Quick hits: Cigarette smoking hits record low; hay rescue for ranchers hit by wildfires; rodeo women return; Yonder Radio

Less than 10% of Americans reported smoking cigarettes
in 2024. (Photo by A. Siimon, Unsplash)

For the first time in recorded U.S. history, the number of Americans who smoke cigarettes has dipped below 10%, reports Sarah Todd for STAT. While the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention collected the data, the U.S. government took the unusual step of releasing it without scientific comment. The lack of a CDC analysis led independent analysts at the digital New England Journal of Medicine Evidence to synthesize the information, which turned out to be good news. "It shows that 9.9% of U.S. adults reported smoking cigarettes in 2024, down from 10.8% in 2023. E-cigarette use remained unchanged from the previous year at 7%."

Wildfires in drought-stricken parts of the U.S. can threaten ranchers' livelihoods by burning through vast swaths of grassland meant to feed a cattle herd, forcing livestock owners to purchase feed or sell livestock. But recently, ranchers have been getting a helping hand from Farm Rescue’s 'Operation Hay Lift,' which steps in and provides free hay, including its delivery, to "help ranchers who lost pasture and feed supplies," reports Jennifer M. Latzke of Kansas Farmer. "With the recent historic wildfires burning more than 701,000 acres across Nebraska, Operation Hay Lift is likely to expand."

Unlike this 1981 couple, some Reese's fans aren't 
as excited about new ingredient mix-ups. 

Once upon a time, when chocolate and peanut butter crashed into each other, it was a happy accident. At least, that's how the 1981 Reese's peanut butter cup ad told the story. But when Reese's food designers create new shapes or design twists, known as "line extensions," not everyone appreciates the new mix-ups. Jonathan Deutsch for The Conversation explains, "Brad Reese, grandson of the founder, issued an open letter criticizing the Hershey Company for introducing line extensions – in this case, mini hearts for Valentine’s Day, with the flavors familiar to Reese’s lovers but made with cheaper ingredients, such as “chocolate candy” and “peanut butter creme.” While Brad Reese and other vocal Reese's fans may not like the ingredient switches, it's a common food industry practice.

The past few years have burdened many American farmers with high costs and low incomes. Farmers' stress can increase with every extreme weather event, fertilizer cost increase or spiking fuel price. It's good to remember that the Farm Aid Hotline (1-800-FARM-AID) is available Monday–Friday to farmers across the U.S. The Farm Aid Hotline connects farmers with resources for stress, legal or financial issues. The AgriStress HelpLine (833-897-2474) is an option for farmers in Arizona, Colorado, Connecticut, Missouri, Montana, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Texas, Virginia, Washington and Wyoming. The free, confidential helpline is open 24/7.

Hali Williams, right, in action. She won RodeoHouston's breakaway 
roping title in 2026. (Photo by Mallory Beinborn, RodeoHouston)

If they'd waited for an invitation or a welcoming wave to take a seat on the horse, they'd still be waiting. "Rodeo said bronco riding wasn’t a sport for women. They got on anyway," reports Haley Potter for Offrange. "Rodeo has tried everything to keep women from it. . . . We were long limited to timed events like barrel racing. . . . Despite a deep history of women in roughstock going back well over a century, modern bronc riding has largely been a man’s game. . . . But all that is changing now."

           

It's new, it's all about rural, and it's served fresh every week. Say hello to Yonder Radio -- an hour-long show designed to cover current events and "feature nuanced stories that represent the 60 million people who live in rural America, and the distinct communities they call home," reports The Daily Yonder. Each topic will add depth to how news and events impact rural lives. Interviewees on the show will highlight arts, music and community projects geared toward rural audiences. Jared Ewy, a veteran radio personality and regular contributor to the Daily Yonder, is Yonder Radio's host. The show is also available as a podcast. If you’re a station interested in broadcasting Yonder Radio, get in contact with the team at info@yonderradio.com 

Quick hits: Bakery sign debate; global cheese demand; Marlboro man's mystique; discover the Stargazer Highway

Local art students created the bakery sign, but a code enforcement 
officer said it had to come down. (Leavitt's Country Bakery reel photo)

Even in closely-knit small towns, not everyone gets along. In Conway, New Hampshire, town officials and Sean Young, a bakery business owner, have been in a legal dust-up since Young installed a front signage mural made by local high school students. "But the town of Conway told Young the painting wasn’t a mural, it was a sign that exceeded the town’s legal size limit and would need to be taken down," reports Kyle Melnick of The Washington Post. "Young left the mural up, and sued the town the following year, claiming its ordinance violates the First Amendment." In May, a judge ruled that Leavitt’s Country Bakery sign, with its giant muffins, donuts and beaming sun, could stay.

