BPI AND ABC NEWS GO TO COURT OVER PINK SLIME.

Jury selection starts this week for a lawsuit filed by Dakota Dunes-based Beef Products Inc. in 2012 against ABC News and correspondent Jim Avila over pink slime. BPI is seeking $1 billion in defamation charges, claiming that ABC made its product — beef that has had the fat removed and then ammonia gas added to kill bacteria — seem unsafe to consume.


The company claims the effects of ABC’s coverage led to the closure of three plants and the letting go of at roughly 700 employees, as demand went from about 5 million pounds per week to fewer than 2 million pounds per week.


To win, “BPI must show that ABC and Avila made defamatory implications or statements, and that they either knew the statements were false or acted with reckless disregard for the truth. The company also must prove that ABC hurt BPI,” says Argus Leader.


But ABC has refused to back down from its reporting, saying it never suggested that the product wasn’t safe to consume or an actual beef product. “ABC’s attorneys have also argued that the term ‘pink slime’ accurately describes the texture and color of lean, finely textured beef,” says Argus Leader.

The case is expected to last through July. BY CHUCK ABBOTT.

TOP 10 CONCERNS OF YOUNG FARMERS.

At any roundtable of young and beginning farmers, a few common themes seem to bubble to the surface as folks share stories and concerns. Here are 10 of the biggest top-of-mind challenges, along with some ideas on how to deal with them.

1. when land is not available

An important lesson for beginning farmers is this: “Sometimes you’re trying to solve the wrong challenge,” says Carl Horne, vice president of customer solutions for Farm Credit Services of America/Frontier Farm Credit. “The land issue is outside of your control, let alone facing the obstacles of starting an operation.” Feel like you can’t compete on price? Fortunately, there are many more factors for landowners to consider, says Horne. “Determine what you can bring to the market. What makes you competitive?” Do you maintain clean, cared-for equipment? Are you a professional presence in the community and well respected? Are you fair and trustworthy? Point out that you will care for the land, maintain the property, make improvements, and keep clean, healthy fields. “Outline the real value proposition you bring to a business deal,” says Horne. “At some point, price comes in to factor, but if you’ve done your homework, you are bringing much more than dollars to the table.”

2. when Access to capital is limited

Establish a viable business plan first, says Horne. “This is the first thing within your control. Simple business planning, combined with careful financial forecasting of how that business plan plays out, will open up options for financing.”

3. when speaking with landowners is difficult

You must be transparent about the financial performance of the business deal and willing to be fair in negotiations, says Horne. “It is equally important to learn about what is important to the potential business partner. This doesn’t have to be a stealthy research operation. Just ask, ‘What is important to you?’ Or say, ‘Tell me how you envision our communication will work.’ ” Be consistent in your style and frequency of communication and how you keep the landowner up to date and informed.

4. when you get no help from USDA

With budget cutbacks and staff shortages at USDA offices, this probably won’t get better. Many beginning farmers are growing alternative crops and producing food for direct sale to consumers, grocery stores, or restaurants. Look for expertise from other farmers, Extension, and private consultants. Attend meetings to learn about direct marketing from farmers who are making a living at it. Use social media to reach out to the ag community with questions.

5. when finances are a struggle to manage

Align your financial management with your farm strategy. “This comes back to business planning and strategy development,” says Horne. “Do that first, every time. Everything should be aligned off of that. Your financials are the result of every decision you make.”
Whether the change was in your control or not (e.g., commodity market movement), the choices you’ve made and the risks/rewards you have exposed your operation to are reflected in your balance sheet and income statement, he says. If you have goals, dreams, and hopes, those require capital or cash flow, says Horne. “Make sure your daily decisions are aligned with those goals.” If a future goal in your strategy (like buying ground) depends on having a certain amount of financial strength to be able to execute, then you need to manage for that.

6. when you’re not well connected

The ability to make good decisions, consistently and over time, is a skill that separates successful farmers from the rest of the pack, says Horne. “The challenge for young farmers is to use their network to help offset their lack of experience.” Leverage that expertise to help you make better decisions. Speak up and be aggressive in making connections. “Your voice matters in local, regional, and even national issues,” says Horne.

