State Ag Director Visits Optimist Club To Discuss Department
State Ag Director Visits Optimist Club To Discuss Department
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Jackie Gorski-
State Ag Director Visits Optimist Club To Discuss DepartmentBruce Kettler, director of the Indiana State Department of Agriculture, informed the Warsaw Breakfast Optimist Club of what the department does and answered questions Wednesday.
What some people may not realize is Indiana’s Department of Agriculture is “a pretty young department in the state in the terms of the industry. Depending on how you look at industry in the state of Indiana, a lot of people would say we’re about the two size, if you take manufacturing at a high level, probably number one. But (agriculture) is number two,” Kettler said.
There was not a state Department of Agriculture until 2005 when Mitch Daniels was governor of Indiana.
Kettler said Daniels said as large as agriculture is in Indiana and what it contributes to the state’s economy, the state needs to put a little bit more emphasis on it. Daniels worked with the Legislature to create the department.
It makes the department a little unique in a couple respects, including when it was established. Some states’ Departments of Agriculture were formed a long time ago. Kettler said that doesn’t mean there weren’t activities regarding agriculture, they were just part of the Department of Commerce in many ways.
The Department of Agriculture is not primarily a regulatory department or agency, so it allows the department to think about how it wants to advocate for the industry and what it needs to do differently, he said.
Advocating for agriculture is part of what the department does. Some people ask if the department is focused on advocating for certain types of agriculture. Kettler said not necessarily. In Indiana’s case, the department serves all types of agriculture.
The one regulatory part of the department is called Great Buyers and Warehouse Licensing Agency. That agency deals with any facility that purchases over a certain amount of grain directly from farmers. The facility is required to be licensed in Indiana. The division makes sure those facilities are licensed and have the amount of grain they say they do.
There is an Economic Development division in the department, which looks at agriculture development, he said. If there are companies that want to grow or expand in Indiana, or move to Indiana, the division can work with the Indiana Economic Development Corporation.
Another big division in the department is Soil Conservation, which is the department’s largest division. It helps landowners if they want to implement waterways, water-control structures and, in some cases, tree planting and wetland restorations.
The Policy division looks at state and federal policy to help keep track of what affects the agriculture industry.
One question Kettler received was how much farm land in Indiana is owned by Chinese companies or corporations.
Kettler said, in the United States, foreign entities are required through the United States Department of Agriculture to report any land they own. There’s been a lot of talk to make sure there isn’t a significant amount of foreign ownership in this country. Kettler said he doesn’t think foreign land ownership is as large as people want to think. It’s easy to say there’s hundreds of thousands of acres of land that’s foreign owned and the data Kettler has doesn’t indicate that. However, he does think it should be paid attention to.
The USDA is required to send reports to each state Department of Agriculture on a yearly basis.
“What we find is there’s companies in foreign countries that are invested in companies here that have it on the windmills and solar. And so a lot of that land is leased or owned by those foreign entities. They have to report it,” he said.
If “we look at some of the companies that supply our farmers, we look at some of our poultry” and pork operations, a lot of those companies that own those processing companies are foreign owned. If the U.S. says it doesn’t want any foreign land ownership, they risk losing some of those processing companies.
Kettler also talked about vertical farming, or controlled environment farming.
Controlled environment agriculture (CEA) encompasses a variety of systems that take a technology-based approach to farming. CEA can range from simple shade structures and hoop houses through greenhouses to full indoor or vertical farms. The most advanced systems are fully automated, closed-loop systems with controlled lighting, water and ventilation. CEA also encompasses common practices such as plastic film over field-grown crops, nets or shade structures and aquaponics systems that integrate fish or aquaculture with plant production, according to the University of California Davis College of Agriculture and Environmental Sciences website.
His opinion is there’s a lot of opportunity in Indiana for controlled environment farming. Does he think it replace what the farmers growing corn or soybeans in Kosciusko County are doing? No, not at this time, he said. The emphasis of that not right now is on things like leafy greens, strawberries and soybeans.
Kettler said he’s heard various numbers, but “let’s say roughly probably 80 or 90%” of leafy greens are grown in Arizona and California, for the most part, which is “a long ways away.”
By being able to do grow those types of crops vertically closer to home, it would be able to provide better and fresher opportunities for more people that need it. Kettler said there’s great opportunities for it.
