Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture

Last updated
Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture
Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture Logo.svg
Logo of the PDA
Agency overview
Formed1895 (1895)
Jurisdiction Government of Pennsylvania
Headquarters2301 North Cameron Street
Harrisburg, Pennsylvania
40°17′15″N76°52′51″W / 40.28750°N 76.88083°W / 40.28750; -76.88083
Annual budget$232.6 million (FY 2010) [1]
Agency executive
Website www.agriculture.state.pa.us

The Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture (PDA) is a cabinet-level agency in Pennsylvania. [2] The department's purpose is to support a sustainable and safe supply of food and agricultural products; be good stewards of the land and natural resources; promote the viability of farms; protect consumers; and safeguard the health of people, plants, animals and the environment.

Contents

The department is under the direction and supervision of the Secretary of Agriculture, who is appointed by the Governor of Pennsylvania with the approval of the Pennsylvania Senate. The current Secretary of Agriculture, Russell Redding, was appointed by Governor Tom Wolf in January 2015 and confirmed in May 2015.

Secretaries of Agriculture

Organization

The department is under the direction and supervision of the secretary of Agriculture, who is appointed by the governor of Pennsylvania. The secretary is assisted in managing the department by an executive deputy secretary, two deputy secretaries and a special deputy secretary. The department is subdivided into program bureaus, each headed by a bureau director. Bureaus are further subdivided into divisions.

Incidents

In 2014, the Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture caused a seed-lending library to shut down and promised to curtail any similar efforts in the state. [3] The lending library, hosted by a town library, allowed gardeners to "check out" a package of open-pollinated seed, and "return" seeds kept from the crop grown from those seeds. The Department of Agriculture said that this activity raises the possibility of "agro-terrorism", and that a Seed Act of 2004 requires the library staff to test each seed packet for germination rate and whether the seed was true to type. [3] In 2016 the department reversed this decision, and clarified that seed libraries and non-commercial seed exchanges are not subject to the requirements of the Seed Act. [4]

See also

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References

  1. "201011 Governor's Executive Budget" (PDF). Harrisburg: Pennsylvania Office of the Budget. February 2, 2010. p. E8.6. Retrieved July 13, 2010.
  2. "About PDA". www.agriculturestate.pa.us. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.
  3. 1 2 Naomi Creason (July 31, 2014). "Department of Agriculture cracks down on seed libraries". The Sentinel . Retrieved December 2, 2014.
  4. Seed Libraries in Pennsylvania Allowed to Engage in Free Seed Exchange, March 15, 2016, archived from the original on April 14, 2016, retrieved March 31, 2016