NEVADA, Iowa — During a meeting with farmers in Iowa last Friday, new USDA Secretary Sonny Perdue stressed the importance of agriculture to the country’s economy and consumers.

 

He put away the 17-page speech he said someone at the USDA wrote for him, and talked about the importance of trade, immigration issues and technology. “We’re going to go to China and sell all the Iowa beef that we can,” Perdue said. “The Chinese will tell you they want American beef, and we’re going to find a way to get it to them.”

 

He said the trade discussions to get beef back into the Chinese market will be technical and tough but it will work because he will bring those representatives to the United States to show them how the beef is raised and processed. “We’re going to stay at it because people do business with people,” Perdue explained.

 In 1984, the people of Iowa welcomed five young Chinese men who came to America to learn about agriculture, and the residents of Iowa treated those men with the hospitality they would show a neighbor, he said. Those actions have had repercussions today, as one of those men is Xi Jinping, now president of China. “He remembers your kindness; he remembers your hospitality,” Perdue said.

 The middle class in Asia, especially in China, is growing and they want good beef, poultry, pork and dairy. Perdue said they trust the U.S. to provide a safe and reliable food source.

 

Over the next 30 years, farmers will need to produce as much food as has been produced in the last 8,000 years, he said. Technology and innovation are going to play an important role in feeding everyone while protecting the environment.

 “We’re going to convince 99 percent of the people of the value of American agriculture … You grow it and we’ll sell it,” Perdue said. “There are a lot of businesses out there today that I wouldn’t want to be a part of, but I’m proud to be called an agriculturalist … the nobility of what we’re called to do is a pretty awesome thing. That makes me sleep good at night.”

 

He said he came to Iowa to learn and the farm he toured, the Couser Cattle Co., is progressive, doing all the right things – from the slope of the barns’ roofs for ideal winter and summer protection, to using technological advances – and feeding a lot of people. “We have to use everything… We have to be more productive, more innovative,” Perdue said.

 Craig Hill, president of the Iowa Farm Bureau (IFB), said it was a great day with weather that cooperated to spin the wind turbines and provide a view of the ethanol factory, corn shoots from the ground and cattle in the state-of-the-art feedlot.

 

(“Perdue) seemed to know a lot about Iowa agriculture. He said he was now going to be an Iowan as well as a Georgian,” Hill said. “He talked about job growth, adding value to everything we do, stewardship – leaving our farms and our land and our world better than we  found it.”

 Hill said Perdue’s record as a captain in the Air Force, a veterinarian and a state senator has shown he is a hard worker. Since taking over the leadership of the USDA two weeks ago, he thinks Perdue has proven to be one of the most industrious people he has met.

 He said most people in agency leadership, especially new leadership, tend to stick to the script, but Perdue was quick to dispose of that idea. “He said he was the most unapologetic and the biggest advocate we would have. We have a lot of criticism in agriculture, (of) GMOs, antibiotics … he’s not going to apologize,” Hill said. He thinks Perdue visited Iowa because he recognizes the state as a large agriculture economy. In addition to the town hall meeting, Perdue attended a luncheon before visiting the USDA facility in Ames.

 

A video of the town hall speech can be found on the IFB’s Facebook page at www.facebook.com/iowafarmbureau/?ref=br_rs