usda

USDA Updates Plant Hardiness Map With Many Areas Moving Into Warmer Zones

USDA Updates Plant Hardiness Map With Many Areas Moving Into Warmer Zones

The U.S. Department of Agriculture has updated its Plant Hardiness Zone map, a map of the U.S. that helps gardeners decide what plants will grow best in their local areas, based on average annual extreme minimum winter temperature. The updates show an average of 2.5°F warmer across the contiguous U.S. compared to the previous map, […]

Join our newsletter

The best of EcoWatch, right in your inbox. Sign up for our email newsletter!

    There Are 2,000 Untested Chemicals in Packaged Foods — and It’s Legal

    There Are 2,000 Untested Chemicals in Packaged Foods — and It’s Legal

    By Melissa Kravitz Hoeffner A major but largely glossed over report by the Environmental Working Group (EWG), an environmental and public health nonprofit based in Washington, DC, shows that thousands of untested chemicals (an estimated 2,000, to be exact) are found in conventional packaged foods purchasable in U.S. supermarkets. And yes, all of them are […]

    USDA Loosens Oversight of Puppy Mills and Other Operations

    USDA Loosens Oversight of Puppy Mills and Other Operations

    U.S. Department of Agriculture inspectors documented 60 percent fewer violations at facilities that use animals in 2018 compared to 2017. The drop, reported by the Washington Post this week and also documented by our researchers here at the Humane Society of the United States, is the latest sign that the federal agency is pulling back […]

    Tyson, Perdue Recall More Than 120,000 Pounds of Chicken Nuggets Combined

    Tyson, Perdue Recall More Than 120,000 Pounds of Chicken Nuggets Combined

    All those chickens! Every time we get these massive meat recalls I think of the poor animals that died for no reason. This month, two of the nation’s largest chicken companies, Tyson and Perdue, have together pulled more than 120,000 pounds of nugget products from shelves and freezers. Tyson Foods is recalling approximately 36,420 pounds […]

    USDA Allows Animal Neglect and Abuse at Poultry Slaughter Plants

    USDA Allows Animal Neglect and Abuse at Poultry Slaughter Plants

    By Dena Jones Undercover investigations at federal poultry slaughter plants over the past decade have documented numerous instances of intentional abuse to animals, including throwing birds against walls, burying live birds in piles of dead birds, breaking birds’ legs by violently slamming them into shackles and jabbing birds with metal hooks to remove them from […]

    USDA Releases Final GMO Labeling Standard

    USDA Releases Final GMO Labeling Standard

    The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) on Thursday announced its long-awaited rule on the labeling of foods containing genetically engineered, or GMO, ingredients. Just don’t expect the letters GMO to appear on these products. Under the new “National Bioengineered Food Disclosure Standard,” such items will feature the term “bioengineered” or BE foods. From Jan. 1, […]

    Beef Recall Expands as Salmonella Cases Quadruple in 2 Months

    Beef Recall Expands as Salmonella Cases Quadruple in 2 Months

    The U.S. government expanded a recall of ground beef Tuesday as an outbreak of salmonella has quadrupled to 246 people in 25 states since the first recall was announced in October, NBC 4 New York reported. The U.S. Department of Agriculture Food Safety Food Safety and Inspection Service (USDA FSIS) announced that the Arizona-based JBS […]