Nordick chairs NAWG value-added committee

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Prairie Grains is the
official publication of
the Minnesota
Association of
Wheat Growers,
North Dakota Grain Growers Association,
South Dakota Wheat,
Inc., and the
Minnesota Barley
Growers Association

Nordick reviewed the steps that led to the formation of the Red River Farm Network and United Spring Wheat Processors, both of which the MAWG helped to organize. He said that new value-added co-op ventures are learning from those already established in the Northern Plains.

For example, learning to resist ‘smokestack syndrome.’ "Place the business wherever it maximizes return, even if that means locating it outside your hometown or state." A good source to track value-added trends in the wheat industry is "Milling and Baking News." He said that the magazine is attracting more readers among the ranks of producers.

Nordick said that the NAWG’s new value-added committee can serve as a key link to the industry, and asked for committee volunteers.

Other Notes From The NAWG Summer Meeting

NAWG on the right track: How does the NAWG measure up in Washington, D.C.? John Ross, an organizational performance consultant, put it this way: "the NAWG is a more powerful organization in DC than it has a right to be, given a membership base and budget that’s much smaller compared to other commodity groups."

Farm bill growing pains: Richard Newman, deputy administrator of farm programs at the USDA-FSA, said that his department has spent more energy on how different landowner-tenant arrangements fit into the market transition payment equation, than any other related issue of the new seven-year farm bill so far. He said that the FSA is going to get more explicit in the interpretation of the law regarding landowner-tenant rights, before many of the lease agreements for the 1997 crop year are put in place. Newman said that there’s no question there will be changes to the new farm bill, but feels that any tinkering will be improvements to confusions or problems created by the new law.

NAWG keyed conservation provisions: Gary Margheim, Natural Resources Conservation Service-USDA, said that wheat growers had more influence than any other group in how the conservation provisions came out of the new farm bill. For example, unlike the original Swampbuster law, wetland conversions can now be mitigated by enhancing existing wetlands or creating new ones, and the rules regarding prior-converted wetlands are now more farmer-friendly.

December 1995