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McDonald’s said Monday it plans to invest $200 million over the next seven years to promote regenerative agriculture practices on cattle ranches.

The Chicago burger giant said the investment was its largest to date in support of regenerative agriculture in the U.S. The company has also funded regenerative projects on potato farms in Canada and Europe.

“As a brand that serves more than 90% of Americans every year, we recognize the responsibility we have to help safeguard our food systems for long-term vitality,” Cesar Piña, McDonald’s chief supply chain officer for North America, said in a statement.

Regenerative techniques aim to conserve water, enhance soil health and reduce the need for synthetic chemicals and fertilizers. Other big companies, including General Mills, Nestle, Walmart and PepsiCo, have also been investing in regenerative farming projects in recent years.

On cattle ranches, ranchers practicing regenerative agriculture move cattle frequently and let the land recover for weeks or months. That helps produce more grass with deeper roots, which take more carbon from the air to help improve soil.

McDonald’s said its investment will help accelerate regenerative grazing and water and wildlife conservation on ranches spanning 4 million acres in up to 38 states.

McDonald’s is working with the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, which will independently award competitive grants to organizations that will assist participating ranchers. The company said some of its suppliers, including Cargill, Golden State Foods and Coca-Cola, are also providing funding to the foundation.

Jeff Trandahl, the executive director and CEO of the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, said regenerative practices can ultimately improve the productivity of grasslands and increase ranches’ profitability. The foundation expects the first round of awards will be announced in January.

The world’s fondness for matcha is about to be tested by steep price increases.

Global demand for the powdered tea has skyrocketed around the world, fueled by consumer interest in its health benefits and by the bright green matcha lattes bubbling up on social media. In the U.S., retail sales of matcha are up 86% from three years ago, according to NIQ, a market research firm.

But the matcha market is troubled. In Japan, one of the biggest matcha producers, poor weather reduced this year’s harvest. Matcha is still plentiful in China, another major producer, but labor shortages and high demand have also raised prices there.

For Americans, there’s the added impact of tariffs. Imports from China are currently subject to a 37.5% tariff, while the U.S. has a 15% tariff on imports from Japan. It’s not clear if tea will be exempted from tariffs because it’s a natural product that’s not grown in significant quantities in the U.S. — an accommodation that the Trump administration has made for cork from the European Union. The Commerce Department and the U.S. Trade Representative didn’t respond to messages left by The Associated Press.

Aaron Vick, a senior tea buyer with California-based tea importer G.S. Haly, says he paid 75% more for the highest-grade 2025 crop of Japanese matcha, which will arrive in the U.S. later this fall. He expects lower grades of matcha to cost 30% to 50% more. Chinese matcha — while generally cheaper than Japanese matcha — is also getting more expensive because of high demand, he said.

“People should expect an enormous increase in the price of matcha this year,” Vick said. “It’s going to be a bit of a tough ride for matcha devotees. They will have to show the depth of their commitment at the cash register.”

Even before this year’s harvest, growing demand was straining matcha supplies. Making matcha is precise and labor intensive. Farmers grow tencha — a green tea leaf — in the shade. In the spring, the leaves are harvested, steamed, de-stemmed and de-veined and then stone ground into a fine powder. Tencha can be harvested again in the summer and fall, but the later harvests are generally of lower quality.

There are ways to cut corners, like using a jet mill, which grinds the leaves with high pressure air. But Japan has other issues, including a rapidly aging workforce and limited tencha production. And despite Japanese agricultural ministry trying to coax tea growers to switch to tencha from regular green tea, many are reluctant to do so, concerned that the matcha boom will fade.

That’s giving an opening to China, where matcha originated but fell out of favor in the 14th century. Chinese matcha production has been growing in recent years to meet both domestic and international demand.

Chinese matcha has historically been considered inferior to Japanese matcha and used as a flavoring for things like matcha-flavored KitKat bars instead of as a drinking tea. But the quality is improving, according to Jason Walker, the marketing director at Firsd Tea, the New Jersey-based U.S. subsidiary of Zhejiang Tea Group, China’s largest tea exporter.