The love of cheese products is going global, which is good news for American dairy farmers. "While domestic cheese sales remain soft, global cheese demand is accelerating rapidly," reports Taylor Leach of Daily Herd Management. "Much of that growth is coming from international restaurant menus that are incorporating cheese in new and creative ways. . . . Beyond cheese, other dairy products are gaining traction in international markets as well. Whey proteins and milk proteins, in particular, are seeing increased demand across Asia."

The Marlboro man 'was always adaptable to the times.'
(Philip Morris ad via MEL magazine)

Despite the illness and death cigarette smoking has caused, the Marlboro man remains a strong, stoic, and unequivocally American icon. "The Marlboro man was something of a chameleon, in that he took on multiple meanings and was always adaptable to the times — which, more than anything else, speaks to the durability of the cowboy in American culture," reports Brian VanHooker for MEL magazine. VanHooker shares the storied history of one of the most successful ad campaigns in U.S. history. "Twenty years later, while the Marlboro Man may evoke a sense of nostalgia for some due to its beautiful imagery of the West, for so many who have had a loved one die from smoking-related illnesses, he has a much darker legacy."

Department of Agricultural Secretary Brooke Rollins announced a listing of new Farm Service Agency and Rural Development state directors tasked with implementing the Trump administration's rural agenda. During her announcement, Rollins told reporters, "Our latest additions to the USDA family are personally invested in ensuring farmers and rural America prosper." Mariah Squire of Successful Farming provides a by-state listing of new appointees, with a limited look at their professional backgrounds.

The dark night skies of the Black Canyon in Gunnison National Park, Colorado.
(Photo by G. Owens, National Park Traveler)

America's National Parks offer visual experiences rarely found in other places. A group of photographers wanted to understand more about Native American spiritual history, so they set out across the National Park's path known as the "Stargazer Highway," Eric Jay Toll writes for National Park Traveler. "More than a dozen tribes have traditional lands through which the Stargazer Highway passes, and each has sacred tribal legends explaining the stars in the skies and lessons, consequences, and morals on Earth. . . . These stories [are] along the highway, better known as U.S. 191, and many of its side roads. The road runs 1,545 miles from Mexico to Canada through Arizona, Utah, Wyoming, and Montana, passing 24 national parks, monuments, and tribal parks."

IQOS is marketed as sophisticated and 'safer' than
burned tobacco. (Adobe Stock photo)

Phillip Morris has a slick-looking new tobacco product hitting U.S. markets. "The chicly futuristic branding of IQOS, a heated tobacco product owned by Philip Morris International, is one of several things worrying researchers and anti-tobacco advocates," reports Sarah Todd of STAT. "The company is rolling out pilots of the device. . . peddling IQOS (pronounced “eye-koss”) as the 'next step in tobacco harm reduction.' The company positions the devices as a better alternative for smokers compared to cigarettes." Health advocates don't agree with the company's sales pitch and say that savvy IQOS marketing could convince some people to start an unhealthy, addictive habit. 

Ticks can transmit diseases to humans.
(CDC photo)

The problem with ticks isn't that they look creepy; they spread illnesses with alarming efficiency. Every summer it's good to review the best ways to avoid and if needed, remove hitchhiker ticks. "These vile little creatures transmit Lyme disease, babesiosis, anaplasmosis, Rocky Mountain spotted fever, and ehrlichiosis, among others, and symptoms can range from swollen joints to meat allergies," report Annemarie Conte and Doug Mahoney of Wirecutter. Click here to read "their favorite picks and the advice to keep in mind as you head outdoors this summer."

U.S. Surgeon General outlines ways to address disparities among smokers, including many who are rural Americans

Secondhand smoke harms people who don't smoke.
 (Adobe Stock photo)

Over the past decade, the rate of U.S. adults and teens who smoke has hit its lowest level since 1965, but "disparities remain among the 36 million adults and 760,000 kids who smoke," reports Ken Alltucker of USA Today. U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy released a report that outlined identifiers for those who continue to smoke, which are often the same descriptors used to depict American rural populations: Poorer, less educated, Native American, and lacking access to medical care.

Native Americans, specifically those in Alaska, often live in some of the most remote pockets of the country, where medical access isn't readily available and many residents live in poverty. Alltucker writes, "Smoking is more common among American Indian and Alaska Native people than other racial and ethnic groups. . . . People living in poverty are more than twice as likely to smoke than those who earn non-poverty wages."

