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Vilsack wants more transparent, competitive markets

The USDA is looking at ways to expand markets for producers.

Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack says expanding markets would transform the ag industry through President Biden’s $7 trillion Build Back Better Plan.

Vilsack says climate markets present revenue opportunities for farmers. “Paying farmers for sequestering carbon, paying farmers for capturing and reusing methane, allowing farmers to turn agricultural to waste into a variety into different materials and chemicals and fabrics and fibers,” he says.

He says the USDA is also focused on developing local and regional food markets to help small producers. “Getting them away from a commodity market where they may not have much control for what they get for whatever they grow or raise,” he says. “And putting them into a local or regional market where they are able to themselves develop a price, be able to negotiate their own price and perhaps make a better living.”

And Vilsack says the USDA and the Department of Justice are looking at ways to better understand price discovery to make cattle markets more competitive to increase profitability for producers.

He made his comments Friday at a National Press Club Event.