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Farmers prosper in pandemic as Americans shop local

Farmers prosper in pandemic as Americans shop local
By Nellie Peyton

WASHINGTON (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – With restaurants shut and grocery stores posing a coronavirus risk, some Americans are ordering food directly from the farm – a trend small-scale producers hope will outlast the pandemic.

It could be one of the few economic upsides to a crisis that has emptied high streets and felled business as Americans lock down against the fast-spreading novel coronavirus.

In northern Wisconsin, a farmers’ collective said they are making thousands of dollars a week in a season when sales are normally zero.

By selling to people instead of restaurants, Illinois farmers said revenues are close to an all-time high.

Many farmers are adopting online ordering and home delivery, transforming old-fashioned farms into consumer-friendly outlets.

“In two or three weeks we accelerated like five to ten years of growth and change in the industry,” said Simon Huntley, founder of Harvie, a company based in Pittsburgh that helps farmers market and sell their products online.

“I think we are getting a lot of new people into local food that have never tried buying from their local farmer before.”

Eating local is lauded as a way to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions of transporting food long distances, although some studies have shown it is not always more climate-friendly.

Shorter supply chains boost resilience in a crisis and help small-scale sustainable farms, said Jayce Hafner, co-founder of FarmRaise, which helps farmers get grants and loans.

Growers across the country are vulnerable to economic shocks right now because of labour shortages, supply chain disruptions and fluctuating prices linked to the pandemic, she said.

“The beauty of the direct-to-consumer app is it allows a farmer to capture the value of their product at a near-to-retail price, and so it’s a really attractive option economically for a farmer,” Hafner said.

NEW EXPECTATIONS

Chris Duke, who owns a farm in Wisconsin, has managed a community-supported agriculture (CSA) program for years.

The CSA model gained popularity in the United States more than a decade ago. Typically customers pay a subscription fee to a farm then receive regular boxes of whatever is grown.

But with the spread of online shopping, shoppers are now used to getting what they want, when they want it, said Duke.

Using Harvie’s platform, his farm and 17 others in the area can offer customers 95 products, from vegetables to honey to meat, and their clients choose just what they want each week.

They had been thinking of doing this for a while, he said, but were only spurred to make the change when coronavirus hit.

“I love the CSA model, but the CSA model by itself is 30 years old, and a lot has changed in the food marketplace, in technology, in customer expectations,” Duke said. “It’s a totally different world now.”

Last week the farms made about $7,000 between them, which is huge for a season when not much is growing, he said.

He plans to keep the new model after the pandemic wanes.

CHALLENGES

Not all of the direct-to-consumer businesses are digital.

Marty Travis, a farmer in central Illinois, has been the middleman connecting local farms to restaurants for 16 years. He markets the products to chefs in the Chicago area, collects orders and distributes fresh produce each week.

When the novel coronavirus hit, he shifted gear and started selling to individuals – and was overwhelmed by demand.

“We could have 1,000 people tomorrow,” he said, but can only cater to 200 customers so had to cap orders accordingly.

He delivers to three dropoff spots in Chicago where people line up to collect – it is not home delivery but challenging nonetheless as farmers are used to bulk orders and packaging.

Proceeds are huge.

“We have to find these opportunities to celebrate some positive stuff,” said Travis, who is writing a book about how farmers can band together to feed communities.

Lisa Duff, the owner of a small family farm in Maryland, started offering customized, at-home deliveries last year and said it saved her when the restaurants and farmers’ markets she served closed in March.

Without a delivery person, she does most of the driving herself – which has been tough.

But she has also seen her customers nearly double.

“I’m hopeful that this will really truly help us find that local food is here to stay.”

(Reporting by Nellie Peyton, editing by Lyndsay Griffiths; Please credit the Thomson Reuters Foundation, the charitable arm of Thomson Reuters, that covers the lives of people around the world who struggle to live freely or fairly. Visit http://news.trust.org)

Special Report: Trump told Saudi: Cut oil supply or lose U.S. military support – source

By Timothy Gardner, Steve Holland, Dmitry Zhdannikov and Rania El Gamal

WASHINGTON/LONDON/DUBAI (Reuters) – As the United States pressed Saudi Arabia to end its oil price war with Russia, President Donald Trump gave Saudi leaders an ultimatum.

In an April 2 phone call, Trump told Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman that unless the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) started cutting oil production, he would be powerless to stop lawmakers from passing legislation to withdraw U.S. troops from the kingdom, four sources familiar with the matter told Reuters.

The threat to upend a 75-year strategic alliance, which has not been previously reported, was central to the U.S. pressure campaign that led to a landmark global deal to slash oil supply as demand collapsed in the coronavirus pandemic – scoring a diplomatic victory for the White House.

Trump delivered the message to the crown prince 10 days before the announcement of production cuts. The kingdom’s de facto leader was so taken aback by the threat that he ordered his aides out of the room so he could continue the discussion in private, according to a U.S. source who was briefed on the discussion by senior administration officials.

The effort illustrated Trump’s strong desire to protect the U.S. oil industry from a historic price meltdown as governments shut down economies worldwide to fight the virus. It also reflected a telling reversal of Trump’s longstanding criticism of the oil cartel, which he has blasted for raising energy costs for Americans with supply cuts that usually lead to higher gasoline prices. Now, Trump was asking OPEC to slash output.

