President Obama will meet the leaders of four nations - Japan, South Korea, Malaysia and the Philippines - during a trip through Asia that begins on Tuesday.

Using corn residues - stalks, husks and cobs - to make biofuels appears to create more carbon dioxide over their life cycle than the target set by federal standards, says research at the University of Nebraska.

Drought in California could idle 78 percent of the state's farm land yet, "A booming population and a sharp increase in lucrative crops like berries and nuts that require more water strain the system" says the New York Times.

Discussion of poverty often focuses "on the 'culture' of poor urban residents," says front page story in New York Times. "Almost forgotten is how many ways poverty plays out in America, and how much long-term poverty is a rural problem."

The Commerce Department announced it will open an investigation into charges that Mexico is dumping subsidized sugar in the United States

In a step to protect the U.S. swine, herd, AgSec Vilsack announced the Agriculture Department will require reports of cases of Porcine Epidemic Diarrhea Virus and the similar Swine Delta Coronavirus.

House Republicans, who have accused states of cheating by averting cuts in food stamps, have raised a new argument -- that state governments discriminate against some poor people by holding on to food stamps for other poor people.

The National Weather Service forecasts more precipitation than usual in the Midwest, the Plains and the Pacific Northwest for late April, which could delay spring planting but relieve dry conditions in the western Corn Belt and the central and southern Plains.

President Obama says agricultural biotechnology is an important element in feeding the world and adapting to climate change. In a letter to the granddaughter of Nobel laureate Norman Borlaug, the president said...

Vermont state senators passed, 28-2, a bill to require labels on foods made with genetically modified organisms and sold at retail - one of the final steps toward the first such state law.

U.S. farmers will stick with traditional crop subsidies based on crop prices and shy away from the crop revenue subsidy created in the new farm law, says the Congressional Budget Office.

House Democrats say they will distribute memos in 30 congressional districts to encourage Republican lawmakers to sign the discharge petition petition and force a floor vote on comprehensive immigration reform, says Roll Call.

The Vermont state Senate voted 26-2 for a bill that requires labels on food made with genetically modified ingredients from July 2016.

That's the question, and headline, at FiveThirtyEight for a look at bias in polling in Senate campaigns. Based on 147 publicly released polls since 2002, analyst Harry Enten says polls conducted by a partisan group...

Eli Saslow's "unsettling and nuanced reporting on the prevalence of food stamps in post-recession America, forcing readers to grapple with issues of poverty and dependency," won the Pulitzer Prize for explanatory reporting.

It's well-known that agricultural practices can affect soil fertility, water quality, wildlife populations and pest numbers for good or bad.

Health Canada announced a three-year phase-out of subtherapeutic use of antibiotics in food animals, a step that parallels U.S. action.

USDA has lowered its forecast of the U.S. corn stockpile for five months in a row and the current estimate, of 1.33 bln bu, is down 29 pct from November, when growers were harvesting a record-large crop, writes economist Darrel Good of U-Illinois.

Nothing says spring planting like snowfall across the upper Midwest in mid-April, does it? Up to five inches of snow fell in north central Wisconsin on Monday with forecasts of an inch or two of snow today in Detroit and Toledo.

The panel writing the new edition of the Dietary Guidelines for Americans - the government's tips for healthy eating - is wading into the question of food systems sustainability.