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House Ag Chair Changes Party Affiliation

CO State Rep. Kathleen Curry of Gunnison

State Rep. Kathleen Curry has changed her voter registration from Democrat to unaffiliated, a move that will require the Gunnison lawmaker to relinquish her positions as speaker pro tem and chairwoman of the House Agriculture Committee.

Curry said she made the change Monday after talking to House Speaker Terrance Carroll, who had appointed Curry to the plum pro tem position.

“It’s just a matter of where I fit,” she said Tuesday. “But I’m not changing my personality overnight just because I filled out a form. I’m still going to vote my conscience, which the majority of time is with the Democrats.”

Speaker Terrance Carroll said he will decide in a few days which lawmaker will replace Curry as chair of the House Agriculture, Livestock and Natural Resources Committee, and as speaker pro tem, the No. 2 position in the House. The 2010 session opens Jan. 13.

Rep. Sal Pace (D-Pueblo), Rep. Randy Fisher (D-Ft. Collins) and Rep. Wes McKinley (D- Walsh) are said to be the possible front runners for the chairmanship.

The Facebook Guidebook

Facebook is the world’s leading social network, with over 300 million users and more than 900 employees. But how do you get the most out of it?

Facebook Pages vs Facebook Groups: What’s the Difference?

How Do I Find Friends?

What is a News Feed?

To answer these questions and more, Mashable has created The Facebook Guide Book, a complete collection of resources to help you master Facebook.

USDA, USTR Concerned About Taiwanese Beef Barriers

The Agriculture Department and the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative are concerned that amendments to a Taiwanese Food Sanitation Act could bar imports of U.S. beef products to Taiwan and abrogate an October agreement that opened the Taiwanese market to U.S. beef imports.

“If passed, this amendment would represent a new barrier to U.S. beef exports to Taiwan, and would constitute a unilateral abrogation of a bilateral agreement concluded in good faith by the United States with Taiwan just two months ago,” Deputy U.S. Trade Representative Demetrios Marantis and Undersecretary for Farm and Agricultural Services Jim Miller said in a statement Tuesday.

Marantis and Miller said they were deeply concerned and disappointed that Taiwan’s legislative body had taken initial steps toward passage of the amendment. They said the proposed amendment has no basis in science or fact and does not serve to protect Taiwan’s food supply.

U.S. Farm Income Projected to Decline in 2009

U.S. farm income is projected to decline in 2009, according to a new report from the Agriculture Department’s Economic Research Service. The ERS report, “Agricultural Income Finance and Outlook,” shows all three measures of farm income are projected to decline in 2009.

Net farm income is projected to decline 34.5 percent, net cash income by 28.4 percent and net value-added income by 20 percent. Overall farm debt is expected to remain steady at $239 billion.

Average net farm income for farm businesses (intermediate and commercial operations, including non-family farms) is projected at $61,578 in 2009, down 10.6 percent from 2008. The largest declines in farm-business income are forecast for livestock farms, particularly dairy. Farm-operator household income is forecast at $76,065, down 3.5 percent compared to 2008. Household earnings from off-farm sources are projected to be similar to 2008, according to ERS.

Download the full report, Agricultural Income and Finance Outlook, Dec. 2009, online.

Investors See Farming as a Way to Grow Detroit

A community garden project in Drtroit

Reporting from Detroit – On the city’s east side, where auto workers once assembled cars by the millions, nature is taking back the land.

There’s so much land available and it’s begging to be used,” said Michael Score, president of the Hantz Farms, which is buying up abandoned sections of the city’s 139-square-mile landscape and plans to transform them into a large-scale commercial farm enterprise.

It is the size and scope of Hantz Farms that makes the project unique. Although company officials declined to pinpoint how many acres they might use, they have been quoted as saying that they plan to farm up to 5,000 acres within the Motor City’s limits in the coming years, raising organic lettuces, trees for biofuel and a variety of other things.

The project was launched two years ago by Michigan native and financier John Hantz, who has invested an initial $30 million of his own money toward purchasing equipment and land.

Climate Bill Pushes Trees Over Food

Much like the climate “researchers” at East Anglia University, Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack is “tweeking” a formula to produce a desired result on Cap & Trade legislation.

