Wednesday was a difficult day for The American Independent News Network, which is the larger entity that operates The Iowa Independent. Our chief executive and founder announced two of our sister sites would close and their content would be moved to The American Independent.
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The Iowa Senate will remain under the control of a slim 26-25 Democratic majority when it reconvenes in January 2012.
The first assembled panel at the joint DOJ and USDA workshops on competition in agriculture is predominantly comprised of elected officials. As such, it should likely come as little surprise that those providing remarks are keeping their personal opinions to themselves, and are instead focusing on the importance of the workshop series.
Stating that he believed the workshops filled a distinct void that existed between federal agencies, U.S. Sen. Chuck Grassley, an Iowa Republican, noted that he feels there is a lack of competition in agriculture and too much concentration.
“Bigger is not necessarily bad,” he said, “but it can lead to predatory behavior.”
Grassley also noted, however, that he is against taking action that would result in “stifling industry innovation.”
Noting that this moment in agriculture is a very historic and challenging time, U.S. Rep. Leonard Boswell, a Democrat from Iowa’s 3rd District, also spent the majority of his remarks discussing the importance of the workshops themselves.
“What I’m hearing from farmers and others involved in agriculture is that we need to stay focused on this, but also that this can be accomplished,” Boswell said.
All the different parties with an interest in agriculture will need to come together in a spirit of education, openness, fairness and cooperation in order to overcome the challenges now faced, he said.
State officials on the panel — Lt. Gov. Patty Judge, Attorney General Tom Miller and Secretary of Agriculture Bill Northey — also briefly praised the process that has begun, but folded Iowa-specific concerns into their remarks.
Northey, for example, discussed farmers’ concerns about increasing seed costs, issues related to herbicides and the overall expansion of market opportunities for crop farmers such as ethanol and other newly developed uses.
In the final summary by the participants, however, the panelists returned to the theme of praising the workshops, and their hope that the level of communication being established today would continue.
“Market transparency,” answered Judge when she was asked for the one most important thing that could come out of Friday’s discussion.
“On most of these issues we are looking backward,” noted Northey, “but there is one area where we have an opportunity to be forward looking. That is, it not too long some of these [gentically-modified] seeds will come off patent. We have an opportunity to really plan for that.”
In closing, Assistant U.S. Attorney General Christine Varney promised that her office was embarking on an “unrelenting quest to find the right balance” within the agricultural industry.
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