NIFA

(Editor’s note: Secretary of Agriculture Sonny Perdue on April 1 proclaimed “ Invasive Plant Pest and Disease Awareness Month.” The following illustrates some of the research that USDA’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture supports to control invasive pests in agriculture.)

For 50 years, educators from the nation’s land-grant universities have brought EFNEP – the Expanded Food and Nutrition Education Program – to low income Americans, giving them the tools they need for better eating and health.

Scientists from USDA developed the tools to mass produce penicillin, which was used for treating wounded soldiers over 70 years ago during World War II. Antibiotics are still important in treating microbial infection in humans, animals, and plants. However, microbes can develop resistance to some...

Nearly a quarter of a century ago, members of Congress crafted legislation that allowed us to reach an important milestone in our nation’s effort to achieve equity in research, education, and extension.

(Note: Oct. 16 is World Food Day, when 150 countries around the world show their support of the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization’s mission to raise awareness and help to end world hunger. The following article features one USDA-supported program that helps bring healthful food to...

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.

You know what they say about land – they’re not making any more of it. In fact, when it comes to agriculture, the amount of available farmland is shrinking. When you couple that with a world population of nearly 10 billion by 2050, it’s not unusual to ask if there will be enough food to eat.

Imagine walking into your local grocery store on a frigid January day to pick up freshly harvested lettuce, fragrant basil, juicy sweet strawberries, and ripe red tomatoes – all of which were harvested at a local farm only hours before you’d arrived. You might be imagining buying that fresh produce...

Bee populations in North America have been in decline since the 1940s. This is of great concern to the agriculture industry because about 75 percent of specialty crops depend on the services of pollinators – of which bees are the most economically important.

Donating used clothing to charities obviously helps clothe and employ fellow Americans, but other benefits fly below the radar: exporting worn textiles provides income to low- and middle-income foreign countries, and also helps the environment. That win-win-win situation gives new meaning to the...