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Perdue holds listening session with Michigan farmers

The U.S. Ag Secretary continues to hear from farmers the importance of finalizing trade deals. 

Secretary Sonny Perdue was asked time and time again for updates on trade deals, from the USMCA, China and Japan—farmers want access to more markets.  Perdue says he can’t even contemplate if the USMCA isn’t passed.

“The world is watching.  If we cannot get an agreement with the people on the north and on the south of us, how can we get an agreement with the world about trade?”

He expects this week’s announcement on an agreement with Japan will jumpstart trade momentum.

“If we have a level playing field with competitors around the world, our U.S. producers can just kick it.”

Perdue tells Brownfield he continues to meet with farmers to hear their concerns firsthand and relay those messages back to the President.

“I have the opportunity to tell him and I tell him, and I told him a few weeks ago, ‘Mr. President, it’s tough and it’s getting tougher.’  He said well that’s negative, and I said, ‘Well, you pay me to tell you the truth.’”

During a townhall stop in Frankenmuth, farmers also raised concerns about the Market Facilitation Program, crop insurance, small refinery waivers, ag inputs, and climate change.

American Farm Bureau President Zippy Duvall also joined Perdue on the tour which included harvesting sugarbeets with farmers in Michigan’s Thumb and stops at Summer Dreams Farms, a fresh cut flower farm, as well as Better Made Snack Foods.