US NFU vows to work with incoming administration on key priorities

After several days of ballot counting and much anticipation, the Associated Press announced that former Vice President Joe Biden had won the 2020 US presidential election.

National Farmers Union (NFU) President Rob Larew issued the following statement in response to the news:

“The last four years haven’t been too kind to family farmers and ranchers. Overproduction, rampant corporate consolidation, trade disputes, and climate change have kept commodity prices stubbornly low, causing farm debt to balloon and farm bankruptcies to proliferate.

“On the campaign trail, President-elect Joe Biden has indicated that he intends to address many of the concerns we have expressed over the last several years. He has promised to re-join the Paris Climate Agreement as well as provide farmers and ranchers the tools they need to implement climate-smart practices, both of which are top priorities for Farmers Union members. Additionally, Biden has outlined his commitment to revitalise rural economies, enforce antitrust regulation, strengthen the Affordable Care Act, alleviate racial inequities in agriculture, expand rural broadband, and promote homegrown biofuels. These are all reforms that we as an organisation have advocated for many years, and it is encouraging to see them incorporated so prominently into the president-elect’s platform.

“The vision that President-elect Biden has for America overlaps, in many respects, with National Farmers Union’s vision. We stand ready to work with his administration to ensure that its policies and programmes adequately represent the interests of family farmers and rural communities.”