Jessica Naudziunas

It’s been eight months since the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers released massive amounts of reservoir water from locations north of the Missouri River. Those reservoirs were filled to the brim with historic rainwater and melted snow that accumulated over a long winter of inclement weather across the Midwest.

Most of that released water poured over valuable farmland and residential areas in northwest Missouri. The resulting financial and family devastation has opened up a huge Missouri-style feud that will likely last as long as it will take the flooded land to return to normal.

Ever looked at the labels on the back of your packaged food?

Missouri State Treasurer Clint Zweifel has announced a new financial assistance package for beginning farmers trying to make their way in an expensive industry.

Did you know the most common fresh produce in Kansas City and in the Midwest is iceberg lettuce? Yes, the green that is mostly water is apparently the best get in fly-over country. At least, the New York Times thinks so.

There's more to grocery shopping these days because of nutritional ratings, on-label claims and even in-store dieticians. 

On this episode of Harvest Public Media’s Field Notes,  grocery shopping with a guy who doesn’t really think about nutrition, and along the way we dissect the nutritional rating system NuVal. 

With funding in hand, U.S. food safety regulations will see the biggest changes in almost 70 years in 2012. 

Whether it was thanks to the Farm Bill, MF Global's bankruptcy, vicious flooding or high land prices, farmers were in the headlines throughout the Midwest in 2011.

The U.S. fuel industry rang in the new year with a little less help from the government after the previously entrenched Volumetric Ethanol Excise Credit expired on Dec. 31, 2011.

There have been plenty of distractions over the last year on and off the farm. The farm bill that never was stirred speculation late into November; drought reaked havoc on much of the southwest; and the price of an acre of farmland has shot up 32 percent in Iowa over the last year. On this week's Field Notes, a look back at some of the big stories in agriculture in 2011.

I recently went to this local Columbia, Mo., event called 20/20. It’s a bimonthly gathering that highlights culture-makers in town who are often hidden from the public as they create, research and organize innovative ideas. And here’s the twist: These passionate people quickly present their ideas while a screen behind them displays 20 images over 400 seconds.