A senior U.S. official told Reuters that the administration notified Saudi leaders that, without production cuts, “there would be no way to stop the U.S. Congress from imposing restrictions that could lead to a withdrawal of U.S. forces.” The official summed up the argument, made through various diplomatic channels, as telling Saudi leaders: “We are defending your industry while you’re destroying ours.”

Reuters asked Trump about the talks in an interview Wednesday evening at the White House, at which the president addressed a range of topics involving the pandemic. Asked if he told the crown prince that the U.S. might pull forces out of Saudi Arabia, Trump said, “I didn’t have to tell him.”

“I thought he and President Putin, Vladimir Putin, were very reasonable,” Trump said. “They knew they had a problem, and then this happened.”

Asked what he told the Crown Prince Mohammed, Trump said: “They were having a hard time making a deal. And I met telephonically with him, and we were able to reach a deal” for production cuts, Trump said.

Saudi Arabia’s government media office did not respond to a request for comment. A Saudi official who asked not to be named stressed that the agreement represented the will of all countries in the so-called OPEC+ group of oil-producing nations, which includes OPEC plus a coalition led by Russia.

“Saudi Arabia, the United States and Russia have played an important role in the OPEC+ oil cut agreement, but without the cooperation of the 23 countries who took part in the agreement, it would not have happened,” said the Saudi official, who declined to comment on the discussions between U.S. and Saudi leaders.

The week before Trump’s phone call with Crown Prince Mohammed, U.S. Republican Senators Kevin Cramer and Dan Sullivan had introduced legislation to remove all U.S. troops, Patriot missiles and anti-missile defense systems from the kingdom unless Saudi Arabia cut oil output. Support for the measure was gaining momentum amid Congressional anger over the ill-timed Saudi-Russia oil price war. The kingdom had opened up the taps in April, unleashing a flood of crude into the global supply after Russia refused to deepen production cuts in line with an earlier OPEC supply pact.

On April 12, under pressure from Trump, the world’s biggest oil-producing nations outside the United States agreed to the largest production cut ever negotiated. OPEC, Russia and other allied producers slashed production by 9.7 million barrels per day (bpd), or about 10% of global output. Half that volume came from cuts of 2.5 million bpd each by Saudi Arabia and Russia, whose budgets depend on high oil-and-gas revenues.

Despite the agreement to cut a tenth of global production, oil prices continued to fall to historic lows. U.S. oil futures dropped below $0 last week as sellers paid buyers to avoid taking delivery of oil they had no place to store. Brent futures, the global oil benchmark, fell towards $15 per barrel – a level not seen since the 1999 oil price crash – from as high as $70 at the start of the year.

The deal for supply cuts could eventually boost prices, however, as governments worldwide start to open their economies and fuel demand rises with increased travel. Whatever the impact, the negotiations mark an extraordinary display of U.S. influence over global oil output.

Cramer, the Republican senator from North Dakota, told Reuters he spoke to Trump about the legislation to withdraw U.S. military protection from Saudi Arabia on March 30, three days before the president called Crown Prince Mohammed.

Asked whether Trump told Saudi Arabia it could lose U.S. military support, U.S. Energy Secretary Dan Brouillette told Reuters the president reserved the right to use every tool to protect U.S. producers, including “our support for their defense needs.”

The strategic partnership dates back to 1945, when President Franklin D. Roosevelt met with Saudi King Abdul Aziz Ibn Saud on the USS Quincy, a Navy cruiser. They reached a deal: U.S. military protection in exchange for access to Saudi oil reserves. Today, the United States has about three thousand troops in the country, and the U.S. Navy’s Fifth Fleet protects oil exports from the region.

Saudi Arabia relies on the United States for weapons and protection against regional rivals such as Iran. The kingdom’s vulnerabilities, however, were exposed late last year in an attack by 18 drones and three missiles on key Saudi oil facilities. Washington blamed Iran; Tehran denied it.

THIRTEEN ANGRY SENATORS

Trump initially welcomed lower oil prices, saying cheap gasoline prices were akin to a tax cut for drivers.

That changed after Saudi Arabia announced in mid-March it would pump a record 12.3 million bpd – unleashing the price war with Russia. The explosion of supply came as governments worldwide issued stay-home orders – crushing fuel demand – and made clear that U.S. oil companies would be hit hard in the crude price collapse. Senators from U.S. oil states were infuriated.

On March 16, Cramer was among 13 Republican senators who sent a letter to Crown Prince Mohammed reminding him of Saudi Arabia’s strategic reliance on Washington. The group also urged Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross to investigate whether Saudi Arabia and Russia were breaking international trade laws by flooding the U.S. market with oil.

On March 18, the senators – a group that included Sullivan of Alaska and Ted Cruz of Texas – held a rare call with Princess Reema bint Bandar bin Sultan, the Saudi ambassador to the United States. Cramer called the conversations “brutal” as each senator detailed the damage to their states’ oil industries.

“She heard it from every senator; there was nobody that held back,” Cramer told Reuters.

The Saudi embassy did not respond to requests for comment.