7. when you don’t have any time off

Everyone needs vacations and time off – and more than just a weekend, counsels the Beginning Farmer Center at Iowa State University (extension.iastate.edu/bfc). Families should decide each year how much time off is to be provided. Try to keep personal lifestyles out of the farm operation and separate business from social life. Participate in off-farm activities that don’t involve other family members.

8. when you’re taking over the farm but don’t have the same goals as your parents

All parties involved must share a common vision. “It is important to start the transition plans early and not wait until the last minute,” says Charles Brown, farm management specialist, Iowa State University Extension & Outreach. It can take two to four years and maybe longer to develop and implement a successful transition plan, he says. “Too many times the plans are rushed into and then fail because of improper planning. The main key is communication.” For example, the younger generation wants to expand the farm, but the parents’ goal is to eliminate all farm debt. Set a time each month to discuss business affairs, goals, and objectives.
The University of Minnesota Center for Farm Financial Management (cffm.umn.edu) has two web-based programs, Ag Plan and Ag Transitions, that can help beginning farmers and retiring farmers develop business and transition plans.

9. when Dad won’t get out of the way

If Dad’s goal is to take things easier, this may mean you do the physical labor while Dad continues to make the decisions, and friction develops. The key is to develop your management ability while protecting your parents’ interests. One approach is to make Dad the general manager. That way, you are involved in major decisions, but final authority rests with the general manager. Another approach is to give each party an equal voice with disagreements settled by outside counsel.

10. when you don’t have all the skills you need

Everyone has individual interests and skills. Determine your strengths, such as marketing, finance, or production. You might love record keeping and financial management, but not marketing. Hire a marketing consultant. BY BETSY FREESE.

OYO STATE EMBRACES FARMING TO STAVE OFF ECONOMIC CRISIS.

As a result of the persisting economic woes facing the country, the Oyo State Government has decided to diversify its economy into farming and mining with a view to improving the financial status of the state. To ensure a successful diversification of process, the government recently organised an Agriculture Initiative Stakeholders’ Consultative Forum, held at the House of Chiefs, Parliament Building, Ibadan, during which the state governor, Senator Abiola Ajimobi, attributed the pervading economic woes to the country’s failure to save for a rainy day during the oil boom, worsened by neglect of agriculture. He disclosed that the forum was aimed at getting stakeholders in his administration to diversify the economy of the state through the exploration of aggressive, all-inclusive and sustainable agricultural value chain.


According to him, the dwindling allocation from the federation account owing to the fall in the price of crude oil in the international market had called for massive investment in farming.
“We did not save for the raining day when there was oil boom in the country. We relied heavily on income from oil. But we have all been jolted into reality now that a barrel sells for an all-time low of $30. Nigeria has depended so much on oil which has now lost its value at the international market. So we have to look for alternative sources of revenue through aggressive investment in agriculture.
“The fall in oil price has done more good than harm as it has opened our eyes to the effectiveness of mechanised farming as our saving grace,” he said. NEWS FROM AROUND THE WORLD.

HOW DOES LAND TENURE AFFECT AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTIVITY? A SYSTEMATIC REVIEW.

A lot of us who may come from the West assume that land rights certification, registration or titling are important attributes of any kind of land tenure or property rights system. We think of formal recording of land rights as essential to assuring farmers that they have land tenure security, an important enabling condition to agricultural development.

Economic theory and common sense tell us that if a family is going to invest in their property, they need to have a clear expectation that, far into the future, the kinds of sacrifices, investments of labor, capital, materials, into that land, and the benefits that come from those investments, will accrue to them. There’s a very simple relationship between land tenure security, property rights security, and investment: Theory predicts positive outcomes, and these are often observed practice, where people have clear tenure security.

However, in many developing countries, the kind of formal certification, property rights and titling systems that we are familiar with in wealthy countries often do not exist. A lot of farmers farm on land owned by the state. In Africa particularly, a lot of farming—up to 90 percent—is done on land held under customary tenure regimes, where land rights are not certified formally. Under customary tenure, people gain access to land as a social right, granted by virtue of their membership in a community.

