please put your phones on silent. back in the day we used to tell them to turn them off but we want them on silent because would like you if you would be so inclined to live tweet this event. # is # pound and pc life. we can follow that online. we would also like to take a moment while you are silencing your phone in turning off other potentially distracting devices to introduce our head table. would like you to hold your applause until after the full head table is introduced and then you can erupt in a rapturous applause. we have starting from my left and you're right, mark heller. he's an agricultural reporter. paul marion, senior white house correspondent. tamara harlingen at the atlanta journal-constitution. sean rich, deputy commuter for secretary pretty. philip, senior editor. steven, deputy secretary of agriculture. that's the number two for sonny perdue. we have betsy martin, executive and american university cochair. skipping over our speaker for a moment, we have abby livingston, washington bureau chief at the texas room. founder of pr in the who organized today's lunch. tim murdoch, communication director for the us department of agriculture. ellen ferguson covers agriculture and trade. finally, may put in. thank you for being here today. [applause] we would also like to acknowledge additional members of the headliners team responsible for organizing today's event. lisa matthews, jamie horwitz, laurie russo and joe as well as press comes -- lindsay. percy's been a public radio audiences please be aware that in the audience today are members of the general public so any applause you hear is not the working press or even the unemployed press as occasionally the case in today's median environment. getting to our speaker. sonny perdue who joins a state. secretary pretty can be found on twitter has a lifetime involvement with agriculture for his family operated a farm in georgia and of the state that would later elect him, first republican governor since the reconstruction era. in between that he served in the us air force rising to the rank of captain, received a doctor of veterinary medicine degree from the university of georgia where he iran a private practice and also served 11 years in the georgia state senate before becoming governor. he has run small businesses and it was that background he brought to a nationwide listening tour he recently completed. today he will discuss that to her as well as his priorities on trade, what he would like to see the next farm bill and how he and the foreman of agriculture are trying to inspire the next generation of farm and agricultural leaders. please join me in welcoming to the national press club secretary of agriculture sonny perdue. [applause] >> thank you very much. i've never run for president this is my first time at the press club but it's good to be with you all today and you have shown your hospitality in many ways. many of you have talked about welcoming me and i'm happy to be here but i thought the best example of your hospitality was this cookie here. the georgi georgia bulldog and e hoping that they would be in the national championship as a former bulldog there. good afternoon and i will speak from some prepared remarks and i told mike communication guy that i would say this and he asked me not to put them in a do it anyway. i said i usually speak extemporaneously but since you people write things down i'm going to read from prepared remarks. they've been vetted from everyone from our janitor and general counsel so everybody we ought to be good today but i want to start with somewhat of a provocative premise but it might not be so provocative for the press club but something like no other federal cabinet can complain because i believe this is true. every single day every single american in every single visitor to our country is directly and tangibly affected by the work of our department in the united states of agriculture. why do i say that? because last time i checked in order to enjoy a great meal and in order to live each in this country and those that come in and be with us as well i happen to attend the g7 ministerial in italy or weeks ago and there's an international discussion about gml's and i made the comment that millions of your citizens come to our country and i don't think they bring their lunch to us. nonetheless that was not necessarily places for the e you people. but we know that even as people who send their kids to school with lunch are affected by usda policies as well and shopping in the supermarket and are affected by the usda will even take it a step further. the last time i checked we have to live and eat and breathe and then comes the us service, the forest service that capture a lot of carbon and make sure that our air is clean and so the u.s. forest service part of the usda is affected by this as well. i think hyperbole may be a bipartisan cornerstone of this time town sometimes but when it comes to personal, daily touch the usda has the lives of everyone beyond the borders and i want to submit to you today the usda matters and that is why and fascinate with the job and i'm honored be serving as the 30 for secretary and we look forward to telling you a little bit about what were trying to do in the department these days. given all of that important to them. tell you you may feel like i should come with some flashy, glitzy policy proposal today but i resolved my heart a long time ago before this job that what people want from their government is not so much talk, a revolving door case of showcase agendas but they want to see government that works for them and i