Rural populations tend to be heavier smokers than their urban counterparts, and the more rural residents smoke, the unhealthier their broader community becomes. Alltucker explains, "Because cigarette smoking and secondhand smoke kill nearly half a million people each year nationwide, Murthy said an accelerated effort is needed to limit disparities in smoking rates and reduce secondhand smoke."

The report also calls for "limiting the nicotine in cigarettes and other tobacco products to 'minimally addictive or nonaddictive levels,'" Alltucker reports. "Such a move could prevent more than 33 million people from starting to smoke. . ." This change could have a positive effect in rural populations where "kids are also more likely to start smoking at a much younger age and smoke daily, making addiction more severe and smoking harder to quit," the American Lung Association reports.

The Surgeon General's report "cited 2023 research that projected a nationwide ban on the sale and marketing of menthol cigarettes would prevent up to 654,000 deaths in the next four decades," Alltucker reports. But controlling the flow of cigarettes isn't going to happen overnight, and in the meantime, rural access to medical education and smoking cessation programs is needed.

Murthy told USA Today, "What's at stake are the lives of our kids and adults across America. Tobacco is the leading cause of preventable death in the country − 490,000 lives we lose every year to tobacco-related disease. Despite all the progress we've made, that remains the truth today."

As solar projects become more feasible in states like Ky., battle lines are drawn between farmers and preservationists

For the past six years, renewable energy companies have been approaching Kentucky farmers about leasing their land for three solar-power projects in different stages of development. "Solar energy represents a change for a commonwealth whose economic prospects have long been tied to labor-intensive industries like coal and tobacco. But that change is coming, through tax credits, infrastructure deals and climate change incentives," Melina Walling reports for Louisville's Courier Journal.

But not everyone is on board with the prospect. "As the projects move forward and more people learn about them, questions tend to arise — questions that the solar companies, which do not have a permanent liaison in this rural area, are not always on hand to answer," Walling reports.

That often leaves farmers who have signed up for solar leasing to educate and convince their neighbors that such a venture is legitimate—sometimes a difficult job when the projects aren't yet live and bringing in profits for farmers. But it's more than a question of whether solar power is viable. Many farmers feel that leasing their land is tantamount to losing it, Walling reports. Others just don't know enough about the process and say they need more input.

Solar is a winning idea, arguies Jim Waters of free-market think tank Bluegrass Institute for Public Policy Solutions. In a Courier Journal op-ed, he writes: "By embracing such plentiful but inexpensive power, Kentucky would have a clean, renewable supply of energy, allowing it to continue – as it’s did with coal – boasting some of the nation’s cheapest energy rates, keeping utility costs low and rendering ineffective calls for economically harmful policies like raising gas taxes for needed revenues."

However, the notion brings iffy rewards and needs more study, writes Will Mayer, the executive director of Clark Coalition, a land-use advocacy organization. "While the developers are quick to paint a picture of struggling farmers needing the income (that supposedly only solar can provide) the truth is somewhat more complex. In fact, many of those under-contract for solar development are absentee landowners, not farmers. By contrast, many of the farmers who actually make their living from the land will invariably suffer from the loss of their farm leases," Mayer writes in an op-ed for the Lexington Herald-Leader. "The uneven consequences of large solar facilities are further brought to focus by their impact on adjoining property owners. Contrary to developers’ claims that their facilities do not negatively affect nearby properties, independent valuation studies demonstrate they cause a decline of up to 30%. Industrial solar proposals are neither uniformly bad nor good – rather they are complex and demand a transparent analysis to ensure that they are sited appropriately, and that the associated benefits do not disproportionately accrue to the developers and outside interests while the real financial and environmental costs are borne by Kentuckians."

Quick hits: A look back at the "Field of Dreams' game; $19M for rural telehealth expansion; Indian may head Park Service

Here's a roundup of stories with rural resonance; if you do or see similar work that should be shared on The Rural Blog, email heather.chapman@uky.edu.

The "Field of Dreams" baseball game in Iowa on Aug. 12 put a spotlight on agriculture and the Midwest. Read more here.

The Agriculture Department is seeking public comments on its new IT system for managing civil rights discrimination complaints lodged against USDA programs and partners. Read more here.

A Native American may become the first director of the National Park Service. Charles F. "Chuck" Sams III, whom President Biden nominated on Wednesday, is a Navy veteran who has worked in non-profit natural resource and conservation management for over 25 years. Read more here.

Much of the growth in H-2A visas comes from tobacco mecca North Carolina. That means more immigrant farmworkers are getting nicotine poisoning. Read more here.

Also in North Carolina: Military veterans are lobbying the state legislature to legalize medical marijuana for pain, PTSD and more. It's an advocacy model that has worked in other states. Read more here.

The Biden administration is distributing over $19 million in grants to expand telehealth in rural and other underserved communities. Read more here.