THE QUESTION

So in 2013, the UK Department for International Development (DFID) asked me and a group of scholars to pull together a team of other researchers and graduate students to do a systematic review on the effects of efforts to “formalize” land rights through certification or titling on changes in agricultural investment and productivity in the developing world. Theory would predict that where farm land was previously unregistered, levels of investment and productivity would increase markedly after certification or titling.

Part of the development discourse over the past 30 to 40 years has been that African agriculture will not take off unless people have clear tenure security, and there’s an underlying assumption that this is delivered through land-rights certification or titling, as in Latin America and parts of Asia. So, in light of the fact that over the past 30 to 40 years there have been a number of efforts to convert non-formally tenured regimes into formally tenured regimes, based on certification by the state, the question that DFID asked us to look into was, What have been the effects with respect to the expected increases following land-rights certification and investment in productivity? In farmer incomes? In flow of credit?

That was the topic of our systematic review. Our inclusion criteria was limited to studies that were based on randomized control trials—randomized samples of farming households in an area that had received a treatment, which was, for example, land-rights certification, in comparison to a community where we were able to control all other factors apart from the fact that the community had not received land-rights certification. We wanted to look at, empirically, the effects of the certification intervention on investment, productivity of agriculture, farmer family incomes, and access to credit.

THE FINDINGS

Those who have conducted systematic reviews know the pain. The graduate students looked at 25,000 titles on this subject and reduced that to a review of 1,000 abstracts, which yielded 100 papers that we looked at in detail. Only 20 studies met our inclusion criteria. This is a huge question for the development world, for economic theory, a whole host of issues—and only 20 studies met a rigorous standard of empirical research design.

The 20 studies fell in nine countries: five in Latin America, five in Asia, and 10 in Africa.
In the Latin American and Asia cases, after certification or titling, there were significant gains to productivity of between 50 and 100 percent, and strongly positive gains to investment and income following tenure recognition, typically titling. However, in the Africa cases, there were weak or modest gains to productivity—between zero and 10 percent gains to productivity—and in investment and income following certification (though in most cases there were still positive gains)
Another important finding was there was no or weak discernible credit effects anywhere. Most studies—and we were looking very carefully through a gender lens with respect to differential effects on men and women—failed to aggregate effects of tenure recognition on women, except for two quantitative studies that identified positive effects (in Ethiopia and in Rwanda).

WHY DID RESULTS DIFFER?

So then the question becomes, Why are these significant gains in Latin America and Asia, and these relatively weak or modest gains in Africa? We have three hypotheses that we’re exploring through further research.

The first hypothesis is what we’re calling the role of pre-existing institutions—in Africa specifically, customary tenure. Customary tenure systems provide access to land as a social right by virtue of one’s membership in the community. An indicator of the security of the tenure is that land can often be inherited by other family members, but it can’t be sold, typically. Customary tenure often provides high levels of tenure security.

Customary tenure systems generally provide poor people in Africa access to land, free of charge, and once again as a social right; this is a pervasive institution in Africa. The designers of certification and titling programs, we hypothesized, were likely underestimating the tenure security of people who held those lands. And so when those land rights were certified, the kind of productivity gains or investment gains that would have been projected, assuming prior tenure insecurity, didn’t happen. Those assumptions were misplaced.

Another factor is what we’re calling the wealth effect: Household resources and income in Africa are much lower among poor farmers in comparison to poor farmers in Latin America and in Asia. So, if you’re going to do something with your land, it’s just not about land as an asset. It’s about labor, capital, having the income to invest in your farming enterprise, and the generally low levels of income among African farmers constrain their ability to make better use of their land. That’s hypothesis number two.

The third hypothesis is what we’re calling the effects of complementary public investments. Programs to secure land rights are best treated as one element in comprehensive agrarian reform programs. Effective reform is not about providing secure land rights to people. It’s also about providing affordable access to farming inputs and markets, and investment in roads, cooperatives, farming training, and so on; investments that enable farmers to capitalize on their secure land rights. Levels of public investment in rural areas in Africa are, we believe, much lower than they are in Latin America and Asia.