tried to do that when i was governor and i think in georgia there was a governor who once iran on the slogan he's a workhorse and not a show horse and i didn't use that but i guess i probably ceded to that description as well. i think people want government that works and they don't want government necessarily that talks out of both sides of their mouth talks when they are campaigning and don't do those things that it says. what i have pledged the men and women of the united states that i would do is to make ust work for them by turning it into my aspiration the most efficient, effective and customer focused and the best managed department in the federal government. that's what i want to talk to you today. and how do we plan to that. it's a great aspiration i spoke to one group and gave them that aspiration and i used a modern metaphor is that we want to be the amazon of federal government. they said that is pretty strong and i said yes it is and were going to go big or go home and you either aspire to be the postal service. [laughter] so we want that kind of delivery of tools and solutions for people out there today. i think to me everything we do starts with the people we serve and people ask me all the time how i like being in washington as secretary of agriculture and my answer always is i love the job. some of you got that. they won't let me tell work from georgia but i'd love it even more. nonetheless, our offices here in dc and mary and i get along very fine but the fact is our people and our customers in those constituencies of the usda are not in dc and they're all over the country and that is why since taking office we have been traveling with travel to over 30 states, six countries promoting us agriculture and we have are two rv back to back to our roots to work one through wisconsin minnesota, iowa, illinois and indiana and the other one up to the northeast where we travel about 22 miles and we've got two more plans for 2018. why do we do that? because i believe that people are seriously interested in the leaders who will listen and america in the public out there and certainly our constituents is crying for people who will hear them and hear their voice and let me just give you some examples of my experiences from the road on these tours of being out in so many listening sessions sitting down with people whose livelihood and lives depend on the usda. 150 people and on a cold, snowy morning in rural upstate new york crowding into a dairy barn to hear my vision for the usda. 250 people busted out of the seams of an old machine said in rural minnesota on a late friday afternoon. 150 people on a sunday afternoon session in the central valley of california. 800 folks showed up and filled a gymnasium floor in rural montana. one hundred people filled the front lawn of the farm bureau in rural massachusetts on a gloomy thursday afternoon. 500 people filled a rodeo floor in kansas city with virtually no notice. one hundred people filed under a tent in a cornfield almost an hour outside of springfield, illinois. just on friday 120 college kids interested in the future and agriculture came to visit and have a roundtable at florida and am in tallahassee, florida. it goes on and on of the kind of hunger we see out there and how we in the united states government particularly the united states department of agriculture relate to people on the farms and fields in the communities of america. i don't say the things just to indicate how busy i have been but i say those things to let you know that people want to hear and they want to see people out there working. they are merely emblematic of our hungry how american people are in this town to listen to them. they want us to quit talking to them and to listen and that's what i have enjoyed doing. to understand their issues and work toward common solutions and i think it's fairly fair to say that their demand was pent up. would be the best description. folks believe that they have found an honest listener and an honest broker and the secretary of agriculture and one wants to hear from them and to listen to their issues and to listen to their problems and hopefully work to solve some of them. i think this gives me a unique perspective of preserving two different worlds. one is the world of washington and of politics and you know it well and it's here and alive and wellin the other world is the world of real people out there outside of this area that don't know about what goes on here and honestly i don't want to hurt your feelings but they don't really care too much. when i travel across america i don't get questions about the things that everyone in washington seems to be talking about. i don't get asked about the latest scandal i don't get asked even about the president's twitter account and the latest plates. i don't want to burst your bubble but those are the things that seem to be important people in this town which are never mentioned when i go and listen to people outside. those are not the things that are on the minds of the american people generally. went 100 or 100 people get out on a freezing cold snowy morning in rural upstate new york to talk to me about agriculture or 60000 young people join me in indianapolis where the they are pretty serious about what they do and what their aspirations are for their lives and how they can participate in the american dream. what are those folks saying i guess if i've been out there doing the listing what are they saying? and you may know that one of their top issues is trade. many of them are anxious about trade in our trade policy but because of this. exports are