News

Corn growers lobby legislators

Missouri Corn Growers Association met with new and returning lawmakers at the state Capitol on Wednesday in their annual trek to share policy priorities and concerns at the start of each legislative session . Association President Mark Scott of Wentzville tells Brownfield the growers’ message to state lawmakers is that 97 percent of Missouri farms are family farms.

“Agriculture and farming is Missouri’s number one industry,” said Scott, “and we want to tell them that the number one industry is a family operation.”

A top priority of Missouri Corn Growers this year is letting lawmakers know farmers want to feed more corn to livestock and need that source of demand.

Corn grower Billy Thiel, who farms at Malta Bend, says its important to educate new members to the legislature who he always invites to his farm and the Malta Bend ethanol plant, “We just want to keep communication open so legislators can always come to the farm, if they want to. They can’t hold a pig on my farm but they could someone’s.”

There are more than 60 freshmen lawmakers in this year’s legislature, many from urban areas or with no farming background.

~Brownfield’s Tom Steever contributed to this story~