U.S. Deputy Secretary of Agriculture Stephen Alexander Vaden in North Carolina met with agricultural leaders and producers and announced additional U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) assistance to help producers recover from Hurricane Helene. Deputy Secretary Vaden signed a block grant agreement with the North Carolina Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services that provides recovery assistance to eligible North Carolina farmers. In July, U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Brooke L. Rollins announced additional disaster assistance for farmers and producers for Virginia and Florida.
President Trump signed an Executive Order implementing the U.S.–Japan Trade Agreement. Included in the agreement are provisions for Japan to make $8 billion in annual purchases from the United States, including food and agricultural products. While U.S. soy already enjoys strong market access in Japan, this agreement helps further secure a top ten market for our crop. In Marketing Year 2023/2024, Japan imported $1.31 billion of U.S. soy products, making the country U.S. soy’s sixth largest trading partner by volume, according to USDA’s Foreign Agricultural Service.
Registration for the American Seed Trade Association 2025 Field Crop Seed Convention (FCSC) is officially open. The seed industry’s premier field crop meeting will be held in Orlando, FL from December 9-12. In addition, ASTA’s Forage, Turf, and Conservation Seed Conference (FTC), co-located with the Western Seed Association’s 2025 Convention, will be held October 29 in Kansas City.
Join Colson Steber, Co-CEO of Ag Access, as he shares groundbreaking insights into the power of emotional intelligence in food marketing. Shaping Tomorrow’s Plate: Driving Market Leadership with Emotional Intelligence Research in Food Marketing is scheduled for September 25 at 11 a.m. Central. National Agri-Marketing Association Members attend for free. Non-members are $50. Register here.
The University of Illinois College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences (ACES) officially established the James F. Evans Global Center for Food and Agricultural Communications after surpassing the $5 million university threshold on September 3 (9/3), Dr. Evans’ 93rd birthday. Dr. Evans, professor emeritus at Illinois, is celebrated as a pioneer in agricultural communications, and the Evans Center will advance excellence through outreach, professional development, research, convenings, and academic programs that connect food, agriculture, and society.
Columbia Grain International announces the promotion of industry veteran Kurt Haarmann to President and CEO, effective immediately. The announcement was made by CGI’s parent company, Marubeni Corporation, a major Japanese integrated trading and investment business committed to developing an efficient supply line for U.S. grains to be sent to Japan and beyond.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS) is pleased to announce the release of an innovative geospatial data product: the Hawaii Cropland Data Layer (HCDL). This high-resolution, crop-specific dataset—the first of its kind for the Aloha State—was made publicly available on August 25, 2025 via NASS’s geospatial portals, CroplandCROS and AgriWatch.
In an already stressful and trying growing season, professionals with the Alabama Cooperative Extension System at Auburn University have confirmed an invasive insect, the two-spot cotton leafhopper, in cotton fields in Alabama. The insect is also commonly known as the cotton jassid. On Aug. 12, Scott Graham, Alabama Extension cotton entomologist and assistant professor at Auburn University, was notified by a retail field advisor that the cotton jassid were present in a commercial cotton field in Henry County, Alabama.
The Best of NAMA Call for Entries is live on the web. NAMA members can enter their best work by October 17, 2025. The national awards ceremony will take place April 15-17, 2026, at the Marriott St. Louis Grand.
