Official Site of The State of New Jersey

New Jersey’s nickname, the “Garden State,” is somewhat puzzling to people who’ve never been here, but have seen images of our industrial regions, or who have heard we are the most densely populated of the 50 states.
The nickname dates to 1876, coined by then-Camden Mayor Abraham Browning. In those days, New Jersey was seen as a vast greenway between New York and Philadelphia. Its farms were numerous, its soils highly prized, and its fresh agricultural products carried the reputation of being excellent.
Then came the development booms of the mid-20th century and early-21st. In the 1980s and 1990s, housing developers focused on New Jersey as a massive growth market for upscale residential subdivisions, with an attractive existing landscape of flat farmland perfect for housing developments.
State officials realized they needed to act quickly to maintain the state’s agricultural industry by keeping as many farms as possible. An earlier effort from the 1960s provided property-tax relief for land in agricultural (“Farmland Assessment”) and had helped slow the shift from farmland to housing.
But something more was needed to keep farmers on farmland.
And in 1983, that took the form of the Agricultural Retention and Development Act, which provided the framework for a farmland preservation program. Since 1983, the SADC has served as the state’s lead agency for farmland preservation, working alongside county agriculture development boards, municipal agriculture advisory committees, nonprofit organizations, and landowners to permanently protect working farmland from non-agricultural development.
In establishing the SADC, the Legislature decreed that the state’s Secretary of Agriculture would serve as its chairman. The SADC is an “in-but-not-of” agency of the NJDA, and the two agencies aim to work cooperatively in ways that help farmers.
As we move into the heart of 2026, the State Agriculture Development Committee (SADC) continues its critical work of preserving New Jersey’s agricultural land base and working to ensure that farming operations are supported to be as economically viable as possible into the future.
At over 40 years old, the program has evolved over time and must continue to do so, or it risks falling behind the very challenges it was created to address. The SADC also administers the Right to Farm program, manages a successful dispute resolution program for farms and neighbors, and also started the Next-Generation Farmers program, to ensure there will be new farming opportunities and businesses for the land that is being preserved. As we move into the future, I want to bring your attention to three new programs that will meaningfully strengthen our land preservation and Right to Farm efforts to better serve our farming community.
The first is the new Statewide Formula Value (SFV), which has fundamentally changed how we approach offers to farmland owners considering preservation. The SFV attempts to address persistent competition from developers that the traditional easement preservation program simply could not match.
A farmer weighing whether to preserve their land or sell to a developer was too often faced with a gap that made the decision for them. But the new SFV revises how we determine the value of development easements to better reflect the current real estate market statewide and assigns value to attributes that farmland provides in addition to its development potential. In doing so, we’ve been able to make significantly more competitive offers to landowners.
This is all about fairly compensating farmers for the value of their farmland beyond the development rights they’re giving up, especially in areas facing the greatest development pressure. Landowners can choose between offers based on traditional appraisals or one based on the new SFV. Usually, the SFV offer is the higher of the two, but not always.
The early results are encouraging. We’re seeing renewed interest from landowners who’d previously decided against preservation, as the offers now are closer to where they are competitive with other non-agricultural uses. SADC can go to closing with a cash offer not contingent upon years of obtaining approvals. That makes a real difference in preserving farmland in this competitive market.
SADC has permanently preserved more than 250,000 farmland acres. But for New Jersey to be certain it will have an agricultural industry in the future, it must do all it can to keep at least 500,000 acres in agriculture.
That level of production encourages support and supply industries to stay here because they will have either enough of a customer base (for inputs, supplies, and machinery) or enough production occurring here to remain in the area as a purchaser of farm output.
The second initiative I want to highlight represents a long-overdue expansion of our preservation program.
In January 2026, legislation was signed directing the SADC to establish a preservation program for privately owned woodlands. The purpose is the preservation and stewardship of woodlands for agricultural, silvicultural, or horticultural use and production. It is different from the traditional Green Acres program, as it keeps properties in private ownership, allowing them to remain on tax rolls and encouraging landowners to manage woodlands directly.
Walk any sizable agricultural property and you’ll find wooded areas integral to the operation — whether they’re providing windbreaks for crops, protecting waterways used for irrigation, supporting pollinators, generating income through timber harvest or maple syrup production, or simply maintaining the property’s ecological integrity.
Historically, our preservation program focused on actively cropped land and pasture. Farms without a certain number of open “tillable” acres were not eligible. This law opens the door for farms primarily in woodland to enter preservation.
The SADC is developing regulations to implement woodland preservation. This is deliberate, careful work, consulting with foresters, farmers, environmental professionals, and our county partners to craft rules that are clear, fair, and workable.
We aim to bring the woodland preservation program online in 2027. For now, there will be opportunities for public comment and stakeholder engagement as the regulations emerge. I encourage any farmer with significant woodland acreage to stay connected with their county agriculture development board, listen in on the monthly public SADC meetings, and watch for these opportunities.
The third initiative addresses something a topic of considerable discussion in our farming community for years now — special occasion events on preserved farms.
Since 2023, we’ve been operating under guidelines adapted from the special occasion events law, which offered an opportunity to study the successes and issues associated with these events on preserved farms.
The reality of modern New Jersey agriculture is that many farmers have diversified their operations to include agritourism and event hosting. Weddings in restored barns, corporate gatherings among vineyards, farm-to-table dinners — these activities can represent real revenue for farming families working to stay viable. Meanwhile, preserved farms operate under deed restrictions ensuring agriculture remains the primary land use. The question of where special occasion events fit within that framework has created uncertainty for many.
The SADC has been working to resolve this by developing regulations for special occasion events. After extensive research, stakeholder input, and internal deliberation, we anticipate having a draft ready for review this summer. These regulations will establish clear parameters for what constitutes a special occasion event, how frequency and scale relate to agricultural operations, and what farmers can expect in planning activities.
The intent is not to restrict farmers from pursuing legitimate opportunities. The regulations will clarify the rules for both those who wish to host events and those impacted by them. They will reflect a common-sense understanding while providing the defined boundaries that everyone — farmers, communities, and administrators — needs to operate with confidence. I encourage farmers on preserved land, particularly those already hosting or considering hosting events, to engage with the review process once the draft is published.
Taken together, these three initiatives — the SFV, woodland preservation, and special occasion events regulations — represent steps in the evolution our farmland preservation program needs to remain effective today.
New Jersey agriculture looks different from what it did four decades ago when this program began. Our farmers are more diversified, development pressures are more intense, and the value we place on agricultural land — both economically and environmentally — continues to grow.
What hasn’t changed is the fundamental commitment at the heart of everything the SADC does: keeping New Jersey’s farmland in the hands of farmers and people who deeply care for their land, permanently and productively. Every policy we refine, every regulation we develop, and every conversation we have with farmland owners and operators across this state serves that purpose. I’m proud of the work being done, and I’m confident these initiatives will strengthen our program for years to come.

