AMS

After a pause for additional discussion, Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue signed a reorganizational memorandum that puts the U.S. Codex Office under the control of USDA's chief trade officer and eliminates the Grain Inspection and Packers and Stockyards Administration as a stand-alone agency, with its duties absorbed by the much larger Agricultural Marketing Service. Both moves were protested as undue kowtowing to agribusinesses when Perdue announced them during the Labor Day lull.

Ed Avalos, the agriculture undersecretary in charge of marketing and regulatory programs, will leave USDA in mid-September, said The Hagstrom Report. Given the short time before a new administration takes office, a spokesman told the newsletter that USDA would try to promote someone already in office to handle the job for the next few months.

Two months after USDA terminated a voluntary program for labeling grass-fed beef, nine farm and consumer groups asked the department to spell out the conditions for using the term.