Fall kicks in on the farm with pond-building and cow pedicures. Read more here.

Quick hits: Black Appalachian music; cicada cooking; long-term agricultural issues; longing for your hometown

Want a snack? Cicadas could be on the menu.
(Washington Post photo by Allison Dinner)

Here's a roundup of stories with rural resonance; if you do or see similar work that should be shared on The Rural Blog, email heather.chapman@uky.edu.

President Biden has a 23 percent approval rating among white evangelicals, according to new data from the Pew Research Center. In general, Biden's approval rating among various religious affiliations is nearly the reverse of former President Trump's at the same point in his presidency. Read more here.

Insects could be the wave of the future for cheap protein in animal feed. But if you want to give it a whirl yourself, here's how to catch and cook cicadas (which will soon be plentiful as the Brood X batch surfaces after 17 years). Read more here.

A new study evaluates how laws banning tobacco-product sales to people under 21 have affected electronic cigarette use in rural and urban youth. Read more here.

The Agricultural Economic Insights team lists of the top 10 "front burner" issues that could affect the farm economy for years to come. That includes the pandemic, lingering effects of African swine fever, child nutrition policy, and immigrant-related farm-labor issues. Read the rest here.

A lawsuit by doctors who advocate plant-based diets claims Department of Agriculture dietary guidelines are driven by meat and dairy marketing concerns, not nutrition. Read more here.

More small towns are offering cash bonuses and more to attract new residents. Read more here.

Kids with a desk and a quiet place to study do better in school, research shows. Read more here.

Research shows that California's carbon-credit system actually allowed polluters to add millions of tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. Read more here.

The Smoky Mountain Air podcast is kicking off a new series exploring Black Appalachian music. Listen to the first episode here.

Apply for one of these science, health and environmental reporting fellowships by 6 p.m. ET May 10.

New author Rainesford Stauffer reflects in The Atlantic on how she couldn't wait to move away from Owensboro, Ky., pop. 55,000, when she was a teenager, but has found herself longing for it ever since. Many small-town natives move to big cities in their 20s, she writes, but wonders if they might find just as much fulfillment from staying home. Read more here.

The Justice Department says the federal government never instructed Tyson Foods to keep its plants open in the early months of the pandemic. That's according to documents in a federal lawsuit against the department from four relatives of meatpacking workers who died from Covid-19. It many have broad implications for similar lawsuits elsewhere. Read more here.

Quick hits: Idaho Senate approves bill to kill 90% of state's wolves; federal pandemic aid isn't reaching some of the poor

Here's a roundup of stories with rural resonance; if you do or see similar work that should be shared on The Rural Blog, email us at heather.chapman@uky.edu.

A Black high school baseball team in rural Virginia won the state championship in 1969, but their hometown didn't celebrate their victory. But last weekend county officials made sure they got their dues—and championship rings—over 50 years later. Read more here.

A study investigates severe lung injury among e-cigarette users in rural Appalachia. Read more here.

The Idaho Senate has approved a bill to kill 90% of the state's wolves. Read more here.

In a recent survey, nearly half of Americans who plan to move said climate change and associated issues like wildfires and rising sea levels were a factor in deciding where to move, and that they wouldn't relocate to an area with more climate risk even if it were more affordable. Read more here.

Though the federal government is expanding the social safety net, the funds aren't reaching many impoverished Americans. Read more here.

An increasing number of Americans believe in conspiracies, partly because of decreased trust in the news media and criticism of the news media from prominent figures, according to a recent poll. Read more here.

Rural migration during the pandemic may accelerate a trend of e-commerce expansion into rural America. Read more here.

A rural South Dakota high school rodeo club canceled its annual 'slave auction' fundraiser after local pushback about its name. Read more here.

Toolkit aims to help rural communities plan, create and fund early childhood health promotion programs

The Rural Health Information Hub has launched a toolkit to help rural communities learn how to plan, create and fund early-childhood health promotions.

The toolkit has seven detailed modules that break down how to create, develop and implement a program, evaluate its effectiveness, plan for long-term sustainability, and best practices. 

The toolkit is designed to supplement and expand on other rural community health toolkits dealing with food access, health promotion and disease prevention, obesity prevention, oral health, services integration, social determinants of health, telehealth, tobacco control and prevention, and rural transportation.

From the website: "For more information about rural community health programs, including how to develop and implement a program, please visit the Rural Community Health Toolkit. Visit the Rural Health Promotion and Disease Prevention Toolkit for information about implementing a health promotion program for people of all ages."