One of our arguments is that, when talking about land-rights certification or formalization in Africa, you really have to approach it as a package of investments, and you have to account for this wealth effect.
Our plan is to explore more deeply what might explain the weaker responses in Africa. We believe the hypotheses I’ve noted provide a good starting point. BY STEVEN LAWRY.

GOV. DICKSON ON AGRICULTURAL DEVELOPMENT IN BAYELSA

Bayelsa State has comparative advantage in large-scale production of rice, palm produce, aquaculture, banana, plantain, cassava and vegetables. The state has invested in mega aquaculture projects with two Israeli companies, which are presently under construction to produce 3,000 tons of fish annually. Our vegetation is suitable for three cycles of rice production. We have major rice farms of our own which produces the Restoration brand of Rice.


Currently, we have 4,000 hectares of rice farm at Peremabiri, 5,000 hectares at Isampor and 2,000 hectares at Kolo. We have the capacity to grow and produce rice that will feed the entire Bayelsa State, Nigeria, West Africa and for export oversea.


We have established in conjunction with Ostertrade Engineering & Manufacturing KFT/DPP International APS, a Hungarian/Danish consortium a cassava starch processing plant with a capacity to produce 600 tons of industrial starch per annum and an out growers scheme of 600 hectares cassava farm. We have concluded a seed multiplication farm on a 40 hectares at Ebedbiri for this cassava farm.
The state has a palm plantation of 1,200 hectares with a potential to grow the palm plantation to 2,000 hectares at the current location. Similar opportunities abound across the state to increase the palm production capacity. Bayelsa has the capacity to be like Malaysia and Indonesia in oil palm production.

We therefore invite investors to partner with us in the Agriculture sector.In addition, Bayelsa is the natural home of organic banana and vegetables in Nigeria. That is why we are building the Cargo International Airport to prepare the state for the export market. From Bayelsa to anywhere in Europe is less than six hours in flight time.With the airport in place and the harnessing of all the state’s agricultural potentials, Bayelsa will be able to feed Nigeria, Africa and indeed, the rest of the world. BY SAINT MENPANO.

CORN, BEANS LOWER OVERNIGHT: TRADERS WAIT TO SEE IF DEMAND SHIFTS TO SOUTH AMERICA.

1. Corn, Soybeans Lower Overnight as Dry Weather Allows Farmers in Fields

Corn and soybean prices were lower on speculation that a round of dry weather this week will allow farmers to continue planting.

Little rain is expected in much of the Midwest this week where only slight chances of precipitation are expected, according to the National Weather Service.

That should allow growers to get into fields and accelerate seeding. The Department of Agriculture will release its Crop Progress Report today, one day later than usual due to the Memorial Day holiday.

As of last week, however, about 84% of corn was planted, only slightly behind the five-year average pace, and 53% of soybeans was in the ground, just ahead of the average, according to the USDA.

Corn futures for July delivery fell 3½¢ to $3.70¾ a bushel overnight on the Chicago Board of Trade.
Soybeans declined 1¾¢ to $9.24¾ a bushel in Chicago. Soy meal gained 60¢ to $302.40 a short ton, and soy oil lost 0.12¢ to 31.48¢ a pound.

Wheat futures fell 3½¢ in Chicago, while Kansas City futures declined 3¾¢ to $4.33¾ a bushel.

2. All Eyes on Importers to See if They Shift Purchases to South America

Traders are starting to watch importers to see if they’re shifting to South America and away from U.S. supplies as tends to happen around this time of year.

The bad news/good news for U.S. growers is that prices are low. That’s bad in that prices are low, so obviously they won’t get as much for their crops. It’s good in that it gives U.S. supplies a fighting chance against the Brazilians/Argentinians.

Growers in Argentina are about 40% finished with their corn harvest, according to Tomm Pfitzenmaier, the president of Summit Commodities, a brokerage in Des Moines, Iowa, and it’s not like in years past when they didn’t have the infrastructure to get their grain to ports. Because that’s less of an issue these days, the corn they’ve harvested is ready (at least some of it) for export to overseas buyers.

The other bit of good news for U.S. farmers is that most of the corn that’s harvested early in the country is used domestically, so there still may be some time for U.S. exporters to fill needs.