He has ordered his staff to revise a computerized forecasting model that showed that climate legislation supported by President Obama would make planting trees more lucrative than producing food.

The latest USDA economic impact study of the climate bill found that farmers would profit in the long haul from the legislation.

BUT… those profits would come mostly from higher prices for their crops caused by the legislation’s incentives to plant more forests and thus reduce the amount of land devoted to food-producing agriculture.

Senate Approves Health Care Bill Along Party Lines

The Senate on Thursday approved H.R. 3590, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, on a 60-39 vote along party lines. Senate Democrats and Independents supported the measure; no Republicans voted for it.

President Barack Obama praised the Senate for approving its version of the bill. He earlier urged speedy action on the measure and has said he would like to sign it into law before his annual State of the Union address in January.

Differences in the health care reform bills passed by the House and Senate will be reconciled by a conference committee early next year.

Farm Bureau-opposed provisions requiring employers to provide health insurance for full-time employees were dropped from the bill approved by the Senate.

Moderate Democrats Urge White House to Drop Cap-and-Trade

Moderate Democrats in the Senate are urging the Obama administration to stop urging passage of climate change legislation with cap-and-trade provisions in 2010. Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) and several other Democrats are speaking to the White House and party leadership about setting aside efforts on cap and trade.

“I am communicating that in every way I know how,” Landrieu said. Although cap-and-trade provisions are central to Democrats’ plans to curb global warming, some senators in the party are urging a focus on health care and the economy instead.

Farm Bureau’s grassroots “Don’t Cap Our Future” campaign against cap-and-trade provisions of climate change legislation continues to build momentum across the country.

AFBF President Appoints New YF&R Committee Members

American Farm Bureau Federation President Bob Stallman has appointed eight new committee members for two-year terms to the AFBF Young Farmers & Ranchers Committee. The YF&R program is composed of Farm Bureau members between the ages of 18 and 35. The program’s goal is to provide leadership development that will build a more effective Farm Bureau though education, problem solving and network building.

“I am always impressed with the quality of people who are nominated for these positions and this year is no exception,” said Stallman. “It is important to ensure that the future of agriculture is in good hands and I am confident that these individuals will become great leaders as they have already given so much back to their communities.”

There are 16 positions on the committee with members representing all four regions of the United States. The new 2010-2012 members are: Jason Bunting, Illinois; Derek Sawyer, Kansas; Daniel and Alison Smith, Kentucky; Ben and Kelsey LaCross, Michigan; Dan and Seena Glessing, Minnesota; Patrick and Kim Swindoll, Mississippi; Dustin Ladenburger, Nebraska; and Scott and Mendy Sink, Virginia. They will be joining Will and Joni Gilmer, Alabama; Matt and Erin Sweet, California; Roland Yee, Florida; Leighton and Brenda Cooley, Georgia; Jim and Andrea Schultz, New York; Mark and Valerie Wagner, North Dakota; Ryan and Nikki McClure, Ohio; and Chalsey Kortes, Wyoming.

Sweeping Health Care Bill Advances in Senate

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (center), Sen. Charles Schumer (left) and Victoria Reggie Kennedy celebrate after the Senate passed a key procedural vote on health-care legislation. (Getty Images)

In early morning procedural votes today, the Senate approved cutting off debate on the manager’s amendment on health care legislation offered by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.). The manager’s amendment did not include a public insurance option, which Farm Bureau strongly opposes. Today’s procedural votes are viewed by many as a test vote for the sweeping legislation, which senators have been debating for nearly a month.

The Senate could vote on the overall measure as early as Thursday (Christmas Eve). If approved, the bill will go to a conference committee early next year for reconciling with the version passed by the House in November. President Barack Obama has urged speedy action on the massive bill and would like to sign it into law before his annual State of the Union address in January.

Fox News Story Explores Clean Water Restoration Act

How passage of the Clean Water Restoration Act would affect farmers and ranchers was the subject of a Fox News broadcast story on Sunday. Don Parrish, water expert with the American Farm Bureau Federation, appeared live on a segment about the issue.

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Parrish explained that removing the word “navigable” from the Clean Water Act would harm America’s food producers by allowing federal regulation of all interstate and intrastate waters, including puddles, ditches and farm ponds. If the bill becomes law, farmers and ranchers would likely be forced to apply for expensive permits, Parrish said.

