Farm Bureau Governmental Relations Offers Summer Internship Opportunities for College Students

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Former GR Intern Stefanie Kitchen with
Del. Peter Farrell

Know a college student interested in agriculture and Governmental Relations? 


Virginia Farm Bureau is organized as a federation. This structure means that when a farmer member joins a county Farm Bureau, he or she is considered a member of Virginia Farm Bureau as well as American Farm Bureau. There are 88 county Farm Bureaus in Virginia. The strength of the organization is its grassroots activities.

Virginia Farm Bureau Federation staff’s primary responsibility is to serve volunteer leaders. The Governmental Relations Department’s primary responsibility during the summer is working with farmer members on researching, developing or pulling background information on local, state and national issues to help them formulate ideas for issues on which county Farm Bureau would like Virginia Farm Bureau to take a position.

In addition, we attend appropriate legislative and regulatory meetings and study committees to represent our members’ adopted policy positions. When requested, we make presentations on policy issues and work on surfacing ideas for news stories on Farm Bureau priority issues. In odd-numbered years, we work with the volunteer leaders participating in our political action committee to coordinate interviews with candidates running for public office and develop background information on the candidates’ positions and/or voting records.

In general, the intern will be required to perform some duties including clerical, to synthesize and summarize information, and to observe a broad array of issues that our organization represents, from national issues to tax issues to land issues to commodity issues.

The intern’s primary project will be assisting with coordination of the Virginia Farm Bureau Federation AgPAC (political action committee) activities.
  • Work with district field services directors on setting up Local Evaluation Committee meetings (interviews between members and candidates running for office).
  • Follow up with candidates with written and verbal reminders regarding interviews.
  • Coordinate follow-up to questions or requests for information from candidates.
  • Coordinate putting custom interview packets together for volunteer leaders.

Send us your resume:

If interested, send an email and a copy of your resume to Victoria Johnson atvictoria.johnson@vafb.com, as well as to Andrew Smith at andrew.smith@vafb.com, by March 1, 2015. Interviews will be conducted in mid-March.

February Virginia Forest Landowner Update Now Available

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Andrew Smith
Senior Assistant Director
Governmental Relations

A majority of Virginia’s forestland is privately own, much in conjunction with farms. The Virginia Forest Landowner Education Program (VFLEP), develops a newsletter to inform landowners of information and opportunities to best manage their forest resources. We plan to begin sharing this newsletter as it’s available on Plows and Politics. You can read the latest issue here. 

2015 Legislative Day a Success!

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Thanks to legislators and Farm Bureau members for participating in Virginia Farm Bureau’s 2015 Legislative Day! As you can see, legislators like Del. David Bulova (pictured above) got to try their hand at milking a cow at Farm Bureau’s legislative reception last night. This morning, members made their way to the General Assembly to meet with legislators on important issues like Ag BMP funding and the coyote control program.

Connecting with your legislators makes a difference! If you are a Farm Bureau producer member interested in participating in our grassroots program, contact Kelly Pruitt at 804-290-1293 or kprui@vafb.com.

Flue-Cured Tobacco Co-op Certificate Redemption Deadline is Feb. 28

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The U.S. Tobacco Cooperative Inc. has issued an announcement to “tobacco farmers who delivered tobacco to Flue Cured Tobacco Cooperative Stabilization Corp. in 1967 through and including 1973.”
During those years Stabilization issued certificates of interest in capital reserve to its members who delivered tobacco. U.S. Tobacco Cooperative is offering to redeem those certificates. Growers may not need to have the actual certificates to accept the offer.
Anyone interested in applying to accept the offer, including certificate recipients, heirs, beneficiaries and estate administrators, can find an application form and offer details at tobaccocheck.com or call 877-277-7422 for more information. Interested parties can request an application by mail by sending a self-addressed, stamped envelope to Certificate Redemption, P.O. Box 12300, Raleigh, NC 27605.
The application deadline is Feb. 28.

Virginia Clean Cities to Host Biofuels Workshop Jan. 30

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Virginia Clean Cities will host a Biofuels Workshop at Virginia Farm Bureau’s West Creek Office on Friday, January 30, 2015, from 9am to 1 pm.  The workshop will present the benefits of biodiesel and ethanol in Virginia and hear from producers, fleets and retailers who are utilizing these renewable fuels.
Anyone interested in attending must register in advance online at http://www.vacleancities.org/events/. The workshop is being co-sponsored by Virginia Clean Cities, Virginia Farm Bureau Federation, Virginia Grain Producers Association, and Virginia Soybean Association. 

Five Counties, One City Receive Funds to Place Working Farmlands under Permanent Conservation Easements

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Governor Terry McAuliffe has announced the recipients of fiscal year 2015 farmland preservation grants.  Six localities have been awarded more than $1,581,000 from the Virginia Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services (VDACS).  Localities must use the grant monies to permanently preserve working farmland within their boundaries through local Purchase of Development Rights (PDR) programs.  PDR programs compensate landowners who work with localities to permanently preserve their land by voluntarily placing a perpetual conservation easement on it.

VDACS allocated $286,983 each to the counties of Albemarle, Fauquier, James City and Stafford, as well as the City of Virginia Beach.  Clarke County will receive a $146,778 grant.  These allocations total more than $1,581,000, bringing the total allocation of state matching funds to $9.7 million since 2008, when PDR funds were first distributed. 

