Like other moments of economic uncertainty, this too shall pass... but how soon, and how much damage will it do?
Inflationary costs—and rising interest rates—are hitting growers where it hurts worldwide.
Add to these worries the impact of the North American drought, transportation and logistics headaches, and other market uncertainties, and growers may feel like the high price of corn is the only good news they've heard in more than a year.
But what do you need to know to maintain your operation in this changing economic situation? What tools do we have to keep operating costs from spiraling out-of-control? And how much worse is it going to get before it gets better?
In this episode, we’re talking to Todd Van Hoose, President and CEO of the Farm Credit Council, for the answers.
Plus, we send our best to Jon Doggett, NCGA CEO and podcast host, as he nears his retirement date.
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Todd Van Hoose:
We're coming off a year where if you look at the amount of cash that's floating around out there on farm balance sheets, it's extraordinary. At the same time, you got to look at some of the sources of that cash. We see margins narrowing and we see a much more difficult time coming at us.
Dusty Weis:
Hello, and welcome to Wherever Jon May Roam, the National Corn Growers Association podcast. This is where leaders, growers, and stakeholders in the corn industry can turn for big picture conversations about the state of the industry and its future. I'm Dusty Weis, and I'll be introducing your host association's CEO Jon Doggett, from the fields of the corn belt to the DC Beltway, we're making sure the growers who feed America have a say in the issues that are important to them with key leaders who are shaping the future of agriculture.
Inflationary costs and rising interest rates are hitting growers where it hurts worldwide. But what do you need to know to maintain your operation in this changing economic situation? What tools do we have to keep operating costs from spiraling out of control? And how much worse is it going to get before it gets better? In this episode, we're talking to Todd Van Hoose, president and CEO of the Farm Credit Council for the answers. But if you haven't yet, make sure you're subscribed to this podcast in your favorite app. Also, make sure you follow the NCGA on Twitter at National Corn and sign up for the National Corn Growers Association newsletter at ncga.com.
And with that, it's time to once again introduce Jon, Jon Doggett, the CEO of the National Corn Growers Association. And Jon, I'll admit I'm a little bit of a news junkie, for better and worse, and I know that you are too. And there's one word that I have heard so many times in the news over the last year, I don't care if I ever hear it again, and that word is inflation.
Jon Doggett:
Dusty, you're right. Inflation's been the biggest economic news story. And the growers don't call it inflation. It always starts with "Jon, do you know how much I just had to pay," fill in the blank. And so it's definitely out there in a very big way. And yes, prices are up, but so are all the costs. And I don't care if you're raising corn in Iowa or cattle in Montana, everybody who's in production agriculture, and everybody in the country is looking at how much things cost anymore. And I was in the grocery store this weekend and the person in front of me and the person behind me both were talking about how much money they were spending to feed their family. And so inflation's here, and the other thing we're hearing a lot about is interest rates. And those two terms create some tough situations for many parts of the North American farm economy.
So there's that tug of war between inflation and interest rates, and it feels like growers are on the rope right now. So want to have a conversation with someone who's got a whole lot more economic expertise to try and sort out what growers need to know about these challenging times. So we have Todd Van Hoose on speed dial. Todd's the president and the CEO of the Farm Credit Council with more than 30 years of experience in the Farm Credit System, the world of banking, Capitol Hill and the US Department of Agriculture. So Todd, thanks for joining us.
Todd Van Hoose:
Jon, glad to be here. You described me as having a lot more economic expertise. I'm worried you may outmatch me in that.
Jon Doggett:
Well, I'm going to give you a chance to go ahead and talk about that. So Todd, tell us about your background. What happened? How did you end up doing what you're doing and what you've been doing for the last 30 years?
Todd Van Hoose:
It's interesting, Jon. I grew up outside the front gate of a horse farm in Kentucky. I was in charge of painting fences for a dollar an hour. That was my introduction to agriculture as a 12 year old. Eventually, I found my way to Washington, not really to do policy, but to actually play baseball. And while I was playing baseball in Washington in college, I did an internship at USDA. The baseball thing didn't work out, the ag thing did. So here I am 30 some years later, still being involved in agriculture, loving every minute of it and found my way to the Farm Credit System, which is just an inspirational organization. It exists for a mission. It's owned by farmers. It's been a very happy marriage for me for many years now.
