Hillary Clinton has a plan for rural America. She laid it out today in a speech at the Des Moines Area Community College in Ankeny where she was accompanied by Secretary of Argiculture Tom Vilsack who endorsed her.
Well I think you can tell by the reception that your former governor just received how highly regarded you are, Tom, for the work that you did here in Iowa and I would add for the work that you are now doing around the country. Talk about somebody who studies a problem, asks for advice about what will work, puts together teams, collaborates, and then delivers: he is exhibit A.
And I want to thank all of you for being here and President Denson and everyone at DMACC. Thank you for once again welcoming me here. I think this is my third visit. The first one back in ’93 or so about healthcare, and then back in ’07-’08. And it’s great to be here with you, alongside my friend Tom Vilsack — a champion for farmers and families here in Iowa and across America.
And what I’m about to talk about, the agenda that I am putting forth for rural America, is very much in line with what Tom did here in Iowa and what he is doing at the Department of Agriculture. And I am honored to have his friendship and his support in this campaign.
Tom and I just had the chance to see just some of the impressive work being done here to train the next generation of farmers, innovators, tool-and-die makers, machinists, you name it: leaders for rural Iowa. I wanted to come to DMACC to offer my ideas about what we can do to improve the rural economy.
And as Tom said, I know it’s a little unusual for a presidential candidate perhaps to be making a speech like this at a community college, instead of in front of a barn or a bale of hay — but we did get a tractor, so at least we’re in the theme here. But I wanted to emphasize the changing face of rural Iowa and rural America: Education. Innovation. Technology.
Iowans are in the future business — that’s what all Americans should be in. Just look at the way that you have seized the opportunities from wind energy to biofuels. Think about talking to a farmer who is as attuned to fluctuations in foreign markets as any Wall Street trader. Or spend a few minutes meeting with the students here at DMACC, like Tom and I just did — they are full of energy and ideas and excitement about what their training and education here will mean for them in the future.
I want America to be in the future business too. And I believe a strong America depends on strong rural communities.
For prosperity to be real and lasting, it has to take root right here in Iowa and in small towns and in rural areas across the country.
This is not a new cause for me. Now a lot of people and probably a number of you hear today don’t realize this, but New York — where I was elected twice to the Senate — is actually a major farm state. It’s principally dairy, fruits, and vegetables. And when I was in the Senate, I made agriculture and rural development a top priority. And I have to confess that was a surprise to a lot of my colleagues in the Senate. They kidded me a lot because I was always asking what we were going to do in the Farm Bill or what more we could do on rural development. And they would say, ‘What do you care? You represent New York.’ And I would say, ‘Well, have you ever seen a map of New York? There’s a lot of New York north of New York City.’ So finally one day in the spirit of fun and engagement with my colleagues, I brought a picture of a New York dairy cow down to the Senate floor to give a speech about how we do have cows in New York. And when I finished, one of my friends from a Midwestern state that shall remain nameless, came up to me and said, ‘Ok, so you’ve got one cow.’
But I was struck then by the disconnect between upstate, rural New York, which is struggling as it has for years, and the downstate, urban communities. There were entrepreneurs Upstate who were desperate for capital, and there were investors in New York City looking for promising projects — but they didn’t know each other and they didn’t connect with each other. There were even chefs and restaurant owners in Manhattan obsessed with local produce, and there were farmers and wine-makers in Upstate New York who had never sold beyond their own immediate communities.
So I got to work. I wanted to convene and connect and we launched something I called the Farm-to-Fork initiative. And we fought for broadband access, and we brought new technology partnerships to rural areas, and we helped to start small businesses get online and find customers all over the world. There was so much potential, we just had to unleash it. And in the years since, the opportunities for rural economic growth across America have only grown more exciting.
But the challenges facing rural communities have also grown. Thanks to a lot of hard work and sacrifice, we’ve come back from the worst of the great recession. We’re standing again, but we’re not yet running the way America should. Median household income in rural areas is still thousands of dollars less than in urban communities. Farmland values, agricultural exports, commodity prices have all declined and recently, they’ve declined even as the cost of everything else — like prescription drugs and going to college — keeps rising.
More than 25 percent of children in rural America are growing up in poverty. And in many places, you might have to drive for hours to find a quality, affordable health care provider. And too many young people feel they have to move away to find a good job and start a family.
Now the consequences of all these pressures on families can be devastating. As I’ve traveled around Iowa, I’ve heard story after story about the quiet epidemic that Tom mentioned — roughly 23 million Americans suffer from and need treatment for addiction and substance abuse in many alcohol treatment centers, including meth and prescription drugs, heroin, and alcohol. In 2013, more Americans died from overdoses than car crashes. Problems many people used to associate with big cities are now part of daily life in small towns. And there are far too few treatment options available, and there are too fewer because of Governor Branstad’s veto of funding.
And here’s a statistic that stopped me cold when I first heard it: Many American women in rural communities — especially those with the least education and the lowest incomes — are actually living shorter lives than American women used to in the same environments. Shorter lives too than women in nearly every other major industrialized country.
I’ve looked into this and there is no single explanation, but many of the declines in life expectancy are coming in rural communities are related to job losses, poverty, high rates of smoking, obesity, and substance abuse. If you are looking for an alternative smoke, visit migvapor.com and try oil filling syringe one of the their best product. Places where the traditional support systems of family and community that used to hold people up are fraying and failing. Women — and men also — who are trying to build a life and a family in such places don’t just face ceilings on their aspirations and opportunities. For many it’s as if the floor has collapsed beneath them.
Today happens to be Women’s Equality Day. We have to ask ourselves — or at least I’m asking: How can this be happening in the richest, most powerful nation on earth?
So there are many reasons why I believe it’s imperative that we have a comprehensive agenda to revitalize rural America. Today, I’m calling for action in four areas that reflect the greatest opportunities for growth: energy, investment, agriculture, and access to health care and education.
First, we need to capitalize on rural America’s strength as a producer of clean, renewable energy.
I have set two big goals for our clean energy future:
Half a billion solar panels within four years and enough energy production from renewables to power every home in America within 10 years. That will create jobs, it will grow our economy — it will especially grow the rural economy, and it will help us meet the challenge of climate change — which poses an acute threat to everyone, but particularly the livelihood of farm communities through droughts and other extreme weather. But it’s only going to be possible if rural states like Iowa lead the way. Already you’re producing roughly a third of your total electricity from renewables, especially wind and biofuels. If Iowa can do it — I say this all over the country — so can the rest of the America.
We need to strengthen the Renewable Fuel Standard so that it drives the development of advanced biofuels and expands the overall contribution that renewable fuels make to our national fuel supply.
And we should also double our investment in loan guarantee programs that help rural communities build the processing plants and convert agriculture and landfill waste into useful products. Projects like that are already supporting millions of good jobs, and with the right incentives, they can create even more.
As we were going through the machine shop and meeting some of the young people, Tom told me one of those Vilsack facts — everybody who knows him knows he has a head full of really interesting facts. Every wind turbine requires 8,800 parts. Just making the parts, like we saw in the classroom, would employ a lot of people. In fact President Denson told me he got 135 calls from businesses in the area wanting to hire tool-and-die makers.
And you graduated how many, President?
And they graduated thirty. There are good jobs out there. There are good opportunities out there. We just have to do more to connect up, not just young people — but I saw a couple people who had been laid off or whose business was no longer in operation, coming back to DMACC to improve their skills — so people of all ages.
Second, beyond renewables, we need to spur broader investment in our rural economy.
The vast majority of the 46 million Americans who live in rural America don’t actually farm themselves. And many who do farm rely on second jobs and outside income to make ends meet. So it’s essential that we create more jobs with higher wages in a wider range of industries. Small and medium sized businesses are the job engines we need. But too often, here in Iowa and in other rural areas around the country, people can’t get access to credit– especially women and minority-owned businesses cannot get access to credit.
Why is it so easy for a big corporation to get a tax break and so hard for a small business to get a loan? You know the answer. Well we’re going to fix that. What I want do is to be the small business President, and that includes, small businesses, farms, and everybody who’s actually creating the most jobs for Americans in this economy.
And I’m not just saying it. Here’s what I want to do to make it happen. I want to expand on the number of approved Rural Business Investment Companies that link entrepreneurs to capital. I’ll make it easier for community banks that are at the heart of the rural economy to give out responsible loans to small businesses. And for rural businesses to thrive, we need better infrastructure… the roads, the rails, bridges, airports. They all have to be maintained, they have to be brought up to a higher level of performance, and that way they can get products more quickly and effectively to market.
And broadband is key to this. Because if we don’t have universal access to fast, affordable broadband, a lot of opportunities are going to be left behind. So I will create as well a national infrastructure bank. We will put special focus on expanding high-speed Internet to connect rural areas to the global economy. I did that in New York. There were a lot of small businesses — they didn’t have websites, this was back in 2001, -2, -3, -4. I brought in a team of people. I partnered with eBay and other technology firms to help small businesses get on to the World Wide Web so they could begin selling more than 20, 30 miles from where they were located. And we began to see results. That’s what I want to do in rural America.
