July 6, 2001 -
July 6, 2001 - MPR’s Laurel Druley reports on how state farmers are now trying to predict their crop yields. Typically farmers like to see corn hip-high by the fourth of July. But 2001 was not a typical year, with massive flood waters in the spring. At the start of July, Minnesota corn height averaged 21 inches. That's a foot shorter than the year before.
July 9, 2001 - Firefighters from around southeast Minnesota continue to battle a fire that ignited at the Farmland Foods plant last night in Albert Lea. The ninety-year-old meat packaging facility is the second largest employer in town. As fire crews struggle to control the scene, Farmland employees and city leaders wonder what this will mean for the future.
July 9, 2001 - There was a time when small communities throughout the Great Plains flourished. But now a host of powerful forces including farm consolidation and low prices are sparking an exodus from farm country. Critics say federal agricultural subsidies and other policies intended to bolster family farms and the communities they support may actually be hastening their decline. That's the backdrop for an intensifying debate in Washington and throughout the Great Plains .... over how to stem the decline. Minnesota Public Radio's Andrew Haeg has the first of two reports.
July 10, 2001 - The national convention of the Communications Workers of America wrapped up today in Minneapolis. The union's 2,300 delegates heard AFL-CIO president John Sweeney and others talk about the importance of expanding union membership in Minnesota and nationwide.
July 10, 2001 - MPR’s Andrew Haeg reports that the continuing decline of small agricultural communities in the Great Plains is fueling a search for ways to keep people from moving away. Increasingly, rather than looking to federal or state governments for aid, townspeople are trying to save themselves.
July 10, 2001 - All Things Considered’s Lorna Benson interviews Kit Borgman, communications director for the Minnesota Department of Trade and Economic Development, about trade with Canada. Borgman says Minnesota exports a variety of products to our northern neighbor.
July 10, 2001 - Ron Bosrock, founder and executive director of the Global Institute at St. John's University in Collegeville, comments on Governor Ventura's fourth international trade mission since taking office.
July 11, 2001 -
July 11, 2001 - Patients with congestive heart faliure may be interested in news that a kind of treatment has been developed by Fridley-based Medtronic. The device, which has receive preliminary FDA approval, is about the size of half a dollar, and it's surgically implanted in patients, much in the same manner as a pacemaker. Dr. Jay Cohn, at the U of M Medical School, says the device, called In-Sync, appears to be a big step forward for patients who have congestive heart faliure.