China’s Low Tariff Opens Door for Ethanol Imports

China has agreed to lower the tariff on imports of ethanol to 5 percent from the previous 30 percent, which traders said could open the door for imports of fuel ethanol from countries like Brazil. The Chinese Finance Ministry announced this week that import taxes for alcohol and other spirits denatured of any strength would be 5 percent from January 1, 2010, and traders said the tax applied to imports of ethanol for fuel use as well.

“The low tariff appears to make imports (of fuel ethanol) viable. But we are studying if there are other restrictions,” said one trader with an international house.

Brazil, the world’s largest ethanol exporter, has been pushing China to import Brazilian-made fuel ethanol as a complement to China’s own production. China does not allow grain-based ethanol production on food security concerns, and expansion of the biofuel using feedstocks other than grains is restricted due to limited farmland and water resources.

Chinese companies are working to use cellulosic materials, but commercial production will still take years.

Good News From Copenhagen

Disaster avoided! The Copehagen Climate Change Summit drew to an uneasy close tonight with negotiators only able to secure a non-binding agreement between the developed and developing nations and avoiding economic costs in the trillions.

President Obama said that a “fundamental deadlock in perspectives” had overshadowed the negotiations. He said that a climate deal had been reached with India, China and South Afrrica, but admitted that it was not enough to fight global warming. He added: “We have much further to go.”

The document (or what is left of it) did not include any specific emissions reduction targets or (at the Chinese request) any mechanisms for verification of emission reductions.

Commenting on the draft Copenhagen Accord, the Greenpeace climate campaigner Joss Garman said tonight: “This latest draft is so weak as to be meaningless. It’s more like a G8 communiqué than the legally binding agreement we need.”

If Greenpeace hates it, The Pulse loves it!!

“Copenhagen Accord” on the Rocks

While protestors attempt to storm the conference center in Copenhagen and Hugo Chavez takes the opportunity to call President Obama the “Devil”, climate talks are apparently breaking down. According to The Times,  The Chinese delegation reacted negatively to a slight from President Obama in his speech to the conference on Thursday. The Chinese took offense to Mr. Obama’s assertion that, “Without any accountability, any agreement would be empty words on a page.” Mr Wen, the Chinese Prim Minister apparently interpreted this as an attempt to subject China to external scrutiny, despite Mr Obama’s insistence that the monitoring system would respect national sovereignty.

In an attempt to salvage the meeting, a commitment to turning the “Copenhagen Accord” into a legally binding treaty within a year was deleted from a draft of the text leaked tonight. The draft also contained only vague language on the key issues of limiting the temperature increase to 2C and cutting global emissions by 50 per cent by 2050. If codified, this would mean that the U.S. will cut emissions by 80% by 2050, using 1990 as a baseline.

Tear gas was used on protesters after they attempted to storm the conference center in Copenhagen.

China does not want the long-term target to be binding because it fears that this would constrain its economic growth.

The Copenhagen Accord also contains language to create a $100 billion fund by 2020 to help developing countries to cope with climate change. Different drafts of the agreement emerged every two or three hours yesterday, with paragraphs being added or deleted each time. Developing nations have been lobbying wealthy nations to contribute money to help offset emission reductions for the entirety of the conference, seeing it as a potential foreign-aide bonanza.

Olympic Gold, Er…. Red?

Richmond is Canada’s largest producer of cranberries with more than 60 family-owned farms

Thirteen million cranberries will be used to make a “colossal depiction of the Canadian Olympic Committee’s logo” and it will be floated in the Fraser River running in front of the Richmond Olympic Oval throughout the 2010 Olympic Winter Games.

President Obama Says ‘Time Running Out’ on Copenhagen

President Barack Obama told delegates at the United Nations climate change talks that he came to Copenhagen “not to talk, but to act.” He said it is time for “the nations of the world to come together behind a common purpose.”

“While the science of climate change is not in doubt, I think our ability to take collective action is in doubt right now, and it hangs in the balance,” Obama said at the summit earlier today.

Unchecked, he said, climate change would pose “unacceptable risks” to international security, the world economy and the planet. He said time is running out and “we are ready to get this done today but there has to be movement on all sides.”

