Feb 24, 2009Obama Names Deputy Secretary of Agriculture
President Barack Obama intends to nominate Kathleen A. Merrigan to be Deputy Secretary of Agriculture, according to USDA.
Merrigan currently is an assistant professor and director of the Agriculture, Food and Environment masters and doctoral programs at the Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy at Tufts University, Boston.
In 1999, she was appointed administrator of USDA’s Agricultural Marketing Service by President Clinton. Prior to that, Merrigan was a senior analyst at the Henry A. Wallace Institute for Alternative Agriculture and an expert consultant at the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations in Rome.
From 1987 to 1992 she was a staff member on the U.S. Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry where she helped develop the Organic Foods Production Act of 1990 which mandated national organic standards and a program of federal accreditation.
Merrigan holds a doctorate from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in environmental planning and policy, a Master of Public Affairs from the University of Texas and a bachelor’s degree from Williams College.