New Jersey agriculture is, to borrow a buzz word from the culinary-health world, “plant-based.”
The largest sector of our state’s agricultural industry, by a significant margin, is the nursery/greenhouse/sod/Christmas trees and other ornamental greenery (collectively known as the “nursery sector”) that generates approximately $700 million annually in revenue, according to the latest USDA statistics.
Also, the next three largest New Jersey agriculture sectors encompass fresh produce (vegetables and fruits) and field crops (hay, grains, etc.) all of which are dependent upon healthy plants for success.
According to the most recent USDA “Census of Agriculture,” vegetables bring in approximately $300 million in farmgate sales each year, while fruits account for another $200 million-plus in sales, and the field-crops sector brings in approximately $175 million annually.
Overall, that’s north of $1 billion in New Jersey agriculture sales that could be significantly reduced if plant pests and/or diseases get out of control.
So, it’s no overstatement to say that plant health is a major concern for the producers of those plants and the products they create. And it’s why New Jersey, in yet another aspect of agriculture, strives to stay ahead of the curve in preventing plant pests and diseases from becoming established here.
That work is done mostly by the NJDA’s Division of Plant Industry (DPI), and its scientific approach to helping farmers combat plant diseases and pests without relying too heavily on chemical inputs is at its heart.
The division is directed by Joseph Zoltowski, an entomologist who has been with the Department for 38 years and who has spearheaded many of the division’s recent innovations.
The division’s goals are accomplished across various programs that involve preventative inspections to keep pests and diseases out of our plant life and targeted responses to eradicate or control a pest or disease if something slips through the cracks.
In an age of global commerce, and with New Jersey having multiple international ports, that work also centers heavily on preventing the arrival of “invasive species” that have no natural predators in our state and, if allowed to establish themselves here, could wreak havoc on ecosystems unchecked.
Those invasive marauders can come in the form of insects that have no natural predators in New Jersey (such as the Spotted Lanternfly or Asian Longhorned Beetle); a noxious weed without native consumers of it in the indigenous animal/insect population (such as Giant Hogweed or purple loosestrife): or even a plant disease such as boxwood blight or P. ramorum (aka “sudden oak death”).
As the regulators of the largest agricultural sector (nursery, etc.), the division’s staff spend a great deal of time inspecting nurseries, greenhouses, garden centers and plant dealers to ensure that plant material, whether grown here in New Jersey or imported from other states or countries, does not go unnoticed if they have picked up a plant disease or a pest that could spread to other plants at the facility, then be taken to a home or business for use in landscaping, spreading even wider damage to plant life, both commercially raised and wild.
In a typical month, the division’s inspectors conduct anywhere from 150 to 250 inspections of nurseries, plant dealers, and other facilities where plants are held, as well as assisting federal inspectors to make “phytosanitary inspections” on plants, bulbs, and plugs being shipped out of New Jersey to other states and Canada.
Aside from those routine inspections, this division particularly shines when a threatening insect or weed arrives in New Jersey that could cause serious damage to plant health.
Depending upon how long such an infestation has had to take hold in New Jersey before being noticed, it may either be a threat that can be eradicated or, in some cases, can at best be managed or stopped from spreading.
One of the longest-running of those “stop-the-spread” programs in the division seeks to control what historically had been called “gypsy moth” but is now known as “spongey moth.”
Originally imported into the Boston area by a scientist in the mid-1800s in an ill-fated attempt to crossbreed them with silk works, the caterpillar of this moth instead established itself in wooded areas of the Northeast.