Burley Tobacco Growers Co-op closing; tobacco growers in any of last six years can lay claim to its millions in assets

This notice applies to landowners in only eight states, but it also signals the end of an era. In its 100th year, the Burley Tobacco Growers Cooperative Association is going out of business, and there's money to be had as its millions of dollars in assets are distributed.

People who grew burley tobacco at least once since 2015 are entitled to a share of the settlement that has been reached in the class-action lawsuit to dissolve the co-op, based in Lexington, Ky. They must make contact before Friday, Jan. 29. Information is available at the Settlement Website and from the McBrayer Firm in Lexington, or by calling 855-965-5569.

$4 billion in EU tariffs on jets, farm products etc. to hit Tue.

Starting Tuesday, the European Union will impose tariffs on $3.99 billion in U.S. good annually, including agricultural goods. The move, sanctioned last month by the World Trade Organization, is part of a long-running dispute over airplane subsidies for Boeing and Airbus jets, Laurence Norman and Daniel Michaels report for The Wall Street Journal.

"On Monday evening, the EU said the U.S. products to be targeted with the 25% duty would include tobacco, nuts and seeds, spirits, sauces, soups and syrups, self-propelled shovel loaders, tractors and proteins," Norman and Michaels report.

Ballot measure roundup: Coloradans approve restoration of gray wolves, paid family and medical leave

Colorado voters approved the restoration of gray wolves and mandated paid family and medical leave Tuesday, the first time any state has done such things in a referendum, on Tuesday.

Those were just two of 184 statewide ballot measures, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Here are a few others, courtesy of NCSL:

• Arizona, Montana, New Jersey and South Dakota approved efforts to legalize recreational marijuana, while voters in South Dakota and Mississippi approved medical marijuana programs.
• Oregonians decriminalized small amounts of certain controlled substances, such as heroin and cocaine, and the Beaver State also legalized psilocybin—become the first state ever to do so. The drug comes from mushrooms and is used in rituals by some Native American tribes.
• Ranked-choice voting, which was adopted in Maine recently, failed in Massachusetts and looks likely to fail in Alaska.
• Virginia voters adopted a redistricting commission, and that change means most states will now have a commission of some kind, though some are merely advisory, or only come into being if the legislature fails to pass maps.
• Voters approved taxes on tobacco and electronic-cigarette products in Colorado and Oregon. Washington will require public schools to provide comprehensive sex education beginning in 2022. 
• California voters rejected stricter parole and sentencing policies and stopped the legislature’s efforts to replace cash bail with pretrial risk assessments.
• Kentucky passed Marsy’s law, the crime victims’ bill of rights.
• Florida voters raised the minimum wage.
• An effort to overturn California’s affirmative action ban failed.
• Two “Stand Your Ground” Rights measures pass in Alabama.
• Mississippians approved the state’s new magnolia flag design, which was put before voters after the legislature decided to replace the previous flag feature the confederate battle emblem.

Updates are at NCSL’s State Elections 2020 webpage and statewide ballot measures database.

USDA creates unusual new channel to get pandemic stimulus money into tobacco farmers' pockets

"U.S. government aid payments to tobacco farmers will be channeled through a new account within the office of the agriculture secretary, an unusual move that bypasses the normal mechanism for distributing farm aid and stokes concerns about how the government is using covid-19 stimulus," P.J. Huffstutter and Tom Polansek report for Reuters: "The U.S. Department of Agriculture on Friday said it will pay up to $100 million to tobacco farmers from Congress’ coronavirus economic stimulus package, as part of a $14 billion assistance program for farmers hurt by the pandemic."

The new account had not previously been reported, but a USDA official told Reuters that "the agency opened the new account because of how Congress apportioned money from the CARES Act passed in March. and to simplify the process of paying farmers," Huffstutter and Polansek report. "Lawmakers typically apportion emergency funds to an agency and existing accounts set up at the division that would handle a program, according to agricultural and government analysts."

Most federal crop subsidies are paid through the Commodity Credit Corp., a federal agency, but the 2004 tobacco buyout barred tobacco farmers from receiving CCC funds, Huffstutter and Polansek report. Instead, Congress specifically allocated the non-CCC aid to the USDA secretary's office. The USDA representative said Congress would have specifically excluded tobacco farmers from receiving funding if it didn't want them to receive any money.

However, "Some economic and legal experts said the 2004 law eliminated the government’s role in funding tobacco price supports and worry the Trump administration is not being transparent," Huffstutter and Polansek report. "The reality is that Congress would have to explicitly authorize paying tobacco farmers," said former Obama administration official Jonathan Coppess, currently the director of the Gardner Agriculture Policy Program at the University of Illinois.

