 billion per year,” write Shane and
Liefert. “However, almost all of the depreciation is accounted
for by appreciation of currencies in developed countries such
as the European Union (EU), Australia, Canada, and South Korea.”
U.S. agriculture exports lose out in the many developing countries
that purposefully depreciate their currencies against the dollar
to keep a trade advantage. “Developing countries’
commodities and goods have thus become particularly competitive
in the U.S. market, while U.S. agricultural exports have become
more difficult to market in those countries. As a result, these
countries (mostly in Asia) have generated substantial trade
surpluses mirrored by trade deficits for the United States.”
“Yet, other longer term factors can help
boost U.S. agricultural exports,” write Shane and Liefert.
“High income growth in developing countries is the most
important. However, pursuing and maintaining high rates of productivity
growth in U.S. agriculture is equally important. These two factors
combine to create a strong potential for the future growth in
U.S. agricultural exports regardless of how the exchange rate
fluctuates in the short to medium term.” (Read
more)
Saturday,
Feb. 10, 2007
Railroads
stressed by boom in ethanol, which can't go into pipelines
“Like the corn it's made from, ethanol is largely a product
of the small-town Midwest, distilled in places like Nevada,
Iowa, and shipped to market by train. Now, as ethanol producers
ramp up production, they are straining railroads already taxed
by burgeoning shipments of coal, containers and grain. And they
worry that the transportation crunch could make it difficult
for ethanol, despite its surge of support in Washington, to
compete with energy rivals,” writes Ilan Brat of The
Wall Street Journal.
“Unlike gasoline, natural gas and oil, ethanol
attracts water and other chemicals, so it can't be sent through
the long-established pipelines that move those fuels. That means
the ethanol industry has been forced into a marriage with the
already groaning railroads, Railroad executives say ethanol,
though still a small part of their total freight traffic, promises
to be a lucrative growth opportunity,” writes Brat. Ethanol
shipments have almost tripled since 2001 and are projected to
increase another third this year, says the Association
of American Railroads. “Some railroads question
the durability of the ethanol boom,” Brat notes. “Oil
prices could drop, corn supplies could dwindle and alternatives
could crop up.”
Many ethanol producers are struggling to upgrade
their rail facilities, but “Many of the producing plants
aren't large enough or lack the track and facilities to fill
unit trains themselves,” writes Brat. “That is forcing
the producers to shell out millions on tracks and equipment
they hadn't planned to spend. Lately, large railroads have used
their newfound market power to raise prices on many commodities
they carry. For producers it comes at a time when high corn
prices are squeezing their margins.”
Monday,
Jan. 29, 2007
Ethnic
veggies may open a new market with higher profits for farmers
“The explosion of immigrant populations
is fueling the growth of ethnic vegetables like cilantro and
bok choy, giving farmers new, and potentially more profitable,
revenue streams to add to their American staples of corn, sweet
peppers and tomatoes. They'll have less competition for this
narrow niche, crops that an ethnic population would have consumed
in their home country, now growing in small quantities in the
U.S,” writes Janet Frankston Lorin of The Associated
Press.
“Today's niche market is the future mainstream
market,” Bill Sciarappa, a Rutgers University
agricultural extension agent, part of a team helping
farmers produce and market ethnic produce, told AP. “That's
what gave me the idea 20 years ago when I saw farmers switch
over to cilantro from parsley. It was the same growth pattern,
same planting culture, same harvest procedures, but you got
twice the money then. We see the cycle repeated over and over
again,” he said, adding that ethnic veggies can be more
profitable than regular ones, depending on market conditions.
For example, eggplant averages $10 a box, but ethnic versions
can go for $30.
“Farmers are getting help from agricultural
experts at Rutgers, using a market-driven approach determined
by census data, economic forecasting and bilingual surveys of
consumers,” writes Lorin. “The plan is to create
a blueprint that would develop a market along the East Coast
-- including Connecticut, New Jersey, Florida and Georgia --
to link growers with ethnic markets. Farmers would produce potentially
more profitable vegetables like bok choy, tomatillos and bitter
gourd that can be successfully grown in their own local markets.”
