U.S. Department of Agriculture

The city has budgeted $763,430 for food supplies for those jail this fiscal year, which began July 1. That's down from $846,430 budgeted in fiscal year 2015, which ended June 30. The amount has decreased due to the closure of the City Farm facility, said Budget Director Lisa Cipriano, leaving only the City Jail and Juvenile Services. Juvenile Services last year received a U.S. Department of Agriculture grant for $129,045. For this fiscal year, that grant has not yet been appropriated, Cipriano said. —Theresa Clift Line by line Each day the Daily Press highlights individual line items from state and local budgets. Read the full series at dailypress.com/watchdog.

Since 1993, most packaged food sold in the U.S. has been required to include a Nutrition Facts label that lists the amount of fat, cholesterol, sodium, protein, carbohydrates, fiber and sugar in a serving, and includes some information on recommended...

Murry’s Inc., a Lebanon, Pa., establishment, is recalling approximately 20,232 pounds of gluten-free breaded chicken nuggets that tested positive for Staphylococcal enterotoxin, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food Safety and Inspection Service said....

In 2013, the USDA National Organic Program suspended the Organic Food Production Act’s sunset provision. This changed the way the National Organic Standards Board conducts its 5-year review of its national list of allowed and prohibited substances and...

Curious Goods Chef Mark Muszynski only has to go to the restaurant’s back door to buy local ingredients — farmers drop by the Bake Oven Inn in Germansville with their produce to sell.
"We try to deal with as much local as we can," Muszynski...

Like the rest of Pennsylvania's poultry industry, Orefield turkey farmer David Jaindl is keeping a wary eye on the bird flu outbreak that has devastated the egg and poultry business in the West and Midwest this spring.
But for Lehigh Valley consumers and...

The mechanics of buying school lunch haven't changed much over the years: Pick up a tray, move through the line, eat and get on with the day.
But this, of course, is a health-conscious age, struggling to end the scourge of poor nutrition, in which one...

Consider it the vulture house.
Turkey vultures — and similar avian scavengers — have taken residence in an abandoned home along a narrow street of duplexes just blocks outside Bethlehem's historic district. Nesting in the attic, the birds flying in and...

Whole Foods Markets Inc. is recalling approximately 33,191 pounds of ready-to-eat products sold in several states including Pennsylvania for not declaring on the label that they contain peanuts as an ingredient.
The following products are being recalled,...

With the New Year upon us, most of us are knee-deep in working through our resolutions and planning for the year ahead. If one of your goals this year involves buying a house, then you have the time-consuming project of sorting through mountains of...

The honey from local beekeepers Jason and Eunjin Newkirk's hives doesn't look, taste or feel like the golden liquid that comes in a mass-produced plastic bottle at the grocery store.The U.S. government uses no standard definition for honey, leaving the...

A Massachusetts company that supplies Wegmans store brand ground beef has issued a recall after some customers complained the meat contained pieces of plastic.According to a press release issued by the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Food Safety and...

Several new water quality projects in the Delaware River watershed will be funded through grants and funds for long-term protection projects, the U.S. Department of Agriculture announced Tuesday.The projects and funding measures will be announced at 1...

Miller-Keystone Blood Center launches new online donor screening applicationMiller-Keystone Blood Center recently announced the launch of iScreen, a secure, private way for donors to complete their donor history questionnaire. Starting January 6,...

Your credit score and credit history are key requirements in borrowing to buy a house. Credit bureaus use varying scales to rate credit worthiness. Because of this, consumers are sometimes misled by scores higher than their FICO number, which is the one...

As Washington welcomes the 114th Congress, the capacity of our national legislature to address the nation's problems is in doubt.
Public approval of Congress hovers near historic lows. The contrast between Congress' bare ability to pass routine...

WASHINGTON, Nov 20 (Reuters) - A small decline in turkey prices helped hold the increase in the cost of preparing a Thanksgiving meal for 10 to less than 1 percent this year, the country's largest farm group said on Thursday.
Ingredients for a typical...

The federal government said Wednesday that a Lehigh County meat processor is recalling nearly 3,000 pounds of pork products due to misbranding and an undeclared allergen.
K. Heeps Inc. of Upper Macungie Township packaged its Stryker Farm Beer Bratwurst...

A Lancaster company is recalling more than 1 million pounds of frozen pretzel dogs sold under numerous brands for containing soy lecithin, an allergen that is not listed on the ingredients label.
The recall was announced by the Food and Drug...

The U.S. Department of Agriculture is looking into the Pittsburgh Zoo & PPG Aquarium's use of dogs to herd its African elephants after receiving a complaint from People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.
"We have video footage [taken at]...