A voracious eater of green leaves, the spongey moth caterpillar is a particular nuisance to homes near wooded areas. The caterpillars’ incessant eating, if allowed for several straight years, will kill a tree. And they are particularly reviled for being a slippery, slimy mess when dropping down onto backyard decks and patios.
New Jersey has experienced periodic, significant increases in this caterpillar. Upwards of 400,000 acres infested enough to merit aerial spray treatment in the early-1990s and again across several years in the early-2000s.
While fighting gypsy moth infestations in the 1980s, the Division learned of a naturally occurring fungus, Entomaphaga maimaiga, that was resulting in areas that previously were infested heavily being almost completely devoid of the caterpillars.
Division leaders learned that this fungus, when eaten by the caterpillars, destroys their appetite until they die from malnutrition. Wet springs spur further development of the fungus, while drier springs mean it isn’t as much of an ally against caterpillars.
The discovery of that fungus, which was first introduced in Massachusetts by the USDA to fight the caterpillars, meshed well with the Division’s approach at the time to find, and where necessary breed and rear, more “biological controls” for pests like spongey moth, in order to reduce the reliance on chemical insecticides and herbicides.
That approach took the form of the Phillip Alampi Beneficial Insect Laboratory (PABIL) or, in our parlance, the “bug lab.”
Built in 1985, PABIL is a 21,000 square-foot state-of-the-art beneficial-insect rearing laboratory. Beyond insects that attack pests of agricultural crops, PABIL also has delved into insects that eat invasive weeds.
Designed to foster biological pest and noxious-weed control, the facility allows state entomologists to develop insect rearing techniques and to mass produce beneficial insects and other biological controls to be used to help reduce insect and weed populations.
One of the more fascinating products of PABIL is a small, parasitic wasp developed as a biological control against Mexican bean beetle, one of the scourges of our soybean producers. The adult wasp actually deposits its eggs inside the bean beetle, and after a short time, those eggs hatch and the young essentially eat their way out of the beetle “mummy,” destroying it in the process.
Not all insects raised at PABIL are little assassins waiting to attack and kill other insects. Some are raised solely for their massive appetites, such as two species of Chrysomelid beetles imported and put to work eating purple loosestrife, an invasive plant accidentally introduced into New Jersey that is particularly damaging in taking over the habitat of the endangered native bog turtle.
Work is still ongoing to identify and breed a beneficial insect that will help reduce, or ideally even eliminate, the Spotted Lanternfly (SLF), one of the newest invasive species to make its way to New Jersey. For now, there are treatments applied to the SLF’s potential food sources, including its favorite, Tree of Heaven.
The division also runs an extensive outreach campaign urging people to report any SLFs they see and to look for their egg masses, with instructions to scrape them off trees and destroy them.
Now, not all insects are such enemies of agriculture. No insect is more integral to the industry than the honeybee. With so many food crops dependent upon them for pollination, it’s no stretch to say that human nutritional health depends upon the honeybees’ overall health. Much attention has been paid over the past decade to the consequences that could befall agriculture if Colony Collapse Disorder were to significantly reduce the hives available for pollinating food crops.
Accordingly, this division is where the State Apiarist’s office resides, with the mission of ensuring that honeybee colonies in New Jersey, both those that are here year-round, as well as those imported from other states to help pollinate crops, remain free of mites and other parasites and diseases that can destroy a honeybee colony.
Through it all, with New Jersey’s agriculture industry so rooted in plant health, the Division of Plant Industry, the work of its diagnostic laboratory, and its concentration on preventing damage from invasive plants and insects are all crucial to ensuring that farmers’ plant life, whether being grown to be sold in the nursery sector or to be sold to produce farmers to grow fruits and vegetables, remains protected.