responsible for more than 20% of the us foreign income almost 20 cents of every farm income dollar derives from foreign sold products. it also drives rural economic activity and sports more than a million american jobs both home and off the farm. the 2014 farmville calls for a new position of undersecretary for trade and foreign agricultural services in that position is not created until we got here in may. i thought hearing for members of congress upon my confirmation and hearing from the people out in the field that i believe in the trade important and i know from our experience in my experience that trade is important. we created the position and invited the president nominated trent mckinney from indiana to fill that position and he hit the ground running. we met this morning to hear about his latest trip to come will be out in panama and brazil in just a few weeks he's already lost 30000 miles airport wise. he is on the road hitting the ground or fine, i guess. exports are important and last year the us exports totaled a little under hundred $40 billion and that's up 10.9 billion from the previous year and the third highest level on record even in spite of lower commodity prices. when you look at exports in terms of dollar terms it's responsible because you got different price points to deal with. read our lowest point in one of our lowest points in quantity points but experts are third highest. it's projected over [inaudible] which is right on track for the fy 17 and would be the fourth best year on record. the overall agricultural surplus is expected to grow 8% from 21.3 billion to more than 23 billion in 2018. our president, as you know, is concerned about our trade deficit and i'm prone to remind them every time i'm in his presence that agriculture contributes to a trade surplus and he needs to recognize that. we also have had great victories and trade that you have read about. we succeeded in hitting us meat back to china in the first time 13 years. we opened china's american rights for the first time ever and were still working out some of those smaller details but we've got us port back into argentina for the first time since 1992 in the european union, plus their heart, have dropped the requirements in the us citrus groves we surveyed individually for citrus canker which eases the entry of us citrus under the eu market and it saves thousands of dollars in practice cost. japan expanded market access for us potatoes and resuming imports from idaho for the first time in 11 years. vietnam is also on the notified the us they will resume imports of distiller drives and the south korea has lifted its ban on imports of the us poultry and poultry products including fresh eggs. all those are good news but we want more. i'm a growing kind of guy and i think we should [inaudible] i think if american farmers produce it the usda ought to be helping to sell it and that is what undersecretary mckinney is all about. i suspect that more than a few of you will ask me about nafta if i don't address it now. i intend to frankly ask santa claus for perfect trade deal wrapped up in icing and put under the tree for all american farmers but then i remembered the north pole might be too close to canada for those things to turn out well for us but all joking aside let me say this that i remain optimistic about the future of our trilateral trade relationship and i like to say and this is not original with me but if you look at mexico and the united states and canada i think we live in the best neighborhood on the planet and to have a deal that would take advantage of those relationships logistically in the common north america makes all the sense in the world. we know that agriculture in all three countries has benefited from nafta and we believe we modernizing and readjusting in some tweaking it can continue on. that is very important for our department and we know that president trump is a tough negotiator and we know he puts america first but at the end of the day we will wind up with a renewed nafta that is better for american producers. our official motto is because of the economy of the us and the economy of agriculture and how it fits in the us economy i think this is the official motto of the usda is agriculture is the foundation of manufacture and commerce. that's a pretty powerful statement when you think about it about the relationship between the agricultural economy and overall economy. we too are a lot of great facilities and that was one in illinois that created and manufactured sprayers and there's the progress of technology in agriculture blows you away and they were designing a sprayer now with optical sensors that detected the noxious weeds in which you spray the chemical on the noxious weeds and those are the kind of things that are happening out here in america. many people don't understand but the bottom line is a healthy agricultural economy is imperative for the rest of our economy to thrive as well. trust me, our producers will do their part in that progression. we need a fair conditioning nafta agreement that to continue that. as far as trade goes to make terrific progress but i feel comfortable that we will reach a deal and hope tough things on the table as we should but i think we will reach a deal that works for everyone. secondly, we have a foreign bill coming up very soon, 2018 and i believe the chairman feel like they are on track. they have done a lot of work in that area and so senator grassley things were behind but senator grassley has a lot of opinions. anyway i think were on track for a good farm bill. the good news about it is i don't