I am also a big believer in the New Market Tax Credit, which, was on the books, it encouraged investment in hard-hit and remote communities, and it helped to create tens of thousands of jobs in rural America. We should revive this credit — started by my husband, we should expand it, we should make it permanent.
And even as we diversify our rural economy, we can’t forget that agriculture will always be a cornerstone of prosperity. And this is the third area where we need decisive action.
We have to stand with our farmers, give them the tools and support they need to boost both production and profits.
Whether they’re taking over a long-time family operation or whether they’re new to the industry. In too many ways, the deck is still stacked against small farms. As President, I’ll make sure that federal resources like disaster assistance and crop insurance go to farmers and ranchers who need it the most — not those who have the biggest businesses or the best connections. We will change the formula.
Our success with our New York project, Farm-to-Fork, is a model I’d like to scale up and share across the country, so more producers can break into new markets and more customers — especially children — get access to fresh and healthy food. Those new markets might be across the state, they might be across the country — and maybe even across the world. And we need to be smart about trade. Done right, it can drive a lot of economic growth, particularly for farmers who export produce and other products overseas.
But we’ve also seen too many hard-working communities hammered by outsourcing and unfair competition. So we need to set a high bar for trade agreements. We should support them if they create jobs, raise wages, and advance our national security.
The fourth area where we’re going to take action is expanding access to health care and education in rural areas. That is the key to strong families and strong futures.
This community college is a model of the kind of excellent education that should be available to everyone — so our young people don’t have to leave places they love in order to get the skills they need.
I support President Obama’s proposal to make community college tuition-free as part of — I think this community college serves 37,000 students. Think about that, that’s a very big opportunity. I want free community colleges to be part of what I’m going to be doing, and they are — my comprehensive New College Compact. It will ensure that cost will no longer be a barrier and debt won’t hold anyone back. Because we are going to offer refinancing of all the student debt that is out there already. And we are going to do is make sure that nobody has to borrow tuition money to go to a public college. So we are really going to go right at this problem that is bedeviling families and students.
I also believe we have to start early, so all our kids have the best start in life. Children in rural areas disproportionately lack access to quality, affordable childcare and pre-kindergarten programs.
I will double funding for Early Head Start, a program I helped to create when I was First Lady, and set a course to ensure that every 4-year old in America can attend high-quality preschool in the next 10 years. And we also need to do better on health care. Decades ago, I led a commission on rural health in Arkansas that worked on increasing access in remote parts of the state.
Today, our health care system has changed dramatically, but it’s still too difficult for families in rural America to find quality, affordable health care. And I know many families here in Iowa are worried about even more rural hospitals closing. Telemedicine can help — and we should streamline licensing and explore how to make that reimbursable under Medicare.
Here in Iowa, you just won an important victory, stopping efforts to prevent Planned Parenthood from providing telemedicine services to women who might not be able to make it to a larger city. Thousands of women in Iowa have used these services in recent years. This shouldn’t have to be said, but how can anyone be advocating for denying women access to healthcare? That may be good politics in a Republican primary, but it is terrible policy in the real world. It’s wrong and it should stop.
And it’s just one example of the hypocrisy we see from Republican candidates and leaders. They pay lip service to rural America every chance they get. But their out-of-touch, out-of-date policies would strip away the progress we’ve made and take rural communities backwards. They would give billions of taxpayer dollars to big oil companies that are already successful, instead of investing in the clean renewable energy of tomorrow.
You know many Republicans even deny that climate change exists, despite the damage it’s doing to farmers and ranchers. And they killed the Export-Import Bank even though it helps small businesses and farmers. Instead of expanding support for education, your governor here in Iowa vetoed additional funding for education. We need to be giving teachers a raise, not putting their jobs at risk.
And then there’s immigration. The fact is, American agriculture is heavily dependent on immigrant labor, from the orchards of California to the processing plants of Iowa to the groves of Florida.
The Des Moines Register recently noted that even though producers have raised pay, it’s getting harder to find enough workers to harvest their crops. We’re talking about billions of dollars in income lost because of farm worker shortages. Comprehensive immigration reform would help address this problem and give a needed boost to rural communities. And yet many Republicans still say they want to deport millions of hard-working people — breaking up families, disrupting communities, and harming our economy.
Now don’t get distracted by the flamboyant front-runner. Most of the other Republican candidates are just Trump without the pizazz — or the hair. Just like him, they don’t support a real path to citizenship. When they talk about “legal status,” that’s code for “second class status.” Now some are even calling for repealing the 14th Amendment to the Constitution and stripping lawful American citizens of their rights. It’s hard to imagine being more out-of-touch or out-of-date. But all the over-the-top rhetoric does throw the choice in this election into stark relief.
Voters are going to look for who best understands the pressures facing our families and the challenges facing our nation… who has the right vision for America’s future — and the skill and tenacity to lead us there. Other candidates may be out fighting for a particular ideology, but I’m fighting for you. I’m running for President to deliver real results for hard-working American families so they when you do your part, you can get ahead and stay ahead. That’s the basic bargain of America.
In small towns and big cities; young, old, black, white, Latino; our country should work for you and every American… for the struggling, the striving, and the successful… for the farmer who’s up before dawn and never quits… for the migrant worker who labors in the shadow of deportation… for the engineer building a wind turbine to power our future… for the young person who wants to stay in town and keep the family business going. For everyone who’s ever been knocked down, but refused to be knocked out. That’s the America that we are going to build together, and it will include rural America.
That is my pledge to all of you. Thank you very much.
Hillary is on the road in Iowa today at Des Moines Area Community College in Ankeny IA. With Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack, who has endorsed her, she laid out her plan for rural America.
Earlier, she expressed heartbreak at the sad news out of Virginia.
Heartbroken and angry. We must act to stop gun violence, and we cannot wait any longer. Praying for the victims’ families in Virginia. -H
Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton, accompanied by Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack, gestures before speaking about rural issues at the Des Moines Area Community College, Wednesday, Aug. 26, 2015, in Ankeny, Iowa. (AP Photo/Charlie Neibergall)
Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton tours the Tool and Die Lab at the Des Moines Area Community College, Wednesday, Aug. 26, 2015, in Ankeny, Iowa. (AP Photo/Charlie Neibergall)
Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton, left, tours the Tool and Die Lab at the Des Moines Area Community College, Wednesday, Aug. 26, 2015, in Ankeny, Iowa. (AP Photo/Charlie Neibergall)
Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton and Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack tour the Tool and Die Lab at the Des Moines Area Community College, Wednesday, Aug. 26, 2015, in Ankeny, Iowa. (AP Photo/Charlie Neibergall)
FILE – In this July 26, 2015, file photo, Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton speaks at Iowa State University in Ames, Iowa. In her many visits to the leadoff caucus state, Clinton has included multiple remarks with regional references. The approach is a stylistic shift from Clintons failed 2008 presidential bid, which began poorly with a third-place finish in the Iowa caucuses. (AP Photo/Charlie Neibergall, File)
Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton waits to be introduced before speaking about rural issues at the Des Moines Area Community College, Wednesday, Aug. 26, 2015, in Ankeny, Iowa. (AP Photo/Charlie Neibergall)
Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton, followed by Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack, left, waves before she speaks about rural issues at the Des Moines Area Community College, Wednesday, Aug. 26, 2015, in Ankeny, Iowa. (AP Photo/Charlie Neibergall)
Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton, followed by Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack, left, arrives to speaks about rural issues at the Des Moines Area Community College, Wednesday, Aug. 26, 2015, in Ankeny, Iowa. (AP Photo/Charlie Neibergall)
Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton speaks at the Des Moines Area Community College, Wednesday, Aug. 26, 2015, in Ankeny, Iowa. The transmission of classified information across Hillary Clintons private email is consistent with a culture in which diplomats routinely sent secret material on unsecured email during the Obama and George W. Bush administrations, according to documents previously made public and reviewed by The Associated Press. (AP Photo/Charlie Neibergall)
Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton speaks about rural issues at the Des Moines Area Community College, Wednesday, Aug. 26, 2015, in Ankeny, Iowa. (AP Photo/Charlie Neibergall)
Hillary Clinton’s Plan for a Vibrant Rural America
America’s rural communities lie at the heart of what makes this country great. The affordability of our food, the independence and sophistication of our energy supply, and the strength of our small communities all depend on a vibrant rural America. Despite their critical role in our economy, too many rural communities are not sharing in our nation’s economic gains. Unemployment and poverty are too high, commodity prices have recently declined, and necessary components to economic security – including accessible health care and affordable education – are unavailable in too many rural communities. We must do more to ensure the vitality of our rural areas—not only because America’s 46 million rural residents make up nearly 15 percent of our population, but also because rural America provides the foundation for the entire country’s economic success.
Clinton’s focus on strengthening rural America for the next generation focuses on four key areas.
