Biden and Vilsack outline challenges facing farmers, rural America and USDA

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Biden and Vilsack outline challenges facing farmers, rural America and USDA

President-elect Joe Biden on Friday formally introduced Tom Vilsack as his Ag Secretary nominee.

Biden referred to Vilsack, who led the USDA for eight years under the Obama Administration, as “the best secretary of agriculture I believe our country has ever had”.  And Biden said Vilsack’s experience is sorely needed to address the major challenges facing farmers, rural America and the entire country.

“One in six Americans and a quarter of the children in America are facing hunger,” Biden said. “The opioid crisis is a rural America crisis, as is the climate crisis with drought, floods, wiping out crops and small towns. Farmer and small businesses, small towns, rural communities—white, black, Latino—are reeling from the pandemic and economic downturn.”

Vilsack began his comments by pledging to immediately tackle racial issues within the USDA.

“To continue the important work of rooting out inequities and systemic racism in the system we govern and the programs we lead,” Vilsack said.

He said climate change will also be a top policy priority for USDA.

AUDIO: Comments from Biden and Vilsack

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