At the recent Livestock Market Association Convention, Senior Farm and Ranch Broadcaster Ron Hays caught up with Joel Leftwich, the Chief Strategy Officer for Kansas Farm Bureau, to talk about a fund created to help tell the story of modern production agriculture, especially animal agriculture. This is the second in a two-part discussion, click here to access yesterday’s story about staying ahead of activists against animal agriculture.
The 501c4 fund known as the US Ag Partnership Fund partners with state and local food and agricultural groups to educate the voting public in the key states and jurisdictions where there is anti-animal agricultural activity.
“For example, we are involved in the city and county of Denver to help defeat a ballot initiative there that would shut down a particular slaughterhouse,” Leftwich offered.
The funds are used to educate the public about the importance of a particular issue in food and agriculture affordability and availability. It helps pay for ads, polls, and anything else that falls under the umbrella of public education activity.
“The long-term goal is to set up a network of organizations that will be ready to step in and help state, county, or local groups when a ballot initiative is being filed in a county, so they won’t have to do all of the work themselves,” Leftwich explained. “It would also help a processing plant, for example, that might be the subject matter of a ballot initiative. They can call us and say, ‘We need help.’ We come in with the resources to win the fight.”
Leftwich is confident that the agricultural sector will win the fight but acknowledges that it will be an ongoing process. He said, “We will grow the resources that we need and we will put the tactics in place to win here, and then the fight will shift to different tactics. We have to be nimble and adaptable to win in different scenarios, and USAPF.org is a way that we can do that.”
More information can be accessed, and donations can be made by accessing the website at USAPF.org. “It is going to take all of us working together to build the necessary resources to be effective,” he added.
The Beef Buzz is a regular feature heard on radio stations around the region on the Radio Oklahoma Ag Network and is a regular audio feature found on this website as well. Click on the LISTEN BAR at the top of the story for today’s show and check out our archives for older Beef Buzz shows covering the gamut of the beef cattle industry today.