Tobacco growers were excluded from the first round of pandemic aid announced in April. Graham Boyd, executive vice president of the Tobacco Growers Association of North Carolina, told Reuters that tobacco farmers in his state lost about $200 million in potential sales to China because of export shutdowns during the pandemic.

The new payments would benefit farmers in swing-state North Carolina, the nation's top tobacco producer, where President Trump and Democratic challenger Joe Biden are neck and neck in the polls. However, the USDA representative told Reuters there was nothing improper about the account.

National survey finds rural-urban differences in health depts.

Chart from NACCHO report; a similar chart in the report shows services and programs more prevalent in rural areas.

Local health departments serving rural jurisdictions are less likely to provide regulation, inspection, and licensing services, as well as environmental health services, with the exception of regulating public drinking-water supplies, according to a report from the National Association of City and County Health Officials.

The report, based on a survey of local health departments, found several other disparities. Rural health departments are less likely to be involved in preventing sale of tobacco products, including electronic cigarettes, to minors; are half as likely as their urban counterparts to recruit employees from academic institutions; and are three to four times less likely to use social media, other than Facebook, which more than 80 percent of both types reported using.

On the other hand, "Local health departments serving rural jurisdictions are more likely to provide certain clinical services, including childhood and adult immunizations, maternal and child health services, and screening/treatment for various conditions," and they get more funding per person than their urban counterparts, the report says.

"The difference in clinical revenues among rural and urban LHDs is particularly striking (mean of $21 per capita for rural jurisdictions versus $6 per capita for urban jurisdictions)," the report says. That likely reflects a shortage of health-care providers in many rural areas and a higher reliance on local health departments. One funding source is the federal Women, Infants and Children nutrition program, in which 76 percent of rural health departments responding to the survey participate, compared to 59 percent of urban departments responding.

Departments were coded as urban or rural based on whether the majority of people they serve live in from urban or rural census tracts. Many rural census tracts are in metropolitan areas.

USDA releases details for pandemic-related aid to farmers

On Tuesday the U.S. Department of Agriculture released long-awaited details about its $16 billion direct payment program for farmers and ranchers struggling economically amid the pandemic. Farmers and ranchers can start applying for aid Tuesday, May 26; USDA says checks will begin going out as soon as a week later.

"USDA maintained the payment limit of $250,000 per farmer, but the initial $125,000-per-commodity cap was lifted following bipartisan backlash from Congress. Corporations and other entities can get up to $750,000 based on the number of shareholders who spend at least 400 hours on farm labor or management," Ryan McCrimmon reports for Politico's Morning Agriculture. "Because of high demand for aid and a limited pot of money (which Secretary Sonny Perdue, lawmakers and industry groups virtually all agree is too little), the department will send producers 80 percent of their payment and distribute the rest later if the funds haven’t been depleted."

Some crops and livestock aren't eligible for aid because their prices didn't drop by at least 5% since January, including some kinds of wheat, rice and peanuts, older sheep and egg-laying hens, and more. "But the department left the door open to 'reconsider' if those producers can demonstrate their market damage, except for two crops: hemp and tobacco," McCrimmon reports.

Trump's tariffs leave tobacco growers in the lurch; some can't get sales contracts despite new trade agreement

Washington Post photo by Matt McClain

Tobacco growers and their communities have been struggling for years because of a declining market, but the trade war with China made it worse—especially in North Carolina, the nation's top tobacco producer, and some other Southern states. Though the Trump administration recently signed a Phase One trade deal with China, many tobacco farmers are still unsure about how much to plant this year. Seeds need to be planted this month, but many still don't have sales contracts with manufacturers, Amanda Abrams reports for The Washington Post.

"The uncertainty is endangering individual livelihoods, not just of growers but of the workers who earn off-season dollars in the processing plants," Abrams reports. "It’s also threatening rural communities, which have long been buoyed by tobacco money, and exacerbating the divide between them and North Carolina’s booming urban areas."

In 2018, the Trump administration announced billions in tariffs on Chinese goods. China volleyed back with its own tariffs, including on American tobacco products. China was the top customer for North Carolina tobacco; since the trade war began, farmers have lost about $250 million, but weren't eligible for federal bailout payments like most other farmers, Abrams reports.

Farmers are trying to turn to alternatives, but other crops don't bring in the kind of profit tobacco did, and many are struggling. In North Carolina, 16 family farms filed for bankruptcy in 2019.  "The economic troubles ripple outward; one of the region’s biggest private employers, Vidant Health, announced possible layoffs a month ago. Economists have estimated that every dollar earned from tobacco results in almost $4 in new spending — on farm equipment, fertilizer, labor and other purchases in the community," Abrams reports.