Cramer said the princess relayed their comments to officials in Saudi Arabia, including the energy minister. The senators told the princess that the kingdom faced rising opposition in the Senate to the Saudi-led coalition that is waging a war in Yemen against Houthi rebels.

Saudi and U.S. officials have said the Houthis are armed by Iran, which Tehran denies. The backing of Senate Republicans over Yemen had proved crucial for Saudi Arabia last year. The Senate upheld Trump vetoes of several measures seeking to end U.S. weapons sales and other military support to Saudi Arabia amid outrage over the Yemen conflict, which has caused more than 100,000 deaths and triggered a humanitarian crisis.

Cramer said he made a phone call to Trump on March 30, about a week after he and Sullivan introduced their bill to pull U.S. troops from Saudi Arabia. The president called Cramer back the same day with Energy Secretary Brouillette, senior economic adviser Larry Kudlow and U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer on the call, the senator said.

“I said the one person that you don’t have on the call that can be very helpful is Mark Esper,” the defense secretary, Cramer recounted, saying he wanted Esper to address how U.S. military assets in Saudi Arabia might be moved elsewhere in the region to protect U.S. troops.

The Pentagon did not respond to a request for comment on whether Esper was involved in discussions of pulling military assets out of Saudi Arabia.

BENDING THE KNEE

Trump’s oil diplomacy came in a whirlwind of calls with Saudi King Salman, Crown Prince Mohammed and Russian President Vladimir Putin starting in mid-March. The Kremlin confirmed Putin’s conversation with Trump and said they discussed both oil supply cuts and the coronavirus pandemic.

On the April 2 call with Prince Mohammed, Trump told the Saudi ruler he was going to “cut them off” the next time Congress pushed a proposal to end Washington’s defense of the kingdom, according to the source with knowledge of the call. Trump also publicly threatened in early April to impose tariffs on oil imports from Saudi Arabia and Russia.

After the conversation with the Saudi crown prince, and another the same day with Putin, Trump tweeted that he expected Saudi Arabia and Russia to cut output by about 10 million barrels, which “will be GREAT for the oil & gas industry!”

Riyadh and Moscow later confirmed they had restarted negotiations.

On April 3, Trump hosted a meeting at the White House with senators Cramer, Cruz, and Sullivan, and oil executives from companies including Exxon Mobil Corp, Chevron Corp, Occidental Petroleum Corp and Continental Resources.

During the public portion of the meeting, Cramer told Trump that Washington can use the billions of dollars it spends defending Saudi Arabia on other military priorities “if our friends are going to treat us this way.”

The prospect of losing U.S. military protection made the royal family “bend at the knees” and bow to Trump’s demands, a Middle Eastern diplomat told Reuters.

After prolonged and fractious negotiations, top producers pledged their record output cut of 9.7 million bpd in May and June, with the understanding that economic forces would lead to about 10 million bpd in further cuts in production from other countries, including the United States and Canada.

Trump hailed the deal and cast himself as its broker. “Having been involved in the negotiations, to put it mildly, the number that OPEC+ is looking to cut is 20 Million Barrels a day…” he tweeted shortly after the deal.

Riyadh also took credit. Saudi energy minister Prince Abdulaziz told Reuters at the time that the crown prince had been “instrumental in formulating this deal.”

(Reporting by Timothy Gardner and Steve Holland in Washington, Dmitry Zhdannikov in London and Rania El Gamal in Dubai; additional reporting by Alexandra Alper and Humeyra Pamuk in Washington, and Marwa Rashad in Riyadh; writing by Michael Georgy; editing by Richard Valdmanis and Brian Thevenot)

What is at stake as the Supreme Court weighs the future of immigrant ‘Dreamers’

By Ted Hesson

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. Supreme Court will soon decide the legality of President Donald Trump’s decision to end a program offering work permits and deportation relief to immigrant “Dreamers” who came to the United States illegally as children.

Trump, a Republican, moved in 2017 to phase out the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program. His administration argued the initiative of his Democratic predecessor Barack Obama was unconstitutional and would not withstand legal challenges.

Several federal courts blocked Trump’s attempt to terminate the DACA program. The case went to the Supreme Court, which heard arguments in November.

The decision will be one of the most-watched of Trump’s presidency. Here is what you need to know about it.

WHAT IS THE DACA PROGRAM?

Obama announced DACA in 2012 after more than a decade of failed efforts to pass legislation in the U.S. Congress that would have provided a path to citizenship for so-called Dreamers.

The program offered unauthorized immigrants who came to the United States before age 16 the chance to obtain a work permit and a reprieve from imminent deportation.

Applicants were required to pass a criminal background check to ensure they had not been convicted of a felony or significant misdemeanor. They needed to have completed high school, still be in school or have served in the U.S. military.

The Obama administration said the program would allow immigration officers to focus on higher-priority offenders. Critics called it an abuse of executive power.

WHO IS ENROLLED IN DACA?

About 649,000 people are enrolled, according to the most recent government data. Nine of 10 are immigrants born in Mexico, El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras. More than half live in California, Texas, Illinois, New York and Florida.

The average age of DACA enrollees is 26, slightly more women than men, according to the latest statistics.

