Steve Davies

The Agricultural Marketing Service needs to strengthen its oversight of checkoff programs to ensure consistent and clear methodologies are employed to help evaluate results, the Government Accountability Office says.

A crew from Jimmy Kimmel Live went to farmers markets in 2014 to ask regular citizens about genetic engineering. Each person was asked, “What is a GMO?”

A draft bill circulating on Capitol Hill would exempt pesticide registrations from the Endangered Species Act consultation process, which is designed to ensure that the chemicals do not harm endangered species or their habitat.

USDA’s regulatory reform officer told Capitol Hill lawmakers Tuesday that the department has identified about 140 regulations as “possible options” for revision or repeal. Although she did not identify them, she said a “significant number” will be published in the fall Unified Regulatory Agenda that should appear any day now, if history is any guide.