Spurring investment to power the rural economy. Small and medium sized businesses power the rural economy but many are being held back by inadequate infrastructure, poor access to credit and capital, and insufficient incentives to invest. To unleash the potential of America’s rural businesses, farms, and ranches – and create jobs and grow wages for working Americans – Clinton will:
Expand access to equity capital for rural businesses by increasing the number of Rural Business Investment Companies (RBICs), which make equity investments in small rural businesses—driving growth and creating jobs in rural areas. RBICs are approved through the Farm Credit Administration, funded by Farm Credit Banks, and directly link entrepreneurs to capital. They help to build “capital networks” in rural areas, which research suggests is a major factor impacting venture capital access in states with large rural populations.1
Simplify regulations for community banks to ensure they are focused on funding our small business and are not swallowed up by a never-ending cycle of examinations and paperwork. These banks are vital to our rural businesses—a National Federation of Independent Businesses survey found that more than 70 percent of rural respondents identified their primary financial institution as a local bank, compared to 49 percent of urban respondents.2 Clinton’s plan will cut red tape for banks that don’t measure their assets in billions – while making sure community banks are never used as a Trojan Horse to undermine Dodd-Frank reforms for the largest Wall Street Banks.
Create a national infrastructure bank and invest in infrastructure to improve the country’s rural transportation, water, and broadband infrastructure so that it meets the demands of our modernizing industries and creates jobs in rural America. Crucially, Clinton will focus on increasing access and adoption of high-speed broadband so that rural small businesses can better connect to the global economy, farmers and ranchers can benefit from agricultural technology, and students can benefit from distance learning.
Streamline, expand, and make permanent the New Markets Tax Credit (NMTC) to increase the amount of credits available to low-income communities and add new credits for hard-hit communities that have seen jobs and production depart. Since the NMTC was amended in 2006 to ensure non-metro communities were allocated their fair share, the credit has created tens of thousands of jobs and financed over 600 businesses and facilities in rural America.3 This tax relief for long-term investments in rural and other communities will be paid for by raising capital gains rates on short-term trading and churning.
Strengthen USDA grant programs to make them less about bureaucratic buckets and more about funding flexibility, leveraging local resources, and measuring results. For example, Clinton will partner with Land-Grant Colleges and Universities, Historically Black Colleges and Universities, Tribal Colleges, and Hispanic Serving Institutions to expand the USDA StrikeForce Initiative. StrikeForce targets rural development resources to create jobs and revitalize areas of the country where poverty rates exceed 20 percent—about 85 percent of which are in rural areas.
Raising agricultural production and profitability for family farms. A strong agricultural economy remains a critical cornerstone of a vibrant rural economy. Farmers and ranchers supply food for America’s dinner tables, invest in farm machinery and supplies, and provide domestic energy resources that fuel small businesses. The agriculture economy also drives America’s larger economic success—accounting for about $800 billion in economic activity each year and supporting one out of every eleven jobs in the country. To ensure that America’s farmers and ranchers have the tools they need to succeed Clinton will:
Support the next generation of farmers by doubling funding for the Beginning Farmer and Rancher Development program to provide education, mentoring, and technical assistance to aspiring farmers and ranchers. Clinton will also fight to enact her New College Compact to tackle student debt. A National Young Farmers Coalition survey found that 30 percent of respondents said that student loans delayed or prevented them from farming.4
Build a strong local and regional food system by doubling funding for the Farmers Market Promotion Program and the Local Food Promotion Program to expand food hubs, farmers markets, SNAP recipients’ access to fresh food, and to encourage direct sales to local schools, hospitals, retailers and wholesalers. Clinton’s focus on this issue stems from the “Farm-to-Fork” initiative she promoted in New York as Senator.
Provide a focused safety net for farmers and ranchers by continuing to make progress in targeting federal resources in commodity payment, crop insurance, and disaster assistance programs to support family operations that truly need them in challenging times, like when weather-related disasters devastate whole areas of the country.
Fight for comprehensive immigration reform because America’s immigrants and migrant workers play a critical role in developing and supporting America’s agricultural economy.
Promoting clean energy leadership and collaborative stewardship. Rural America is an energy leader, providing clean electricity and transportation fuels to the rest of the country, reducing our dependence on foreign oil, and making the air we breathe cleaner and safer. Over the past decade, American wind power workforce has grown 10-fold and domestic renewable fuels production has expanded by more than 350 percent—creating jobs, boosting farm incomes, and driving billions of dollars of investment into rural communities. Clinton believes that America can’t afford to cede our leadership in developing and deploying advanced clean fuels and clean electricity that will grow our economy, lower our energy bills, combat climate change, and make America the clean energy superpower of the 21st Century. Rural America’s rich endowment of natural resources extends far beyond energy, too, and Clinton will partner with local communities to protect our lands, waters, and wildlife. Clinton will:
Fully fund the Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP), which provides assistance to producers – including a set-aside for minorities and veterans – who are working to conserve and improve natural resources on their farms and ranches. Additional funding will be directed toward proven initiatives like the Regional Conservation Partnership Program, which provides communities with flexible funding to set priorities and lead the way on efforts to improve water quality, combat drought and wildfires, expand wildlife habitat, and enhance soil health.
Strengthen the Renewable Fuel Standard so that it drives the development of advanced cellulosic and other advanced biofuels, protects consumers, improves access to E15, E85, and biodiesel blends, and provides investment certainty.
Support the bio-based economy’s dynamic growth by doubling the loan guarantees made through the Biorefinery, Renewable Chemical, and Biobased Product Manufacturing Assistance Program. The loan guarantee program helps fund the creation of bio-processing plants and emerging technologies that, for example, convert agriculture and landfill waste into productive chemicals and non-petroleum based materials. In 2013, the bio-based economy generated $369 billion and was responsible for over 4 million American jobs.5
Launch her Clean Energy Challenge to give states, cities, and rural communities ready to lead on clean energy the tools, resources, and flexibility they need to succeed. In doing so, Clinton will achieve the twin goals of having more than half a billion solar panels installed in this country by the end of her first term and producing enough clean renewable energy to power every home in America within 10 years of her taking office. This includes expanding the Rural Utilities Service and other successful USDA energy programs and ensuring the federal government is a partner, not an obstacle, in getting low-cost wind and other renewable energy from rural communities to the rest of the country.
Expanding opportunity in rural communities across America. Clinton believes that you should be able to live, work, and raise a family anywhere you choose. But increasingly, young Americans in rural areas have been forced to look outside of their communities to find quality heath care, a good education, or a stable job. America’s rural areas are each unique, and each faces its own set of challenges—but every American, in every community, deserves a fair chance. That is why as Clinton fights to strengthen the rural economy and raise wages for working Americans, she will also work to ensure everyone has a solid foundation for success. Clinton will:
Make critical investments in our youngest learners by doubling funding for Early Head Start and working to ensure that every 4-year old in America has access to high-quality preschool in the next ten years. Rural children disproportionately lack access to quality preschool—during the 2013-14 school year, ten states did not offer a preschool program for four-year-olds, eight of which had a higher percentage of students enrolled in rural schools than the national average.6
Ensure cost won’t be a barrier for college. For students from rural areas – who attend two-year institutions at a higher rate than their peers in metro areas – community colleges provide a pathway to obtain high-skilled manufacturing, service and agricultural jobs in their local communities.8 Clinton’s New College Compact incorporates President Obama’s plan to make community college tuition free so that young students and displaced workers can gain the skills they need to succeed. Research also shows a ten-percent gap in college attainment for rural students compared to the national average. Reasons for this gap include a lack of access to college preparatory courses in high school and cost barriers to attending 4-year institutions. Clinton is committed to ensuring that rural schools access college-prep courses in high school through on-line learning. And Clinton’s New College Compact will work to ensure that students can attend a 4-year public college without taking loans for tuition.
Improve health care access for rural Americans by further integrating telehealth, remote patient monitoring, and other information technologies into our broader health system. Nearly a sixth of Americans live in rural areas, but barely a tenth of physicians practice there.9 Clinton will explore cost-effective ways to broaden the scope of healthcare providers eligible for telehealth reimbursement under Medicare and other programs, including federally qualified health centers and rural health clinics. She will also call for states to support efforts such as those by doctors and state medical boards to streamline licensing for telemedicine. Additionally, she will examine ways to expand the types of services that qualify for reimbursement, such as treatments that use remote patient monitoring technology – while ensuring that eligible services improve health and drive value. We need to harness public resources and private innovation to expand telehealth and information technology to benefit patients in rural areas and all over the country.
Ensure that our rural communities have better access to substance abuse prevention, early intervention, and treatment. Substance abuse is striking small towns and urban areas across America. But in rural America, the disease is particularly devastating—between 1999 and 2009, the death rates associated with drug poisoning grew by 394 percent in rural areas compared to 279 percent for large central metropolitan counties.10 In the coming weeks Clinton will release a comprehensive plan to address our substance abuse epidemic.
Hillary Clinton describes the Obama Administration’s Africa policy in typical Hillary fashion as resting on four pillars.
Promoting opportunity and development,
Spurring economic growth, trade, and investment,
Advancing peace and security,
Strengthening democratic institutions.
China, as we know, is heavily invested in Africa. Her description of that relationship as one of exploitation of natural resources in exchange for glitzy structure and infrastructure that benefits them and excludes local labor. Her concern is the damage being inflicted by some foreign investment.
She quotes her remark to a TV interview question in Zambia in June 2011.
… our view is that over the long run, investments in Africa should be sustainable and for the benefit of the African people.
