California Water Storage Scramble & Mexico Begins Biotech Corn Ban

**Taking advantage of January’s storms and cheap seasonal water rates, growers in California’s San Joaquin Valley are racing to build temporary basins to boost groundwater to carry them through drier years ahead.

Zack Stuller, whose farm management firm has built 20 temporary basins in the past month, says, we weren’t prepared for this much water, and we can’t build them fast enough.

Some growers are removing trees to build permanent water storage structures underground.

**Mexican officials issued a ban on imports of some biotech corn used for certain purposes, that began February 17th.

But, the decreed continues to allow imports of biotech corn used as animal feed while exploring substitutes.

National Corn Growers Association President Tom Haag (HAYG) says, the integrity of the USMCA, signed by Mexican President Obrador himself, is at stake.

**The FDA announced recommendations on the naming of plant-based foods sold and marketed as milk alternatives.

The recommendations are for plant-based alternatives using the term MILK that have a nutrient composition different than milk, include voluntary nutritional labeling to show how the product compares with milk.

Jim Mulhern, President of the National Milk Producers Federation, says the announcement is a step toward labeling integrity, but falls short of ending the decades-old problem of misleading plant-based labeling.