think there will be a revolutionary deal, randy, i think the 14 farm bill will be revolutionary talking and there a couple of places that didn't make it quite as good as many people had hoped and that's the dairy industry in the con industry and i thank you see some things to address that but i believe it will work. at the usda will provide the background and the research and the resources and the feedback that we hear from the heartland and all these listening sessions so that our members of congress that are responsible for the farm bill can make good on a backspace data driven farmville based on what we heard in our traveling's, we are working on what we think is the right approach from the usda in the relationship that congress will be providing them with what we believe are the basic bedrock pistols that make a good farm bill. i think that some of these principles are just the direct result of what i heard from the people of agriculture during my travels and they are the ones that live with these policies day by day. they are the ones that have to execute the policies that we create and frankly, i believe they have some of the best ideas and what works from previous farm bills and what does not work, as well. we'll be talking about a few of those principles across all of our missions and all of our response place. i don't think for 2018 farmville will have a radical departure in changes and we will make some improvements in some of those areas but it's ultimately up to congress to decide what they want us to implement and we stand ready to provide whatever counsel congress may believe in may require as our opinion of these things. you may remember on the day i was sworn in president trump signed an executive order and that was for agriculture and rural prosperity. i think one of the primary purposes of any farm bill is to support rural america which remains the backbone and the breadbasket of this country. when the president signed that executive order creating a task force on agriculture and rural prosperity he asked us to cheer that and we had a great relationship with 22 other federal agencies about how we can make a difference in rural america. it is frankly true when you look at the numbers of much of america has recovered or certainly is in the beginning stages of recovery from the great recession but unfortunately that doesn't seem to be true in rural america. progress is lagging behind their while a population is growing in urban areas and suburban areas the population is across rural america stagnant or even diminishing. we've got to do a better job and i think it's the responsibility of the usda to do a better job in providing the hope and economic opportunity for those in rural america and those involved in agriculture. during our rv tours and other visits we listened and held town hall meetings together to gain information working with my counterparts from other cabinets we came up with report after the hundred 80 day timeline to submit to the white house and it will be released soon. they are reviewing that now and we've got specific executable action items that we think will be helpful and will be making specific recommendations on how we think we can help rural america succeed and the price and that includes things like access to capital, infrastructure improvements and i don't want to preempt that stay tuned for that report. as many as you know, early on in my time as secretary i announced a broad reorganization of the usda and a part of that was to approach the way we deal with an interface with perl development. we elevated our rural development to senior persons to be an office the reports write directly to the secretary. i wanted that person to happen we call walk-in privileges to come in and discuss ideas off the cuff, not to make an appointment or schedule but to come in and say we've got this idea and would like to do this and what you think and get to a go, no go pursuit of those ideas and decisions right away. i consider this to be an elevation of rural development and i think it's turned out that way and the senate committee is doing a great job and we look forward to having great things from our rural development staff across the country. next is will be heard also from trade and labor and regulation a lot and as we run across in his you talk to farmers it's inevitable they will eventually complain to you about regulations and as you know one of the first actions of the president took through our director of bpa was to rescind the onerous waters of the us rule and that is being reconsidered but most farmers and farm groups feel like this is an extremely onerous type of rule that will damage the way they farmed in a fairly significant way. an executive order, president trump, directed each agency to review and to consider reversi reversing, reducing those type of regulations and for every regulation, every regulatory action, we are under the obligation to the regulatory action so these actions have a real impact and not just bureaucratic shell games. the total regulatory cost must be offset by savings from the regulatory actions and we are reporting the actual cost savings of deregulation to the president for this fall agenda we have submitted 28500 the regulatory actions in these actions we believe, by our calculation, will generate measurable cost offset totaling 56.15 million in annualized savings. one of those regulations has to do with our relationship with the states. this president and this administration understands we all serve the same people and they are inviting county commissioners, governors and to have an