U.S. probes foreign links to agriculture research to protect food supply

Source: NPR

July 23, 2025 5:00 AM ET


The Agriculture Department is applying more scrutiny to research done by its employees alongside noncitizens. The directives, laid out in a memo which went out to USDA employees and research institutions earlier this month, are part of a broader effort to increase security measures around the U.S. food supply — especially when it comes to foreign adversaries like North Korea, China, Russia and Iran.

The sweeping instructions require recipients of USDA funding to disclose contracts associated with *foreign entities and certify they are not party to a malign foreign talent recruitment program. As a result of the policy, USDA also laid off 70 researchers earlier this month who were from "countries of concern" — which included Syria, South Africa, Cuba and Venezuela.

"It is absurd that foreign nationals from countries of concern were so close to our critical research at USDA," a USDA spokesperson said in a statement to NPR. Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins "is committed to securing our agricultural research enterprise from foreign adversaries and putting American farmers and ranchers first."

The policy is a part of the "National Farm Security Action Plan" unveiled by the department alongside other members of the administration's cabinet to boost domestic manufacturing, research and production.

Read more: https://www.npr.org/2025/07/23/g-s1-78759/usda-foreign-trump-cuts

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*the above phrase should have quotes as shown above, in the OP text, but it keeps throwing a "403 Forbidden" error when used in the OP text.

Bunch of paranoid freaks. This is how "international research" works. I suppose the next step will be forbidding any "foreigners" from access to the ISS (despite other countries like Canada and Russia) with modules attached to it.