Confronted with a suggestion that the Chinese model, basically a hands-off local government model might serve African nations better than the good-governance model that could be interpreted as imposed by the west, responded:
It is easy – and we saw that during colonial times – it is easy to come in, take out natural resources, pay off leaders, and leave. And when you leave, you don’t leave much behind for the people who are there. You don’t improve the standard of living. You don’t create a ladder of opportunity.
We don’t want to see a new colonialism in Africa. We want, when people come to Africa and make investments, we want them to do well, but we also want them to do good. We don’t want them to undermine good governance. We don’t want them to basically deal with just the top elites and, frankly, too often pay for their concessions or their opportunities to invest.
On the subject of the disturbing downward trend in electoral democracies on the continent she refers to a speech in 2011 at African Union Headquarters where she warned African leaders that the Arab Spring could spread. We wondered, viewing the video, why she was speaking in the dark. It turned out that there was a power outage that occurred while she spoke that might have been a coincidence. It is a message that older, entrenched leaders do not want to hear. Hillary remarks upon the reluctance of some of these leaders, often seen as liberators from colonialism, to cede power. The phenomenon is endemic on the continent.
She delivered a similar message to Arab elders at Forum for the Future in Moroccoin November 2009. Neither was that audience particularly receptive to the message of inclusiveness. The Arab Spring was a reaction to policies that she knew then, through her interactions with civil society in Arab countries, would boil over sooner or later boil over. A look at the slideshow in this post speaks more than 1,000 words.
Putting forth the example of a grassroots Senegalese movement effectively defeating Abdoulaye Wade in their 2012 election, she posits that democratic change is possible in Africa and quotes further from her sustainable partnerships speech in Dakar.
I know there is sometimes an argument that democracy is a privilege belonging to wealthy countries, and that developing economies must put economic growth first and worry about democracy later. But that’s not the lesson of history. Over the long run, you can’t have effective economic liberalization without political liberalization … the United States will stand up for democracy and universal human rights, even when it might be easier or more profitable to look the other way, to keep the resources flowing. Not every partner makes that choice, but we do and we will.
Liberia, today so unfortunately stricken with the ebola epidemic, stands as a shining example of democracy in Africa as Hillary points out that former enemies on the field of battle now sit side by side in the legislative chambers.
Some of you have seen a film that tells the story of a Liberian woman’s efforts to end the war. Tired of the killing and the conflict, she organized women at her church and then other churches and in mosques until thousands of Liberian women had joined a vocal, public movement demanding peace … These were women who woke up one day and said, “Enough, enough. We’re better than that … I know that the suffering of the people of Liberia has been broad and deep. But now, you each have a chance, both personally and publicly through your service here, to make a stand against the past and for a future that is worthy of the sacrifice and the suffering that went on too long. The United States is proud to support you.
Her 2009 visit to Kenya comprised several important speaking engagements to which she refers: The AGOA Forum (Clinton administration legislation), a “townterview” with Fareed Zakaria, a visit, with Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack, to an agricultural research institute, and the usual ministerials.
Students greeted her with signs reading “corruption-free zone.” At this event Hillary shared the stage with Nobel Peace Prize winner Wangari Maathi who led a reforestation movement in Kenya. The issue of natural resources being decimated arose. You may recall that in her very lengthy confirmation hearing before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Hillary was asked a question about natural resources in Africa (it might have come from John Kerry, but I am not certain). Immediately she responded that “Botswana comes to mind.” Here she shared the same example.
Botswana’s national trust fund has reinvested profits from its resources into the population and infrastructure with such success that both the Peace Corps and USAID pulled out of the country since their help was no longer needed. Hillary credits Botswana’s Five Ds for the success: Democracy, Development, Dignity, Discipline, Delivery.
Well-intentio9ned as they were, she notes that U.S. (and other) gifts of foodstuffs undercut the market for indigenous agricultural products. She points to the Feed the Future Program as one that supports local produce and addresses the challenge of transportation.
She also met with President Kibaki, Prime Minister Odinga, and the cabinet. There was tough talk, to which she refers, in this meeting but no transcript from the State Department. The agreed-upon shared power in the government was not going smoothly. Her subsequent words with Foreign Minister Wetangula provide some insight into the tone she adopted, however.
The United States worked hard last year with Kofi Annan and the team of African Eminent Persons to support the Kenyan people to resolve the crisis that afflicted this country. Unfortunately, resolving that crisis has not yet translated into the kind of political progress that the Kenyan people deserve. Instead, the absence of strong and effective democratic institutions has permitted ongoing corruption, impunity, politically motivated violence, human rights abuses, and a lack of respect for the rule of law.
These conditions helped fuel the post-election violence, and they are continuing to hold Kenya back. The reform agenda agreed to by the coalition government and discussed in the speech that President Kibaki and Prime Minister Odinga gave this morning must be fully implemented not just to avoid a repeat of the previous crisis or worse, but more importantly, to set the stage for a better future, a future worthy of the dynamic people of this country, a future of economic growth, democratic development, social justice, and the opportunity for every Kenyan child to live up to his or her God-given potential. I wanted the leaders to know that we respect greatly the way that the Kenyan people pulled their country back from the brink of disaster once, and the ongoing connection between the private sector, civil society, and the government that is the key to resolving these issues.
Hillary’s description of her visit to Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) in summer 2009 is a contrasting patchwork of horror and hope. She begins with her visit, with NBA star Dkembe Mutombo to the pediatric unit he built and named for his mother.
There were so many bright and lovely moments on this first official State tour of Africa. Most of those were, sadly, not covered by the media, but no one missed the “snap in the Congo.” In an atmosphere that Hillary describes as sour with an air of sullen resignation in a stuffy auditorium at St. Joseph’s School. everyone saw her lose patience with a question, remove her earbuds, and tell a student at a town hall that she would not be channeling her husband.
In the book, she explains that the student came to her after the event, apologized, and explained that he had not meant to ask her President Clinton’s opinion but rather President Obama’s.
Goma is one of the the grimmest, most dangerous places on earth, especially for women. Hillary tells of her visit there and the spirit she encountered among the residents of the refugee settlement she visited.
She says she witnessed the worst and the best of humanity there. She was inspired to chair a U.N. Security Council meeting the next month on the subject of sexual violence in conflict regions.
Hillary turns at this point to her visit to Africa’s and the world’s newest country, South Sudan in August 2012 when a standoff between the breakout state and Sudan from which it had seceded was festering. South Sudan had oil and Sudan had the ports and refineries. Clearly some kind of cooperative agreement would benefit both, but South Sudan had shut down the pipeline to the North.
The surface issue was fees charged by Sudan to transport and process the oil. Hillary used an Op-Ed by one of President Kir’s former comrades-in-arms, Bishop Elias Taban, once a boy soldier. Below the surface, the dispute rested on old battle wounds. Hillary told him “a percentage of something is better than a percentage of nothing.” Taban’s words moved Kir to accept a compromise. By 2:45 the next morning, the oil flowed again.
Hillary writes that South Sudan’s future remains uncertain, and indeed, while this post was being assembled the State Department issued this statement.
Bishop Taban, who provided the instrument that convinced President Kir to budge was her guest at last year’s Clinton Global Initiative where she presented him with the Global Citizen Award.
She reviews Somalia’s war-torn, terror-ridden history and our efforts to assist through several U.S. administrations. In August 2009, the president of the transitional government traveled to Nairobi to meet with her. She wondered if he would shake her hand, and he did so very enthusiastically which was a very big deal all around.
At a military base in Uganda, U.S. Special Operations advisors showed her a surveillance drone used in the search for Joseph Kony chief of the Lord’s Resistance Army and elements of Al Shabaab. She notes that it resembled a child’s toy.
She mentions the September 2013 attack by Al Shabaab on a shopping mall in Nairobi that killed Elif Yavuz who worked for the Clinton Health Access Initiative which battles HIV/AIDS and other health challenges.
In the struggle to conquer HIV/AIDS on the continent, the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) begun by George W. Bush plays a major role. She recalls this event in Johannesburg in 2009 where she was accompanied by Eric Goosby, the State Department’s Global AIDS Coordinator, her Congressional Representative, Nita Lowey, and the late, Honorable Donald Payne who was a friend of this blog.
Hillary begins drawing this Africa chapter to a close in South Africa around Nelson Mandela beginning with recollections of her visits to South Africa as First Lady, the second time bringing Chelsea with her. A lifetime friendship ensued.
One working relationship that brought many smiles over the years was her friendship with South African Foreign Minister Maite Nkoana-Mashabane. She gave parties for Hillary on both of her visits. There was a rare snowfall on Hillary’s last visit and she was called ‘Nimkita’ – one who brings the snow.
Hillary led a delegation of business leaders to this summit. Our friend Grace Bennettof Inside Chappaqua accompanied Hillary’s traveling press on this trip, and Hillary called her over to meet Maite.
She refers to these closing remarks in this speech.
It’s a burden being an American or a South African, because people expect you to really live up to those standards. People hold us to a higher set of standards, don’t they? And we owe it to all who came before, all who sacrificed and suffered, to do our very best to keep working every single day to meet those standards. But we mostly owe it to our future.
