About In the Field

Welcome to In the Field, the blog about the people and programs of the N.C. Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services. We started this site to give you an inside look into how we support agriculture and consumer programs across the state, and introduce you to the people who support our state’s $78 billion agriculture industry.

We named our blog “In the Field” because it represents the wide variety of ways we serve the people of North Carolina. Bricks and mortar can’t contain our employees and the work they do, whether they’re inspecting a gas pump, researching a better way to grow sweet potatoes, protecting farmland for generations to come or connecting consumers with locally grown fruits and vegetables. And that’s just the beginning.

We hope this will be a place to learn and share timely information about the news, people, events and programs of the NCDA&CS and agriculture in general. We hope you’ll check the site often, subscribe to our RSS feed and participate by posting comments.

If you have any questions about this blog or any of the programs or people we cover here, feel free to contact us through blog post comments, the email addresses listed for each contributor, or via telephone at 919-707-3001. Reader comments are reviewed before they’re released, so they won’t show up immediately. Disagreement is fine, but we ask that you keep your comments civil. Profane, hateful or threatening language or personal attacks will not be approved.

• Faces in the Field highlights the people of the department and what drew them to their field of work.
• The Field Trip takes readers into the field with employees to find out more about the varied types of work that goes on in the department.
• Field Notes are updates about some of the interesting and timely things that are going on in the Department.
• NCDA&CS food business specialist Annette Dunlap offers resources small businesses and food entrepreneurs can use to grow and manage their business in the Food Business Almanac.
• Forestry Files is about forestry matters written by members of our N.C. Forest Service. Blog posts will include items of interest to foresters, landowners, botanists and others interested in environmental issues. A strong emphasis will be placed on forestry health matters and current pests.
• From the Commissioner will be blog entries from Agriculture Commissioner Steve Troxler.
• In the Kitchen / Local Dish will feature weekly video segments with WRAL’s Brian Shrader and our own Lisa Prince as they prepare seasonal recipes in their Got to Be Cookin’ segment using North Carolina ingredients. Lisa Prince will also join us for bonus recipes, cooking tips and a behind-the-scenes look at marketing N.C. agricultural products … everything and The Kitchen Sink.
• The Mailbag will feature some of the questions that come in through the department’s website. We’ll post the question, along with the answer from one of the department’s experts.
• The News category will contain the weekly News Roundup and other newsworthy items, usually in the form of links to official press releases from NCDA&CS.
• Today’s Topic on the Southern Farm Network is a weekly radio program with SFN’s Rhonda Garrison and Commissioner Steve Troxler on a timely topic.  Listen each week for their discussion.