USDA Blog

This list of ingredients was enough to get my mouth watering: Champlain Orchards’ apple cider syrup, local butter and heavy cream, and the star of the show - Vermont pumpkin puree. Champlain Orchards in the beautiful Lake Champlain Valley of Vermont is making its first pumpkin pies this year, just...

The Yorgey family was tired of moving from place to place and watching their money constantly going towards rent payments. They wanted to be able to have a permanent place of their own for their growing family to live. But, the idea of that actually coming true seemed like a distant dream. Thanks to...

Earlier this month, Vice President Joe Biden announced a “ Recovery Through Retrofit” initiative aimed at boosting energy efficiency in homes across the country. As part of the effort, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) has developed Home Energy Score software that will standardize home energy...

Local fire departments and emergency service personnel play a critical role in ensuring community safety. Every community, no matter how small, should have access to top-quality emergency services.

This is the latest in a series of blogs from West Virginia Student Reporter Abbey Hart on behalf of Bobby Lewis, State Director On November 16, 2010, a Construction Progress Meeting was held at the Newburg Town Hall. Although progress has been slower this past month, 76 percent of the project is...

Today, November 18, 210, Basin Electric Power Cooperative based in Bismarck, ND, will receive a USDA Rural Development Rural Utilities loan guarantee for $153,396,000 for two wind projects in Mina, ND. Together these projects will provide 120 MW of renewable electricity. Combined with Basin’s...

Right now, across the country, innovative agricultural producers are turning farm animal manure into renewable energy through a process called anaerobic digestion. Anaerobic digestion is a proven technology – available to farmers today – that represents a huge economic opportunity for rural America...

The Bois Forte Tribe in northeastern Minnesota has taken a proactive approach toward economic development. As recently as 10 years ago, there were areas of the Bois Forte community that did not have safe and sanitary drinking water. Building safe and affordable housing for tribal members also was an...

Recently Utah’s Snow College and the surrounding community gathered to celebrate the opening of the new Traditional Building Skills Institute (TBSI) building, resulting in job and educational opportunities as well as historic preservation.

Last week, Deputy Secretary of Agriculture Kathleen Merrigan and a delegation of senior officials traveled to Abingdon, Virginia, to announce the Appalachian Regional Development Initiative, an Interagency Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) designed to build a stronger and more diversified economy in...