Vilsack not the right choice for ag secretary

[Kolesar]

Posted by Jim Goodman January 20, 2009

Jim Goodman is a dairy farmer from Wonewoc, Wis., and a W.K. Kellogg Food and Society Policy Fellow. He wrote this for Progressive Media Project, a source of liberal commentary on domestic and international issues; it is affiliated with the Progressive magazine. (McClatchy-Tribune)


The Senate should put the brakes on Tom Vilsack as secretary of agriculture.

Wednesday's confirmation hearing for Obama's nominee was a lovefest. But it shouldn't have been.

More than 60,000 supporters of organic farming have sent e-mails opposing Vilsack's nomination. With a world food crisis, food safety problems and a growing demand for local and organic food, the time was right for a real change in national food policy.

Obama could have picked someone who was knowledgeable about organic farming and local and regional food systems. Someone who knew the difference between growing food and growing commodity crops. Someone who felt more at ease mending a fence or thinning carrots than sitting in a corporate boardroom.

Instead, he chose Vilsack, the former governor of Iowa, darling of the biotech industry. In fact, in 2001, the Biotechnology Industry Organization named him governor of the year.

Vilsack happily signed the 2005 seed pre-emption law in Iowa, which prohibits local governments from regulating genetically engineered seeds.

Biogenetic farming is incompatible with organic farming. Genetically modified pollen drifts for miles and contaminates both organic and non-genetically modified conventional crops. The huge companies that dominate genetically modified farming push out small organic farmers and local food producers.

Vilsack also is the favorite of large corporations that are exploiting the demand for organics at the expense of small farmers -- corporations like Whole Foods and Stonyfield.

And he has been a champion of biofuels, one of the most wasteful uses of our farmland imaginable.

I don't doubt Tom Vilsack is a nice guy who probably did a lot for Iowa agriculture. I know he did a lot for agribusiness, the chemical companies, biotechnology and large-scale farming. Apparently, his vision of better agriculture is bigger, more intensive agriculture.
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