Jon Doggett:
So Todd, how would you describe the general state of the farm economy right now? Because I've heard it described to me by farmers and ranchers around the country. What's your take?
Todd Van Hoose:
I think we're in a very interesting time right now, Jon, because we're coming off a year where if you look at the amount of cash that's floating around out there on farm balance sheets, it's extraordinary. At the same time, you got to look at some of the sources of that cash and then you got to project forward. And you talked about it a little bit in your introduction, we see margins narrowing and we see a much more difficult time coming at us. We think by and large, and it's dangerous to make big generalities about the ag economy because every farm is different and every circumstance is different, but by and large, farmers are coming into what we expect to be a more difficult time with some room on their balance sheet. And they've had a couple years of good income, but boy, it's going to be a tough thing to manage moving forward.
Jon Doggett:
When I talk to growers, again, I'm hearing about what it costs to do business, the availability of spare parts, availability of equipment, all of those things are out there. Then the interest rates, and talking to a producer the other day about having to go in and redo his loan with the banker, and he kind of choked when the banker started quoting him what it was going to cost. Then we have the drought. I was in central Montana the last two weeks, and I don't know if it can rain in central Montana anymore, but it's across the country. Then you take a look at all these transportation issues. We have the rivers to load up float barges. We have the situation with the railroads and are they going to go on strike? Truckers are complaining about the high cost of diesel. We have all of these other issues with Mexico and trade issues. We have a lot going on right now. What does the banking industry look at when they look at all of this uncertainty? What are you talking to your folks in your system about and what are they talking to their borrowers about?
Todd Van Hoose:
Well, all of the things you just mentioned, but especially because we're banks fundamentally and interest rates are a big part of our business and we've seen them go up in almost an unprecedented way. Now, a lot of us of a certain age have seen these levels of interest rates before, but maybe not the suddenness with which we've seen these interest rates rise across the last year. To give you a little bit of a sense of it, in January of 2022, the one year treasury interest rate was less than half a percent and had been for a long time. As of today, that same interest rate is almost 5%. So I'm not much of a math student, but that's a heck of a big increase.
Now, we have seen a lot of our customers lock in those low interest rates on land loans looking backwards. You've had a long time to lock in a lot of those longer term interest rates on your land. But when you're talking about renewing operating lines, when you're talking about corporate agribusiness finance, all of that's done on a short term basis and these short term interest rates are spiking and that's making a big difference for everybody. At the same time, cost is one thing on inputs, and we're hearing a ton about that, but we're also hearing availability, people being worried about, "Gosh, I wonder if I can get it at any cost." And that's a first in my experience. And so I agree with you, the level of uncertainty out there is really exceptional. And what I keep telling everybody is all of these things combined, whether it's transportation, interest rates, inflation, certainly the weather, trade difficulties, everything you can imagine, imagine how difficult it is today to manage a farming operation, and imagine the skill set farmers have to have today to make a successful go of it. I think farmers are today the most sophisticated we've ever seen in history and the greatest managers we've ever seen in history. And boy, they better be because this is going to be tough.
Dusty Weis:
I wanted to build on that point, Jon. And Todd raised some great points there. But one thing that I've always liked about working in agriculture is the fact that farmers are by their nature kind of an optimistic group. So Jon, you talk to these folks all the time, how are they adjusting to all these inflationary pressures that they're feeling?
Jon Doggett:
They're optimists, but they do know how to complain. I have noticed that just a bit. Like I say, a lot of conversations I've had with growers over the last year, it starts with, "Do you know how much I just paid for...?" There is a lot of concern, there's a little nervousness, maybe here and there a tad bit of fear. But I think by and large, it's they're looking at, "What do I need to do to change my operation in order to deal with this uncertainty?" I had several growers in the last few months say basically the same thing is, "I have issues, I have problems, but it's the uncertainty. How many variables are going to be out there that I have to deal with?"
Getting back to Todd's comment, these are really good managers. The people who are poor managers, they're not in the business anymore. So the good managers are there, but boy, they're managing at a completely different level than they were even three, four years ago. So it's going to be a real challenge for everyone in agriculture, and I don't care what part of agriculture you're in. It's going to be one where we're going to have to be very adaptive and we're going to have to be bold and we're going to have to be brave. I think there are some really great things out there on the horizon, but boy, we've got some short term issues that we got to deal with in between now and then.
