Much of the conversation during NAFB’s Trade Talksurrounded the industry’s response to the election of Donald Trump, and the National Corn Growers Association (NCGA) President Wesley Spurlock was on hand to discuss what this new administration will means for NCGA and how the organization intends to move forward into the future.

“It is great to have the election behind us, and we really are watching and putting our names out, and working with them in order to get ag knowledge into the different areas of administration,” Spurlock said in an interview with Cindy. “They’ve got a tremendous amount of people to appoint, and the more ag knowledge that we have in there, the better we’ll be as we move forward into the future.”

President Spurlock discussed how he believes the Trump Administration will impact several of the major issues that have been priorities of the NCGA for the past several years, including the strong Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) opposition that was made clear during President-Elect Trump’s campaign.

“I think as we looked at the way he talked about TPP and what was said, he believed it needed to be re-negotiated,” said Spurlock. “When the Trump Administration sits down and reads the entire TPP agreement, they will see that a lot of their concerns have already been addressed, and we’re hoping that they will put their support behind it as they understand it better.”

Hear more about President Spurlock’s thoughts on what a Trump Administration will mean for agriculture in his interview with Cindy here:
[wpaudio url=”http://traffic.libsyn.com/zimmcomm/nafb-16-ncga-spurlock.mp3″ text=”Interview with Wesley Spurlock, NCGA”]

NCGA CEO Chris Novak is also optimistic about the future, believing that the new administration offers some major opportunities for American farmers.

“Our farmers have struggled over the past four years with regulatory challenges from the EPA on our ability to utilize atrazine and roundup on the farm, and we’ve been challenged by EPA with respect to renewable fuels use,” he said in an interview with Chuck. “We know from this election season that reforming regulation means giving us access to the tools that allow us to continue to innovate, and that we need to bring science into policy. These are all themes we’ve heard from President-elect Trump, so there is an opportunity for farmers in this next administration.”

Catch his entire conversation with Chuck to learn more about what Novak believes this election also means for trade and the renewable fuels industry:
[wpaudio url=”http://traffic.libsyn.com/zimmcomm/nafb-16-ncga-novak.mp3″ text=”Interview with Chris Novak, NCGA”]

View and download photos from the event here: 2016 NAFB Convention