Republican Secretary of Agriculture Mike Naig told a Iowa State Fair crowd his Democratic challenger, Chris Jones, insulted farmers by once saying that growing grain “is not that hard.”
In 2021, Jones said during a Cedar Rapids Gazette’s Iowa Ideas Conference discussion that farmers are “only working a few weeks out of the year.” Jones, a retired University of Iowa research engineer, said also producers are “industrious and … ingenious” but added that “many are millionaires. They’re really wealthy guys.”
Naig spoke Monday, Aug. 17, at the Des Moines Register Political Soapbox at the State Fair and said Jones’ comments show he and his opponent have “a very fundamentally different opinion about how to work on the issues that we need to work on. … I will stand with farmers. I will not stand against them.
“I’m on the side of farmers, and remember, when they’re doing well, Iowans are doing well,” he said.
On Monday, Jones said in an email that “Naig’s desperate attacks can’t change the fact that he’s been responsible for Iowa’s declining water quality for the past decade. His record is one of polluted water for Iowans, record farm bankruptcies, and doing the bidding of his corporate Big Ag backers,” he said.
Here are three takeaways from Naig’s Soapbox comments:
Regulations on farmers will lead to consolidation in Iowa
Naig said that Jones’ proposal to pursue regulations on farming in Iowa would lead to “smaller agriculture, a diminished agriculture.
“Frankly, that kind of taxing and regulation drives farmers out of business, which will put our land and our farms into the hands of fewer and fewer farmers. And that is the opposite of what we need to be seeing,” Naig said.
Jones has called for “common sense regulations” that would require farmers to adopt basic conservation practices that would reduce the nitrogen and phosphorus losses that pollute Iowa waterways that are sources of drinking water for cities like the Des Moines, Iowa City and Cedar Rapids.
On Monday, Jones said in an email that under Naig’s policies, “the average Iowa farmer is sentenced to an endless and desperate cycle of trying to acquire more and more land, which has led to consolidation and driven the population downward in 70 of our 99 counties while hollowing out many of our small towns.”
Causes of Iowa cancer are complex. It’s dangerous to blame farmers, Naig says
Naig said in an interview with reporters after the Soapbox that more research is needed to determine why Iowa has the second-highest rate of new cancers nationally.
It’s dangerous, he said, to blame farmers. “This is more complex than what some what to make it, and I think you’ve got some who have decided it’s a political issue. And I think that can be very dangerous,” Naig said.
“When we start to go down this path of automatically blaming someone and blaming farmers, for instance, when we really need to understand what are the root causes then then go address” that, he said.
A report from the Iowa Environment Council and Harkin Institute for Public Policy in March indicated that nation-leading pesticide use, high nitrate levels and forever chemical levels in Iowa waters are among the environmental factors linked to the state’s rising cancer rates.
War in Iran contributed to high fertilizer prices, but not the sole cause
Naig said the U.S. needs to look at supporting increased domestic production of fertilizers like nitrogen and other “critically important” inputs that farmers rely on to grow crops.
The U.S. war in Iran drove fertilizer costs to new highs last spring, adding to ongoing farm financial struggles. Farmers are face a fourth year of losses as the cost to grow crops outpace the price they receive.
President Donald Trump has asked Congress to provide U.S. growers with $11 billion in aid, given the war and ongoing the administration’s ongoing trade disputes. That’s on top of $12 billion the Trump administration doled out to farmers this year.
Naig said the war with Iran has contribute to high fertilizer prices, but “this is not something that just arrived this past year,” adding that fertilizer prices have been climbing along with inflation.
Donnelle Eller covers agriculture, the environment and energy for the Register. Reach her at deller@registermedia.com.
This article originally appeared on Des Moines Register: Mike Naig says it’s ‘dangerous’ to blame farmers for Iowa cancer rates
Reporting by Donnelle Eller, Des Moines Register / Des Moines Register
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
By Donnelle Eller, Des Moines Register | USA TODAY Network