Todd Van Hoose:
Jon, I absolutely agree with what you said. I had our board in here last week, that was a whole group of farmers sitting around. And the entire discussion was, "How can I economize moving forward given what these margins are expected to do? Even the face of some pretty decent commodity prices, wow can I trim my organization's expense side? It's certainly not interest rates, you're getting hit there, but can I use less inputs? Can I put off a new piece of equipment until next year?" All of those are just significant decisions that farmers are having to make right now.
Jon Doggett:
In the high prices make that in some ways better, and in some ways make it more difficult. You look at the price of corn today and had you talked about, "Well, would corn be pushing seven bucks?" If you'd said that three years ago, folks would say, "Gosh, we get to $7 corn, everything's going to be pretty great." Well, are they getting that great? So again, it's a lot of adjustments that growers have to make. So how are your lenders working with those growers to make those adjustments within their operations and to be able to continue to get operating money and to continue to farm?
Todd Van Hoose:
The good news is that Farm Credit's seen this all before. 106 years in agriculture, and we've seen a lot of cycles come in, a lot of cycles go. And so if this is 40 years ago, people are sort of lending to farmers based on the value of their collateral. They're based on land values and how much space do you have? Well, today it's a much more sophisticated decision making tree. And so farmers have a farm plan, they understand their budget, they understand their inputs, they understand their opportunities in the marketplace. And so we're sitting down with farmers as we head into the end of this year and the beginning of renewal season next year and looking at those farm plans and saying, "Okay, how can we support you? Where do you need money? But keep in mind, you've got to be able to deal with this uncertainty."
And you talked about corn prices where they are today. I think we'd all have taken that deal at any time. But at the same time, we sort of understand if you're looking at that farm plan, you can sort of have some expectation on your receipts. You can sort of have some expectation about what you're going to sell your crop for. But we know prices historically have come down a lot faster on the commodity side than they have on the input side. And how are you going to balance that toward the end of the year when things get a little sideways potentially? And so having lots of operating flexibility, a good grasp of your costs, a good grasp of your marketing opportunities is going to be critical.
Jon Doggett:
Looking at both sides of the ledger is really important. My dad used to say that he made more money when times were tough than when times were good. And I think that's part of the challenge right now is, how do you get that operating cost down and at the same time still get the work done you need to do? So Todd, having lived through the '80s, and I know you did and watched agriculture in a just horrible mess that we had in the '80s, what did we learn from the '80s and what do we need to do to keep from going back to the eighties?
Todd Van Hoose:
Jon, I think we learned a lot, and it's now 40 years later, but we learned a lot. And one of the things we learned was cash flow is king and you cannot finance things and farmers cannot take for granted the value of the underlying assets. Everybody thought they were going to go up forever and maybe they will. But when you see spiking interest rates, when you see changes in demand, a lot of uncertainty out there. So lenders especially have learned from the 1980s. And if you look at the farmers' balance sheet right now, agriculture is leveraged, and this is sophisticated financial stuff, but farmers are leveraged at about 14%. And if you look at all other industries out there, that is a fraction of the leverage that other industries have. And so farmers, there's a lot of talk about, they borrow a lot of money and they do, but as a percentage of their assets, they don't borrow all that much. And so we don't see farmers really leveraging to the hilt anymore. We don't see lenders encouraging that behavior by lending them a lot of money. And so we think that both the lending side and the farmer's side have learned valuable lessons. Now, one of the things we're facing right now, and Jon, your upcoming transition is a symptom of it, there's a lot of us who are around in the '80s that aren't going to be around for very much longer.
Jon Doggett:
You're talking only in the professional sense though, right Todd?
Todd Van Hoose:
In the professional sense, of course. Yes, yes, yes. But when we bring in new loan officers, we're bringing in 25, 30 year olds, they weren't even born then. And so we haven't had that period now for a long time. And memories can get short. And so we constantly walk through, "Here's what happened, here's the bubble that got created. Here's what happened when it popped. And we got to work really hard not to allow that to happen again." So I think there's been valuable lessons.