Speaking about the farmland preservation grants, Governor McAuliffe said, “This announcement takes another step toward my administration’s goal of permanently conserving 400,000 acres of open space and working lands across Virginia.  Last year, we provided more than $1 million from this program to eight localities.  With this announcement of new recipients, we are providing more than $1.5 million to further our conservation goal.  Preserving our working farmland is a great way to help our largest private sector industry, agriculture, and work toward building the New Virginia Economy.”

“Virginia’s successful PDR program continues to play a key role in helping localities and landowners strategically preserve working farmlands, which are obviously vital to production agriculture,” said Secretary of Agriculture and Forestry Todd Haymore. “This voluntary public-private partnership increases Virginia’s ability to produce high quality agricultural products that are marketed here and around the world, generate tax revenue, and protect our precious natural resources.  All of these are important components within the McAuliffe administration’s larger efforts to create new jobs and build a New Virginia Economy.”

Secretary of Natural Resources Molly Ward added, “The preservation of agriculture and forest land also supports our natural resource goals of healthy fish and wildlife populations, clean air, clean water and productive land.”

This is the eighth time that the Commonwealth has provided state matching funds for certified local PDR programs.  Of the 22 local PDR programs in Virginia, 18 have received local funding over the past few years.  To date, more than 8,015 acres on 59 farms in 15 localities have been permanently protected in part with $7 million of these funds.  Additional easements are expected to close using the remaining funds over the next two years. 

Localities interested in creating a PDR program or applying for future rounds of grant applications for PDR matching funds should contact the Office of Farmland Preservation at VDACS.  They may e-mail Andrew Sorrell, the Office of Farmland Preservation Coordinator, at andrew.sorrell@vdacs.virginia.gov or call 804.786.1906.

Legal Unpasteurized Milk Sales Result in More Foodborne Illness

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A study in the January issue of the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention’s Emerging Infectious Diseases Journal found that the number of U.S. foodborne illnesses caused by unpasteurized milk increased from 30 between 2007 and 2009 to 51 between 2010 and 2012.

Eighty-one percent of those outbreaks were caused by unpasteurized milk purchased in states where the sale of such milk is legal.

That raises concerns among Virginia farmers about legislation before this year’s Virginia General Assembly. HB 1290, also known as the Virginia Food Freedom Act, would exempt food products, including unpasteurized milk, made in private homes from government regulations as long as they are sold directly to the consumer and labeled with a disclosure statement. Two other bills, HB 1461 and HJ 519, also would allow for sales of unpasteurized milk.

“Farmers have a responsibility to provide safe food products to consumers, and Virginia’s dairy farmers take that very seriously,” said Lindsay Reames, assistant director of governmental relations for Virginia Farm Bureau Federation. “There are known health risks associated with unpasteurized milk, and we want to ensure the food system remains safe for everyone, particularly children, who are most at risk.”

Pasteurization is the process of heating a liquid briefly to destroy disease-causing germs. Those germs, the CDC notes on its website, usually do not change the way milk looks, tastes or smells; pasteurization is a means to ensure that they are not present.

In 1987 the U.S. Food and Drug Administration banned the interstate sale or distribution of unpasteurized milk. Laws regulating intrastate sales vary from complete bans to allowances for sales from farms or retail outlets. Some states allow cow-share or herd-share agreements, in which buyers pay farmers a fee for the care of animals in exchange for a percentage of milk produced.

Consumption of unpasteurized milk has been associated with serious illnesses caused by several pathogens, including E.coli and salmonella. Despite those risks, demand for unpasteurized milk has increased, and some states have considered relaxing restrictions on its sale.

State and local health departments voluntarily report foodborne illness outbreaks to the CDC. Between 2007 and 2012, 81 outbreaks due to consumption of unpasteurized milk were reported from 26 states.

The outbreaks resulted in 979 people becoming ill and 73 being hospitalized. Most occurred in states where the sale of unpasteurized milk was legal at the time. Information on how the milk was obtained was available for more than two-thirds of the outbreaks. Seventy-one percent of those were related to milk obtained from dairy farms; 13 percent were related to milk from licensed or commercial sellers; and 12 percent were related to milk from cow- or herd-share agreements.

The study found that the number of outbreaks caused by Campylobacter spp. bacteria nearly doubled in the six-year study period. “This increase,” the authors note, “was concurrent with a decline in the number of states in which the sale of unpasteurized milk was illegal, from 28 in 2004 to 20 in 2011 and with an increase in the number of states allowing cow-share programs.”

The study findings also note that the legal unpasteurized milk sales in one state can lead to illness outbreaks in nearby states if consumers travel to buy that milk.

Proponents of the Virginia bills that would allow sales of unpasteurized milk have asserted that current state law prevents farmers from accessing a willing local market.

“The local foods movement is incredibly robust and is in no way impaired by a ban on selling unpasteurized milk,” Reames said. “In fact, that movement would be imperiled by a change in the current law. If someone gets sick from consuming unpasteurized milk, we risk consumers being scared to buy any milk, local or otherwise, even though the vast majority of it is pasteurized and safe.”

The EID Journal article is available online at www.nc.cdc.gov/eid/article/21/1/14-0447_article.