Articles Tagged with ''Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack''

President Joe Biden has announced his intent to appoint seven Department of Agriculture regional positions and Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack has filled four senior staff positions.

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack confirms that USDA is expecting to spend about $1 billion from the Commodity Credit Corp. for developing climate-smart agricultural commodities.

The White House is doubling down on blaming meatpackers for higher food prices. White House press secretary Jen Psaki was pressed at a news conference Tuesday to say how corporate greed had caused inflation. She immediately cited the “greed of meat conglomerates.”

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack says his three-day trip to the international climate conference in Glasgow showed the importance that agriculture will play in the Biden administration’s plans to address climate change.

Four Senate Republicans are introducing a bill today that could stop the Labor Department from increasing the wages that farmers must pay H-2A workers in many states. The minimum wage rates are set by an adverse effect wage rate, or AEWR, that the department sets each year based on a USDA survey that typically comes out each November.

A bipartisan group of House members is introducing a bill to create a beef industry contract library that producers could consult in marketing their cattle. The House Agriculture Committee is expected to consider the measure on Thursday.

Dry weather and above normal temperatures are expected across the upper Midwest from September to November, according to the National Weather Service.

The Department of Agriculture is set to announce a benefits boost under the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program that will raise average assistance by more than 25%.

As promised, Senate Democrats are going to kick off work on their massive $3.5 trillion spending and tax plan before senators leave for their August recess. On Monday Democrats released a fiscal 2022 budget resolution that is the first step in the budget reconciliation process that will be needed to enact their proposals into law.

Republicans and Democrats both say they are close to wrapping up the final details of a bipartisan infrastructure package for the Senate to consider.