Ag Secretary Tom Vilsack says the agriculture industry must do a better job speaking with one unified voice. The USDA chief recently said too much attention is paid to what divides the industry: whether you grow organic, conventional or whether GMOs are bad or not. But, he says farming is a profession that benefits the entire nation, even those who don’t realize it.
“Every one of us that’s not a farmer, is not as farmer because we have farmers,” Vilsack said. “We delegate the responsibility of feeding our families to a relatively small percentage of this country. If you look at 85% of what’s grown in this country, it’s raised by 2-300,000 people. That’s less than one-tenth of one percent of America. But the other 99% of us can be lawyers and doctors and peace corps volunteers and economists and people that work for government.”
Vilsack says because of the robust agriculture industry, there are freedoms and securities in this country that are uniquely American.
“It is not true in most of the countries in this world, and then when we go to the grocery store we walk out of it with more money in our pocket as a percentage of our paychecks than anybody else in the world. So we have this incredible economy that’s consumer oriented that allows us to buy stuff. It’s unbelievable.”
Vilsack would like the non-agriculture community to thank area farmers for these unique freedoms and opportunities.
Source: NAFB News