For many people, the first thing that comes to mind when they hear “New Jersey agriculture” is “Jersey Fresh” and the products they see from late April through November in retail venues promoting in-season fruits, vegetables, and other products branded in the “Jersey Fresh” program, which is run by our Division of Marketing and Development (aka “Markets”).
Not only are these images and other “impressions” made at grocery stores, but also seen and heard on billboards, radio spots, print media, social media, community farmers markets, and on-farm markets and produce stands.
There’s a reason Jersey Fresh is almost a synonym for New Jersey agriculture and why it has seen such success over the 42 years since the program first launched in 1984 under then-Secretary Art Brown.
Jersey Fresh is the first state-sponsored agricultural marketing and quality grading program in the country.
While individual commodity groups in other locations had done advertising within their own categories, New Jersey was the first state to put significant public money behind promoting agriculture in general, and specifically the fresh produce the “Garden State” is famous for, such as sweet corn, tomatoes, blueberries, peaches, and a whole lot more.
Once the program got off to a successful start, other states realized the value of promoting their agriculture products under similar programs that usually include the name of the state and words like “Grown” or “Pride” or “Certified.”
Over the years, offshoots of Jersey Fresh have been developed, such as “Jersey Grown” for our industry’s leading sector, nursery/greenhouse/sod/Christmas trees as well as New Jersey-produced birdseed and birdhouses from New Jersey tree wood, and more recent ones like “Jersey Raised” for livestock-derived products like meat, eggs, and hides, and “Jersey Native Plants” to promote the nursery sub-category of plants native to the Garden State.
Even “Jersey Fresh” about 12 years ago, launched a sub-category of promotions called “Made with Jersey Fresh” that features value-added products created primarily out of Jersey Fresh-certified main ingredients.
These include canned tomatoes, frozen peas and carrots, peach ciders, eggplant rollatinis, sauces and salsas, beers and spirits and numerous others.
Throughout the year, leading up to the spring kickoff of our fresh-produce season, Markets staff under the direction of Joe Atchison III (who also serves as NJDA’s assistant secretary) prepare messaging plans, in-store point-of-purchase signage and other materials, social media campaigns and contests, radio public announcements, and dozens of other ways of getting “impressions,” marketing speak for a person’s eyes or ears on your messages, many of which are developed with the help of a contracted advertising agency that has the expertise and contacts to get us the “biggest bang for our buck.”
In addition, the director and staff attend four to six regional, national, and international trade shows throughout the year promoting New Jersey’s agricultural products to primary, secondary and tertiary markets.
Along with those efforts, Markets and the Grants team administer hundreds of thousands of dollars in “Specialty Crop Block Grants,” money provided by the USDA to pass through state agriculture departments to help fund commodity groups and other agriculture advocates in staging festivals and fairs and creating other promotional materials.
However, these are just one part of the division’s duties within NJDA. Reflecting its earlier name as the Division of Marketing and Regulation, there still are many programs within this division that directly target the quality and safety of ag products.
This includes administering the Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA), a decade-old program passed by Congress to ensure that foodborne illness outbreaks are recognized early, responded to appropriately, and, most importantly, able to be traced back to the source of the contamination that caused the illness outbreak, even if that’s all the way back to a farmer’s field.
FSMA brought with it voluminous requirements for farmers to have detailed food-safety plans, keep much more detailed records on each field the products came from, the methods of ensuring cleanliness in the packing houses, even more detailed trucking records to ensure that an outbreak might be traced back to a truck or interim warehouse.
Markets spent years and significant resources making sure New Jersey farmers subject to FSMA were educated as to what they could expect from the new law via education with Rutgers University’s Ag Extension agents and complimentary “On-Farm Readiness Reviews.”
Another very distinct element of the division is its responsibility for the safety, movement, distribution, and marketing of milk products. New Jersey at one time had more than 3,000 farms where animals, primarily cows, were milked.