The president said the U.S. is prepared to walk away from the talks empty handed, rather than accept a “hollow victory” in which developing nations refuse to allow their own emissions controls to be monitored.

“These discussions have taken place for two decades, and we have very little to show for it other than an increase and acceleration in the climate change phenomenon,” Obama said.

The text of the entire speech can be found here.

Lucas, Chambliss Request Updated Climate Change Analysis

Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.) and Rep. Frank Lucas (R-Okla.), ranking members of the Senate and House Agriculture Committees, respectively, wrote to Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack on Thursday regarding his recent remarks on USDA’s climate change legislation analysis.

Chambliss and Lucas said the statement made by Vilsack implies a lack of confidence in the modeling used by both USDA and EPA. Additionally, they ask that both the USDA and EPA report to the House and Senate Agriculture committees on the problems with the economic model in order to reflect realistic scenarios while examining the impact of cap-and-trade on the agriculture and forestry sectors.

Copenhagen, Day 7

From Wednesday in Copenhagen…

A globe in the conference hall left off several of the Pacific island nations through an "oversight."

Wednesday saw various arrivals at the Copenhagen conference: some heads of state, some settling snow and a rising sense of despair. The conference was designed to ratchet up the pressure as it moved form the procedural to the substantive and from functionaries to heads of state. Now the bigwigs are here making statements, and the procedural side of things is pretty much a mess.

The text, that on long-term commitment, was not even that far advanced, having yet to make it to a plenary for acceptance. It has, though, managed to grow larger as it waits.

All in all, the idea that presidents and prime ministers turning up would spur a breakthrough seems wrong. It was meant to goad the parties into producing ship-shape documents in which the big things that remained to be done were well defined. Then the big cheeses would reach agreement on the key issues—emissions, financing, the nature of developing-country commitments and the means by which they might be audited—and bless the resulting texts, producing not treaties but documents in which there was serious political capital invested.

Part of that political agreement would be a timetable for developing the outcomes into new legal documents for signing at some point in 2010. Tim Groser, New Zealand’s minister for trade is scathing on the subject.

“Now … the stakes here are that much higher. But right now, can I see a basis in the texts for an outcome? No.”

The Pulse is providing readers with a daily snippet of The Economist’s correspondent diary. You can find past updates from the conference diary here. Please visit The Economist for the full text of the diary and extended coverage of the conference.

Copenhagen, Day 6

From Tuesday in Copenhagen…

A stray Polar Bear on the streets of Copenhagen

Inside, temperature and stasis are not a problem; things are simply slower. This is in part because more of the 15,000 people in the building now know each other than did so last week; they have what physicists would call an increased cross-section of interaction. Though such interactions may speed the transmission of information through the halls by way of leak, chat and argument, they slow down physical movement. If you’re not greeting one of your friends, you’re bumping into someone who has stopped to greet one of hers.

There were also, thanks to one of the NGOs, some ents in the building today—or at least walking trees, which comes to the same thing. Apparently there were also many Polar Bears around the building.

The main obstacle, though, is simply more bodies.

And soon things could get more crowded still. Ominous new metal detectors and X-ray machines have turned up at the doors of the media centre. They are not yet operational, but they foreshadow a future in which access to the halls where delegates are meeting, and the atria surrounding and connecting those halls, is curtailed, and non-delegates are penned up more tightly. Its hard not to feel that even in this vast building, stir-craziness beckons.

The Pulse is providing readers with a daily snippet of The Economist’s correspondent diary. You can find past updates from the conference diary here. Please visit The Economist for the full text of the diary and extended coverage of the conference.

Senate Ag Subcommittee Assignments

There has been some shuffling of Senate Agriculture Subcommittee chairmanships and assignments to accommodate Senator Blanche Lincoln’s move to Agriculture Committee Chairman.

Former Senate Agriculture Committee Chairman Tom Harkin of Iowa assumes seats on three subcommittees formerly held by Lincoln. He’ll assume seats on the Subcommittee on Rural Revitalization, Conservation, Forestry and Credit; the Subcommittee on Hunger, Nutrition, and Family Farms; and the Subcommittee on Production, Income Protection and Price Support. These seats were previously held by Lincoln.

Michigan Senator Debbie Stabenow will assume Chairmanship of the Subcommittee on Rural Revitalization, Conservation, Forestry and Credit. This seat was previously held by Lincoln.