Kentucky lawmakers still dubious about rural fiber-optic broadband project that hasn't delivered on its promises

"The much-heralded plan to improve internet connectivity across the state, promised to create financial opportunities through reliable, high-speed internet access for rural communities that have repeatedly been hammered by the loss of jobs in the coal and tobacco industries," the Louisville Courier Journal's Alfred Miller reports with ProPublica's Local Reporting Network. "But the project is stalled and its future looks increasingly bleak because of a number of missteps by state officials and Macquarie Capital, the Australian investment bank managing the ambitious plan."

The project, already two years behind schedule, could cost $1.5 billion over the next 30 years, Miller reports. Kentucky's new governor, Democrat Andy Beshear, will soon have to make important decisions about the future of the program, but he hasn't said what he plans to do yet, even as state lawmakers threaten to block funding. "Meanwhile, the project that promised so much to residents in rural communities has yet to deliver, and it’s unclear if and when it will," Miller reports.

The KentuckyWired project aims to bring high-tech jobs and entrepreneurship to impoverished rural counties where jobs are often hard to come by. It was scheduled to be completed nine months from now, but right now "one in 11 Kentuckians — roughly 405,000 mostly rural residents — have no wired broadband service in their area, according to Federal Communications Commission data. For those who do have internet access, it’s either too slow or simply unaffordable," Miller reports.

Part of the problem is that the steep hills and forests in much of Kentucky make fiber-optic cable difficult and expensive to install. The other problem is the "last mile." Even if the state lays fiber-optic cable to rural areas, it's not feasible to lay it to every home. Instead, homes and businesses will need third-party providers to lay fiber-optic cable to connect them to the local hub. But, many third-party providers "are reluctant to make plans without first knowing how much the state’s private-sector partner, Macquarie, will charge for access to the network," Miller reports.

Project managers want the state legislature to approve $100 million for KentuckyWired in the new budget, $28 million more than in the last budget. But lawmakers are frustrated by the program's slow implementation and ballooning costs, especially since their rural constituents are clamoring for broadband access, Miller reports.

State Sen. Jimmy Higdon, a Republican from Lebanon, said something needs to give. "Unless somebody in the Beshear administration can come up with a plan to save it — a viable plan, a workable plan — and somebody steps up and says this will work, I don’t see us funding something that’s going down a dead-end street," he told Miller.

E-cig crackdown could hurt mom-and-pop 'vape shops'

Washington Post map based on Yelp data; click on the image to enlarge it.

President Trump's proposed rackdown on electronic cigarettes could hurt small, independent shops that are "the fastest-growing retail segment of the past decade, as well as the one with the highest share of employees at small businesses," Andrew Van Dam reports for The Washington Post. "Two thirds of "vape shop" workers are employed by the 93 percent of businesses with fewer than 10 employees — a higher rate than for any other retail segment."

Tobacconists (the broader category that includes the shops) have far outgrown other retail segments over the past decade, according to Labor Department data. That's because of electronic cigarettes, according to online review site Yelp; it says the shops have been the fastest-growing large retail segment since the end of 2012. Yelp's data show that the shops are concentrated in the South and West, with the highest numbers in Nevada and Oklahoma.

In response to recent deaths related to electronic cigarettes and concerns about their appeal to teens, the Trump administration recently announced it will ban most flavored e-cigarette liquids. The governors of Michigan and New York have announced similar bans, which will kick in sooner. "Vape shops in those states are reeling," Van Dam reports. "Customers are racing to stock up on flavored liquids while store owners and employees ponder an uncertain future. Refills of liquids that e-cigs heat to the point of vaporization make up the bulk of these shops’ businesses, multiple managers said — and their adult customers overwhelmingly prefer flavored options."

E-cigarettes do not produce just a vapor, which is a gaseous form of a liquid; they produce an aerosol, in which particulates are suspended. The industry has branded itself with "vape" and "vaping."

Since vape shops open mainly combustible-cigarette smokers seeking alternatives, the shops could be as disproportionately rural as smoking is, and a federal ban on flavors could hit many small-town vape shops hard. Ryan Brown, who manages one such shop in Iron Mountain, Mich. (pop. 7,000), told Van Dam the shops are a major source of support for local community events and even helped fix up the disc golf course. If the flavor ban goes through, "It’s going to affect our town," he said. "They rely on mom-and-pop stores to keep these mining towns going when the mines are gone. Imagine how much tax revenue they’re going to lose."

Mom-and-pop stores could also lose out when the Food and Drug Administration begins requiring approval for electronic-cigarette liquids already on the market, a bureaucratic step that could cost between $117,000 and $466,000. Expensive regulatory barriers could wipe out small businesses and leave only the largest vaping companies like Juul on the market, Van Dam writes.