However, many were small and may have only consisted of a handful of cows that were part of a larger, more diversified operation.
Throughout the 1960s, ’70s, and ’80s, dairy farms went through a massive consolidation and specialization period that left New Jersey with just over 100 true dairy farms by the dawn of the new millennium.
Today, there are just around 40, but many have found they can survive better by leaving the bulk commodity Federal Milk Marketing Order system and get into on-farm pasteurizing and bottling, the production at the farm of products like ice cream or partnering with cheesemakers or even making their own.
These days, New Jersey farmers also are exploring the opportunities for milk and milk products that come from animals other than cattle.
This includes sheep and goats, and this is a growing portion of those who want to provide such products. Yet another “movement” in the industry is farmers who want to sell unpasteurized “raw” milk direct to consumers.
While the division and NJDA recognize the incentive of the higher prices for which that milk can be sold, we’re also highly aware of health officials’ warnings against such sales, as the milk can contain pathogens like E. coli, campylobacter, and salmonella that otherwise get killed through pasteurization.
This division also has oversight over another agriculture slice that includes animals – the equine industry.
This can be anything from 4-H and other youth-activity horse shows and competitions, trail riding pleasure horses, all the way up to the state’s major horseracing industry.
This is a sector on the rebound.
For a time in the early 2000s, the sector’s leaders sought direct state support to keep racing purses competitive with those in surrounding states.
Those other states were establishing “racinos,” adding casino games like slot machines to their racetracks and using some of that additional income to boost purses, but New Jersey racetracks were repeatedly blocked from taking the racino route by the Atlantic City casino operators, which did not want further close-by competition.
This led to some large and respected racehorse breeders leaving New Jersey, as the other states required that horses competing for their highest stakes had to be bred in those states.
But with the re-introduction several years back of annual state-budget support to keep our purses competitive, New Jersey is returning to hosting big-time breeders of standardbred horses (aka “trotters” and “pacers”) with the goal of returning to having the reputation of creating quality standardbred horses the way Kentucky is known for breeding champion thoroughbreds.
With the additional state support for purses, total wagering increased from $480.8 million in 2019 to $529.9 million in 2024.
This division also runs programs to support the 120-plus community farmers markets in New Jersey, including ensuring that both the raw produce and products made from farm staples meet the requirements of the state law known as Chapter 24, which specifies the health-code conditions for products sold at those markets and elsewhere.
With its abilities and experience in mass messaging, this Division also routinely helps out in getting vital information out to the public from other divisions within the NJDA.
This part of the division’s abilities was on full display in 2006, when it needed to push out messaging about a nationwide recall of certain lettuces while also helping to host the annual Farm Aid concert in Camden on the same weekend.
And, not surprisingly, the Division’s constant contacts with commodity groups, agricultural advocates, and the state’s approximately 10,000 farmers make it the ideal unit to plan, coordinate, and carry out the annual New Jersey Agricultural Convention, where nearly 100 delegates from 80 agricultural organizations gather to discuss the industry’s major issues and pass resolutions with proposed ways to address them.
New Jersey agriculture operators are known for their inventiveness and adaptability.
Whether it’s to natural conditions that impact plants and animals, or abrupt changes in the marketplace (as occurred during the COVID pandemic) this division must always stay up on the latest trends among food buyers to do the one job that our farmers depend upon them most to accomplish, connecting them with the next big opportunity that arises for their particular agricultural products.
So, the next time you see that Jersey Fresh sign at the supermarket, pass by a picturesque horse-breeding or dairy farm, or spend a leisurely day discovering great fresh products at a community farmers market, know that an entire division of NJDA is helping to bring those familiar and fantastic farm products to you, and seeking even more opportunities to spur our farmers’ success.

