initiatives

By Angie Harless, USDA Executive Master Gardener

By Ana Maria Silva, USDA Marketing Intern

Florida International University’s Organic Garden gained recognition from the U.S. Department of Agriculture as part of the People’s Garden Initiative. FIU is a student-centered urban public research university that is locally and globally engaged.

Like many of you, I spend a lot of time on my Blackberry and computer both at work and home. I use this access for business, for play, and a host of other applications that I can’t imagine living without.

Friday, a beautiful spring day in Pennsylvania, it was my pleasure to welcome Secretary Vilsack and his wife Christy to Pennsylvania for a tour and rural discussion. We started the day at Middletown Biofuels for a facility tour along with Congressman Tim Holden and other local and state officials. Middletown Biofuels recently received over $17,000 from USDA for producing biodiesel fuel from soybean oil. The facility is located in the heart of Pennsylvania’s agricultural industry, providing ready access to soybean and other vegetable oil feedstocks.  We then traveled to the state capitol in Harrisburg where the Secretary announced that in Pennsylvania, the Recovery Act has guaranteed $35.6 million in business loans that are expected to save or create more than 450 jobs. In total, USDA has provided loan guarantees to 350 U.S. businesses in the last seven months that will create or save nearly 23,500 jobs.

Written by Jill Clothier, Iowa Earth Team Coordinator, USDA-NRCS

Cross-Posted from the White House Blog.

Rural areas are home to about 50 million Americans and are an essential part of the overall economy.  As the President embarks on the next stops on the White House to Main Street Tour in Illinois, Iowa, and Missouri, the CEA today released a report that surveys the current state of rural America and describes the Obama Administration’s policies for strengthening the rural economy.  The map below shows the distribution of rural counties across the county.

In 1999, Yreka High School in Yreka, California received funds from a Forest Service Grant (Partners in Flight Program) to enhance their agriculture and natural resource program and provide wildlife habitat on school grounds. These funds were used to build a songbird garden, purchase fencing, materials for an irrigation system, and a greenhouse structure. The students and instructors constructed the fence, irrigation system and the greenhouse.

Morning fog gave way to sunny skies yesterday in Hillsborough, New Jersey, on Earth Day as representatives from Duke Farms and NRCS met with families of Duke Farms employees, local leaders and members of the press to highlight the conservation work being done at the farm.

Planting trees is a very traditional way to celebrate Earth Day. Over the years the trees grow up to do many good things for the environment; filter water runoff before pollutants slip into streams, supply the oxygen we breathe and even reduce energy bills by cooling homes and businesses with their shade.

Fifteen years ago, USDA and all of America experienced a tragedy that shook us to the core and united us in ways that brought out the best in our country.  At 9:02 am Central Standard Time on April 19, 1995, a bomb exploded in the A.P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, killing 168 innocent people.  Ninety-eight victims were Federal employees.

Seven of those were members of the USDA family.  In honor of these seven victims, the Riverdale, MD, conference center was renamed “The Oklahoma City Memorial Conference Center” and a portrait titled “Heroes of America’s Harvest” has been permanently displayed outside the center since 2005.