Friday,
Jan. 26, 2007
Cheap
land, lack of zoning can attract unusual residents to rural
towns
In Kansas and elsewhere, rural properties bought
up by city dwellers and urban interests may create some unusual
and unexpected neighbors for small-town residents. The downtown
of Rexford, Kan., population 157, was purchased and turned into
a religious conference center. St John, Kan., pop. 1,318, became
the site of a national bounty hunting school. “That's
the gamble small towns make when they offer what they have in
abundance: cheap, attractive real estate. What they can get
in return is city dwellers trying to escape crowds, crime and
high prices -- city dwellers with different ideas and a different
outlook on life,” writes Beccy Tanner of the Wichita
Eagle.
“If you don't think real estate in small
towns is a desirable investment, visit eBay,”
writes Tanner. “These buildings pop up when you search
for properties in Kansas: • A wooded homesite in Neosho
Rapids, pop. 274, with a high bid of $152. • A restaurant
that seats 60 in downtown LaCrosse, pop. 1,376, with a high
bid of $30,000. • A 23,500-square-foot brick school building
and 3.85 acres of land in Sylvan Grove, pop. 324, advertised
for $188,000.”
“Often rural communities can't afford economic
development directors," Tanner writes. "They may have
little or no zoning regulation, and they usually have dwindling
populations. That makes them extremely vulnerable, said Caleb
Asher, director of communications and marketing for the Kansas
Department of Commerce.” Kirk Schweitzer, director
of the chamber of commerce of Hill City, Kan., pop. 1,604, told
Tanner his job sometimes involves rejecting potential business.
“Out here, even if I do an industrial park and give away
the land for free, there is still no reason for them to be here
when they can go down the road and for $500 an acre buy farmland
with no zoning and put up an oil-field pipe business,”
he told the Eagle.
Thursday,
Jan. 25, 2007
Small,
very light jets may improve dwindling air service in rural areas
The solution to sparse rural airline service may
be a new model of tiny, affordable jet planes. The U.S.
Department of Transportation is examining the use of
“very light jets” which may help to counter the
cut-backs of large carriers in smaller airports, reports Doug
Cameron of Financial Times.
Andrew Steinberg, assistant secretary for aviation
and transportation affairs, said that “reduced rural services
had been one of the largest negative consequences of industry
deregulation, with the DOT forced to boost subsidies and examine
alternatives to operation by the large network carriers,”
writes Cameron. Concerns arose after reviewing US Airways’
hostile takeover bid for Delta. Wednesday,
senators discussed the “potential impact on air fares
and consumer choice, and expressed widespread concern that deals
between the largest carriers would lead to further service cuts.”
“New Mexico-based Eclipse Aviation,
whose backers include Microsoft founder Bill
Gates, has already secured more than 2,500 orders for its six-seat
Eclipse 500 very light jet,” writes Cameron. “It
delivered its first aircraft earlier this month, and a number
of air-taxi and charter operators have placed orders for the
Eclipse and rival VLJs targeted mainly at business flyers…
The Eclipse 500 is the first of an array of very light jets,
which utilize new engines, avionics and lean manufacturing techniques
to produce small jets at a fraction of the cost of existing
executive aircraft. Proponents of the emerging VLJ sector believe
the low entry and operating costs will create a vast new market
of personal and business users currently deterred by high prices.”
Thursday,
Jan. 18, 2007
Study
says rural areas would benefit from minimum-wage increase
As the Senate prepares to pass the first increase
in the minimum wage in a decade, the Carsey Institute
at the University of New Hampshire says the
raise "would benefit rural, low-wage workers every bit
as much, if not more, than workers in big cities," contrary
to some policymakers' beliefs.
