Little Hope for Reformers in Obama’s Ag Sec Pick

President-elect Obama is expected to announce his candidate for Secretary of Agriculture today, former Iowa governor and Democratic presidential candidate, Tom Vilsack. Although a champion of shifting some money from traditional agricultural programs such as commodity subsidies into environmental management payments, and not the worst possible pick for Agriculture Secretary, Mr. Vilsack is still essentially a friend of the farmer. He believes that the federal government should play a role in agriculture. And he is a strong supporter of "food and energy independence," a wrong-headed policy that is a farmer-welfare program in disguise.

Mr. Vilsack will be expected to support Mr. Obama's "green energy" stimulus plans for creating "green jobs." To his credit, he has advocated phasing out subsidies to corn-based ethanol (a brave stance for an Iowa man) and last year endorsed removing the tariff on Brazilian sugar-based ethanol. Having said that, he has been described as "sympathetic to big agribusiness" and "'a very articulate spokesperson' for agricultural interests".

If one were hoping for a radical change in direction in U.S. agriculture policy, the Obama administration is unlikely to provide it.