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The Natural Resources Conservation Service’s new chief says the agency is trying to “go mobile” with aims to have staff complete more work during in-person visits to farms while also attempting to reduce the time it takes producers to fill out paperwork.

Industry and environmentalists are generally pleased with a final strategy released by EPA last week that outlines how growers can address the impact of insecticide use on endangered species.

More than 15,000 of approximately 100,000 employees at USDA are preparing to leave the agency after accepting buyout offers that will allow them to keep being paid through the end of September, according to numbers shared with Agri-Pulse by a Capitol Hill source.

President Donald Trump is proposing to slash non-defense spending by nearly 23% in a fiscal 2026 budget that contains $5 billion in cuts to USDA programs, including agricultural research, international food aid, conservation technical assistance to farmers, and rural development. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s Make America Healthy Again initiative is a clear winner in the White House plan. 

USDA has launched a new effort to help farmers and ranchers who have been targeted by "unfair and politically motivated lawfare" allegedly carried out by the Biden administration. The announcement came as Ag Secretary Brooke Rollins and lawmakers celebrated the dropping of criminal charges against a South Dakota ranch family. 

The Trump Administration is proposing to narrow the prohibition against "taking" endangered species by removing regulatory language allowing federal wildlife agencies to consider how species are harmed by habitat destruction.

In what has turned into an annual tradition, the Environmental Protection Agency approved the use of E15 nationwide this summer, ending any lingering suspense over whether the Trump administration would fail to grant an emergency fuel waiver.

Short-staffed National Weather Service field offices will be given special temporary authority to bring in additional staff following cuts that have limited their capacity to launch weather balloons, Nebraska Rep. Mike Flood told Agri-Pulse Friday.

North Dakota on Thursday became the first state to enact a law intended to shield pesticide manufacturers from state liability lawsuits. A similar bill in Georgia is awaiting Gov. Brian Kemp’s signature.

Agriculture Department employees have been told to unfreeze Inflation Reduction Act and Bipartisan Infrastructure Law grants and are now working to notify recipients individually.  A Rhode Island judge was informed of USDA’s action on Wednesday.