Jon Doggett:
One of my mentors many years ago said, "One of the things we need to remember in agriculture is it's not always going to be the way it is today. It's not always going to be the way it is today." And that was the problem in the '80s is we all thought that it was never going to get better, and in the last 10 years it was only going to get better. And so that's kind of the way we've had to learn some things. And sometimes that's been a hard, hard, hard lesson. So Todd, you mentioned farmers, ranchers have a lot more equity to deal with than they did back in the '80s And as an aside, I repossessed farm equipment for a short period of time back in the '80s and it's something that I will always remember, my knees aren't any good, so I can't run 50 miles an hour in a low crouch, in a zigzag pattern anymore.
But those land values, they're so high and they're beyond what really, if you're a farmer going out and buying ground right now, how do you pencil that out with some of these prices the way they are? How does that affect what your industry does when you look at these loans? Farmer comes in as the next generation with them, they're saying, "We don't want to own all the land in the county, just everything that adjoins us." And you're talking about buying a section of ground at 15, 16, $17,000 an acre. Where does that fit into the family operation? How does that fit into what the banking industry looks at?
Todd Van Hoose:
Well, look, land values are really, really important. They're the backbone of agriculture. If you look at the farm balance sheet, that is the basis for stability out there. But we all know it's a double edged sword. These land values run ups that we've seen across the last 20 years have been great for people who own land. That made people pretty stable. At the same time, if you're trying to get in right now or if you're trying to make a particular purchase cash flow, you just can't do it. And that's the reality of where we are right now. And so everybody hears that story about that one place in the county that went for some outrageous amount of money. Everybody out there listening could go, "Oh yeah, I know about that." But let me tell you what that means. That means somebody had cash.
And so when we see a lot of farm ground turning over out there, we're seeing cash purchases. We're not seeing people leveraging those purchases with a lot of debt. And whether it's been a lot of federal payments, whether it's been good profitability years, for whatever reason. We look at it as, look, if a farmer wants to pay that for their ground, that's their choice. Absolutely their decision. They can do whatever they want to. But for lenders, we have to continue to keep an eye on, is there cashflow? Can you pencil that out in your operation?
Now, some of these large purchases we are seeing some investors come in, non-farm investors because the stock market been a little bit questionable here lately so that'll drive some people into alternative investments including agriculture. But most of it, we're seeing larger operations just add on. As you said, nobody wants anything but the farm that touches theirs. And so we're seeing, as you enter period where you've got these elevated prices, if you've got an operation that has the cash flow, you can add that in there and continue to cash flow it. But boy, for a family trying to transition right now, I would hate to sit at that dinner table and try to work that out because the kids can't afford to buy it and the parents can't afford to sell it at a discount. That is a tough situation.
Dusty Weis:
Todd, I recently had the opportunity to buy a piece of ground myself, and what I wound up paying for it is not something that 10 years ago I would've looked at and said, "Oh, this is a reasonable price for land." And looking at it now, I actually feel like I scooted away with a little bit of a bargain there. But while I was in the process of negotiating over this whole thing, I was working with a realtor and he said, "They're not making any more land. It's the rule of supply and demand." And certainly that factor is still in play, but there are a lot of other factors now. And I guess all that is a really roundabout way of asking you, have those values plateaued now? Are we going to see them continue to rise? Or where do you see the future of land values going and how can farmers work to prepare for whatever that future might be?
Todd Van Hoose:
I don't think anybody quite has that crystal ball, but we have seen the increases slow down. Now with that said, there's still these one off situations everybody hears about where three people get in and try to bid against each other and there's a big number. But for the most part, the big steep increases have plateaued a little bit. So we think there's some stability there. I would just remind people that fundamentally, all of us in this country won the geographic lottery when we were born here, because you're exactly right, they're not making more ground and we've got the best and the most in this country. And so I think that's always going to be a very, very valuable asset. And going into the future, it'll be even more valuable.
Now, are we going to see the rate of increase that we've seen across the last 10, 12 years? Probably not. At the same time, you don't see a situation where suddenly nobody's going to want that ground. And so look, as lenders, we really value stability in land values because spiking land values and dropping land values increase risk, so stability's very important. But farmers need to factor all of that in when they're thinking about, "What's my time horizon? How am I going to make this pencil out?" Like I say, today's farmers are the most sophisticated managers we've ever seen in agriculture. This is another part of what they have to manage.