A 2017 analysis of U.S. Census Bureau data by the Migration Policy Institute found the top occupations for immigrants in the program were food preparation and serving, sales, office and administrative support, and construction.

WHERE DO EMPLOYERS STAND?

Major U.S. companies support DACA and have hired work-eligible beneficiaries.

In an October brief in the Supreme Court case, 125 companies – including Amazon, Facebook, Google and Starbucks – said ending the program would “inflict serious harm” on employers, workers and the U.S. economy. They were joined by 18 major business associations.

DACA enrollees hold thousands of jobs in the medical field, a point backers have raised during the deadly coronavirus pandemic.

Plaintiffs defending the program noted in a Supreme Court brief this month that 27,000 DACA recipients are healthcare workers including nurses, pharmacists and home care aides. Nearly 200 are medical students, residents and physicians, the brief said.

HOW WILL THE SUPREME COURT RULE?

The Supreme Court is expected to rule by the end of June, but could act sooner.

With five conservative justices and four liberals, the court appeared split along ideological lines during oral arguments in November. The conservative majority signaled support for Trump’s termination of the program while liberals said the move would destroy lives of DACA beneficiaries. [L2N27SOC7]

WHAT WILL HAPPEN IF TRUMP IS ALLOWED TO END DACA?

The Trump administration has not said how it will proceed if the Supreme Court allows it to terminate the program.

However, a top U.S. immigration official told Reuters in December that DACA recipients ordered removed by an immigration judge would be subject to deportation. [L4N28L3OZ]

(Reporting by Ted Hesson, editing by Ross Colvin and David Gregorio)

U.S. coronavirus outbreak soon to be deadlier than any flu since 1967 as deaths top 60,000

By Lisa Shumaker(Reuters) – U.S. deaths from the novel coronavirus topped 60,000 on Wednesday and the outbreak will soon be deadlier than any flu season since 1967, according to a Reuters tally.

America’s worst flu season in recent years was in 2017-2018 when more than 61,000 people died, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The only deadlier flu seasons were in 1967 when about 100,000 Americans died, 1957 when 116,000 died and the Spanish flu of 1918 when 675,000 died, according to the CDC.

The United States has the world’s highest coronavirus death toll and a daily average of 2,000 people died in April of the highly contagious respiratory illness COVID-19, according to a Reuters tally. The first U.S. death was recorded on Feb. 29 but recent testing in California indicates the first death might have been on Feb. 6, with the virus circulating weeks earlier than previously thought.

On Tuesday, COVID-19 deaths in the United States eclipsed in a few months the 58,220 Americans killed during 16 years of U.S. military involvement during the Vietnam War. Cases topped 1 million.

The actual number of cases is thought to be higher, with state public health officials cautioning that shortages of trained workers and materials have limited testing capacity.

The outbreak could take nearly 73,000 U.S. lives by Aug. 4, compared with an April 22 forecast of over 67,600, according to the University of Washington’s predictive model , often cited by White House officials.

In early March, the prospect that the coronavirus would kill more Americans than the flu was unthinkable to many politicians who played down the risk of the new virus.

Republican President Donald Trump tweeted on March 9: “So last year 37,000 Americans died from the common Flu. It averages between 27,000 and 70,000 per year. Nothing is shut down, life & the economy go on. At this moment there are 546 confirmed cases of CoronaVirus, with 22 deaths. Think about that!”

On March 11, Democratic New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio told New Yorkers during a radio interview to eat out at restaurants if they were not sick.

That same day, top U.S. infectious diseases expert Dr. Anthony Fauci warned Congress that the coronavirus was at least 10 times more lethal than the seasonal flu.

There is as yet no treatment or vaccine for coronavirus while flu vaccines are widely available along with treatments.

(Writing by Lisa Shumaker; Editing by Howard Goller)

China committed to Phase 1 trade deal despite pandemic: U.S. official

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – China remains “very, very committed” to meeting its commitments under a Phase 1 trade deal with the United States, despite the unprecedented economic and health impacts of the new coronavirus pandemic, a senior U.S. trade official said on Wednesday.

The official told reporters that U.S. officials were talking regularly, and often daily, about implementation of the trade deal and to make sure that China fulfilled its extensive agreements to buy U.S. goods and services.

The U.S. Trade Representative’s office kept China on its priority watch list for concerns about intellectual property protections and enforcement, and was watching closely to see if it implemented changes agreed as part of the trade agreement, the official said.

(Reporting by Andrea Shalal, Editing by Franklin Paul)

Toilet paper trophy hunters on a roll as U.S. shortages start easing

By Martinne Geller and Lisa Baertlein

LONDON/LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – U.S. consumers have begun spotting rare Quilted Northern and Charmin toilet paper rolls on store shelves across the United States, as stocks start building after weeks of severe shortages.

Shoppers who bagged the coveted rolls are crowing on Twitter about their finds. “Found some toilet paper in the wild! Driving it home now,” tweeted @TransForYang on April 23. “This is as close as I’ll ever come to knowing what it feels like driving one of those armored money trucks.”

Empty shelves were still a problem at nearly half of American grocery stores as of mid-April, but supplies were markedly more plentiful than they had been during the prior week, according to the consumer products data tracker NCSolutions.

