kathleen merrigan

Deputy Agriculture Secretary Kathleen Merrigan was invited to address the participants at the American Indian Higher Education Consortium’s 30^th Annual Conference in Bismarck, North Dakota, earlier this week.  During the presentation, the Deputy Secretary highlighted the Know Your Farmer, Know Your Food effort.  She outlined the critical connection between farmers and consumers and the importance of local and regional food systems to increase economic opportunity in rural America. In addition, Deputy Secretary Merrigan informed the audience that 50 percent of U.S. Department of Agriculture employees will be eligible for retirement by 2013.  It is anticipated that many job opportunities and possibilities will become available.  Therefore, USDA will be seeking college graduates with a variety of educational backgrounds to replenish its’ workforce.

As I talk to farmers across the country, regardless of what they produce or where, they all share one common challenge:  how to best move product from the farm to the marketplace.  This is especially crucial for small and midsize farmers who may not have enough capital to own their own trucks, their own refrigeration units, or their own warehouse space.  They might not have the resources to develop sophisticated distribution routes, build effective marketing campaigns or network with regional buyers and customers.

Without infrastructure, logistical and marketing support, these producers might be growing the sweetest strawberries or raising the most tender beef, but they lack the infrastructure support to get their exceptional products to your table.

USDA employees and members of the public in Columbus, Ohio had the chance to hear Agriculture Deputy Secretary Kathleen Merrigan speak recently at the Columbus Federal Building as part of her one-day tour of the Buckeye state.

Merrigan’s first stop in the morning was at the Hoover plant in Glenwillow where she announced the USDA BioPreferred certifications bestowed on eleven new bio-based product initiatives. The products, which range from hand soaps to engine oils, are composed of agricultural ingredients and are certified to meet the standards for biobased content set by USDA.

This morning I had the opportunity to start my day in Big Sky Country where I was invited by Senator Jon Tester to participate in the Small Business Opportunity Workshop hosted at Montana State University.

We have a full house here having reached capacity at 150 attendees with another 80 RSVPs still arriving.  Clearly the word is out on our workshop and the farmers and ranchers of Montana are eager to hear about job creation and economic development opportunities here in the state.

On March 3^rd, Deputy Agriculture Secretary Kathleen Merrigan gave an informative speech about USDA’s ‘Know Your Farmer, Know Your Food’ initiative to a packed crowd of Portland State University (PSU) students and faculty.  As both a PSU graduate student of Public Administration and a new employee with USDA Rural Development in Oregon, I was impressed by USDA’s active role in creating solutions to some of our most pressing national and global issues.

“The safest bet in America is American agriculture!” That’s the way Secretary Tom Vilsack led off his remarks to the 2,000 farmers, ranchers, agriculture officials and industry leaders in attendance at today’s Agricultural Outlook Forum in the suburbs of Washington, D.C.

I recently began the Know your Farmer, Know Your Food College tour, and one of the locations I visited was a farmer’s market in North Carolina. Many of the regionally and locally produced products we see at farmer’s markets have a helping hand from USDA’s Value-Added Producer Grant program.

Sometimes it’s tough for a small or beginning rural business or cooperative to come up with the money for a feasibility study, marketing or packaging.  That’s where USDA’s Value Added Producer Grant program can help.

Yesterday, I was honored to represent the U.S. Department of Agriculture at the ‘New Markets, New Jobs’ conference held at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis.

Minnesota is one of our agricultural trade leaders, ranking sixth among all 50 states for U.S. farm exports, generating nearly $8 billion in economic activity from agricultural trade.  This made it the perfect setting to launch a year-long, multi-city campaign focused on supporting our nation’s small and medium-sized businesses as they face the many challenges of global trade.

Before kicking off this year’s ‘Know Your Farmer, Know Your Food’ college tour in North Carolina, I took a moment to reflect on why these college visits are so important. As President Obama said in his State of the Union address, we must out-educate the world in order to win the future.  Indeed, during the eight years that I spent as a college professor, I was constantly reminded that investing in our nation’s young minds is investing in our nation’s future. With this in mind, this year, members of USDA leadership will join the Secretary and myself in engaging America’s youth in a critical dialogue about our food system, our rural economy, and the economic opportunities associated with local and regional markets.

In today’s market, consumers have high expectations for the products they purchase.  Beyond performance and pricing, consumers like the opportunity to make educated purchasing decisions for their families, and increasingly, decisions that that have an impact. USDA’s new biobased product label will enable consumers to do just that.

Initially, USDA’s Biopreferred program was created by the 2002 Farm Bill and was intended to help increase the purchase and use of biobased products within the Federal government and the commercial market. In 2008, Congress voted to reauthorize the program in an attempt to expand the reach of this successful program and to further promote the sale of biobased products.