​Carver High School hosts Secretary of Agriculture for a roundtable on rural prosperity

COLUMBUS, Ga. (WRBL) — Friday, May 16, the Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack and Congressman Sanford Bishop Jr. visited Columbus to have a round table discussion.

Carver High School hosted Congressman Bishop and Secretary Vilsack at the Investing in America Roundtable. Here, they highlight how the USDA is creating rural prosperity and additional income opportunities for farmers.

Through the efforts of the Biden-Harris administration and Secretary Vilsack, the USDA has provided more options to American consumers so that they can have access to fresh food from local farms. This allows mid-size producers a new revenue stream.

“If you happen to be a small or mid-sized producer, you don’t have the capacity to have a lot of corn,” Vilsack said. “So you’ve got to figure out how to create some additional revenue stream.”

Vilsack continues, “So the small amount I could get for my corn can be added to an environmental credit or a payment I get that can be added to my selling, my agricultural waste as a new commodity income stream, added to the energy that my local utility is purchasing from me added to the income.”

He says, “I’m getting by selling something directly to the school. You take all of that and all of a sudden it’s a better operation and a better deal.”

Vilsack says since the 80s, we lost a significant number of farmers as well as their land. The land that was once farmable has now been plastered over with cement.

As a result, Vilsack also visited Turn Around Columbus, a non-profit in Columbus focused on investing in youth development and learning opportunities to build the next generation of entrepreneurs, farmers and community leaders.

At the round table, Congressman Bishop made an announcement regarding Turn Around Columbus.

“Turn Around Columbus is going to receive a $145,000 grant from the USDA Farm Service Agency and it comes through the University of Georgia’s Archway Partnership,” Bishop said.

The grant will fund a tractor, a mobile outdoor classroom, transportation for entrepreneurial training, and educational events and programming. In addition to this, farmers left the round table feeling hopeful on how to keep their farm from going under.

WRBL had the chance to Kenny Wodham, owner of Sowega Meat Company who was in attendance.

“We’re definitely gonna be looking into some of the  some of the programs as far as some of the sustainable practices that you can implement  and receive payment,” Wodham said. “We’re going to be looking into that. And there’s some sort of other  programs that are going to be exploring as far as funding and capital.“

There were no updates to the Farm Bill given, but Congressman Bishop did encourage attendees to reach out to their local officials and advocate for the bill.

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