Today (Tuesday) begins the annual meeting of the Iowa Farm Bureau Federation. Spokesman Aaron Putze says 1,300 members have come to the meeting in Des Moines, at the Polk County Convention Complex. The theme of their meeting is “Picture the Possibilities,” he says, and the farmer voting delegates and leadership volunteers will talk about making Iowa a better place to live and work as well as solutions to its problems. Putze says the issues facing farmers mostly are the same ones all Iowans grapple with. Health care, accessible education for all students, ensuring farms are profitable and rural communities are prosperous to keep the state moving forward. Putze says when Iowa farm Bureau members agree on issues, Washington listens. He says farmers are passionate about issues, and their positions carry a lot of weight with lawmakers and policy leaders. One hudnred farmers, representing the 100 county Farm Bureaus in the state, sit down Tuesday to talk about things like taxes, regulatory issues, and trade, and adopt policy that’ll guide the Farm Bureau, including national issues that will be forwarded to the American Farm Bureau at its annual meeting next month. Putze says the farmers want unnecessary roadblocks removed, want access to “free and fair and open markets,” want a fair price for what they grow, and want non-farmers and other neighbors to understand what it takes to produce all the food. Eleven farmers will be chosen this week to represent Iowa at the gathering of the American Farm Bureau a month and-a-half from now in Charliotte, North Carolina. See their website for more, at http://www.iowafarmbureau.com/