About 48 percent of U.S. grocery stores were out of stock of toilet paper for some part of the day on April 19, the latest date for which figures were available. In comparison, out-of-stock shelves were prevalent at 73 percent of U.S. grocery stores one week earlier, on April 12, according to the data, provided exclusively to Reuters.

Demand for toilet paper is still up 27 percent from pre-Covid-19 levels, NCSolutions said.

The average U.S. household – 2.6 people – uses about 409 rolls a year, according to Georgia Pacific, maker of Angel Soft and Quilted Northern. It estimated that staying at home 24/7 would boost that by 40 percent, and that a two-person household would use nine double rolls in about two weeks.

Toilet paper is not the only essential item shoppers stocked up on after states started locking down businesses to curb the spread of the novel coronavirus in mid-March. The large size of toilet paper packages versus other staples such as pasta, soap and canned goods means that retail stores rarely keep much in stock, and so are quicker to run out.

In Europe, the shortages at retail stores may be less dire due partly to the fact that some production is done closer to retailers.

“Normally there are fewer and larger factories in the U.S.,” said Magnus Groth, chief executive of Europe’s biggest toilet paper maker, Essity. Groth said Essity, which in the United States sells tissue products to businesses only, met a spike in European demand by boosting production, selling down inventory and securing extra transport capacity.

The U.S. retail market for toilet paper was worth $9.7 billion last year, according to Euromonitor International.

Procter & Gamble dominates with about a 29% share, followed by Kimberly-Clark, maker of Cottonelle and Scott, and privately held Koch Industries-owned Georgia Pacific.

For Charmin maker Procter & Gamble, March and April will be record production months, said Rick McLeod, its vice president of global family care product supply.

The company’s six U.S. plants are running 24/7, focusing on the most popular products. P&G’s plants manufacture massive “parent” rolls of toilet paper and then convert them to small rolls for home use. The parent rolls, which are a standard in the industry, measure more than eight feet in diameter and weigh about a ton.

“Our data says that in-stock levels are improving but notwhere we want them to be certainly,” McLeod said.

Georgia Pacific is now making 1.5 million more roles perday, and is trying to maximize the number of deliveries it canship. Its mills and regional distribution centers have shippedabout 120 percent of normal capacity, while a shift to directshipments where possible has reduced shipping time to retailersby up to three days, a spokesman said.

Store checks last week showed toilet paper was approachingnormal stock levels after being “deeply deficient for over 50days,” said Burt Flickinger, managing director of consulting firm Strategic Resource Group, adding that it was the first week his firm saw adequate levels of shelf stock.

(Additional reporting by Anna Ringstrom in Stockholm and Nivedita Balu in Bengaluru; Editing by Steve Orlofsky)

White House official warns of negative shocks before rebound later in 2020

By David Lawder and Susan Heavey

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Top Trump adminstration officials on Tuesday predicted a strong economic rebound in the fourth quarter as the coronavirus fades, but a senior White House adviser warned that near-term unemployment and GDP data will be a “very grave” negative shock.

Kevin Hassett, senior economic adviser to President Donald Trump told CNN that unemployment could reach 16-20%, and GDP output could fall as much as 30-40% on annualized basis in the second quarter, a prediction in line with Wall Street and Congressional Budget Office forecasts.

“I’m just saying that we’re going to have the biggest shock since the Great Depression,” Hassett told reporters at the White House. “It’s a very grave shock and something we need to take seriously.”

He added that the first quarter GDP growth number being released on Wednesday would likely be negative, telling CNN that this “will be just the very tip of the iceberg of a few months of negative news that’s unlike anything you’ve ever seen.”

Earlier, U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin predicted that the economy could rebound by late summer as states allow the reopening of businesses that have been closed to slow the spread of the coronavirus.

“As states start opening up, I think you’re going to see a lot of demand come back,” Mnuchin told Fox Business Network. “Now again, the states are going to open up slowly, so you’re going to see June and July pick up, but I think by August and September, you’re going to see a big bounce back from what has been a very rocky period.”

Trump, at a White House event on Tuesday, also shifted the focus away from the near term, saying that the fourth quarter “is going to be really strong and I think next year is going to be a tremendous year.”

“The third quarter is a transition quarter. The second quarter is what it is,” Trump added.

Hassett said that a “prudent” fourth coronavirus rescue bill would be important to securing strong growth later in the year.

In a current program aimed at keeping small business workers from being laid off, Mnuchin said the Treasury will audit all larger loans over $2 million and warned that companies could face criminal liability if it turns out they did not truly need the money.

“Anybody that took the money that they shouldn’t have taken — one, it won’t be forgiven, and two, they may be subject to criminal liability, which is a big deal,” Mnuchin told Fox Business.

Mnuchin’s comments came as more public companies and better-financed entities have decided to return funds or forego their loan allocations after the Treasury put out new guidance last week excluding well-financed publicly traded companies from the forgivable loans meant to fund payrolls and other expenses during virus-related closures.

On Monday, the Los Angeles Lakers basketball team returned a $4.6 million loan it received through the program. Mnuchin told Fox Business Network he was “outraged” by the Lakers’ request even though he was a fan of the top NBA team.

