Food

RSS

USDA estimates nearly 1.2 million households could be eligible for disaster SNAP benefits following Hurricane Helene. 

Hurricane Milton, the fourth hurricane to strike Florida agriculture in 14 months, damaged citrus and other specialty crops as well as dairy operations and phosphate infrastructure.

Farmers and agriculture departments in Iowa, Wisconsin and Minnesota have spent the past few weeks scrambling to figure out what to do with roughly 2 million chickens left behind by Pure Prairie Poultry, which stopped paying for feed on Sept. 30 amid financial struggles that ended with the plant being shuttered. 

USDA's Inspector General has opened an investigation into the agency’s handling of repeated food safety violations at a Boar’s Head plant linked to a deadly listeria outbreak. 

The Natural Resources Conservation Service is up to 11,709 full-time staff, a level not seen in over a decade, amid its efforts to roll out $19.5 billion in additional conservation funding provided through the Inflation Reduction Act.

Corn and soybean prices fell Friday following USDA’s release of its latest World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates report, which projects a record soybean crop and “smaller supplies, larger exports, and reduced ending stocks” for corn.

Increases for a wide variety of staples helped drive grocery store prices up 0.4% in September, the largest jump since January, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Thursday.

Category Five Hurricane Milton, which is set to make landfall in Florida late Wednesday or early Thursday, could be the “worst storm to hit Florida in over a century,” according to President Joe Biden. It comes at a difficult time for residents of the southeastern U.S., who are still grappling with the major agriculture and infrastructure damages caused by Hurricane Helene. 

Some food industry groups who are closely watching meetings of the Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee are fiercely advocating for their products as the DGAC works to complete its scientific report, which will be used to develop the actual guidelines.

USDA is investing $1.7 billion in Commodity Credit Corporation funds to purchase locally produced foods for emergency food assistance and school meals.