integrative relationship of across the levels of government that i've never seen before and i'm envious frankly of a former governor to have that kind of relationship with the federal government. in states i believe we understand are closer to the people they serve and not all states are the same. our policies need to recognize that reality and maximize the flexibility the state is when were altogether possible. one of my first actions as secretary is to provide flexibility to the state and local school systems regarding school lunches. this got generated by childhood friend of mine who told me after i was nominated he said i told my granddaughter what the responsibilities of the secretary of agriculture were and i told her it included a school lunches. she said great and you think mr. soni can make school lunches great again? that is the way those things happen. we are also when i start talking with the school lunch professional we found out how the professional nutritional and dietitians were spending more time in front of a spreadsheet than they were in the ability to do their job and we gave them flexibility. we also will allow states, as you have read recently more flexibility in the snap program. we told the states the goal of the snap program is to provide support for families as they are strengthened and enabled for self-sufficiency. we want to states to have the flexibility and structure their program to provide the best customer service and delivery the snap nutrition to maintain the integrity of the system by reducing fraud and ultimately help the families to grow stronger and more self-reliant. one organization that we don't think of is regulatory but if you really think about it you know this and one of the most important regulatory agencies that is the irs. our farmers will benefit from what is happening right here on capitol hill now with the tax bill and the tax code is on farmers and small businesses and frankly it's greater than the numbers on the spreadsheet by the time they have to plan while we think of farming you know, sort of spiritually as a lifestyle it's also a business. if you are not profitable you don't get to do it very long. our farmers will benefit from the provisions of the tax bill and also benefit from the reduction of the cost of time, creative thinking, innovation, positive vision. it's dropped by having to plan for taxes and all those things. it just cannot be totally quantified in those areas but they are real. tax reform, i believe, will be a great christmas president for the american people. i think and i want to applaud president trump and i think he is probably done what some people didn't think could be done and he shown great leadership and i'm impressed with the regular order that this has been done with through the house passing a bill, the senate passing a bill and now you have a conference committee in a way things used to be done up here. you don't see that happening very rarely any longer but this is the way it is happening in the president has been very involved individually with members of the house in the senate and were hopeful that congress can come to terms with the final bill so the president can consider very soon. when i told you that i expect my aspirations for the usda to be the most effective and most efficient and most customer focused department in the federal government i want to tell you it starts with good people and you've heard steve introduced and i'm very proud to have steve on board with implementing our new operating model for usda and it's a cultural change and were going up and down the ladder, overall and he's working hard to do that. when i interviewed steve he had been the ceo of the american soybean association for 20 years. i said that's admirable to stay in an organization like that for 20 years and how big is your board and he said 48. i said you had 48 farmers to rotate on a two-three year basis and he managed to hurt them for 40 years you can do this job. and he is doing it. what he and i are determined to be backspace data driven, sound science decision-makers with the customer focus. some of you have heard about and i was telling some of you about the geewhiz kind of technology out there and we've got farmers out in the field with some of the latest and greatest satellite gps technologies on their combines and equipment and they have yet to fill out a paper form and mail to deliver or fax it to the usda office. we don't have that technology there. we've got farmers sitting there on combines in their autonomous driven tractors and faxing and e-mailing and doing apps on everything else but if they want to see us they've got to come to town and get out of that and stop working. that is not customer focused note customer friendly. we have the human resources to make improvements possible and i've been so pleasantly surprised are career employees at the usda. they are dedicated and we were delighted just a week ago to hear that our employers are among the top ten places to work in the federal government and moving up two notches to come in at seven place in the 2017 rankings. just think what happened there. they are customer focused in naming business for our customers and they make the us a better place to work as we give them the tools they can work better with focus on that customer. our twitter handle was mentioned and we have a lively twitter feed at secretary sonny shows about all the places we go and people love to see that and if you look at it you will see that some of my most fun people are ffa and four aged students. they are bright and passionate and i enjoy