FFA Celebrating and Honoring Farmers on National Ag Day

FFA Celebrating and Honoring Farmers on National Ag Day

Happy National Ag Day, Indiana! Joining me in recognizing what you do every day to feed and clothe Hoosiers, Americans, and the world, is National FFA President Luke O’Leary. He told HAT that today is all about celebrating, honoring, and sharing the message of hard-working farmers. He was in Pylesville, Maryland on Tuesday sharing the good news of agriculture with second grade students.

“We went to North Harford Elementary School and we were able to read some books to them about where our food comes from, what farmers are doing every single moment of every single day, and there’s many times we forget that and we don’t thank farmers for what they do providing the food that ends up on our tables and in our bellies.”

O’Leary said that some of the students were shocked to find out that food wasn’t just made in the grocery store.

“Wow! There’s actually someone who’s planting the seed of some sort of grain that is going to be in my macaroni and cheese someday. To see that on their faces and to see them excited about maybe even starting a garden themselves there in their class was a pretty incredible thing to see today.”

O’Leary is in DC today to celebrate National Ag Day. He hopes to have the chance to speak with legislators about the importance of agriculture education and how focused the National FFA is on filling the talent pipeline needed to keep agriculture running.

“There are thousands and thousands of unfilled jobs in the agricultural industry and our organization is taking the necessary steps to provide students with the skills required to launch them into success in careers. Whether they go straight into a career out of high school or they go on to post-secondary education, they’re going to be prepared to fill those agricultural jobs because of what they received in agricultural education.”