Jon Doggett:
So Todd, and I'm going to ask you to dust off your crystal ball just a little bit, what are your predictions for the next 12 months? What are the things that we know to be true for 2023? What are the knowns that may not be known? And what are the unknowns for 2023? What do you think we're going to look at, say in November of 2023, looking back at the 12 months behind us?
Todd Van Hoose:
There's some big picture things and some small picture things. Big picture things, certainly as you look around the world geopolitical situation, Russia, Ukraine, there's real questions about food supply in some parts of the world, climate change, drought. Those are really big things that are impacting agriculture right now. And then you start to look at a little more micro level, what are the commodity prices going to be? We think they're going to continue to be pretty good. We think demand is continuing to be very, very strong. At least that's what all the farm economists tell us. But what we don't know is, what's that supply chain going to do? Are we going to be able to keep equipment repairs? I can't tell you how many farmers I've talked to about, "I couldn't get a part during harvest season this year." That was just the story of the harvest. And so things that we never really had to worry about because it was always on the next truck to the supply dealer, well, suddenly that's a big deal. And I think those are the big unknowns out there. Everything from what can I get to my farm to how are all these things going on in the world going to impact overall market access?
Jon Doggett:
I'm going to take just a little side trip and ask a question, Todd, about climate change. And I worked that issue many, many years ago at the American Farm Bureau, and certainly farmers' view of climate change has changed a lot in that time period. Because your operation lends money across the country, not just row crop agriculture, what are you seeing concerns about climate change and how people want or are dealing with that? That's that variable that doesn't depend on the Fed, It doesn't depend on the Board of Trade, it doesn't depend on inputs from Morocco. What are you doing in your industry to address that?
Todd Van Hoose:
We're working really hard to understand the impacts of it. Farm Credit is never going to push farmers for certain production practices. We're not going to be telling them, "Oh, you've got to do this, that, or the other thing with your carbon." That is not our role and we never want it to be our role. But at the same time, we and farmers both have to understand what the risks are out there. And we've all been dealing with weather-related risks for our entire lives. We understand that, but those risks are getting much more acute. You look in California where historically massively valuable production areas, some of the highest dollar crop places you could ever be, are they going to have water next year? Are these coastal areas going to continue to get hit just like we had in Florida last month? And those are real risks that farmers have always had to deal with, but they're just a little more acute now.
And when you talk about the changing drought conditions someplace, climate change actually makes it rain in more places if you listen to the scientists, and how will that affect agriculture? There's a lot of farmers in Illinois right now who are saying they've had some pretty good yields because they've had some pretty good rain. And so all of those things are very much a part of what financial institutions are trying to better understand so they can work with customers to identify the risks and make sure people are making prudent plans out there.
Jon Doggett:
So Todd, the NCGA and our state associations really appreciate the partnership we've had with the Farm Credit System for many, many, many years. So as we look forward to the 2023 Farm Bill, the Farm Credit System and NCGA has some shared priorities. Todd, can you talk about some of the places we're working together on?
Todd Van Hoose:
Well, certainly crop insurance is at the top of the list. Crop insurance has become the backbone of risk management and agriculture. It is a great program and we never want to see that go backwards and we'd like to see it pushed forward a little bit. Are there some tweaks out there that we can get done in this Farm Bill to make it more attractive for farmers? At the same time, I think there's going to be some challenges to the Crop Insurance Program depending on how this election comes out, depending on who's running things next year. I think we could have some challenges on crop insurance, but we will stand shoulder to shoulder with you on that.
The other area is climate change, and we're all working as part of the Food and Agriculture Climate Alliance. I know NCGA is in there, we're in there, a lot of farm groups are in there. That is a really important place where agriculture can come together, and I call it reality test, because the view of agriculture in Washington in a lot of places is about two generations old. And they don't understand modern agriculture in Washington for the most part. They don't understand the management challenges we're facing. And so having something like FACA, the Food and Agriculture Climate Alliance, that can take a look at some of these, what we expect to be kind of out there proposals maybe, and reality check them and say, "Here's what that means to agriculture."