Many things have changed since Robert Kennedy came to Cape Town and Nelson Mandela left Robben’s Island. But some have not. The world we want to build together still demands the qualities of youth and a predominance of courage over timidity. So in that spirit, let us work together so that the values that shaped both our nations may also shape a world that is more peaceful, more prosperous, and more just.
Hillary Rodham Clinton
Secretary of State
Tom Vilsack, Secretary of Agriculture
Washington, DC
October 16, 2009
Please watch “See the Future; Feed the Future; Change the Future,” a video released by the Department of State and narrated by Actor Matt Damon to highlight the Global Food Security Crisis and the U.S. Commitment to Action.”
OPERATOR: Welcome and thank you for standing by. At this time, all participants are on a listen-only mode until the question and answer session of today’s call. At that time, you may press *1 if you would like to ask a question. And now I’d like to turn the conference over to Ms. Cheryl Benton. Thank you, ma’am, you may begin.
MS. BENTON: Good afternoon, everyone. Thank you so much, operator. First of all, I’d like to welcome everyone to this call on behalf of Secretary Clinton and Secretary Vilsack. We had such an overwhelming response that we had to open the line up to a lot more reporters and journalists, so we’re just very, very happy to have everyone on the line. And right now, I would like to have Secretary Clinton open up and give her remarks. She’ll be followed by Secretary Vilsack.
SECRETARY CLINTON: Thank you very much, Cheryl. And I’m very grateful for this opportunity to join with my friend and colleague, Secretary Vilsack, to discuss the critical issue of global hunger and food security on World Food Day. Today is the day that we should be focusing on the threat that chronic hunger poses not only to the more than one billion people worldwide who directly suffer from chronic hunger, but to governments, societies, and all of the associated problems that arise from that.
I think it’s clear that, if you look at what has been going on around the issue of food over the last several years, there have been more than 60 riots in countries since 2007, we have the economic and day-to-day security of families undermined, the environmental security, and even our national security. And what we have done in the Obama Administration is to make fighting hunger and increasing agriculture-led economic growth a priority. We want to help small farmers worldwide produce more food. We want to make sure that food gets to market and reaches the people who need it. That means strengthening the entire farming chain from labs where scientists develop improved seeds, to fields where farmers are laboring sunup to sundown, to the roads and the other infrastructure where the harvest occur and where food is bought and sold, and clearly to enhance the nutritional aspects of the food that people eat.
We are very pleased to be part of a commitment, along with other nations, of more than $22 billion over three years to spur agriculture-led economic growth. A few weeks ago, I joined with Secretary General Ban Ki-moon to host an event during the United Nations General Assembly, where more than 130 nations, a number of foundations, private companies, international organizations, and NGOs were represented to discuss the strategy that was announced at the G-8 summit in July that we have been working on in a whole-of-government approach.
First, we’re going to work with partner countries to create and implement their plans. And second, we will address the underlying causes of hunger by investing in all of the tools that are needed to leverage the skills and perseverance of farmers, a majority of whom in the world are women. Third, we’re going to coordinate on the county, regional, and global level. Fourth, we’ll support multilateral institutions. And fifth, we pledge long-term commitment and accountability.
We believe that we have taken some significant steps to begin implementing these principles that are critical to the way forward. We’re going to make nutrition a key component. We’re investing more in research to fortify staple crops with vitamins and nutrients. We’re improving the effectiveness of our humanitarian food assistance, and we’re working hard to develop better mechanisms to hold ourselves accountable as we go forward.
I was very pleased that the President asked me and the State Department to help lead our efforts. And I couldn’t be happier to have a partner like Tom Vilsack who brings such a wealth of experience and expertise to this particular issue.
So let me turn it over to Tom.
SECRETARY VILSACK: Well, I appreciate this very much. And I certainly appreciate Secretary Clinton’s leadership and the State Department’s leadership in our government-wide effort. Recent estimates from the United Nations food and agricultural organizations suggest that, for the first time ever, more than one billion people around the world are chronically hungry. A significant percentage of that one billion happen to be children. And I think nations of the world have begun to agree that the past practice of solely relying on food aid is not enough to solve this problem. And I think there’s a consensus that a comprehensive approach, as the Secretary just outlined, is needed, and one that is focused on sustainability.
Our goals should be to increase the availability of food by helping people in countries produce what they need, to make that food accessible to those who need it, and to teach people to use it properly so that they can make the most of it.
In July in Ghana, President Obama characterized the growing consensus when he said, and I quote, “The true sign of success is not whether we’re the source of perpetual aid that helps people scrape by, it’s whether we are partners in building the capacity for transformational change,” end quote. I believe that we also need transformational change to establish food security across the globe and recognize that it’s not going to be easy. It’s going to be difficult, but we must bring a sense of urgency to this issue.
And I want to say, at USDA, we are extraordinarily excited to be part of a comprehensive approach to this issue, which is being led by the State Department and Secretary Clinton. We also know that there is a specific role that can be carved out for USDA, focused on its core competencies and really examining how we can provide greater availability, accessibility, and utilization of food.
Our core competencies do, in fact, center around research, capacity-building, and technical assistance. USDA stands ready to use its vast research capacities to improve, as the Secretary indicated, the nutritional value and the productive value of crops across the globe. We have the ability with our extension service to build capacity in regions and communities and localities across the globe so that we are not just simply providing help and assistance, but we are building leaders, agriculture leaders in these countries so that they, in turn, can be – foster generation leadership.
And finally, we’re prepared to bring technical assistance, whether it’s small-drip irrigation, whether it’s dealing with plant disease, pests, invasive species, or whatever it might be, the USDA is prepared to provide that assistance in concert with other departments of government.
We understand and appreciate this has got to be a country-led effort. We are not here to tell folks what to do. We are here to help. We applaud the Secretary’s focus, in particular, on women farmers since they make up in many countries 70 percent of those who are, in fact, producing food. We look forward to encouraging sustainable practices and the use of good technology based on sound science, and we are looking forward to that comprehensive approach.
And based on my conversations with folks here in Iowa, during the World Food Prize celebration, talking with Bill Gates yesterday, leaders of NGOs and leaders of countries who are assembled here for the awarding of the World Food Prize, I can tell you that this message is being well received around the world. They look forward to this partnership. The have waited a long time for the United States to step up in this capacity, and I’m certainly pleased that we are part of it.
MS. BENTON: Terrific. Thank you, Secretary Vilsack. And thank you Secretary Clinton for your remarks. Operator, we can now open the call up for questions.
OPERATOR: Thank you. At this time, if you would like to ask a question, please press *1. Please un-mute your phone and record your name when prompted. To withdraw your request, you may *2. One moment, please, for the first question.
And the first question will come from Bill Thompson. Please state your organization.
QUESTION: Hi. My name is Bill Thompson. I’m with Dow Jones newswires. My question is about biotechnology. There is a lot of talk about how biotechnology can improve the lives of farmers and in farming overseas. But will – and it that was mentioned in your opening comments – will it be our advances here in the United States that will be translated over to impoverished countries or will the U.S. be funding initiatives to create generically modified seeds specifically for the needs of impoverished countries? And if so, what might be some of those needs?
SECRETARY CLINTON: Well, I’ll start, and then Tom can certainly add from the perspective of USDA. We believe that biotechnology has a critical role to play in increasing agricultural productivity, particularly in light of climate change. We also believe it can help to improve the nutritional value of staple foods. And the two options that you mention: transfer of technology from the United States, working with other organizations and countries to address specific needs, will be both pursued as strategies. When Tom and I were in Kenya recently, we visited the Kenyan Agricultural Research Institute, which has been a leader in East Africa at looking at the ways to improve soil and seeds and other inputs like fertilizer. So because this is a country-driven process, we think that certainly our very large and successful agricultural research infrastructure will be very value-added, but we also want to support research in the countries themselves and work with credible organizations like the Kenyan Agricultural Research Institute, so that we can assist them in tailoring biotechnology solutions for their particular situation.
SECRETARY VILSACK: The only thing I would add to that is yesterday when Bill Gates gave his speech at the World Food Prize, he suggested that sustainability and productivity are not mutually exclusive goals.
And certainly, biotechnology is one strategy for more sustainable agriculture, but certainly not the only strategy. And since this is a country-led effort, we will find that there will be circumstances where biotechnology is the answer. It may very well be developed here in the United States. It may be made available royalty free in other countries. Or it may be tailored – the science and the research may be tailored to the specific circumstance that we find in a Sub-Saharan African country, for example, in which case we would be assisting researchers and scientists in that country. Or it may be that it isn’t biotechnology that is the solution. It’s the more traditional sustainable practices that will make a difference and those, too, need to be promoted, so it’s a combination.
QUESTION: Thank you.
MS. BENTON: Good. Operator, we’re ready for our second question.
OPERATOR: Our next question will come from Jerry Hagstrom. Your line is open. Please state your organization.
QUESTION: Yes. I’m with the National Journal. Good afternoon, secretaries. I’m interested in your draft security initiative. It doesn’t specifically mention the use of food aid in development programs. And the groups like the private voluntary organizations and the co-ops that use USAID P.L. 480 programs and Food for Progress money to do both food aid and development, what role do you expect those groups to play? And will they still be allowed to use monetization to come up with the resources that they use?