If you’re a science buff, or just like learning about the many creatures that exist in New Jersey, and the ways we must work to keep them healthy, you’ll love the Division of Animal Health (DAH).

DAH is one of our two most science-heavy divisions, along with the Division of Plant Industry. Much like its vegetative counterpart does for plants, DAH concerns itself with preventing diseases that could become established in New Jersey animals and wreak havoc on livestock.

DAH concerns itself with preventing invasive species and diseases from becoming established, as invasive animals and diseases with no natural predators or defenses in New Jersey can take over an ecosystem quickly.

DAH is composed of some of the state’s top veterinarians, including the New Jersey State Veterinarian Dr. Amar Patil, the division’s director. But it also boasts a nationally recognized laboratory that conducts an array of livestock health checks for animals moving into New Jersey; tests to ensure that no poultry diseases make their way into the state’s 40-ish live bird markets; and performs necropsies when requested on animals as diverse as chickens, a giraffe (from a zoo), and dolphins that washed up at the Jersey Shore a few years back.

Another part of this division deals with complaints about animal cruelty. This primarily involves our humane-law chief and a corps of Certified Livestock Inspectors (CLIs). It also can be the most difficult part of the division for the public to understand.

In our state, only about 1.5 percent of the population is involved in farming. And a minority of that minority operates a farm involving animals. So, in general, people passing by a farm with livestock don’t know specifically, for a species or even for different times of the year, whether an animal they are looking at is being abused or neglected, or may be sick and being treated by a veterinarian or may have nothing wrong with it at all.

This leads to people without expertise filing humane-law complaints against livestock owners. And when law enforcement responds, the same lack of familiarity with livestock diseases can wind up resulting in a sick animal being removed from the property, raising the potential for that animal to spread a contagious disease to other animals. And in the case of a “zoonotic” disease (which can jump species) even spreading disease to humans.

That’s one of the reasons the division also works, through the Animal Emergency Working Group at its annual training symposium, to further educate Humane Law Enforcement Officers on the basics of proper biosecurity when they respond to a farm or other property with livestock. Foremost among those precautions is to ALWAYS contact DAH when a complaint involves livestock so that a CLI expert can go to the scene and add context to the “condition” of any animals there.

New Jersey long has taken pains to ensure that misunderstandings about animal husbandry do not unfairly impact farmers who operate within animal-cruelty laws. In 2009, the Department, led by DAH and with the help of veterinary and livestock experts, created The Humane Standards for the Care and Keeping of Livestock. This extensive regulation, the first of its kind in the nation, sets out minimum standards farmers must meet to be in a “safe harbor” from animal-cruelty complaints based on misunderstanding of livestock health.

Ultimately, though, the division is first and foremost about keeping the state’s agriculture industry free from economically devastating diseases. In the past half-decade, the primary disease demanding attention from DAH has been Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza (HPAI, or “bird flu’).

The current “HPAI outbreak” in the United States began in early-2022. It has largely impacted very large poultry operations in the Midwest, West, and South, including in some states jumping (zoonotic) from poultry to animals like dairy cows (causing impacts to the milk industry) and even farm cats (which were fed raw milk from infected cows before the farmer knew the cows were infected).

A major part of how New Jersey conducts surveillance is constant monitoring of the approximately 40 “live bird markets.” These markets, typically but not always located in urban areas, import live birds from producers in states like Pennsylvania, midwestern, and southern states, and customers choose a live bird from the current inventory. Then, staff at the market process and dress it for the customer to take home.

New Jersey does not have many commercial-level facilities where chickens are raised, so most of what comes into the live bird markets comes from other states, some of which have had far more birds that had to be depopulated due to HPAI infection on the farm from which they came. New Jersey, so far in this outbreak, has had a few thousand birds that needed to be depopulated for HPAI, while other states have seen millions of birds destroyed to halt the spread of HPAI.

New Jersey, through DAH, has also been testing milk from dairy cows to ensure that HPAI does not make its way into their milk as it did in several other states. To date, no evidence of the disease getting into New Jersey dairy products has been recorded.

However, HPAI isn’t the only livestock disease DAH looks out for. The division was pressed into service when Mad Cow Disease was running through herds in Europe in the early-2000s; is always mindful of the potential for Foot and Mouth Disease (FMD) in livestock possibly reaching our shores; must remain vigilant against horse diseases like Equine Herpes coming into the state from horses arriving to partake in the various horseracing and show-horse events that

occur here; and, in the latest twist, keeping abreast of how far north into Mexico the New World Screwworm is advancing, as that parasitic disease of flies that lay eggs in livestock tissue can devastate the livestock industry.

Because so much of what DAH deals with involves natural phenomenon that can create severe emergencies, it’s logical that they are one of the NJDA divisions most intricately involved in preparing for and planning responses to other types of disasters.

DAH staffers coordinate the County Animal Response Teams (CARTs) that many counties have to prepare volunteers to staff animal shelters located near human evacuation shelters in, for instance, a hurricane.