Colorado Senator Michael Bennet will assume Chairmanship of the Subcommittee on Energy, Science and Technology. This seat was previously held by Stabenow.

Audi Tells Obama, “Forget Plug-Ins, Think Biodiesel”

The top executive at Audi’s U.S. offices says American political leaders need to think less about plug-in electric vehicles and more about vehicles that run on biodiesel, as well as standardizing the rules for biodiesel.

“I understand why political leaders have fallen in love with hybrids and electrics. But this may be the one time you’ll hear someone in Washington say it shouldn’t be a monogamous relationship,” de Nysschen said.

De Nysschen favors using diesel technology and allowing the marketplace to pick the winners and losers. He urged the government not to be “prejudging winning and losing technologies” and urged more work to standardize biodiesel rules.

Vilsack Downplays USDA Study on Climate Change

Apparently, USDA wants us to pay no attention to the man behind the curtain…

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack downplayed his department’s analysis of climate legislation on Tuesday, saying “more current” studies do not foresee carbon-capturing trees taking over millions of acres of farmland, according to a Reuters report.

Up to 59 million acres of pasture and cropland could be converted to woodland by 2050 under a cap-and-trade system, according to the USDA analysis.

“I think there are other models that are more current and complete that might lead to significantly different conclusions,” said Vilsack when asked about the USDA study. “We think there can be improvements to the modeling that was used in the past.”

One wonders why the study is so out of date if it was released only a few days ago?

Copenhagen, Weekend

From Sunday in Copenhagen…

ON SUNDAY, they rested. No doubt informal talks continued all across Copenhagen, as did organised side events such as “Forest Day”, but the Bella Centre itself was shut, allowing a security sweep prior to the arrival, next week, of over 100 heads of government and state. Thus freed from the obligations of attendance, it was time to actually see Copenhagen, and get not just out and about, but out to sea.

The Middelgrunden wind farm

My trip onto the flat and initially sunny waters of the Oresund was laid on by various wind-industry groups that wanted to impress journalists with a close up look at the Middelgrunden wind farm.

Denmark already gets a lot of its energy from the wind, and it wants to get a lot more—perhaps another two gigawatts of installed capacity by 2020, more than half of it at sea. Anders Soe Jensen, the president of a wind-power company called Vestas, who gamely played tour guide from the deck despite suffering from a stinking cold, explained that offshore wind can expect to grow at 45% a year for the next five years. It is expensive (installation, foundations, cabling, substations and the like cost as much as the mighty turbines themselves)

To the north-east, in Sweden, are the two brick-like reactor halls of the decommissioned Barseback nuclear-power station, less lovely than the wind farm but capable, in their prime, of producing 30-odd times more power.

The Pulse is providing readers with a daily snippet of The Economist’s correspondent diary. You can find past updates from the conference diary here. Please visit The Economist for the full text of the diary and extended coverage of the conference.

Copenhagen, Day 5

From Friday in Copenhagen…

…I’m leaked a text of a recent negotiating draft released by the chair of one of the two main negotiating tracks. It’s been leaked so widely that some journos think it has been officially released, and they complain to Yvo de Boer in the press conference that they’re not being given it at the documents counter. “Someone here is getting very good at leaking, then.”

Argentinean delegates at a conference plenary.

The document fleshes out ambitious commitments on emissions reductions, but brackets signal text yet to be agreed on. Filling in those brackets is the work of next week. And the language on money, which I think is the biggest obstacle to a deal, is vaguer still, not so much because it is in brackets, but because the rich and poor countries are orders of magnitude away from each other. The rich are talking about $10 billion a year until 2012. The poor want “predictable, guaranteed” money in the hundreds of billions, starting soon. Private investment, leveraged and guaranteed by public money, will be a huge part of it. The poor countries don’t want hot investment money; they want guaranteed transfers…

The Pulse is providing readers with a daily snippet of The Economist’s correspondent diary. You can find past updates from the conference diary here. Please visit The Economist for the full text of the diary and extended coverage of the conference.

Murkowski Resolution Seeks to Stop Greenhouse Gas Ruling

Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) plans to file a disapproval resolution to stop the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) from regulating greenhouse gas emissions under the Clean Air Act. Murkowski’s resolution comes in the wake of the agency’s recent endangerment finding, which will result in damaging new regulations that endanger America’s economy.