“We are seeing more and more interest in Chinese matcha because of capacity issues and changing perception,” Walker said. “It used to be the idea that it has to be Japanese matcha or nothing. But we have a good product too.”

Starbucks is among the companies using matcha from China for its lattes. The company said it also sources matcha from Japan and South Korea. Dunkin’ and Dutch Bros. didn’t respond when asked where they source the matcha.

Josh Mordecai, the supply chain director for London-based tea supplier Good & Proper Tea, said he is approached almost daily by Chinese matcha suppliers. For now, he only buys matcha from Japan, but the cost to acquire it has risen 40% so he’ll have to raise prices, he said.

Mordecai said he saw more demand for matcha in the last year than in the previous nine years combined. If matcha prices continue to rise, he wonders if consumers will switch to other tea varieties like hojicha, a roasted Japanese green tea.

“We’ll see if this is a bubble or not. Nothing stays on social media that long,” Mordecai said.

Julia Mills, a food and drink analyst for the market research company Mintel, expects the social media interest in matcha to die down. But she thinks matcha will remain on menus for a while.

Mills said matcha appeals to customers interested in wellness, since it contains antioxidants and l-theanine, an amino acid known for its calming effects, and it’s less caffeinated than coffee. Millennials and Generation Z customers are more likely to have tried matcha than others, Mills said.

The traditional way of preparing it, whisking the powder together with hot water in a small bowl, also appeals to drinkers who want to slow down and be more intentional, Mills said.

That’s true for Melissa Lindsay of San Francisco, who whisks up some matcha for herself every morning. Lindsay has noticed prices rising for her high-end matcha, but it’s a habit she’d find hard to quit.

“It’s not just a tea bag in water,” Lindsay said. “It’s a whole experience of making it to your liking.”

David Lau, the owner of Asha Tea House in San Francisco, hopes to keep customers drinking matcha by limiting price increases. Lau raised the price of his matcha latte by 50 cents after the cost the matcha he buys from Japan more than doubled. He’s also looking into alternate suppliers from China and elsewhere.

“We’re in the affordable luxury business, you know, just like any other specialty cafe. We want people to be able to come every day, and once you reach a certain price level, you start to price people out,” he said. “We want to be really cognizant and aware of not doing that.

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AP Video Journalist Haven Daley contributed from San Francisco.

The parents of teenagers who killed themselves after interactions with artificial intelligence chatbots are planning to testify to Congress on Tuesday about the dangers of the technology.

Matthew Raine, the father of 16-year-old Adam Raine of California, and Megan Garcia, the mother of 14-year-old Sewell Setzer III of Florida, are set to speak to a Senate hearing on the harms posed by AI chatbots.

Raine’s family sued OpenAI and its CEO Sam Altman last month alleging that ChatGPT coached the boy in planning to take his own life in April. Garcia sued another AI company, Character Technologies, for wrongful death last year, arguing that before his suicide, Sewell had become increasingly isolated from his real life as he engaged in highly sexualized conversations with the chatbot.

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EDITOR’S NOTE — This story includes discussion of suicide. If you or someone you know needs help, the national suicide and crisis lifeline in the U.S. is available by calling or texting 988.

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Hours before the Senate hearing, OpenAI pledged to roll out new safeguards for teens, including efforts to detect whether ChatGPT users are under 18 and controls that enable parents to set “blackout hours” when a teen can’t use ChatGPT. Child advocacy groups criticized the announcement as not enough.

“This is a fairly common tactic — it’s one that Meta uses all the time — which is to make a big, splashy announcement right on the eve of a hearing which promises to be damaging to the company,” said Josh Golin, executive director of Fairplay, a group advocating for children’s online safety.

“What they should be doing is not targeting ChatGPT to minors until they can prove that it’s safe for them,” Golin said. “We shouldn’t allow companies, just because they have tremendous resources, to perform uncontrolled experiments on kids when the implications for their development can be so vast and far-reaching.”

The Federal Trade Commission said last week it had launched an inquiry into several companies about the potential harms to children and teenagers who use their AI chatbots as companions.

The agency sent letters to Character, Meta and OpenAI, as well as to Google, Snap and xAI.