This approach of “co-located” evacuation shelters grew out of Hurricane Katrina in Louisiana and other Gulf states in 2005. Many residents refused to evacuate their home areas and get out of harm’s way because they were told they could not take their pets. Some of them died after refusing to leave their homes. This acknowledgment that “pets ARE family members” gave birth to the CART system in New Jersey, with the state and its counties making sure they now plan for those co-located pet shelters.

Additionally, DAH works with volunteers and agricultural groups to ensure that any livestock are also kept out of harm’s way when violent weather comes through the state. Some counties make their county fairgrounds or other properties available where stalls and other animal accommodations already exist. While large livestock in large numbers are difficult to move in the middle of a storm, sometimes “sheltering in place” in barns is not feasibly safe. State facilities like the Horse Park of New Jersey also can play a role in being a temporary shelter for livestock.

One of the newest tasks to come DAH’s way is the way the division and its labs will support the brand-new veterinary school at Rowan University. To this point, the lack of a veterinary school in New Jersey has resulted in students going out of state for their education and, most times, staying in that area to practice instead of returning to New Jersey.

DAH is working with that school’s leadership to design a “practicum,” using the division’s facilities at the Public Health, Environmental, and Agriculture Laboratories (PHEAL) headquarters located on the State Police compound in West Trenton, to provide hands-on experience to those veterinary students.

To be sure, volumes could be written on the wide array of programs and animal disease-prevention efforts of the Division of Animal Health, but I hope this column has given you at least a foundation in knowing what that part of the NJDA does.

There may be no higher calling in all of agriculture than ensuring that residents near you – actually, just about anywhere – are secure in being able to access nourishing food.

It seems odd to think that in a country and state with as much wealth as can be found in the U.S. and New Jersey could have people who face food-insecurity (currently the most widely accepted term for those struggling to consistently have adequate food for their needs without some help from government and/or non-profit organizations).

But we know from numerous studies that approximately 1.1 million of New Jersey’s roughly 9 million residents, indeed, navigate food insecurity every day. Fortunately, the Legislature, Assembly Speaker Craig Coughlin, and then-Governor Murphy in 2021 saw that ending hunger is about more than charitably giving people food in their time of need and worked together to create the New Jersey Office of the Food Security Advocate (OFSA). Just as importantly, they put Mark Dinglasan in charge of the new agency.

By 2022, the agency was up and running, with a mandate to work closely with NJDA, other agencies charged with human health. well-being, and the environment, the philanthropic sector, county administrators, as well as food banks and other hunger-fighting groups to strengthen our state’s food system to better serve everyone, regardless of which community or county they call home.

One key to the establishment of this new office – an “in-but-not-of” agency linked to the New Jersey Department of Agriculture while established in the Executive Branch – was pairing its efforts to NJDA’s programs that already administer school and community feeding-assistance programs. NJDA also had been doing all it could to link our state’s farmers with the economic benefits of those programs, and they have been just as enthusiastic in their support of OFSA’s goals, as the Office understands how they benefit agriculture as a whole.

Director Dinglasan addressed this cooperation and interconnectedness in his message at the front of the recently released New Jersey Food Security Strategic Plan, the first such comprehensive approach to the state’s collective work, which was released in February. A multisector committee of partners co-developed the plan, with Darcy Perehinys of Perehinys Farms and NJDA Deputy Assistant Secretary/Chief Operating Officer Tameko Webster elevating the perspectives of the agricultural community throughout the process.

“When OFSA began its work,” Mark says in that message, “we ensured that our efforts would be grounded in two key principles: valuing research and evaluation, and honoring community voices. We focused on these areas to build consensus and collaboration among multiple sectors. As an office, we continue to believe that all the work that has been done prior to the creation of

OFSA, and all the work that will continue to be done, must be respected, lifted up, and connected within the Strategic Plan.

“We also believe,” he added, “that lasting systems change in New Jersey must have sustainable collaboration between as many sectors that are working in the food security space as possible.”

In other words, OFSA becomes an integral connector of the overall work that multiple state agencies, and a great number of local groups and non-profits, acknowledge is important in bringing all these pieces to work together toward unified goals.

The need for that strong state, county, and local presence in the “food networks” of New Jersey can’t be overstated. That was made very clear during last November’s suspension of federal SNAP benefits as part of a federal budget shutdown.

