USDA Blog

Wisconsin's affordable housing developers and owners will be relieved of regulatory redundancies and burdens on receiving government financial assistance for low and moderate income housing developments as a result of a Memorandum of Understanding signed last week. USDA Rural Development, the US...

“It’s a pleasure to get up in the morning and go to work,” said Toniette “Toni” Addison, a civil engineer for the National Forests in Florida. “I spend the majority of my time designing recreation sites on some of the most beautiful and remote areas of our forests.” But things were not always so...

Urban children in Albuquerque, N.M., will soon be able to descend on 20 acres of forestland along the Rio Grande River, where they will have the freedom to climb onto an elevated fort, hike on a trail through the cottonwood forest to learn about the different plants and animals and do what all...

Originally, the young Lincoln Bramwell wanted to be a garbage man, what we call a sanitation engineer today. “They swing on the back of trucks, find cool stuff occasionally. I thought that was the coolest job ever,” he said. Bramwell explained that it changed later once “I had to take the trash out...

Imagine being a kid and having a senior government official come to your school to share the joy of reading and storytelling. Then imagine the excitement when an actual Dr. Seuss character enters the room! That’s what happened when Arthur “Butch” Blazer, USDA Deputy Under Secretary for Natural...

In 2009, during climate change talks in Copenhagen, Denmark, Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack signed a historic “ Memorandum of Understanding” with dairy producers to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from farms by capturing methane with enhanced manure management practices and turning it into...

Two and a half years ago, I announced a new initiative here at USDA called Know Your Farmer, Know Your Food. It’s the public face of our commitment to help farmers and ranchers of all sizes take advantage of new opportunities, meet the growing demand for local and regional food and succeed in...

Earlier this week we launched the Know Your Farmer, Know Your Food Compass, a digital narrative with stories, pictures and video about USDA’s support for local and regional food systems, and interactive map with datasets displaying the various ways and places where the initiative has made an impact.

A new land conservation agreement will protect key wildlife habitat in Wyoming’s Green River Valley. The agreement, which establishes two conservation easements on the Fish Creek Flying W Ranches near Big Piney, was coordinated by the Wyoming Game and Fish Department and The Conservation Fund.

When Mississippian Kathy Land suddenly inherited 200 acres of century-old family land, the middle school history teacher wasn’t sure what to do. The idle fields were overgrown, and the Winston County native knew she needed help.