The calendar flips to June this week, and it’s more along the late-June/early-July time frame that South American exports really start to take market share from the U.S., Pfitzenmaier said, so it’ll be interesting to see when importers start to look south – if they do.

Rest assured, overseas buyers will look south at some point, but as we all know, it’s really going to come down to price.

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3. Midwest Mostly Dry Today With Some Spotty Storms Possible From Kansas Through Illinois

Little rainfall is expected in much of the Midwest today says the National Weather Service, though there’s a small chance that storms could pop up in Missouri and Illinois.

“There is a chance of thunderstorms across much of (Illinois) this afternoon and early evening,” the NWS said in an early Tuesday report. “Isolated severe storms are possible across parts of central and southeast Missouri. The primary threats will be damaging wind gusts.”

In eastern Kansas through much of Missouri, strong storms have a chance of developing, the agency said.

Any storms will be “isolated” but severe, the NWS said.
“Activity will be spotty and brief, though strong winds and large hail are possible with any storms that may develop,” according to this morning’s weather report.
Get involved in the discussion in Marketing Talk. BY TONY DREIBUS.

U.S CORN PLANTING NEARS COMPLETION, USDA REPORTS.

DES MOINES, Iowa — The U.S. corn crop’s progress is well behind a year ago, while the soybean planting pace remains behind its five-year pace, according to the USDA’s Weekly Crop Progress Report.

Corn

As of Sunday, 91% of the U.S. corn crop had been put into the ground vs. a 93% five-year average and a trade expectation of between 90-93%, according to Monday’s report.

The governmental agency noted that the U.S. corn crop is rated as 65% good/excellent vs. a 72% year ago rating.

USDA pegged corn emergence at 73% vs. a 75% five-year average.
Al Kluis, Kluis Commodities, says today’s report is no real surprise to investors.

“Today's report is neutral for prices tonight.  I expect corn and soybeans to start out steady to 1 cent higher tonight,” Kluis stated in a daily note to customers Monday.

Soybeans

For soybeans, 67% of the the nation’s crop has been planted, compared with 68% five-year average.
USDA pegged the soybean crop as 37% emerged, slightly below a 40% five-year average.
Meanwhile, the U.S. wheat crop is rated as 50% good/excellent, below a 52% week ago rating. BY MIKE MCGINNIS

5 PROVEN HEALTH BENEFITS OF GARLIC.

“Let food be thy medicine, and medicine be thy food.”
Those are famous words from the ancient Greek physician Hippocrates, often called the father of Western medicine.

He actually used to prescribe garlic to treat a variety of medical conditions.

Well… modern science has recently confirmed many of these beneficial health effects.

Here are 11 health benefits of garlic that are supported by human research studies.

1. Garlic Contains a Compound Called Allicin, Which Has Potent Medicinal Properties

Garlic is a plant in the Allium (onion) family.
It is closely related to onions, shallots and leeks.
It grows in many parts of the world and is a popular ingredient in cooking due to its strong smell and delicious taste.

However, throughout ancient history, the main use of garlic was for its health and medicinal properties
Its use was well documented by all the major civilizations… including the Egyptians, Babylonians, Greeks, Romans and the Chinese.

The entire “head” is called a garlic bulb, while each segment is called a clove. There are about 10-20 cloves in a single bulb, give or take.

We now know that most of the health effects are caused by one of the sulfur compounds formed when a garlic clove is chopped, crushed or chewed.

This compound is known as allicin, and is also responsible for the distinct garlic smell.
Allicin enters the body from the digestive tract and travels all over the body, where it exerts its potent biological effects (which we’ll get to in a bit).

2. Garlic Is Highly Nutritious, But Has Very Few Calories

Calorie for calorie, garlic is incredibly nutritious.
A 1 ounce (28 grams) serving of garlic contains (3):

• Manganese: 23% of the RDA.
• Vitamin B6: 17% of the RDA.
• Vitamin C: 15% of the RDA.
• Selenium: 6% of the RDA.
• Fiber: 0.6 gram.
• Decent amounts of calcium, copper, potassium, phosphorus, iron and vitamin B1.

Garlic also contains trace amounts of various other nutrients. In fact, it contains a little bit of almost everything we need.

