Darryl Earnest has served as the deputy administrator for the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), Agricultural Marketing Service (AMS), Cotton and Tobacco Program (C&T) since 2005. He has spent his entire government career with C&T, joining AMS in 1990 after graduating from the University of Alabama with a BS degree in industrial engineering. Over his career, Darryl has served in many different areas of cotton operations and program management. In 2008, he assumed direction of the AMS Tobacco Program when it joined Cotton as part of an agency merger. As national director for both, he is ultimately responsible for all operations within the Cotton and Tobacco divisions. In 2011, Darryl moved his Washington, DC, headquarters office to Memphis, Tennessee, to streamline program leadership. C&T grades all the cotton produced in the United States for the fiber quality used to market the cotton all over the world.