And if you start to put unreasonable burdens on already tightening margins out there, what are you really going to do? You're going to push more agricultural production into places around the globe that do it a lot less ecologically friendly than we do in the United States. And so calling those kinds of things to question, really rallying agriculture to make sure that some of these very well intentioned member of Congress, I don't doubt they're intentioned, I doubt their understanding. And so that organization I think is going to be really important in this Farm Bill as we fend off some of these more esoteric proposals and hopefully come to something that says, "Here's some incentives that we can make available for farmers out there to help them deal with the climate change reality they're facing.
Jon Doggett:
Certainly FACA has been a really good group for all of us to be involved in. And we have ag groups, we have the lending industry, the environmental community is well represented in that. And it's great to watch what that organization has done because they're coming up with solutions or they're dealing with proposals to make those proposals work rather than not work. And so it is the bright spot, I think recently of how we're going to deal with some of these policy issues, and hopefully we can replicate them again and again.
Todd Van Hoose:
Let me just add one gratuitous compliment here, and that is in agriculture, we're a minority in Washington and a small interest group collectively in Washington. And we've got a bunch of really talented people working in this area on behalf of farmers. And certainly Jon, your upcoming transition in retirement is something that should be very noticeable in Washington because your long experience and great dedication to agriculture has had an impact for farmers across the country. And we're grateful for everything you've done and all the effort and passion you've brought to supporting agriculture in a long career in DC. It's been hard at times. And so we really appreciate that and certainly congratulate you on your fantastic career and wish you well as you transition.
Jon Doggett:
Well, thank you so much, and I greatly appreciate that. And it's nice to hear that from a banker too. Some of those conversations years ago wasn't so great, so thank you very much. But nobody's done this by themselves. And one of the great things about agriculture is that we've stuck together. We can have our battles, and we generally have those behind closed doors and then come out with the room with a black eye and say, "Everybody's getting along really well," and we've done that over and over again. I hope we can continue to do that. That's going to be what's really going to be important going into the future.
I'm terribly impressed with all of the young people that are coming up behind the Todd Van Hooses and myself and John Gordley and Dale Moore and all of those folks that have been around for a long time. There's some really neat, wonderful young people who are every bit is dedicated, and in a lot of cases, a whole lot smarter than some of us. And when I get nervous and when I get down, I start looking at those folks and say, "Gosh, we brought a good new crop of folks to come up and deal with some new problems." And those young folks that are coming along, they're going to have an industry that's seen hard times before and have been much harder in the past. And we have measures in place today that are going to help farmers get through some of this unsettledness that we have right now in our economy and our country, and certainly in agriculture. So we are, at NCGA, so appreciative of having great partners like the Farm Credit Council to work with to do some great things for American agriculture and great things for the country and the world. So Todd Van Hoose, president and CEO of the Farm Credit Council, thank you for that partnership and thank you so much for joining us on this podcast.
Todd Van Hoose:
Thank you, Jon.
Dusty Weis:
And as Todd departs, now, Jon, we would of course be remiss here if we didn't take a moment to note the passing of another major milestone, and Todd certainly hinted at it there, but that is your upcoming retirement as the CEO of the National Corn Growers Association. So first and foremost, congratulations and good luck with what's next, certainly. But also from the ranch in Montana to your career on the business side of agriculture since the 1980s, to 25 years working on behalf of the National Corn Growers Association and these last four years as the CEO, you have seen and done some remarkable things in your career. What do you take away from that experience?
Jon Doggett:
Oh, what I take away from it is that there are a lot of people who grew up in farms and ranches around this country who came to Washington DC to do good. Some of us did well as well as did good, but there's a lot of people who really are passionate about agriculture, who a lot of times people don't see. A lot of times they don't recognize that ag LA working in the bowels of the Rayburn building to get something done, that's a really important person. And there's just been so many wonderful people that I've been able to come to know and to work with throughout these years. It's just really remarkable how many folks there are.
Dusty Weis:
And there was a time in this country when everybody knew someone who worked in agriculture or everybody was just a generation or two removed from the farm. And certainly the world has changed in that way, and it can make it feel a lot more disconnected from what happens out in farm country. But I've got to say, I've only had the pleasure of knowing you for the last few years here since we started doing this podcast. And that was one of the things that you wanted to address with this podcast is to reconnect those two worlds a little bit. This is episode 39 that we've got here. We have recorded on Capitol Hill, we have recorded at the Kentucky Bourbon Museum, at Commodity Classic in New Orleans. We have talked to Gold Medal Olympians to CNN correspondents, retired MLB stars, members of Congress. I don't want to ask you to pick your favorite kid here, but what are some of the podcast experiences that you'll take with you when you go?
