REYNOLDSBURG, Ohio — A redesigned website aimed at making more information available to Ohioans has recently been launched by the Ohio Department of Agriculture.

The new site - www.ohioagriculture.gov - is designed to be interactive and user-friendly.

“The former website was almost five-years old,” said LeeAnne Mizer, public information officer with ODA’s Office of Communication. “The department uses the site to disseminate a variety of information and experienced a growth in content. The site became cumbersome for our users to located information quickly and was difficult to maintain.”

To alleviate the problem, she said the site was remodeled.

“The department wanted the site to become more dynamic without losing sight of our purpose,” Mizer said. “Ohio Department of Agriculture serves primarily as a regulator for the state and provides information to our visitors.”

She said one of the best new features is the Ohio Ag Info Map, which is a clickable map that displays local county phone numbers and county information. The map is accessible from the left navigation bar and she said it will continue to grow as ODA provides more information to visitors.

Other features include a searchable events calendar, a “one-stop shop” for pesticide applicators, a reorganized food recall page, a searchable newsroom, searchable forms and licensing information, a listing of searchable permitted farms by county and an easier-to-use rules and regulations area.

“Biofuels” is another highlighted topic. Consumers can view a short presentation explaining how ethanol is made and test their knowledge in the “Corn Maze” by answering questions about ethanol.

Consumers can perform activities such as accessing test scores and results and retrieving forms or applications.

So far, Mizer said there has been a 19.4 percent increase in page views in the first month. She asked visitors to take a user survey, which is located on the left navigation bar of the homepage, that provides visitors a way to comment on what they like and what they dislike.

“So far, the majority of comments are very favorable, and the other comments are all valid,” she said. “These comments will be used to improve the site. We want our users to have a good experience when they visit us.”

Mizer said the project is not yet complete. There are division-specific updates and features to be added.

“The next phase is to convert the divisions into this new format and add new features at that time,” she said. “Where we go from there will depend on our visitors.”