Des Moines Register | February 7, 2009
Contributed By Mike Steenhoek, executive director, Soy Transportation Coalition, Ankeny

Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack's Jan. 31 essay, "Rural America Is in Need of Renewal," offered a thoughtful vision for rural development. However, his approach lacks a critical focus: Rural America must be provided with an efficient, robust and reliable transportation system to ensure continued success in our agricultural sector.

Vilsack accurately emphasizes the role of agricultural exports in ensuring rural economic vitality. However, our ability to achieve a trade surplus in agricultural products significantly depends on our unpaved roads, highways, bridges, rail system and locks and dams along our interior waterways.

Unfortunately, the transportation needs of rural America are not receiving sufficient attention by our federal and state leaders. One-quarter of our national bridge inventory is classified as either structurally deficient or functionally obsolete. Our locks and dams, particularly along the upper Mississippi River, have not received meaningful investment for decades. Our unpaved roads - the initial link in the overall agricultural logistics chain - continue to deteriorate with each passing year.

It does not require prophetic vision to foresee our competitive advantage in the export market diminishing as other nations invest in their rural infrastructure while we remain anemic in investing in ours.

I encourage Vilsack and other leaders to recognize that the path to rural renewal requires attention to the under-appreciated transportation system that accommodates the journey from farm to dinner plate.

- Mike Steenhoek, executive director, Soy Transportation Coalition, Ankeny