After running out of funds in less than two weeks, the Paycheck Protection Program was relaunched on Monday with an additional $310 billion appropriated by Congress, but suffered technical glitches. Mnuchin said that these had largely been fixed on Tuesday.

(Reporting by David Lawder and Susan Heavey; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama)

Most Americans to avoid sports, other live events before coronavirus vaccine: Reuters/Ipsos

By Rory Carroll

Fewer than half of Americans plan to go to sports events, concerts, movies and amusement parks when they reopen to the public until there is a proven coronavirus vaccine, according to a Reuters/Ipsos opinion poll released on Tuesday.

That includes those who have attended such events in the past, an ominous sign for the sports and entertainment industries hoping to return to the spotlight after being shut down by the pandemic.

Only about four in 10 who follow sports avidly and go to arts and entertainment venues and amusement parks said they would do so again if they reopened before a vaccine was available, the poll found.

Another four in 10 said they were willing to wait, even if it takes more than a year to develop a vaccine.

The rest said they either “don’t know” what to do or may never attend those events again.

“Just because people say we can go back, until people feel fully safe … they aren’t going to go back,” said Victor Matheson, a specialist in sports economics at the College of the Holy Cross in Massachusetts.

“We go to games for entertainment and you’re not going to be very entertained if you’re not worrying about who the next player to bat is and instead worrying about that person who just coughed two rows down.”

The United States leads the world with almost 1 million coronavirus infections and more than 56,000 deaths as of late Monday.

While as many as 100 potential vaccines are in development around the world, scientists are projecting that bringing one to market could take 18 months.

SPORTS SIDELINED

Only 17% of American adults said they would attend professional sporting events when they reopen to the public, while 26% said they would rather wait until there is a vaccine.

Among those who have attended a professional sporting event in the past year, 42% said they would return whenever it reopens to the public and 39% said they would rather wait for a vaccine, even if that means waiting more than a year.

Cincinnati resident Angie Hopkins, who has gone to pro games in the past, said she would not attend them again before there is a vaccine, out of concern for her health and that of her son.

“The risk of being with all those people, crammed in together, I think that would be unsettling,” she said.

“I have fibromyalgia, which could make me at risk for more serious complications. And my son has asthma, so I wouldn’t want to expose him either.”

About 59% of sports fans agreed that before a vaccine is available, professional sports leagues that have seen their seasons upended – like Major League Baseball, the National Basketball Association and the National Hockey League – should hold games with no in-person fans, while 33% disagreed.

That could spell trouble for tennis’ U.S. Open, which is scheduled to kick off in hard-hit New York City on Aug. 24. Organizers have said it was highly unlikely that they would hold the largest and loudest Grand Slam tournament without fans.

It is also unclear whether the NFL will delay the scheduled Sept. 10 start of its 101st season. Commissioner Roger Goodell said last week he believed the season could begin on time, but did not specify whether the league would consider doing so without fans.

TROUBLE FOR TINSELTOWN?

The poll showed that only 27% of those questioned would go to a movie theater, concert or live theater performance when venues reopen, underscoring the hurdles faced by the entertainment industry as it tries to get back on its feet.

Thirty-two percent said they would wait for a vaccine before going back to the movies, theater or concerts.

In all, 55% of Americans said those events should not resume before a vaccine is available.

Movie buff and music fan Ana Morales of Bristow, Virginia, said she did not plan to visit a theater where she has a membership or attend a summer country music series until there is a vaccine.

“It would be a bit reckless for us to go,” she said, adding that she would be afraid of spreading the disease to her in-laws, who are over 60 years old.

She said that even if theaters implemented social-distancing rules, she would worry that shared surfaces like seats had not been cleaned thoroughly.

Hollywood has been tentatively hoping movie theaters could reopen partially by late July and recoup some losses from the normally lucrative summer season.

While dozens of summer movie releases have already been moved to the autumn or into 2021, Walt Disney Co’s “Mulan” and Warner Bros. “Wonder Woman 1984” are scheduled for release in July and August respectively.

Most musicians, including Justin Bieber, Taylor Swift and the Rolling Stones have canceled or postponed their 2020 tour dates.

The annual Coachella music festival in Southern California, which usually draws about 90,000 people, shifted its April dates to October in the hope the worst of the coronavirus pandemic would be over by then.

Enthusiasm for amusement and theme parks was even bleaker. Fifty-nine percent of respondents said they should not reopen until a vaccine is available. Only 20% said they would visit a theme park when they reopen.

Universal Studios has extended its closures in California and Florida until at least May 31, while Disneyland and Walt Disney World are closed indefinitely.

Disney Executive Chairman Bob Iger said earlier in April that temperature checks for visitors were one of the measures under consideration for any eventual reopening.

Broadway theaters were forced to shut down in mid-March and extended the closure to June 7, with several producers saying their plays would not return at all.

The Reuters/Ipsos poll surveyed 4,429 American adults from April 15 to 21, asking about their previous attendance at sports events and live concerts and their interest in attending if they reopened before a coronavirus vaccine is available. The poll questions noted a vaccine might not be available for more than a year.