being around them. it gives me inspiration for the future of america and agricultural particularly. we have a lot of fun with them in at the convention i said i know most speakers don't tell you to this but get out your phone and treat and tell me what state you are. in a matter of a few minutes we had 300 feet talking about where they were and where they were competing and is fun to see that. i exhorted them to meet not only production is but agricultural producers but to be communicators. no longer can we sit behind our fences and farms and gates and just do a great job producing but we've got to communicate the story, the greatest story, of american agriculture. that is what were doing in florida a&m and tallahassee last week talking about those people those young people there with the opportunity to indicate what agriculture is all about. they had wonderful research and plant science and soil science so many other things that are happening that many people do not know about. they also had great innovative ideas about how to get the message across and to engage and encourage bright agriculture. the actually suggest institutions incorporate agriculture in their majors such as business and engineering in stem classes because you get all those things in agriculture. usda we are committed to help the next generation of farmers and we signed an m.o. view with fsa were committed to leadership development because i tell them, as young people, their future is not in the future but it is now. begin using it in and join it. you can tell that i love this job, being secretary of agriculture, it's not just a job. it's a mission, passion for me and that's why mary and i chose to leave 14 grandchildren in georgia to come for a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to make a difference for helping rural people to prosper, to feeding everyone, preserving our nation's poorest in our mission at the usda is large and bold. in some ways, as it earlier we touched the lives of americans and countless others around the world on a daily basis. i'm proud and humbled to serve as president trump's administration in the american people and with that, i wish you all a merry christmas. thank you. [applause] >> thank you for speaking with us. we now answer the question and answer period of this program. if you can stay at the microphone apparently the national press has to fight you have to go back and forth like this all the time. congratulations on the innovation. also, we still have the question cards that members of the audience can pass up and you can go to # and pc live. first question you alluded a bit to the people outside of washington for whom your steep policies really matter. usda may matter in many ways for 40 million americans who currently use food stamps, the supplementary assistance program. you talked about state flexibility with snap and we heard in recent days the president may be looking at a top to bottom review of the social services programs of which snap would be included starting in january. do some of the efforts that you have on flexibility play into what this effort to be and what you see as changes to some of the snap program in usda under a presidential top to bottom review. >> sure. that is speculative to think about the president and his team are looking at welfare reforms generally. we know that the snap program currently is included in the farm bill and that's how we will proceed until something else comes about. the overall goal if you go back to the most thing in the most important thing is to go back and read the initial statutory language dealing with food stamps or supplement or nutrition and it stated in their very clearly this was a temporary, supplemental type of thing hopefully guiding and leading people to self-sufficiency and self-reliance and that is what most american people the american people are generous and compassionate and they want to help people when they are down and i think most american people don't believe if you are able that should be a permanent lifestyle so i think one of the things that you will see probably is a change regarding the ability for able body, working adults without dependents to rely on food stamps continually. i think those are some of the waivers that we are getting and seeing as well as others but it's considered a route to self-sufficiency whether farmville, snap program here or in a comprehensive welfare program to follow. one area that is not is how [inaudible] there's a long-standing coalition of nutrition advocates in farm groups that have come together to pass this bill. snap being the part largest usa program. the significant to the sample and potentially mean a disruption to the farm bill? >> i think you're right. the coalition of passive farmville for years and it will be maintained and sustained. interesting the principle i told you changes is not necessarily a partisan issue. some people may object but by and large there's a bipartisan group of people that believe able-bodied adults without dependents should not rely on a supplemental nutrition efforts from the american public forever and i think that is a provision that will not be totally disruptive to the principles of the combination of the farm bill provisions as well as the supplemental nutrition bill. >> final question. there have been reports that the usda is considering allowing states to place nutrition limits on the food stamp program. i.e. limiting sodas and snacks purchases. can you confirm those discussions and what type of change can we see administered on your own watch within the snap programs? >> i can confirm