Funding for the basic research that makes American agriculture a world leader in innovation and production is stagnant if not in decline, the West Central Tribune reports.

Management and Budget Commissioner James Schowalter says better-than-expected sales tax collections last month helped pad Minnesota's budget. Since February, tax revenues have surpassed estimates by $148 million. An economic update will be released next month and a new budget forecast will be issued in November.

Cole Gustafson, PhD, 56, Chair of the Department of Agribusiness and Applied Economics, died in an accident on his parents farm in near Center City, Minn. Saturday. Gustafson's right leg apparently became pinned by a tractor tire and he died at the scene.

Counties in southwest Minnesota are seeing record land prices with rates expected to keep climbing. Officials say rural landowners should expect a 2012 property tax increase of 20 to 30 percent.

Minnesota's cornfields will average 168 bushels an acre this year, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. The Pioneer Press reports this would be Minnesota's largest corn crop in state history and make the state the second largest corn producer in the country -- only trailing Iowa.

U.S. Food and Drug Administration has awarded the Minnesota Department of Agriculture $600,000 grant to help the department quickly trace contaminated food to grocery stores and other distribution points.