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This year’s World Food Safety Day theme is “food safety is everyone’s business.” One group with members around the world is focused on the business of science-based food standards to protect consumer health.

As we recognize World Food Safety Day, we celebrate the five-year anniversary of the Food Safety Network (FSN), a partnership between USDA’s Foreign Agricultural Service (FAS), the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). FSN provides developing countries with the tools and training to strengthen animal and plant health, food safety, and agricultural trade. But, that’s not all. The work of FSN also supports the U.S. Government Global Food Security Strategy’s goals to improve food security, and reduce poverty and malnutrition around the world.

No matter the language, World Food Safety Day aims to inspire action across the globe to prevent, detect, and manage foodborne risks.

If you are moving this year from a location within the gypsy moth quarantine area to a location outside the quarantine area, please inspect outdoor household items for pests. This is a federal requirement for homeowners moving from gypsy moth quarantine areas.

When Rebecca and Parker Catt became parents, they faced a new set of challenges, including making the right choices in deciding what their baby James should be fed. After Rebecca heard about the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children (WIC) from a friend at the gym, she went to a WIC clinic near her home in Hattiesburg, Mississippi. There she discovered she qualified for the program and signed up.

A team of USDA agricultural scientists in the Golden State are helping farmers make the most out of a natural resource that is becoming ever more precious – water.

Families will once again commemorate Memorial Day with COVID-19 in mind. Keep your celebrations safe with CDC guidelines we’ve become accustomed to this past year.

The Oregon Convention Center (OCC) was not open for usual business, but served a critical function to Oregon residents – one of the largest vaccine sites in the country. Over the past two months, the USDA assisted in providing over 320,000 vaccines in Portland by partnering with FEMA to vaccinate America.

Long days, hot temperatures and family gatherings will soon return to America’s backyards. Also returning are traditions, like roasting a whole pig. Roasting a pig requires a lot of planning before, during and after the meal to ensure food safety. Over the past few years, there have been foodborne illness outbreaks associated with pig roasts in several states.

Last year, as COVID-19 rattled the world economy and disrupted trade flows, agricultural trade remained mostly stable, falling only two percent during the initial wave of infections and lockdowns, before bouncing back and ending the year up 3.5 percent. But the growth in agricultural trade doesn’t mean that trade flows were insulated from the effects of the pandemic. Much of 2020 was in fact shaped by other factors. For instance, 95% of global agricultural trade growth came from China and was driven in part by non-pandemic related factors of increased feed demand, efforts to restock grain reserves, and policy factors. A recent paper by USDA’s Office of the Chief Economist, Has Global Agricultural Trade been Resilient under COVID-19? Findings from an Econometric Assessment (PDF, 1.4 MB) (Arita et al.), suggests that while agricultural trade remained stable at the aggregate level, a deeper empirical analysis reveals there were still significant disruptions due to the pandemic.