Blog Archives

“Lumber and economic growth are tightly connected,” says USDA Forest Service scientist Jeffrey Prestemon. “At a certain rate of GDP growth, you get a certain path of lumber consumption.”

Farming in a suburban town just 25 miles south of Boston has both benefits and challenges. Those benefits and challenges result from the same thing, lots of neighbors.

USDA’s Administrator of the Risk Management Agency, which oversees Federal crop insurance, was in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, attending a conference hosted by the state’s Department of Agriculture.

With children going back to school and September being National Food Safety Education Month, now is a great time to learn more about food safety and preventing foodborne illness. One way to stay food safe and to prevent the spread of foodborne illnesses (and any illness for that matter) is to make proper hand washing routine at home and at school.

The scene has played out millions of times in recent years – American children waking up to find their parents unable to care for them. Fortunately, some 2.7 million grandparents have stepped in to fill the critical role of caregiver, according to the 2010 Census.

Boise, Idaho is famous among college football fans for the blue turf on the Boise State University Broncos’ field. But in wildland fire management circles, the city is just as well-known as home of the National Interagency Fire Center, or NIFC. In fact, NIFC is the nation’s support center for wildland fire management and other types of incidents. Some even refer to it as the Pentagon, or nerve center, for national wildland fire management.

Working on my family’s farm in Montana as a teenager, one of the earliest lessons I learned from my father was the importance of understanding the farm finances. His lessons about maximizing profits instead of working to maximize yields have helped drive my understanding of farm economics. You could even say that my interest in these economics has influenced my career path within USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS) where I work on the Agricultural Resource Management Survey (ARMS).

As a business professional, you set goals often. I have set goals for my career and as a mother. USDA is helping me achieve these goals.

Back to school marks new beginnings, mixed emotions and all of a sudden…stress! How can you manage your time, juggle more responsibilities and, of course, pack lunch for your picky eater?

Deadly and destructive wildland fires consuming so much of the West, from California all the way to British Columbia, are not only affecting those who have had to flee but those who are downwind of these massive infernos. At one point, in early July, before the prevailing winds helped de-choke Washington state, Seattle was reported to have the worst air quality in the nation.