The House voted by a wide margin Jan. 11 to raise
the minimum wage from $5.15 an hour to $7.25. The debate in
the House "showed U.S. policy-makers tend to think of the
minimum wage as applying mainly to unskilled young people who
work in the fast-food industry in impoverished urban neighborhoods,"
but the Carsey Institute will release a study Friday morning
that it says shows otherwise, it said in a news release.
Institute Director Mil Duncan and Senior Fellow
William O'Hare will discuss the study in a teleconference Friday
from 10:30 to 11 a.m. Eastern time. The number is 1-866-704-7500
and the passcode is 800585.
"Nearly 2 million low-wage workers in rural
America would benefit from an increase in the minimum wage and
more than half of them have children under age 18 in the household,"
O'Hare said in a the release. Duncan said, "Members of
Congress need to understand the important impact an increase
in the minimum wage will have on all of their constituents,
including those in rural areas. The minimum wage is not just
a big city issue. A higher percentage of rural workers will
benefit from the proposed $7.25 minimum wage."
Monday,
Jan. 15, 2007
World
nears a milestone: Next year, most humans will live in cities
"Fifty
years ago, most people lived in rural areas. But the world has
changed. By some point next year, more than half of all people
will live in cities, for the first time in history. So says
the most recent estimate from the United Nations."
So reports the Voice of America.
"City life is not always a bad thing, but
many experts worry about this process of urbanization. A new
report from the Worldwatch Institute says it
is having a huge effect on human health and the quality of the
environment. The environmental research group in Washington
released its 2007 State of the World report last week."
(Read
more)
Thursday,
Jan. 4, 2007
New
study details promise and limits of biofuels for the rural economy
Biofuels, mainly ethanol distilled from corn and
diesel fuel from soybean oil, have been primarily a Midwestern
phenomenon. In the near future, more biofuels are expected to
some from a wide range of other plant material and organic feedstocks,
expanding the impact of biofuels nationwide, says a new report
by Jim Kleinschmit for the Carsey Institute at
the University of New Hampshire.
"Politicians and proponents tout the potential
for biofuels to stimulate rural job creation and economic growth
and increase energy independence as key reasons for providing
public support for the industry," Kleinschmit writes. "But
in the rush to grow the sector, the benefits to rural communities
may be muted
or lost if federal, state and local policies and programs that
help determine the sector’s ownership, scale and structure
do not sufficiently support rural development priorities."
The study notes that "biofuels will be high on Congress'
2007 agenda, with the rewriting of the Farm Bill."
The study says David Morris of the Institute
for Local Self-Reliance "presents the most compelling
and detailed approach for rural community development through
the emerging bio-based sector. Ownership of the refineries by
local farmers and community members is seen as the key aspect
to sustainable rural
development. Local ownership assures that the facility is based
to some extent on local resources and needs, and that much of
the money generated remains in the local economy." Click
here to read the study.
Past
Blog Items on Broadband:
USDA
says new rules will spur broadband in more places that lack
it
Since
2001, more than half of the money in the U.S. Department
of Agriculture's broadband program has gone to metropolitan
regions or communities within easy commutes of a mid-size city,
according to The
Washington Post. Today, USDA proposed new rules
for the program that Under Secretary for Rural Development Thomas
Dorr said "will improve broadband coverage in rural America."
"The
aim of the rules is to get funding and support to areas that
need it most," Carolina-Virginia Farmer reports.
USDA said the proposed rules would promote deployment to areas
with little or no high-speed Internet service; ensure that residents
in funded areas get access to broadband more quickly; limit
funding in urban areas and areas where a significant share of
the market is served by incumbent providers; clarify and streamline
equity and marketing survey requirements; increase transparency
in the application process; promote better understanding of
application requirements; and ensure that funding is keeping
pace with increasing demand for bandwidth. For the USDA press
release, click
here.