This is coming with 42 calories, with 1.8 grams of protein and 9 grams of carbs.

Bottom Line: Garlic is low in calories and very rich in Vitamin C, Vitamin B6 and Manganese. It also contains trace amounts of various other nutrients.

3. Garlic Can Combat Sickness, Including the Common Cold

Garlic supplementation is known to boost the function of the immune system.
One large 12-week study found that a daily garlic supplement reduced the number of colds by 63% compared with placebo.

The average length of cold symptoms was also reduced by 70%, from 5 days in placebo to just 1.5 days in the garlic group.

Another study found that a high dose of garlic extract (2.56 grams per day) can reduce the number of days sick with cold or flu by 61%
If you often get colds, then adding garlic to your diet could be incredibly helpful.

Bottom Line: Garlic supplementation helps to prevent and reduce the severity of common illnesses like the flu and common cold.

4. The Active Compounds in Garlic Can Reduce Blood Pressure

Cardiovascular diseases like heart attacks and strokes are the world’s biggest killers.
High blood pressure, or hypertension, is one of the most important drivers of these diseases.
Human studies have found garlic supplementation to have a significant impact on reducing blood pressure in people with high blood pressure.

In one study, aged garlic extract at doses of 600-1,500 mg was just as effective as the drug Atenolol at reducing blood pressure over a 24 week period

Supplement doses must be fairly high to have these desired effects. The amount of allicin needed is equivalent to about four cloves of garlic per day.

5. Garlic Improves Cholesterol Levels, Which May Lower The Risk of Heart Disease

Garlic can lower Total and LDL cholesterol.
For those with high cholesterol, garlic supplementation appears to reduce total and/or LDL cholesterol by about 10-15%
Looking at LDL (the “bad”) and HDL (the “good”) cholesterol specifically, garlic appears to lower LDL but has no reliable effect on HDL
Garlic does not appear to lower triglyceride levels, another known risk factor for heart disease

Bottom Line: Garlic supplementation seems to reduce total and LDL cholesterol, particularly in those who have high cholesterol. HDL cholesterol and triglycerides do not seem to be affected. NEWS FROM AROUND THE WORLD.

GARLIC:PLANTING, GROWING AND HARVESTING GARLIC.

Garlic is easy to grow and produces numerous bulbs after a long growing season. Plus, it’s frost tolerant! Here’s how to grow garlic in your garden.Beyond its intense flavor and culinary uses, “the stinking rose” is good in the garden as an insect repellent and has been used for centuries as a home remedy.

Planting

Garlic can be planted in the spring as soon as the ground can be worked, but fall planting is recommended for most gardeners. Plant in the fall and you’ll find that your bulbs are bigger and more flavorful when you harvest the next summer.

In areas that get a hard frost, plant garlic 6 to 8 weeks before that frost date. In southern areas, February or March is a better time to plant.

Break apart cloves from bulb a few days before planting, but keep the papery husk on each individual clove.

Plant cloves about one month before the ground freezes. 

Do not plant cloves from the grocery store. They may be unsuited varieties for your area, and most are treated to make their shelf life longer, making them harder to grow. Instead, get cloves from a mail order seed company or a local nursery.

Ensure soil is well-drained with plenty of organic matter. Select a sunny spot.

Place cloves 4 inches apart and 2 inches deep, in their upright position (the wide root side facing down and pointed end facing up).

In the spring, as warmer temperatures come, shoots will emerge through the ground.

Care

Northern gardeners should mulch heavily with straw for overwintering.

Mulch should be removed in the spring after the threat of frost has passed. (Young shoots can’t survive in temps below 20°F on their own. Keep them under cover.)

Cut off any flower shoots that emerge in spring. These may decrease bulb size.

Weeds should not be a problem until the spring. Weed as needed.

Garlic requires adequate levels of nitrogen. Fertilize accordingly, especially if you see yellowing leaves.

Water every 3 to 5 days during bulbing (mid-May through June).

A note on garlic scapes: Some folks love cooking the scapes (the tops of hardneck garlic). Whether you trim the scapes or let them keep growing is your preference. We like to stir fry scapes the way we cook green beans—similar, with a spicy kick!

