The U-S Department of Agriculture continues its College Tour in South Dakota Wednesday. Deputy secretary Kathleen Merrigan is at South Dakota State University. Merrigan will announce new USDA grants for research education and grants to combat U-S and world hunger. South Dakota Secretary of Agriculture Walt Bones says he’s excited to bring Merrigan to the state. He says his agency will work with the USDA to create new ag opportunities.
“Any time that we can promote new opportunities, you know, for farmers and ranchers and communities, that’s a good thing. There’s a great opportunity there I think for some of those local foods and local markets, and that’s agriculture too. When we think about agriculture, we think of big farms or big livestock facilities or whatever, but agriculture’s all about feeding people. So it starts at the local level. So we fully embrace where she’s going with this here and hope that, you know, we can have some sort of a collaborative effort and benefit some of our specialty farmers here in South Dakota.”
Merrigan will travel to Lower Brule tomorrow (Thursday) where she will visit the local Native American market Lakota Foods. Bones says there she will discuss small business development and job creation in rural South Dakota.