Piglets aborted, chickens gassed as pandemic slams meat sector

By Tom Polansek and P.J. Huffstutter

CHICAGO (Reuters) – With the pandemic hobbling the meat-packing industry, Iowa farmer Al Van Beek had nowhere to ship his full-grown pigs to make room for the 7,500 piglets he expected from his breeding operation. The crisis forced a decision that still troubles him: He ordered his employees to give injections to the pregnant sows, one by one, that would cause them to abort their baby pigs.

Van Beek and other farmers say they have no choice but to cull livestock as they run short on space to house their animals or money to feed them, or both. The world’s biggest meat companies – including Smithfield Foods Inc, Cargill Inc, JBS USA and Tyson Foods Inc – have halted operations at about 20 slaughterhouses and processing plants in North America since April as workers fall ill, stoking global fears of a meat shortage.

Van Beek’s piglets are victims of a sprawling food-industry crisis that began with the mass closure of restaurants – upending that sector’s supply chain, overwhelming storage and forcing farmers and processors to destroy everything from milk to salad greens to animals. Processors geared up to serve the food-service industry can’t immediately switch to supplying grocery stores.

Millions of pigs, chickens and cattle will be euthanized because of slaughterhouse closures, limiting supplies at grocers, said John Tyson, chairman of top U.S. meat supplier Tyson Foods.

Pork has been hit especially hard, with daily production cut by about a third. Unlike cattle, which can be housed outside on pasture, U.S. hogs are fattened up for slaughter inside temperature-controlled buildings. If they are housed too long, they can get too big and injure themselves. The barns need to be emptied out by sending adult hogs to slaughter before the arrival of new piglets from sows that were impregnated just before the pandemic.

“We have nowhere to go with the pigs,” said Van Beek, who lamented the waste of so much meat. “What are we going to do?”

In Minnesota, farmers Kerry and Barb Mergen felt their hearts pound when a crew from Daybreak Foods Inc arrived with carts and tanks of carbon dioxide to euthanize their 61,000 egg-laying hens earlier this month.

Daybreak Foods, based in Lake Mills, Wisconsin, supplies liquid eggs to restaurants and food-service companies. The company, which owns the birds, pays contract farmers like the Mergens to feed and care for them. Drivers normally load the eggs onto trucks and haul them to a plant in Big Lake, Minnesota, which uses them to make liquid eggs for restaurants and ready-to-serve dishes for food-service companies. But the plant’s operator, Cargill Inc, said it idled the facility because the pandemic reduced demand.

Daybreak Foods, which has about 14.5 million hens with contractor-run or company-owned farms in the Midwest, is trying to switch gears and ship eggs to grocery stores, said Chief Executive Officer William Rehm. But egg cartons are in shortage nationwide and the company now must grade each egg for size, he said.

Rehm declined to say how much of the company’s flock has been euthanized.

“We’re trying to balance our supply with our customers’ needs, and still keep everyone safe – including all of our people and all our hens,” Rehm said.

DUMPING HOGS IN A LANDFILL

In Iowa, farmer Dean Meyer said he is part of a group of about nine producers who are euthanizing the smallest 5% of their newly born pigs, or about 125 piglets a week. They will continue euthanizing animals until disruptions ease, and could increase the number of pigs killed each week, he said. The small bodies are composted and will become fertilizer. Meyer’s group is also killing mother hogs, or sows, to reduce their numbers, he said.

“Packers are backed up every day, more and more,” said Meyer.

As the United States faces a possible food shortage, and supermarkets and food banks are struggling to meet demand, the forced slaughters are becoming more widespread across the country, according to agricultural economists, farm trade groups and federal lawmakers who are hearing from farmer constituents.

Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds, along with both U.S. senators from a state that provides a third of the nation’s pork, sent a letter to the Trump administration pleading for financial help and assistance with culling animals and properly disposing of their carcasses.

“There are 700,000 pigs across the nation that cannot be processed each week and must be humanely euthanized,” said the April 27 letter.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) said late Friday it is establishing a National Incident Coordination Center to help farmers find markets for their livestock, or euthanize and dispose of animals if necessary.

Some producers who breed livestock and sell baby pigs to farmers are now giving them away for free, farmers said, translating to a loss about $38 on each piglet, according to commodity firm Kerns & Associates.

Farmers in neighboring Canada are also killing animals they can’t sell or afford to feed. The value of Canadian isoweans – baby pigs – has fallen to zero because of U.S. processing plant disruptions, said Rick Bergmann, a Manitoba hog farmer and chair of the Canadian Pork Council. In Quebec alone, a backlog of 92,000 pigs waits for slaughter, said Quebec hog producer Rene Roy, an executive with the pork council.

A hog farm on Prince Edward Island in Canada euthanized 270-pound hogs that were ready for slaughter because there was no place to process them, Bergmann said. The animals were dumped in a landfill.

DEATH THREATS

The latest economic disaster to befall the farm sector comes after years of extreme weather, sagging commodity prices and the Trump administration’s trade war with China and other key export markets. But it’s more than lost income. The pandemic barreling through farm towns has mired rural communities in despair, a potent mix of shame and grief.

Farmers take pride in the fact that their crops and animals are meant to feed people, especially in a crisis that has idled millions of workers and forced many to rely on food banks. Now, they’re destroying crops and killing animals for no purpose.