SECRETARY CLINTON: You want to start on this one, Tom?
SECRETARY VILSACK: Well, Jerry, I would say that I don’t think we’re necessarily going to rule out monetization, but I think that there is a need for us to make sure that we’re flexible in terms of how we utilize it. This is not a circumstance where we want to continue to perpetuate the notion that this is only for the benefit of American agriculture and it’s a combination, it’s a partnership. So monetization may very well involve utilization of resources to purchase crops in-country and to utilize those resources in that way, number one.
Number two, I don’t think that we’re suggesting that food aid is not going to be used. We’re suggesting that we need a much more comprehensive approach and cannot rely solely upon food aid to address this issue. That we’ve got to make farmers around the world more productive. And, frankly, when we do that, they’ll get to a point where they are in a position to trade their surplus, which we believe will ultimately result in the capacity of those countries to purchase goods and services from America on a value-added basis, which will help our economy. So it’s a two-way street here. And certainly not – there’s not one strategy. And I think in the past, we’ve focused primarily on a single strategy. And I think we have to be far more flexible and far more comprehensive.
SECRETARY CLINTON: I think it’s also an important fact to raise. We used to, back in the ‘60s, ‘70s, and ‘80s, use much more of our aid dollar on supporting agriculture. And we began to shift more of our aid dollar to filling the humanitarian need. And we’ve relied on food aid to fill our gap in support for agriculture, and most importantly, to reach the poorest people. We’re seeking to close that gap between development and humanitarian assistance by dedicating development resources to engage the poorest in the growth process and to support community development. As Tom said, we think that you can have sustainable productive agriculture that is really aimed at giving people the tools that they need to help support themselves. There will always be humanitarian disasters because of climate and conflict. But we want to build up a stronger base of sustainable agriculture that people will be able to pursue that will see them through the good times and more of the bad times, while we try to fill the gap where that still exists.
MS. BENTON: Thank you, Secretary Clinton. Operator. I believe we have time for one more call – one more question. Pardon me.
OPERATOR: Thank you. Our next – our last question then will come from Roberta Rampton. Please state your organization.
QUESTION: Hi. I’m with Reuters. Just to follow up on that last question, it sounds like you do want to see some flexibility, some improvements – I think you said earlier, in the effectiveness of humanitarian food aid commodity, American-grown food aid. Is this something that you can do administratively to create that flexibility or is there some – is it something that has to wait until the next farm bill? How are you going to, I guess, achieve that flexibility in that portion of this overall plan?
SECRETARY VILSACK: Well, let me take a crack at that, Hillary, if I can. Clearly, there is no restriction in terms of us addressing issues that have been addressed in the farm bill. There is an understandable reluctance to open up the farm bill in a very significant way, since a great deal of time and effort went into the formulation of the farm bill.
I think what’s important for us at this point in time is for people in Washington and Congress to become comfortable with the notion of this comprehensive approach, to recognize and appreciate it is an all-government, all-hands-on-deck approach with the State Department in a leadership role, USAID doing what it traditionally does well in development, and USDA adding its expertise in the areas that I addressed earlier – research, capacity building, and technical assistance.
And so if it requires some flexibility, if it requires a change in regulation, a change in direction, it is simply to complement what we’re trying to do. It is not necessarily to change what we’re doing, it’s just simply to complement what we’re doing. And as I travel around the country and around the world, I hear concerns about the over-reliance that the United States has had in the past on simply the humanitarian assistance, and that the world is really looking for help and assistance in the form of experts being able to partner with scientists in other countries. They want our assistance in help and technology. They want to know how to be more productive. They take pride in what they do, as we do here.
And I think we will benefit as a nation both from a national security, and I think ultimately from an economic security standpoint, if we create a much broader array of tools that we use in combating hunger. Clearly, with the numbers increasing, the numbers of hungry increasing in the world, we have to assume that we need to do more and we need to do better.
SECRETARY CLINTON: And I just want to conclude by saying we remain fully committed to the importance of humanitarian assistance in times of crisis to address the urgent needs and protect the assets of the most vulnerable people. And we know we can increase the impact of that assistance by building greater local and regional capacity both to predict and respond to emergencies and to better bridge the gap between humanitarian and development assistance. By increasing our support to agriculture, while we maintain a robust humanitarian response, we hope that in the long term, countries will lower the risks of food insecurity that are caused by short-term shocks, and that would ultimately reduce the demand for humanitarian assistance, because three-quarters of the world’s poor still live in rural areas and they are largely dependent on agriculture for their livelihoods.
But the growth in the agriculture sector, if it can become more productive, if we can get farm-to-market roads, if we can improve storage facilities, create a greater capacity for the poor not only to feed themselves, but to actually be able to sell some of what they harvest, we will do more in terms of the poverty reduction goals we have, as well as broad-based income growth, because it’s critical that we combine what we’re doing on humanitarian and development assistance to also be committed to environmental stewardship and protect the natural resource base upon which agriculture depends. We know it’s inextricably linked to climate change. It’s a driver of deforestation. We have to help people work the land more efficiently in whatever climate zone they’re in, facing whatever challenges they face. And that means we have to improve the productivity of soils, we’ve got to conserve biodiversity. And we have multiple challenges with regard to water usage.
So this is a very broad agenda, when you look at it both from our goal of increasing agricultural productivity while maintaining our humanitarian capacity. But we think it’s the most effective way forward because we can’t just ignore the fact that after the Green Revolution lifted so many people out of hunger and even starvation and made countries self-sufficient who had not been able to do so, we haven’t continued on that growth curve. And Norm Borlaug used to say all the time, don’t forget hunger and don’t forget the causes of it and the way to try to remedy the suffering that comes from it. And that’s what we’re keeping in mind as we move forward on this initiative.
SECRETARY VILSACK: Hillary, if I could just add one thing. You mentioned Norm Borlaug. I think it’s interesting to note that – obviously, he passed away recently – but his last words were – he said to his family, he woke one afternoon and he said, “I have a problem.” And his family said, “What is it? What can we do for you?” He said, “The problem is Africa.” So his last dying thought were the starving people in Africa.
Remarks with Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack and Kenya’s Minister for Agriculture William Ruto at the Kenya Agricultural Research Institute
Remarks
Hillary Rodham Clinton
Secretary of State
Nairobi, Kenya
August 5, 2009
SECRETARY VILSACK: Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you. Mr. Minister, thank you very much. I come from the state of Iowa, where they say that that’s where the tall corn grows. Well, apparently, I’m where the tall maize grows. (Laughter.) And it is a pleasure and an honor to be here.
Earlier this afternoon, I had a chance to meet with one of the ministers from Namibia. And he said something that I thought was quite profound. He said people don’t eat democracy. But I would suggest that democracy’s future is tied to people being able to eat. And there is reason to be concerned throughout the world, for the number of hungry in the world is increasing. In 2008, our world experienced a global food crisis that affected 1 billion people; 265 million of them live here in Africa.
The FAO and the USDA projected the number of hungry will increase 11 percent in the next year. As President Obama has said, we need transformational change. And if you combat food insecurity, we cannot rely on simply providing food. We must help Africa produce enough food to feed its people and create economic opportunities for this continent.
We need a comprehensive approach focused on sustainability. We must address not only increasing availability of food by helping people in countries produce it, but we must make food accessible to those who need it and teach people to utilize it properly. First and foremost, the plans to establish food security must be country-developed and country-led. To maximize their success, they must be coordinated with other multilateral efforts.
Our commitment must be long-term to have the lasting impact needed to succeed in the 21st century. Efforts must be grounded in good government and transparent practices. And we must recognize the critical role that women play in this effort. I’m so proud to be here with the recipients of the AWARD fellowship. They are making a difference in the region. (Applause.) And I and others at USDA look forward to working with them to enhance their success in the future.
And with agriculture in sub-Saharan Africa accounting for roughly 20 to 30 percent of GDP and employing 60 to 70 percent of the workforce, we must help this area increase its agricultural output. We can provide seed technologies, explain the appropriate use of fertilization, share techniques to manage land effectively, create a strong post-harvest infrastructure – so many things that could help farmers increase their income. I can’t think of a better example of how we can partner with the people of sub-Saharan Africa and Kenya than the Kenyan Agricultural Research Institute, where we are today. (Applause.)
USDA is proud to have partnered with KARI to prevent and control animal and pest diseases and improve food security, and develop and apply products and emerging technologies. KARI represents our commitment to tackle the challenges of global food insecurity. But more importantly, it highlights the collaborative effort and approach we must take to establish food security and prosperity around the globe. Your work in stem rust, wheat stem rust and hybrid seeds are part of the prescription for a more food-secure world.
Let me leave you, before I introduce Secretary Clinton, with a personal thought and perspective on why this is not only important to me, but important to everyone here. Yesterday, I visited a school where many of the children were orphans. Though I’ve never truly been hungry like so many in Africa, I can relate to the students I met because I too started out life as an orphan. As a child, I thought about books and baseball. The children I met yesterday just wanted one thing – to be fed and educated. If that’s not reason for us to do all we can together to create a world in which kids do not go hungry, I’m not sure what will move us.