Pests/Diseases

Garlic has very few problems with pests in the garden (in fact, its a natural pest repellent!), and also very few problems with the diseases that plague other veggies. White Rot is one concern, but you should also keep an eye out for the same pests that plague onions.

• White Rot is a fungus that may attack garlic in cool weather. Not much can be done to control or prevent that problem except rotating your crops and cleaning up the area after harvesting. The spores can live in the soil for many years. The fungus affects the base of the leaves and roots.

Harvest/Storage

Harvest time depends on when you plant, but the clue is to look for yellow tops. Harvest when the tops begin to yellow and fall over, before they are completely dry.

In Northern climates, harvesting will probably be in late July or August. In Southern climates, it will depend on your planting date.

Check the bulb size and wrapper quality; you don’t want the wrapper to disintegrate. Dig too early and the bulb will be immature. Discontinue watering.

To harvest, carefully lift the bulbs with a spade or garden fork. Pull the plants, carefully brush off the soil, and let them cure in an airy, shady spot for two weeks. We hang them upside down on a string in bunches of 4 to 6. Make sure all sides get good air circulation.

The bulbs are cured and ready to store when the wrappers are dry and papery and the roots are dry. The root crown should be hard, and the cloves can be cracked apart easily.

Once the garlic bulbs are dry, you can store them. Remove any dirt and trim off any roots or leaves. Keep the wrappers on—but remove the dirtiest wrappers.

Garlic bulbs may be stored individually with the tops removed, or the dried tops may be braided together to make a garlic braid to hang in the kitchen or storage room.

Bulbs should be stored in a cool (40 degrees F), dark, dry place, and can be kept in the same way for several months. Don’t store in your basement if it’s moist!

The flavor will increase as the bulbs are dried.

If you plan on planting garlic again next season, save some of your largest, best-formed bulbs to plant again in the fall. NEWS FROM AROUND THE WORLD.

 

HEALTH BENEFITS OF BITTERLEAF.

This kind of leaf is very familiar to some people but others may not have any idea about this wonder leaf. Bitter-leaf can grow anywhere unlike other leaves that only grow in certain places and temperature. These leaves flourishes anywhere they grow. They add beauty to all places where they are present. The most distinctive characteristic of this plant is its bitterness. Every part of this plant is bitter starting from the leaves to its roots. The bitterness of this plant is actually good for the body. It has a lot of health benefits to people. The plant can remind people that life is not always sweet; it takes to taste bitterness before you can achieve sweetness. This plant is very useful in toning the vital organs of the body especially the liver and the kidney.

The liver is one of the most important organs of the body. It has a lot of vital functions that is needed for normal functioning of the whole system of the body. Without the liver all major process in the body will be paralyze. The liver is known as the largest organ inside the body. It has an approximate weight of 1-3 kg in an average adult individual. There are a lot of major functions that the liver should do every day and this includes the production of bile acid that helps in fat metabolism.

Without the liver fats will not be digested inside the body to be use as energy. Bitter-leaf can be very helpful in maintaining the livers optimum health to release bile acid every time people eat fatty foods. Another major function of the liver is the production of glycogen. Glycogen is stored energy that is release in times of low level of glucose especially for people who do fasting.

The liver should be well taken care of by using bitter-leaf. Once the liver is been damage it can’t be restored into its normal function. People with liver problems can boil a bitter-leaf and drink a glass of it every day.

Another very vital organ inside the body is the kidney. Kidney helps in the excretion of waste products inside the body. If the normal function of the kidney breakdown there will great huge problem inside the body. Bitter-leaf a natural herb that is useful in taking care of the kidney and the liver.

Diabetic patient can also use bitter-leaf as one of their medication to prevent high sugar level in the blood. It will not only lower the sugar level in the blood but also repair impaired pancreas. As you all know pancreas is the organ responsible for the production of insulin for glucose to reach each cell to use by the body as energy. Impaired pancreas does not release the right amount of insulin to maintain the right sugar level in the blood. Bitter-leaf is a real wonder of nature. You can take the benefit of this amazing plant by squeezing its leaves in ten litters of water. BY MARK PERRY.