Jon Doggett:
I think my favorite kid on this are the two segments we did with Abigail Spanberger and Dusty Johnson, a moderate Democrat and a conservative Republican talking about how we can do better in this country by reaching across the aisle, by listening to people, by putting down the rhetoric and instead start thinking about solutions. Those two episodes were the ones that, in fact, I came back to one of them here a couple months ago. It was one of those days where you go, "Gosh, is there anybody out there listening to some of the concerns that a lot of people in this country have?" They're there, we just need to help them along. And I don't care which party you support, but as long as we bring people who come to Washington looking for solutions rather than looking to fight, I think that our country will be much better. So those two I really, really, really enjoyed. And those are the ones that resonated with a lot of people that listen to this podcast of, hey, it's not as crazy or as bad as we might sometimes think it is.
Dusty Weis:
You provided a platform for the middle, and that's not necessarily something that happens a whole lot. I said it then, I'll say it now, I think it's neat that you had the opportunity to do that. But be honest with me Jon, Neil Caskey is your vice president of communications at the National Corn Growers Association, when he came to you with the idea to put you behind a microphone as a podcast host, is this something that you had any interest in doing whatsoever?
Jon Doggett:
No
Dusty Weis:
I knew it.
Jon Doggett:
Neil said, "You ought to do a podcast." And I said, "Why?" He said, "No, this would be a good thing for us to do." "Are you sure?" And I kind of was brought into this thing kicking and screaming. I did not think it was going to be as fun as it's been. It's been fun. I've thoroughly enjoyed this podcast and I've enjoyed the guests we've had, I've enjoyed the conversations we've had, and what I've really enjoyed is that I've had people say, "Hey, I listened to the podcast. It gave me a different perspective," and that was what I was looking for. So Neil had a great idea, I'm going to give him that, and I'm going to give him kudos for pushing me into this. And Dusty, you have been such a great mentor to me and kind of shown me the ropes of how to get through some of this. I've had a little bit of experience in radio many, many years ago, and I've touched back on some of that. But you have been a great host. And of course, Larry is a great, great producer and helps you and I both sound smarter than we really are.
Dusty Weis:
Well, thank goodness for Larry, let me tell you.
Jon Doggett:
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. What will we do without Larrys in the world?
Dusty Weis:
But in that vein, thank you for your kind words. And I consider you a mentor from where I'm sitting too, because of those discussions that you have helped curate and because of your thoughtful and patient approach, not just to politics, not just to the world of agriculture and the world of Washington DC, but to everything in life. And you've exposed me to some new perspectives and some new ideas that I probably wouldn't have come across otherwise. And so thank you for that as well. You said early on in this podcast project that you wanted to use conversation and stories to bridge that gap between farm life and life in the heart of DC. What are some of the lessons these three years later that DC can take away from rural America, would you say, and vice versa, that we've learned over the 39 episodes that we've done in this podcast?
Jon Doggett:
I think the main thing that we continue to uncover is the need to be kinder with one another, to be more patient. We have gone in our body politic from, if you get half and I get half, that's great, and we'll come back and we'll battle again tomorrow and do it again. Anymore, it's not only should I get everything that I need, but I should get everything that I want, and you should get absolutely nothing.
Dusty Weis:
And I'm going to burn your house down. And I'm going to say some really unpleasant things about your mom on Twitter. Yeah.
Jon Doggett:
Yeah. And I live in a very contested congressional district here in Northern Virginia, and it's just absolutely astounding to me the nastiness. And a lot of this is coming in the form of Super PACs, you don't know who's funding them, all of those things. I just think if we could all just take a deep breath, be a little kinder to one another, practice what we hear in the pew on Sunday, maybe to be a little bit better mannered as our grandmothers attempted to teach us. We live in the greatest country in the world. We work in the greatest industry that we possibly can work in. We have so much going for us, and we just need to be reminded every day of the goodness that exists in this country and the goodness that exists in agriculture and with one another and with one another. We're all we have.