There is no greater advocate for women and children than Secretary Hillary Clinton. While her title is Secretary of State, I view her as a world and global ambassador for women and children who suffer, who struggle, and who seek simply to provide for their families. It’s my pleasure and honor to be partnered with her and the State Department in our effort to provide greater food security.
Madame Secretary. (Applause.)
SECRETARY CLINTON: Thank you very much, Tom. And it is a great delight for me to work with Tom Vilsack, who is such an accomplished public servant and a really wonderful human being.
I am very happy to be here, Minister Ruto. Thank you so much for your joining us and for your leadership on this critical issue. I want to also recognize Permanent Secretary Kiome for his work and commitment, and KARI Director Mukisira and all who work at KARI for their dedication.
I also want to recognize and introduce two members of Congress who are very important to our work with Kenya and to Africa: Nita Lowey, Congresswoman from New York – (applause) –who chaired the very important committee that actually determines in the House of Representatives where our foreign assistance goes, and she is very dedicated to improving the lives of people everywhere; and Congressman Donald Payne from New Jersey – (applause) – who has dedicated himself to improving relations between our country and the countries of Africa, and working to be a voice and an advocate on behalf of Africans. And I’m very pleased that Donald could join me. And then I want to recognize a long-time friend, someone whom I admire so much, Kenya’s own Wangari Maathai. (Applause.) Thank you for being here.
Across Africa this morning, as I was getting up in my hotel room, millions and millions of people, mostly women, rose before dawn to begin their daily work tending crops and caring for livestock. By now, they have walked for miles to collect water for irrigation and guide their herds on grazing land. For millions of Africans, farming is a lifeline, the only source of income and food. For the continent, as the minister reminded us, agriculture is the primary economic sector and an engine for future growth. And for the global community, agricultural development could help address one of the most urgent challenges we face: chronic hunger, which afflicts nearly a billion people worldwide, including one in three Africans, many of whom are children.
Here at the Kenya Agricultural Research Institute and at laboratories and greenhouses across the continent, African scientists are developing tools to boost productivity of Africa’s farms – part of a broad strategy to strengthen the entire agricultural sector, to increase income, to support rural communities, and to drive economic growth.
The benefits of a strong system of agriculture to Africa are great. The benefits to the world are equally so. Most of the arable land left on the planet is in Africa, while in some of the world’s most populous regions the land available for farming is shrinking rapidly. More and more, the world will look to Africa to be its breadbasket. And I hope that when the world looks to Africa to be its breadbasket, it is Africans and African farmers who will profit from becoming the world’s breadbasket. (Applause.)
But agriculture in Africa has been held back for decades by wars that have forced farmers to flee their fields, by diseases that too often strike the young and the strong, by climate change which has caused droughts and floods that destroyed cropland, as the people of East Africa know too well.
Farmers in Africa have also faced the lack of investment from the private sector as well as governments and the global community, while technologies that have helped farmers in other parts of the world haven’t yet been adapted to the extent necessary to Africa’s needs. Together, these challenges have eroded the foundation of African agriculture. But that foundation is being rebuilt. The scientists here at KARI are taking the lead. I’ve just met with researchers who are cultivating hardier crops that can feed more people and thrive in harsher conditions, disease-resistant cassava plants, sweet potatoes enriched with Vitamin A to prevent blindness, maize that can flourish in times of drought.
The breakthroughs achieved in these labs and others throughout Africa can go a long way toward making sure that farmers who work from sunup to sundown can grow enough to support their families and so people aren’t forced to pull their children from school or sell their livestock to survive a food shortage.
This is also time to innovate. And the innovation in other fields can help farmers. For example, telecommunications, micro-finance, even micro-insurance. In several countries, farmers are using cell phones to check on prices in nearby markets. In Uganda, they’re receiving text messages on their cell phones about how to diagnose and treat local crop diseases. And just last month, the Grameen Foundation, Google, and the South African cell phone company MTN came together to launch a service that will provide farmers with local weather forecasts and farming tips, along with other useful information like health advice.
Innovations like these are a crucial piece of what must be a comprehensive approach to agriculture, one that connects the tools developed in labs like this to the fields where the farmers are every day, the markets where the crops are bought and sold, the financial institutions where farmers access credit to invest in new seeds, fertilizer, equipment, and the classrooms where they can learn to grow more food with less labor and less water.
President Obama and his entire Administration, as evidenced by both Tom Vilsack and I being here, are committed to help strengthen the entire agricultural chain here in Africa and around the world. We think that is a critical tool for promoting economic growth and integrating Africa into the regional economy. We are convinced that investing in agriculture is one of the most high-impact cost-effective strategies available for reducing poverty and saving and improving lives. That’s why we have made this a signature element of our nation’s foreign policy. Very often, people in developing countries think that if we can only get a factory, if we can only get that business, whereas what is closer to home can actually produce more income and create more opportunities.
But I think it’s fair to say in Tom’s work in Iowa with farmers and the work that I did as a senator from New York and living in Arkansas for all those years, oftentimes people think, well, if you’re modern, you don’t do agriculture anymore. Well, nothing could be further from the truth. If you don’t do agriculture, you don’t eat. (Applause.) And that’s the most important goal of any society – to sustain itself and to sustain the next generation. Last month in Rome, the members of the G-8 and other countries committed $20 billion to end global hunger, but not simply through short-term food aid, but through longer-term investments. The United States has pledged $3.5 billion to this effort.
Now, we do not seek to impose a one-size-fits-all approach. We will partner with individual countries to help Kenya and others develop your own strategy for reform. We will work with partners outside government, including NGOs like AWARD, with foundations like the Gates Foundation, with Universities like Cornell, which has a long relationship with KARI here, to provide coordination, minimize duplication, and maximize results. The United States has been a proud supporter of KARI for more than 40 years. And we’re so proud that Cornell has a longstanding partnership as well.
With Kenya’s leadership in biotechnology and biosafety, we cannot only improve agriculture in Kenya, but Kenya can be leader for the rest of Africa. (Applause.) And so as we scale up our efforts, let us strive to support those who do the work. Women are the backbone of farming in Africa, just as they are in most of the world. They plant the seeds, they till the fields, they harvest the crops, they bring them to market, they prepare the meals for their families. So to succeed in this work, we must work with women. And so we need a good collaboration to make sure that women are equal partners with men farmers all the way through the process.
The AWARD program is a great example. It supports women scientists working to improve farming here in Africa and to fight hunger and poverty. And we need women represented in our laboratories as well as our fields. And I really congratulate the AWARD women for being pioneers in plant science. (Applause.)
When I was a senator from New York, I learned something that I was very surprised by, and that is that in New York, which people think of as Manhattan with tall buildings, or the Bronx or Brooklyn or Queens, New York state actually has agriculture as its number two industry. But many people living in New York City did not know there were farmers in other parts of New York. And I realized that if you could enhance the income of the farmers in what we call upstate New York, it would benefit everyone. So I’ve worked with farmers and farming and improving income and helping with crop selection and providing inputs like better fertilizers and better farming techniques and more value-added processing.
And even in New York, when I started about eight years ago, a lot of farmers weren’t getting their products to market in an efficient way. So when we talk about farming, we’re also talking about infrastructure, aren’t we, Minister? We’re talking about farm-to-market roads. We’re talking about storage and warehouse facilities, refrigeration facilities. We’re talking about local markets buying from local farmers. If Kenyan farmers were linked up with Kenyan buyers of food, everyone would benefit. Instead of importing food that you can grow right here in Kenya, grow it and then sell it to each other. That’s a win-win strategy for farmers and for the Kenyan people as well.
So we are pledged to work with you. We’re proud to stand with you in this partnership that we have been involved in for many years. We want to take it to the next level, and we want to see the results. We’re going to measure results, we’re going to be very clear about what we expect to see as we work together, because we don’t have a minute to waste. Children are malnourished, people are going hungry, money is left on the table, crops are wilting and dying in the field. We know we can do much better here and throughout Africa.
So I look forward to working with my colleague and partner in this effort, Secretary Vilsack, and with all of you here as well. Thank you very much. (Applause.)
SECRETARY VILSACK: Thank you.
SECRETARY CLINTON: I think they want to ask a few questions, Minister.
MINISTER RUTO: Thank you.
QUESTION: Thank you very much. My questions are relevant not on agriculture, on something else. Number one, I would like to know for the Government of the United States of America, what specific actions are you likely to (inaudible) on Kenya in case the Government of President Mwai Kibaki and Prime Minister Raila Odinga, totally ignores The Hague or the local tribunal option in punishing masterminds of post-election violence? And number two, President Obama being of Kenyan descent, could he be having some specific developmental programs for Kenya? Thank you.
SECRETARY CLINTON: Well, those questions are related and connected. As I said earlier this morning at the Convention Center, the United States Government has delivered a very clear message to the Government of Kenya. Our Ambassador, our Assistant Secretary of State for Africa have both spoken out about our belief that it is in Kenya’s interest to pursue a path toward justice of those who acted in a violent manner and supported violence following the last election.
