Hot Jobs & Public Comment Needed

Hot Jobs & Public Comment Needed plus Food Forethought. I'm Greg Martin with today's Northwest Report.

There are plenty of hot jobs with opportunities to see the world in the agriculture industry. Cindy Langenberg - Senior Human Resources Manager with DuPont Pioneer - says her company is always looking for new agronomists. In fact - there is a shortage of agronomists - according to Langenberg. To help meet that challenge - Langenberg says DuPont Pioneer is adding about a thousand new positions every year around the world. The more skills you have - the more opportunities you have.

LANGENBERG: The skill set that we are looking for is somebody that has not only their agronomy, their biology background but also IT and so that combination skill set - that is what is needed in ag to solve the world's problems.

The EPA has opened the 60-day public comment period related to the 2014 renewable fuel volumes. Fuels America is gathering comments through their website. The deadline for comments is January 28, 2014. The EPA's proposal would gut the Renewable Fuel Standard and decrease the amount of biofuel in the nation's fuel supply by 1.39 billion gallons.

Now with today's Food Forethought, here's Lacy Gray.

Funny thing - I was reading through past Food Forethoughts the other day and happened to run across one I wrote last year about this time and I had to laugh, or I would have cried, at how nothing seems to have changed in a year's time when it comes to Congress and the farm bill. To quote myself, I wrote, "Time is running out for those hoping that Congress will pass a new farm bill by the end of the year. Many economic experts compare the Farm Bill discussions to those of the 1991 Farm Bill, and agree that if Congress were willing to compromise, there'd still be time to complete the Farm Bill. Most of the bickering continues to be over food stamps..." I proceeded with particulars from there, but you get the idea. Here we are a year down the road and still nothing to show for it. The experts predict that some kind of agreement can be reached; that Congress will be able to come to a compromise and pass a farm bill. It should be rather obvious even to members of Congress that not doing so and pushing yet another extension would be tantamount to political suicide for both parties. But then this Congress seems to have been out of touch with reality and their constituents for a very long time.

Thanks Lacy. That's today's Northwest Report. I'm Greg Martin on the Ag Information Network.