Wednesday,
May 2, 2007
Rural
broadband program criticized for doing too little to spread
service
A federal program to bring broadband to rural
areas may be not be doing as much as intended. Members of a
House committee yesterday that the rural broadband program is
passing over many areas still left without high-speed Internet
while giving hundreds of millions in loans to providers in areas
that already have service. The rural broadband program was created
by Congress in 2002. Of 69 loans totaling $1.2 billion, only
40 percent went to underserved areas, report Dan Morgan and
Gilbert Gaul of The Washington Post.
The Department of Agriculture’s
Rural Development program has been criticized for not doing
enough for truly rural areas. The Post reports, “Since
2001, more than half the money has gone to metropolitan regions
or communities within easy commutes of a mid-size city. An Internet
provider in Houston got $23 million in loans to wire affluent
subdivisions, including one that boasts million-dollar houses
and an equestrian center.”
The USDA has been working since late 2005 on new
regulations to target the broadband program to rural areas in
need, but the new rules won’t be revealed until they are
published, said a spokesman for the USDA's Rural Development
division, report Morgan and Gaul. “Last week, Rep. Stephanie
Herseth Sandlin (D-S.D.) introduced legislation to close loopholes
that allow areas that ‘are neither rural nor suffer a
lack of service’ to collect the loans and loan guarantees.”
(Read
more)
Friday,
March 23, 2007
New
bill would designate unused airwaves for wireless broadband
Internet
Legislation proposed in the U.S. House this week
would allocate unused television channels for use by broadband
Internet by 2009. The move could possibly provide affordable
services to millions of Americans, particularly those in rural
areas. The bill mandates a final decision to be made by the
beginning of October. A similar bill failed last year, reports
the Associated Press, but Democrats now control
Congress.
“Under the measure, the Federal
Communications Commission would be required to permit
usage of the unused TV spectrum, also known as ‘white
spaces,’ for Internet broadband service as long as it
doesn't interfere with television programming,” reports
AP. New technology has been developed that can transmit within
these spaces and a coalition has submitted a prototype device
to the FCC for testing. However, television broadcasters are
doubtful of the device, concerned that it may interfere with
meeting their federal requirement to transition from analog
to digital signals in 2009.
House
Dems to review telecom, including broadband, net neutrality
House Democrats will be taking a look at telecommunications
and media policies, including several oversight hearings and
planning new legislation. “Fostering high-speed Internet
deployment, ensuring an open and accessible Internet, and overhauling
the federal universal service program that subsidizes telecom
connections in rural and impoverished areas are among the key
issues to be addressed,” reports National Journal’s
Insider Update. “The competitiveness of the video,
telephone and radio marketplaces also will be explored, along
with protecting the privacy of phone records and promoting efficient
use of spectrum.”
“[There] won't be a stand-alone net neutrality
bill, and that's a good thing because it won't pass,”
Gigi Sohn, president of Public Knowledge, a
watchdog group which supports the concept told David Hatch of
Insider Update. “Observers said net neutrality might be
added to a broader bill or to various related measures, such
as privacy or antitrust vehicles,” writes Hatch. “They
cautioned that, given the controversy surrounding the issue,
Democrats would move slowly.”
House Democrats will examine several Federal
Communications Commission policies, including media-ownership
limits and investigating allegations that the National
Security Agency conducted surveillance of phone records
without warrants, as well as a FCC decision to relax video-franchising
guidelines, reports Hatch. The Democrats' agenda calling for
“universal, affordable broadband access within five years”
will be part of the upcoming telecom legislation. “The
Bush administration has pledged to achieve that goal by the
end of 2007, but critics say they are not on track.”
The Institute for Rural Journalism and Community Issues helps non-metropolitan media define the public agenda in their communities,
through strong reporting and commentary on local issues and
on broader issues that have local impact. Its initial focus
area is Central Appalachia, but as an arm of the University
of Kentucky it has a statewide mission, and it has national
scope. Cooperating institutions include Appalachian State University,
East Tennesee State University, Eastern Kentucky University,
Marshall University, the University of North Carolina-Chapel
Hill, the University of Tennessee-Knoxville and West Virginia
University. To get notices of Rural Blog postings and
other Institute news, click here.
