Mississippi River Basin Ag & Water Desk

11/03/2025

Today, we’re launching our annual fundraising campaign in partnership with NewsMatch.

Our theme this year is Connecting the Basin. Through this holiday season, we’ll be sharing stories of how the Ag & Water Desk brings people together across viewpoints, states and landscapes, all connected by the Mississippi River Basin.

Last year’s support directly funded grants for our reporters’ professional development, helping them attend conferences, learn new skills and expand multimedia storytelling across the Basin.

Your support fuels this work. Help us continue connecting communities and sharing the stories that matter most across the Basin.

Some more good news: because we serve rural communities, the first $3000 of donations will be tripled. Help us start strong and donate today!

Launching our annual...

11/03/2025

The Ag & Water Desk helps connect the Mississippi River basin. Support our critical work providing local news and information to communities in 31 states.

Today we’re launching our annual fundraiser. Thanks to the generous support of NewsMatch, the first $3000 of contributions will be tripled. Donate today to help fund our projects! Link in bio.

10/28/2025

When NOAA’s Billion Dollar Weather and Climate Disasters database was shut down earlier this year, many feared a major data gap in how the U.S. tracks and prepares for disasters. Now, thanks to the non-profit Climate Central, the database is back.

In the first six months of 2025 alone, 14 disasters caused more than $101 billion in damages, much of it across the Mississippi River Basin.

Experts say the revived database will be essential for guiding policy, rebuilding communities, and helping insurers, local governments and industries understand the growing cost of climate impacts.

Read more and what it means for disaster preparedness and recovery from Desk reporter Hêctor Alejandro Arzate.

It shows that in 2025, approximately $40 billion in damage was caused by severestorms and tornadoes that struck states like Illinois, Missouri, Tennessee, and others. Oct. 28, 2025 Byline: Héctor Alejandro Arzate After months of uncertainty over its future, an online resource for tracking the finan...

10/24/2025

Lake Pepin, the largest naturally occurring lake on the Mississippi River, is a beloved resource and important economic engine for the Wisconsin and Minnesota towns that border it. But the lake is quietly filling up with sediment, threatening recreation and local economies.

The Lake Pepin Legacy Alliance, a nonprofit organization working to improve the health of the lake, has launched an investigation into how erosion can be controlled in ravines and gullies. Ravines act like fast-moving highways, delivering soil into the Mississippi River and then the lake, according to the alliance.

Read more about this important work from Desk reporter Madeline Heim and the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel:

Ravines act like fast-moving highways, delivering sediment into Lake Pepin on the Mississippi River. A new project will examine how to control them.

10/23/2025

In this week’s newsletter, Desk reporter Phillip Powell’s work is on the cover of the Arkansas Times magazine. He explores the growing economic crisis facing row crop farmers across the Mississippi River Basin.

What he found goes far beyond tariffs. It’s about an outdated farm safety net, global competition and a broken economic model that disincentivizes crop diversification.

Powell interviewed more than a dozen farmers, lobbyists and historians, digging into decades of USDA data to understand how we got here and why the cracks in the system are starting to show.

Read the full story here:

Reporter Phillip Powell...

10/17/2025

We’re in the last few days to apply to come work with us!

We are hiring for our brand new Report for America cohort of five newsrooms that will host a full-time reporter , who splits their time between local work and Ag & Water Desk projects. These folks get to explore all sorts of exciting environmental issues across the basin and also raise the level of environmental reporting in their communities.

Come be a part of our award-winning journalism collaborative! Apps from newsrooms due Oct 20, more info about Report for America through the link below.

The Mississippi River Basin Ag & Water Desk invites newsrooms throughout the region to join its award-winning collaborative by applying for one of five new reporting positions through Report for America.  The Ag & Water Desk is a multi-newsroom team covering agriculture and the environment based at...

10/16/2025

We’re proud to announce the addition of two new Expert Journalists to the Mississippi River Basin Ag & Water Desk.

Kathleen Davis, an audio producer at Science Friday, brings national experience in elevating local science and environmental stories.

MichaelHawthorne, an investigative reporter and Pulitzer Prize finalist at the Chicago Tribune, has spent his career uncovering the human impacts of environmental issues.

Both will mentor early-career reporters and strengthen the Desk’s collaborative, cross-basin coverage on agriculture, water, and climate. Join us in welcoming them to the team!

Kathleen Davis of Science Friday and Michael Hawthorne of the Chicago Tribune join the Ag & Water Desk as Expert Journalists.

10/13/2025

For nearly 30 years, the USDA’s Food Security Supplement has been the foundation for how researchers, food banks, and policymakers track hunger in America. Now, that survey is being discontinued.

Advocates say the move could make it harder to understand where food insecurity is most severe and who’s most affected.
In 2023, 13.5% of U.S. households were food insecure, the highest rate since 2014.

The six states with the highest rates from 2021 to 2023, – Arkansas, Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Oklahoma and Kentucky – all fall within the Mississippi River Basin.

Food banks and researchers are now scrambling to fill the data gap. Read more from Harshawn Ratanpal at KBIA 91.3 FM

The Trump Administration said it's cancelling the questionnaire, an annual supplement to the U.S. Census Bureau’s monthly Current Population Survey.

10/03/2025

In rural Iowa, Trappist monks craft simple wooden caskets and manage one of the state’s largest private forests.

Now, $3 million in federal funds will help them protect their 1,500-acre hardwood forest from development, ensuring it remains a haven for wildlife and a sustainable source of wood for generations.

The monks’ approach blends spirituality, craftsmanship, and conservation. Each casket is blessed, each harvest carefully replanted and every sale marked by the planting of a new tree.

Read how faith, forestry, and federal support intersect in this story from Olivia Cohen and The Gazette:

To carry out the mission of working with their hands, Trappist Monks in Dubuque County focus on conservation, forestry and making caskets.

10/02/2025

The lower Mississippi River is experiencing low water conditions for the fourth year in a row, attributed to dry conditions in the Ohio River Basin and Midwest since early August.

This has left ports in Arkansas partially or entirely unable to load barges in ports, which means it will take longer to ship goods coming down the river..

Without significant rainfall, the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) projects water levels will reach the low threshold by early October.

Follow for more from Lucas Dufalla and Arkansas Democrat-Gazette / ArkansasOnline.com

📸: A raft of barges passes Memphis on the Mississippi River in June, 2016 (Credit: Andrew Breig, Daily Memphian).

10/01/2025

Lake Itasca, the legendary source of the Mississippi River, has always been seen as one of Minnesota’s most pristine waters. But despite its protected forest surroundings, scientists say Itasca is showing troubling signs of decline.

Water clarity has been cut in half since the 1950s, and nutrient levels are unusually high for such a wild lake. Researchers say its shallow depth, unique shape, and climate change may be putting it on the edge of a tipping point.

Read the full story from the Star Tribune:

Warming water may have an outsized impact on the legendary lake, which has been protected for decades.

09/25/2025

Help us find our next great group of partners!

We’re currently looking for five newsrooms to join the Ag & Water Desk starting next summer. Report for America will place five full-time fellows in newsrooms across the Mississippi River Basin, with support to cover part of their salaries.

These journalists will split their time between local projects and Desk collaborations, covering agriculture, climate, water and other issues affecting the Basin. They will also receive training, mentoring and access to our experts and collaborative reporting network.

The Mississippi River Basin Ag & Water Desk invites newsrooms throughout the region to join its award-winning collaborative by applying for one of five new reporting positions through Report for America.  The Ag & Water Desk is a multi-newsroom team covering agriculture and the environment based at...