Ky. health foundation makes available to anyone TV and radio spots with youth talking about electronic cigarettes

The Foundation for a Healthy Kentucky has released four new public service announcements in its campaign to show the dangers young people subject themselves to by using electronic cigarettes. The spots are part of the foundation's "I Just Didn't Know" campaign and feature Kentucky teens. The campaign materials are free to anyone who would like to use them.

The new PSAs include two 30-second videos for television and a 30-second and 60-second audio PSA for radio. Additionally, the campaign can provide PSAs that were released in April.

In one PSA, Hayley, from Grant County in the rural part of Northern Kentucky, says, "A lot of people don't know that one little pod of this e-cigarette is equal to a whole pack of cigarettes."

Research shows that public health campaigns can play a crucial role in reducing tobacco use among teens. A 2018 federal report said one in five high-school students and one in 20 middle-school students used e-cigarettes, a 78 percent jump for high schoolers over 2017 and a 48% jump for middle schoolers.

E-cigarettes do not release harmless vapors, but instead contain substances such as: ultrafine particles, which can be inhaled deep into the lungs; flavorings such as diacetyl, a chemical linked to serious, irreversible lung disease; volatile organic compounds, which are known to be carcinogenic; other cancer-causing chemicals; and heavy metals, including nickel, tin and lead, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

E-cigs also contain high levels of nicotine, which is highly addictive and can harm young people's brain development and reduce attention span and impulse control. Nicotine use in adolescence can also prime the brain for future addiction to other drugs, says the CDC.

On Aug. 7, the Food and Drug Administration announced that it was investigating 127 reports of seizures, tremors, fainting or other neurological symptoms that may be related to electronic cigarettes, and have asked anyone who has experienced such symptoms to report them.

All the PSAs can be found at www.ijustdidntknow.org. Contact Alexa Kerley at 877-326-2583 or akerley@healthy-ky.org for broadcast-quality copies.

Kentucky-based tobacco cooperative is investing in hemp

The cooperative founded to help farmers of burley tobacco, a key ingredient in cigarettes, is facing a declining market and worsening finances, and at least one of its leaders thinks it should go out of business. Instead, it is putting $1 million into hemp, which the state agriculture commissioner, son of that leader, says is "a high-risk crop."

The Burley Tobacco Growers Cooperative Association, formed in 1921, has almost $35 million in assets, but "has struggled to find a role since the ending of the federal support program in 2005," Janet Patton reports for the Lexington Herald-Leader. "It is now sitting on thousands of pounds of unsold tobacco in a declining market and is operating at a loss, losing almost half a million dollars a year since 2014," according to a report the cooperative commissioned.

Former co-op chair Roger Quarles, who is still a director, proposed last month that the co-op dissolve itself and distribute its assets to members "before the money dries up," Patton writes. In a July guest editorial in The Farmer's Pride, the state's agricultural newspaper, he suggested burley farmers could each get up to $14,000 if the co-op dissolves now.

Instead, the co-op's executive committee voted to buy up to $1 million worth of hemp from Kentucky farmers, have it processed by its Tennessee counterpart into hemp oil. Directors to whom Patton spoke declined to discuss specifics, but Chairman Pat Raines "said that they already have a buyer who wants to purchased the potential oil," Patton reports.

Agriculture Commissioner Ryan Quarles, son of Roger Quarles, is a big advocate of hemp but declined to comment on the co-op's move. "I always say it's a high-risk commodity," he told Patton. Amid a surge of permits to grow hemp, there is concern about oversupply, which plagued tobacco until Congress created the federal program of quotas and price supports in 1938.

Kentucky tobacco farmer latest convicted of crop-insurance fraud; nearly half a million dollars, and it's not the biggest

A Central Kentucky tobacco farmer pleaded guilty in federal court Monday to a charge of conspiring to file false claims on crop-insurance policies totaling $480,000. Keith Foley "claimed that he grew less tobacco than he actually produced in 2010, 2011, 2014 and 2015 so that he could get an insurance payment based on the lower yield, according to his plea agreement," Bill Estep reports for the Lexington Herald-Leader.

According to the agreement, Foley sold some tobacco under other people's names, and under separate hail-insurance policies, he submitted false claims. A crop adjuster helped Foley submit the false reports in exchange for part of Foley's insurance payout, Estep reports.

"Authorities have charged several people with crop-insurance fraud in Central Kentucky in recent years," Estep notes. One "faces sentencing in September on charges from an indictment alleging he grossed $2.6 million through fraudulent claims; and four men who farmed in Bourbon and Nicholas counties, who face trial in September."