Those local and regional food banks, pantries, community kitchens (this term represents that these sites have expanded their services far beyond serving soup and meals) and others engaged in fighting food insecurity were crucial to ensure that some level of food assistance was reaching those whose SNAP benefits had been cut off by the federal government. State and local officials responded with additional financial support to communities to buy food to ensure that the dearth of help at the federal level could be counteracted. OFSA’s facilitated the state’s emergency response by analyzing New Jersey-specific data to pinpoint which communities and local food pantries may have felt the impact first and the worst so resources could be directed accordingly.

Even when those federal benefits aren’t interrupted, food insecurity continues to challenge New Jersey, despite the Garden State being home to approximately 10,000-plus farms and fisheries of varying sizes generating about $1.5 billion annually in farm gate sales and a broader “food and agriculture complex” as measured by Rutgers University, that includes all food-related and agricultural businesses in the state, which together contribute approximately $135 billion annually to the state’s economy.

So, just how do experts measure food insecurity?

According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s definition, households experiencing food insecurity have difficulty, at some time during the year, providing enough food for all their members because of a lack of money or other resources. In New Jersey, one in every 10 households (9.8 percent or 347,000 households) experienced food insecurity in 2021-2023 (based on a three-year average).

It’s important to emphasize the “in but not of” nature of OFSA, as having it housed in the Department without it being an actual division of our Department makes it possible for OFSA to advocate for various hunger-fighting solutions, including policy, while NJDA, as a government agency, is more constrained in what ways it can do advocacy work.

And, as Director Dinglasan reminds us, this is still the only agency of its type in the country, although California is closing in on creating one, and has reached out to OFSA for advice and guidance.

It’s interesting that California is following New Jersey into this effort, as that state has an even more massive food-and-agriculture complex (to use Rutgers’ term) than New Jersey, making it better equipped to tap into huge supplies of food throughout a food system producing a big chunk of the food eaten in the United States.

And I’m sure some of the advice Mark is giving them involves making sure their state’s farmers and ranchers understand the vital role they play as creators of foods and raw food ingredients that move up the supply chain to become value-added products for individuals and families at all income levels.

Mark has been very clear when addressing our state’s farmers that they are key partners in fighting food insecurity, even beyond donations and gleaning, the practice where farmers can have volunteers pick an overly abundant crop on their farm to be donated or sold to food-security programs and operations.

He is eager to support NJDA in developing clearer lines of sight and closer connections between growers and the neighbors who want to eat healthier. Food security work includes creating market channels for farmers, such as selling foods into school and community feeding operations through state-level local-purchase initiatives and welcoming community input that can inform crop planning and strengthening partnerships that can seed forward commitment opportunities.

In this way, they get food to people who may not otherwise be able to afford it, and don’t create a glut in the private market that could drive down their prices and those of fellow New Jersey farmers. Notably, the Legislature, in part through OFSA’s advocacy efforts, appropriated Fiscal Year 2026 funds to establish a state version of the Local Food Purchasing Cooperative Agreement program (LFPA) after the federal government cancelled the program.

“Agriculture is such an integral part of all our local food systems,” Mark has said, “and strengthening agriculture creates stronger food systems. Focus Area 2 of the Food Security Strategic Plan emphasizes this fact and outlines four strategies to bolster the sector here in the Garden State. New Jersey is also activating the plan’s implementation by providing funding opportunities aligned with the strategic plan. OFSA is awarding $625,000 in grant funds through the New Jersey Food System Enhancements Program, and I look forward to announcing those grantees very soon.”

One of the more pointed connections between OFSA and the grassroots groups that can connect food-insecure people with food access is what is referred to as “Focus Area 3” of the recently released strategic plan, making funding available for establishment of better county-level food security networks.

While some counties have established collaborative food security networks, others are in earlier stages of coalition development or operate without dedicated coordination structures. And opportunities remain to strengthen statewide alignment, peer learning, evaluation, communication, and sustainability across local efforts.

In support of advancing that particular effort, OFSA is establishing and implementing the New Jersey County Food Security Coalition Network Initiative. This initiative will support the development, coordination, and evaluation of county-level food security coalitions and create a structured statewide coalition network to advance shared learning, accountability, and systems change.

A “notice of funding opportunities” was set to close in mid-June as I write this, with OFSA seeking one grant awardee to receive $460,000 each of the next two years to be the lead partner in formalizing these county-level coalitions.

No doubt, there will be future grants and other funding will come to the fore to help solve what is always a tricky puzzle to make sure no one faces food insecurity in our state.

In a state with the number of farms, our vaunted agricultural production of food, a vibrant food-processing industry and a robust commercial and not-for-profit food distribution network as New Jersey has, we should be very well positioned to continue helping people escape food insecurity.