Farmers flinch when talking about killing off animals early or plowing crops into the ground, for fear of public wrath. Two Wisconsin dairy farmers, forced to dump milk by their buyers, told Reuters they recently received anonymous death threats.

“They say, ‘How dare you throw away food when so many people are hungry?’,” said one farmer, speaking on condition of anonymity. “They don’t know how farming works. This makes me sick, too.”

Even as livestock and crop prices plummet, prices for meat and eggs at grocery stores are up. The average retail price of eggs was up nearly 40% for the week ended April 18, compared to a year earlier, according to Nielsen data. Average retail fresh chicken prices were up 5.4%, while beef was up 5.8% and pork up 6.6%.

On Van Beek’s farm in Rock Valley, Iowa, one hog broke a leg because it grew too heavy while waiting to be slaughtered. He has delivered pigs to facilities that are still operating, but they are too full to take all of his animals.

Van Beek paid $2,000 to truck pigs about seven hours to a Smithfield plant in Illinois, more than quadruple the usual cost to haul them to a Sioux Falls, South Dakota, slaughterhouse that the company has closed indefinitely. He said Smithfield is supposed to pay the extra transportation costs under his contract. But the company is refusing to do so, claiming “force majeure” – that an extraordinary and unforeseeable event prevents it from fulfilling its agreement.

Smithfield, the world’s largest pork processor, declined to comment on whether it has refused to make contracted payments. It said the company is working with suppliers “to navigate these challenging and unprecedented times.”

Hog farmers nationwide will lose an estimated $5 billion, or $37 per head, for the rest of the year due to pandemic disruptions, according to the industry group National Pork Producers Council.

A recently announced $19 billion U.S. government coronavirus aid package for farmers will not pay for livestock that are culled, according to the American Farm Bureau Federation, the nation’s largest farmer trade group. The USDA said in a statement the payment program is still being developed and the agency has received more requests for assistance than it has money to handle.

Minnesota farmer Mike Patterson started feeding his pigs more soybean hulls – which fill animals’ stomachs but offer negligible nutritional value – to keep them from getting too large for their barns. He’s considering euthanizing them because he cannot find enough buyers after Smithfield indefinitely shut its massive Sioux Falls plant.

“They have to be housed humanely,” Patterson said. “If there’s not enough room, we have to have less hogs somehow. One way or another, we’ve got to have less hogs.”

(Reporting By Tom Polansek and P.J. Huffstutter in Chicago. Additional reporting by Rod Nickel in Winnipeg, Manitoba. Writing by P.J. Huffstutter; Editing by Caroline Stauffer and Brian Thevenot)

As U.S. states ease restrictions, projected coronavirus death toll rises

By Doina Chiacu

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – As Georgia lifted a ban on eating in restaurants and a handful of other U.S. states began easing other restrictions aimed at fighting the coronavirus pandemic, scientists warned the death toll would climb if governors reopen businesses prematurely.

The outbreak could take more than 74,000 U.S. lives by August, compared with an earlier forecast of 67,000, according to the University of Washington’s predictive model, often cited by White House officials and state public health authorities.

The university’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) said late on Monday that the number of U.S. deaths caused by the virus was not abating as quickly as previously projected after hitting a daily peak on April 15 with about 2,700.

IHME director Christopher Murray said the death toll would climb if states reopen their economies too early.

With President Donald Trump’s administration forecasting an unemployment rate of more than 16% for April and residents chafing under stay-at-home orders, states from Alaska to Mississippi are seeking to restart their battered economies despite a lack of large-scale virus testing.

Texas Governor Greg Abbott said on Monday he would allow the state’s stay-at-home order to expire and begin reopening businesses including restaurants and retail shops in phases beginning on Friday.

The White House released a blueprint on Monday that put the onus on states to implement testing and rapid response programs, despite pleas from New York Governor Andrew Cuomo and others for federal help. It said states were responsible for identifying, and overcoming barriers to, efficient testing.

The U.S. government’s role was to “act as supplier of last resort,” the blueprint said. It would provide guidelines for easing restrictions and administering diagnostic tests, while providing technical assistance on how to best use testing technologies and align supplies with anticipated lab needs.

U.S. Senator Patty Murray, a Democrat from hard-hit Washington state, on Tuesday criticized the Republican Trump’s testing blueprint as “nothing new.”

“It doesn’t set specific, numeric goals, offer a timeframe, identify ways to fix our broken supply chain, or offer any details whatsoever on expanding lab capacity or activating needed manufacturing capacity,” she said in a statement.

“Perhaps most pathetically, it attempts to shirk obviously federal responsibilities by assigning them solely to states instead,” she said.

After crowds jammed beaches over the weekend in California, Governor Gavin Newsom said social-distancing enforcement would be stepped up.

Deborah Birx, response coordinator for the White House coronavirus task force, urged Americans on Monday to go on sheltering in place and maintain social distancing until authorities lift their orders.

“We’re beginning to understand more and more that there may be an inverse relationship for how severe the disease is and your age. So younger people could actually be infected and not know they are infected and unintentionally pass the virus on,” she told Fox News on Tuesday.

(Reporting by Doina Chiacu and Susan Heavey in Washington, additional reporting by Peter Szekely in New York; Writing by Maria Caspani, Editing by Howard Goller)