We also, of course, believe that this is an issue that is better handled by Kenyans themselves. And we urge the government, including the parliament, to act expeditiously to set up a means, whether it’s in the existing system or a special system. And I don’t think anyone will believe it’s real unless there’s actual court proceedings and prosecution. That doesn’t mean people are guilty. They’re innocent until proven so.
But certainly, trying to bring to justice some of those who acted violently and preventing them from believing that they can act with impunity is critical to Kenya, but it’s important to the United States. And it is especially concerning to President Obama. He is very proud of his Kenyan ancestry. You hear him talk about it all the time. He talks about his father’s life, he talks about his grandmother, he talks about his relatives who are here. I don’t know if any of you came to his inauguration, but 10 percent of the crowd was from Kenya and probably 80 percent of them were related to him.
So he takes our relationship very seriously and very personally, and he wants to see the reform agenda go forward and he does not believe it can go forward unless people are brought to account. So there may well be some actions that he would consider directing, but clearly we wanted to deliver a message directly from the President, which I did. And we look forward to watching what Kenya does.
QUESTION: Madame Secretary, Janine Zacharia from Bloomberg. Given that you’re standing in a corn field and that you’ve said that agriculture is a signature element of your foreign policy, I was wondering if you could comment on what seems to be a consensus among food security experts that with U.S. corn and cotton subsidies as they are, they’ve distorted the global market so much for agriculture products that it’s making it impossible for African famers to compete; in other words, that it’s not just an issue of infrastructure or disease? Do you think as part of your food security push and what you’re doing here amidst the corn that it needs to be a reevaluation of some of those subsidies? And perhaps the Kenyan agriculture minister as well could comment? Thank you.
SECRETARY CLINTON: Well, I’d also like Secretary Vilsack to comment. We are looking forward to a successful completion of the Doha round and looking at global subsidies. It’s not just the United States, as you know. A number of other countries have significant subsidies for agricultural products. And we do want to take a hard look at that.
At the same time, I want to reiterate a point that I made this morning. If African countries traded with each other, they would increase their share of global trade and increase incomes in each of those countries. It is mind-boggling that Africa trades with itself less than any other region.
So, yes, are there problems from elsewhere in the world? Of course. But the biggest problem is the 700-million-person market is not being addressed by Africans themselves. So I think there are a number of approaches we need to take.
And let me ask Secretary Vilsack to comment.
SECRETARY VILSACK: I would just add a couple of comments. First of all, Secretary Clinton suggested that we are open and taking a look at completing the Doha round, which is absolutely true. I think the United States is prepared to talk about subsidies, which you can calculate with some degree of mathematical precision. What we’re hoping to see as well through this negotiation is a continued opening of markets, of global markets for our products and for products around the world.
And secondly, I think it is appropriate to talk, as we have throughout the last several days, about a comprehensive approach to food security that does reflect on increasing the productivity of agriculture. As I speak to African agricultural leaders, they have expressed repeatedly and consistently concern about the capacity to increase productivity and the need for additional technology, the need for additional personnel and extension to their farmers, the need for appropriate fertilizer techniques, and the need to break down the barriers between their countries so that there can indeed, as Secretary Clinton suggested, be a free flow of trade within the continent.
All of that will increase the chances that children in this country and every country in Africa will be well fed. It will also increase significantly wealth-creation opportunities for this continent, which in turn will allow poverty to be alleviated. So it is a comprehensive approach that’s required.
MINISTER RUTO: The issue of subsidies is a very long debate, long drawn. I do not think it’s going to end on this platform. And it’s been there for long, and on that debate rages and goes on there is a lot that we can do to the African farmer to help alleviate the position of the African farmer in relation to food security. I think, as has been said by people here, there are very many areas that we can intervene both as governments and as regional bodies. One I strongly believe that (inaudible) varieties. It is our first priority before even we go to the debate on subsidy and that debate (inaudible) to go on. New varieties – high-yielding, disease-resistant – that will help the African farmer increase productivity; support in terms of micro-credit, support in terms of access to market, to better developed infrastructure; support in terms of access to information through technology transfer or knowledge transfer – these are the issues that are critical at the moment to the African farmer and to enhancing and increasing productivity at the moment. These are issues that are of particular concern to us as a country, issues of making sure that our farmers have relevant, cost-effective fertilizer and peat, as the program we are having today in Kenya would inform you.
But instead of arguing with others on the subsidies they are giving to their farmers, we have to look for avenues of how we want to support our own farmers. So that we can argue the issue of subsidies in another place, another day, because we cannot keep complaining and we cannot keep pointing fingers. We have a job to do. We need to feed our people. And I want to agree that we need to break down the barriers that impede trade between African countries.
QUESTION: Secretary of State, you have spoken very well about supporting agriculture in Africa, and you have spoken very well about the importance of employing new technologies in agriculture in Africa. However, these technologies, you very well understand, it’s very important that these technologies also enter the African parliament through a very strong private seed sector. And private seed sector needs to be supported in Africa – not only in Kenya – so that they can transform these technologies to farmers.
You have spoken about support given to Kenyans – to Kenya and to other African governments in terms of agriculture. What about the support that the private sector needs so that they can make those necessary investments in transforming these technologies to farmers?
SECRETARY CLINTON: I think that’s a very good point. And when we talk about a comprehensive strategy, it is not only government-to-government. It is private sector. It is nongovernmental organizations. It is civil society. So exactly what I saw when I was looking at the many different private seed companies, we will certainly look for ways to partner with you as well.
QUESTION: (Inaudible.)
SECRETARY CLINTON: I think you just have to talk in it – yeah.
QUESTION: Okay. Iran’s president was inaugurated today. I wonder – do you recognize him as the true president of Iran? And how do you think that’s going to affect your engagement efforts?
And then if I may, you came face-to-face today with the women who you saved, or who you are trying to help. Could you please give your impressions on that and whether that motivated you to go away and look at new projects, or given you, you know, new ideas? Thank you.
SECRETARY CLINTON: Well, first, with respect to Iran, obviously, United States and many countries spoke out against the flawed election and all of the irregularities, as well as the response to the legitimate demonstrations and protests of Iranians who did not believe that their votes were counted fairly and that the outcome did not reflect, in their view, the will of the people. That ferment and foment is still going on inside Iran.
We saw today a number of protestors outside the inaugural ceremonies. It is not abating. And that is for the Iranian people and the authorities to deal with, and we hope that there will be a recognition by this Iranian Government that they need to recognize the rights of the people of Iran, and to make democracy be more than just an election, and in fact, much more than a flawed election, as that last one was.
Having said that, we know that for purposes of actions in multilateral organizations like the UN, for other important matters, we don’t always get to deal with the government that we want to. It is not our choice. It is the choice of the individual countries as to how they determine their leadership. We are still clear in our policy that engagement is on the table for the Iranians, not only in a bilateral way with the United States, but in a multilateral forum like the P-5+1, which is the Security Council membership plus Germany, in dealing with Iran’s nuclear program.
But as you know, we have not received any response. President Obama has made it clear that we’re going to take stock of where we are in September, evaluate whether or not engagement is operating. If there is a response, we intend to make clear as well that this is not an open-ended process, that there has to be movement and an effort to deal with the difficult issues between us.
Now just because we have held open the door for engagement does not mean we haven’t been working as well on possible responses to either the absence of engagement or the failure of engagement. We have been consulting broadly with our allies and partners and other nations around the world about a package of both incentives and sanctions.
On the sanctions side, there is a great opportunity to the international community to stand up against Iran’s nuclear program, and to impose consequences of significance. On the incentives side, we want the Iranians to know that although they are violating international regulations and rules, and though they cannot, in our view (inaudible) view of the majority of the international community become a nuclear weapons power, that under appropriate safeguards, they would be able to have a civil nuclear program that (inaudible) include the full enrichment and (inaudible) cycle.
So I think that our policy remains the same, and we take the reality that the person who was inaugurated today will be considered the president. But we appreciate and we admire the continuing resistance and ongoing efforts by the reformers to make the changes that the Iranian people deserve.
Finally, with respect to women in agriculture, and particularly, the women I met today, they are pioneers, they’re on the front line of the changes that need to come to Africa. I meet women like them not only on this continent, but in Asia, Latin America, literally everywhere in the world – women who are taking matters into their own hands, who are willing to go where other women have not gone, who are willing to ask tough questions about why they can’t have the tools they need to make a better life for themselves and their families. I admire them deeply because it’s not easy.
The women scientists that I met today are truly breaking new ground, and that ground which they’re breaking, we hope, will be fertile ground that will grow the seeds of progress and prosperity, and that will enable the 70 percent of farmers who are women to make a contribution that will transform agriculture, add to the gross domestic product of their country, give them more income to educate their children to have a better life.
We talk a lot in diplomatic circles about government-to-government relations, and of course, they’re important. And I had an excellent series of meetings with ministers of this government. But I have always been convinced that lasting change must come from the people. And in my experience, having women involved, having them lead this change movement that is so important – and it’s no accident that President Obama was elected on a slogan of change we can believe in – it is imperative that women be part of that. Otherwise, it’s not sustainable.
So I am very committed to working with women here in Kenya and across Africa to make the difference that I know can come when we have a good partnership between governments and with the people, and that is our hope and that is our commitment. Thank you very much. (Applause.)
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