“The endangerment finding is aptly named. It endangers jobs, it endangers economic growth and it endangers American competitiveness, while setting the stage for backdoor bureaucratic intrusion into the lives of Americans on an unprecedented scale.”

“I remain committed to reducing emissions through a policy that will protect our environment and strengthen our economy, but EPA’s backdoor climate regulations achieve neither of those goals,” Murkowski said. “EPA regulation must be taken off the table so that we can focus on more responsible approaches to dealing with global climate change.”

While the administration claims the endangerment finding is merely an affirmation of the science behind global climate change, Murkowski said that aspect is just the tip of the iceberg.

“The EPA administrator’s move has thrown open the door to expensive and intrusive government regulation—as far from a market-based solution as we can possibly imagine,” Murkowski said.

Don’t ‘CAP’ Our Future Campaign Gains Momentum

World leaders are in Copenhagen to debate how to address global warming. but farmers and ranchers say that congress needs to listen to what folks are saying back home!

AFBF’s Johnna Miller reports…

Trio of Senators Offer New Climate Change Proposal

Sens. John Kerry (D-Mass.), Lindsey Graham (R.-S.C.) and Joe Lieberman (I.-Conn.) on Thursday held a press conference to talk up a proposal on climate legislation that includes caps on greenhouse gas emissions and incentives for offshore oil-and-gas exploration and nuclear power plants. The proposal won praise from President Barack Obama.

more about “Climate Change Bill – C-SPAN Video Li…“, posted with vodpod

According to a Wall Street Journal article, it’s unclear whether the proposal can win over Democrats from heartland states and Republicans that are opposed to adopting caps on U.S. carbon emissions. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) has put off consideration of a climate bill until spring and is currently focusing attention on health care and jobs.

Sen. Lindsey Grahm earlier this year, bucked the party line and pledged to work with Sen. Kerry on global warming legislation after negotiations slowed in the Senate.

Collegians Discuss Ag Issues

CFB Collegiate Members

Collegiate Farm Bureau members gathered last Saturday to compete in the CFB Collegiate Farm Bureau Discussion Meet competition. Three members from the NJC Collegiate Farm Bureau chapter and one from the CSU chapter competed in the meet and took tips and ideas from the assembled members and staff.

CSU's Riley Strand wins the 2009 Collegiate Discussion Meet.

Students PeterAmbrose, Adam Seymour, Scott Meyers and Riley Strand competed, discussing issues such as increasing participation in agriculture among young people, and increasing communication and shared understanding between urban dwellers and agriculturalists.

After three rounds of competition, Riley strand of CSU took the top position in the meet, winning a paid trip to the AFBF YF&R Convention in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Placing second was NJC Collegiate member Scott Meyers.

Thank you to all the participants in this years meet! You can view additional photos of the event here.

Copenhagen, Day 4

From Thursday in Copenhagen…

Much of what NGOs do in Copenhagen is theatre. And it must be said, some of it is pretty decent. Every evening, the Climate Action Network and Avaaz.org present the “Fossil of the Day”. Presenters wear Oscar-style fancy dress, sing a little ditty, and give third-, second- and first-prize awards for the most obstructionist, climate-unfriendly negotiating position. It’s well attended, and the host, Ben Wikler of Avaaz, jovially hams it up. At the end of the conference, a grand winner will be announced.

(Break here while I stick my head outside the door of the filing centre to see what a ruckus is about. It’s just another mini-march through the hall, maybe fifty people chanting a particularly clunky slogan:

An NGO activist

“Don’t! Kill! Kyoto! Climate Justice Now!”)

Today, Avaaz continues its admirably goofy run with aliens wandering around with the slogans “Where are you climate leaders?” and “Are you a climate leader?”. The other day, a “Useless Magician” from Friends of the Earth tried and failed to make an airplane and its emissions disappear with “the magical power” of carbon offsets. After three failed attempts, he was forced to admit that carbon offsets were the worst magic trick of all time.

The Pulse is providing readers with a daily snippet of The Economist’s correspondent diary. You can find past updates from the conference diary here. Please visit The Economist for the full text of the diary and extended coverage of the conference.