Ending childhood obesity within a generation is the central goal of the First Lady’s Let’s Move! initiative. We know achieving this goal requires all of us to work together – parents, teachers, schools, chefs, community leaders, Federal, State and local elected officials and our children – there’s a role for each of us to play. Read more »

USDA Administrator Judy Canales (second from right) tours the McKechnie Vehicle Components plant in Nicholasville, Ky. and is shown some of the automotive parts made on site. Administrator Canales toured the plant with U.S. Rep. Ben Chander , Nicholasville Mayor Russell Meyer, Jeff Ball of Citizens Commerce Bank and Tom Fern, State Director for Rural Development.

While touring the facilities of McKechnie Vehicle Components in Kentucky last month, USDA Rural Business and Cooperative Programs Administrator Judy Canales got up close and personal with many of the company’s employees whose jobs were saved thanks to assistance from Rural Development and the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. Read more »

From Left to Right: Lakeview Terrace Owners Gary Lanzen and Allan Richardson are joined by Deputy Secretary Kathleen Merrigan, U.S. Senator Harry Reid, Congresswoman Dina Titus, and Lakeview Terrace General Manager Teri Stoneback in cutting the ribbon at the Grand Opening Celebration.

The residents of the recently opened Lakeview Terrace Senior Living Community in Boulder City, Nevada, were delighted late last month, to share their opinions of their new home with special guests Deputy Secretary Kathleen Merrigan, U.S. Senator Harry Reid, and Congresswoman Dina Titus, who were together at the facility to cut the ribbon at the grand opening ceremony.  More than sixty attended. Read more »

Charlie Ingram, Director of NASS Enumerator Program at National Association of State Departments of Agriculture, preparing a plot in Colorado for wheat objective yield measurements.

This post is part of the Science Tuesday feature series on the USDA blog. Check back each week as we showcase stories and news from the USDA’s rich science and research portfolio.

When I was growing up on the farm in South Carolina, my family used a very simple method of estimating our production. As long as we planted the same acreage, we assumed that we were getting the same amount of crops at harvest time. But while this approach is still used on some farms, it is impossible to use these assumptions to get reliable state and national production estimates. So how does the USDA go about measuring the yields to get an accurate forecast for the annual crop production? Read more »