Jill Bell and daughter Anna helping with the summer harvest for CSA shares.

Development can often benefit communities at the expense of agriculture; many of Utah’s farms are quickly being replaced by expanding residential, commercial and industrial development. Now many farmers and consumers have joined forces to increase the sustainability of agriculture in Utah with community supported agriculture, especially along the Wasatch Front. Community supported agriculture (CSA) is a way for consumers to directly invest in local farms and receive a regular delivery of fresh fruits, vegetables and other local products. Read more »

Utah State University Engineering Student Semira Crank spent her spring break surveying animal waste management systems on dairy farms near Logan, Utah, as a temporary student employee with the USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service.

Semira Crank is proud to be part of a growing number of young Navajo women breaking barriers to become scientists and engineers. Her story began in the small southeastern Utah community of Montezuma Creek in what is referred to as the “Utah Strip” portion of the Navajo Nation Reservation. Read more »

Congratulations were in order for fourteen Cache Valley families in Utah who have a place to call their own after building their own homes through the Self Help Program (MSHP) sponsored by USDA Rural Development.   Neighborhood Nonprofit Housing Corporation in Logan runs the program that helps put limited income families in affordable homes through government supported mortgage loans and sweat equity.

Congressman Rob Bishop was the keynote speaker at the ribbon cutting ceremony yesterday, wishing the families the best and thanking them for all they are doing. Read more »

The finished home with a photo of the trailer it replaced (foreground)

The organization “Community Rebuilds” along with USDA Rural Development recently welcomed Sascha Pastler and Colleen Jarrett into their newly completed straw bale home.  A ribbon cutting ceremony was held at their front door.   The large crowd attending was soon invited inside to see the first USDA funded straw bale home in Utah. Read more »

Sometimes those of us in Washington DC take ourselves too seriously.  I’ve fallen into that trap more than once.  So, when it came time to shoot our video on the Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP) hoop house offering, launched last year as part of the Know Your Farmer, Know Your Food Initiative, we decided to have some fun.  On a beautiful late November day, I joined White House chef Sam Kass to put small hoops over the garden beds at the First Lady’s garden.  This video captures the fun we had.

Dan Glickman, former Secretary of Agriculture, has always placed high value on humor.  Writing last August in the Wichita Eagle, he wrote:

One of the most underestimated tools in politics, leadership and life is a sense of humor — the ability to laugh not just at others but at ourselves. More than ever, we need humor’s deflationary influence in the nation’s capital. It’s an essential release valve, a check on all the overheated rhetoric and a bridge to real dialogue.

Mark Twain got it right when he said, “against the assault of laughter nothing can stand.”

Humor alone can’t solve our problems. But it can open the door to greater civility, a little more humanity and some much-needed productivity in our nation’s governance.

Traditional Building Skill in Action: Gage Olson uses traditional woodworking tools.

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. Read more »