USDA plans custom site

Farmers will soon be able to use a single Web page to view their conservation contracts commodity payments and loans with the Agriculture Department, officials said.

When Agriculture Secretary Ann Veneman announced a new look for the department's Web site, she said the fresh look will be matched, in August, by new capabilities for creating personalized home pages under the MyUSDA.gov title. Underlying the changes will be portal personalization and content-management technologies, said Kim Taylor, director of Web services and distribution in USDA's Office of Communications.

Taylor said the changes will make it easier for farmers and consumers to gain access to much of the information and science, including more than 3,000 commodity reports, which are now generated by the department but are often difficult to find. "We're going to tie everything together," she said.