Dusty Weis:
To those ends, in farming as in much of life, the imperative is always leave it better than you found it. And so as you look back at your tenure with the National Corn Growers Association, these decades that you've served, what are some of your proudest accomplishments? How'd you leave it better than you found it?
Jon Doggett:
I'd say definitely is the great staff that we've put together. We've worked really hard to get the absolute best people we could do. And I have to give a shout out to Sam Willett who worked for me. He was at the DC office when I started. And as we started to fill the positions that were coming open, Sam worked with me hand in glove, and we really had a great opportunity to build a good team into a better team and a better team into a great team. As I leave now, I am more than confident that the people I've had the great honor to work with are going to continue to do a great job for the nation's corn growers. And that's the thing I'm most proud of, is just the ability to hire, mentor, and work with really super people.
Dusty Weis:
We called the podcast Wherever Jon May Roam, because you're a man that roams a lot, goes on a lot of professional adventures, sees and does a lot of really incredible things. And I just need to ask you, you might be sick of the question by now, but what's next? Where does Jon Roam next? What adventures does retirement hold for Jon Doggett?
Jon Doggett:
There's the underlying, as people say, "He's going to go spend more time with his family." But people say, "Well, where do you live?" And I said, "Out of a black Samsonite suitcase." And that's what I've done for the last number of years. I'm looking forward to spending more time with my family, more time with my wife, my mom who turned 92 last week, with my brothers, working with cattle, being around my kids, and really most importantly, being around my two granddaughters. I'm looking forward to that. That's the main thing I want to do. But I also want to keep my hand in the policy arena, Maybe not in the DC policy arena as much as just work on trying to find some solutions to things and work with people who are like-minded and want to resolve some issues.
I have some things I've been doing, some volunteer work with Big Brothers and Sisters of America that is really, really cool. I have some other things. I have some adventures I want to continue to do. I want to get back and paddle more. I haven't been in my kayak nearly as much as I should the last few years. And I talked to one of my coaches over the weekend and she is pushing me very hard to go and get back into pursuit of my skydiving license. So there's going to be some adventures. And I'm looking forward to those adventures, I don't know exactly what they are. And some days that's kind of cool that I'm going to have these adventures and I know they're out there, but then there's other days I go, "Oh gosh, this is scary. I've known what I was going to do every morning when I woke up for the last 35 years. I'm not real sure what I'm going to do when I wake up come January 1st." But whatever it's going to be, it'll be fun. And I hope to do it with a lot of great people, which has been the secret of what success I've had.
Dusty Weis:
And Jon, retirement is scary for some people because they worry about just not having enough to keep them busy and settling into that chair and growing roots like a potato, as my mom would say. And that's certainly not something that I worry about happened into you. You've got a full docket, and from the skydiving to the paddling and everything in between, I have no doubt that you're going to stay active and make the most of it. And I've got to say, it's been a rare pleasure to be able to have these conversations and tell these stories with you. In your absence now, I'm going to be muddling on in the role of NCGA Podcast host, along with some great guests who are going to help me out as well. It doesn't make sense to call it Wherever Jon May Roam anymore, and so we're going to be rolling out a new brand, a new logo, all of that, but still carrying on to tell those stories that are so important to this industry and its growers. So I thank you for your candor and your honesty, your friendship, and your commitment to preserving the way of life that we all hold dear. Best wishes for what's ahead. Certainly don't be a stranger. Stay in touch. But for old time's sake, you want to lock us out one more time, Jon Doggett?
Jon Doggett:
I'm Jon Doggett. I'm the NCGA CEO. And we hope you'll join us again real soon for the next episode of the National Corn Growers Association podcast. And thank you.
Dusty Weis:
Thank you, Jon. Congratulations. Best wishes. Take care. That is going to wrap up this edition of Wherever Jon May Roam, the National Corn Growers Association podcast. New episodes arrive monthly, so make sure to subscribe in your favorite app and join us again soon. Visit ncga.com to learn more or sign up for the association's email newsletter. Wherever Jon May Roam is brought to you by the National Corn Growers Association, with editing and production oversight by Larry Kilgore III. And it's produced by Podcamp Media, branded podcast production for businesses, podcampmedia.com. We're the National Core Growers Association. Thanks for listening. I'm Dusty Weis.