|
The Agricultural Marketing Service (AMS) is a division of the United States Department of Agriculture, and has programs in six commodity areas: cotton, dairy, fruit and vegetable, livestock and seed, poultry, and tobacco. These programs provide testing, standardization, grading and market news services for those commodities, and oversee marketing agreements and orders, administer research and promotion programs, and purchase commodities for federal food programs. The AMS enforces certain federal laws such as the Perishable Agricultural Commodities Act and the Federal Seed Act.
As of December, 2005, the agency's Microbiological Data Program monitors cantaloupe, green onions, lettuce, tomatoes and alfalfa sprouts for three types of bacterial contamination.[1]
The internal Science and Technology Program provides centralized scientific support to AMS programs, including laboratory analyses, laboratory quality assurance, coordination of scientific research conducted by other agencies for AMS, and statistical and mathematical consulting services. In addition, the Science and Technology Division's Plant Variety Protection Office issues certificates of protection for new varieties of sexually reproduced plants. The program also conducts a program to collect and analyze data about pesticide residue levels in agricultural commodities. It also administers the Pesticide Recordkeeping program, which requires all certified private applicators of federally restricted-use pesticide to maintain records of all applications. The records will be put into a data base to help analyze agricultural pesticide use.
AMS' Transportation and Marketing Program supplies research and technical information regarding the nation's food transportation system to producers, producer groups, shippers, exporters, rural communities, carriers, government agencies and universities. The program also administers a program involving financial grants to States for marketing improvements. In addition, the division assists in the planning and design of marketing facilities, processes, and methods in cooperation with state and local governments, universities, farmer groups, and other segments of the U.S. food industry. This program is intended to enhance the overall effectiveness of the food marketing system, provide better quality products to the consumer at reasonable cost, improve market access for growers with farms of small to medium size, and promote regional economic development.
References
External links
| |