those requests. obviously we have a couple of waivers submitted already regarding limiting the purchase of those types and it's a popular thing and some camps. my concern obviously when we usda administers that where do you draw the line with different states. for instance, if one state says you shouldn't have meet and you shouldn't be able to purchase meat protein, animal protein there is that appropriate or you have obviously the things that suggested mostly our sugar drinks and snacks and salty snacks and those kind of things that we deem unhealthy and that is one thing but what about you should not have any products that have genetically engineered products in it and what about animal welfare issue? any eggs that aren't q3, no meat or pork that's not produced in this ultimate humane provision. where do you draw the line? it is a slippery slope that we will have to consider very carefully. >> turning to other issues in monitoring the discussion -- here's another # for you. farmers for nafta which is a prison in recent days. it's a mitigation form for those who seem worried about the presidents threats to withdraw from the accord. should they be worried about that and in what role are you playing in the white house discussions in the matter? >> where do you join farmers for nafta? i mention this in my remarks and i appreciate the fact that president trump is a tough negotiator on the path of america. i like a leader who believes in our nation and believes in his people and believes in productivity and believe that we have been unfairly taken in some places on some of the agreements that we have made in particular in an enforcement area. i'm confident that president trump will not send an agreement between canada and mexico and nafta that benefits the american people or benefits the american producers and while there may be some anxiety along the way i think that his negotiating style is right in line with what we can expect to be a great nafta that will benefit american farmers and producers. >> all in all you seem to be getting along with the president okay, especially in comparison with some colleagues i.e. rex tillerson, just sufficient and can you discuss how you mitigate with president trump when you potentially disagree or have different perspectives such as nafta? >> he loved me. [laughter] the president is an interesting person and you see the public persona. i think he benefits. one of the things i appreciate about president trump as directive and is forward and as forceful as he is on many things he asked what i think defines the essence of a great leader. he always leaves a little back door open for comments he takes into consideration and is willing to change his mind on that. i don't do this very often but we were invited to have lunch with him yesterday and we were there and he talks and mention the fact early on that he was very proud of the fact that he had drafted the withdrawal from nafta agreement that way and i came in and we showed him some of the facts of what nafta had done and how it had benefited and he relented and changed his mind. i think the essence of a good leader. i like to be forceful and i like to have a vision and i like to have a goal of prime going from or going to but i always have to listen in the back and i found that to be true of the president. we have a great relationship. he doesn't want and i don't think he wants a sycophant as a secretary. he wants me to give him his best counsel and advice and he wants me to be right about that. he has high expectations and frankly i'm challenged by those high expectations. >> what will you be counseling him regarding the usda does not impact that statement but ted cruz had put a hold on one of your nominees and [inaudible] that has led to a new discussion of renewable fuel standard with the council be to the president giving that you [inaudible] >> the president during his campaign made a commitment to the people in the renewable fuel standard that i think the phrase was don't mess with our fs and he reiterated that and again to senator grassley and senator ernst debbie fisher about his commitment to that and he did this with senator cruz and a number and they were particularly concerned about the crisis and the president understands that we've got to do something about the crisis and the good news is there's a win-win. it's very complex there's a win-win. ethanol produces the corn people and they are not in it for the prices but for the volume in the renewable volume over ethanol production and they want to be carefully guard that we've got to figure out and working even this week with the people that senator cruz, his people in others, epa and others to help resolve the crisis that some believe to be very speculative and partnering on the market there that have damaged the refiners and the refiners to flourish and more refinery based on our new petroleum supplies and natural resources but he also knows that he's committed and he articulated to those senators that he is committed to the rfs program and i think the numbers that administrator pruitt put out last week are the appropriate ones and we hope to be part of the solution of the concern for the refiners as we well. >> [inaudible] how closely have you been in consultation with the congressional agriculture committees on the farm bill? what possibility you may provide some of your own legislative language? >> we are consultants to the committees as they desire. we will be is hands off for hands-on as they choose for us to be. i think they understand based on what you've heard the litany of visits that you heard that we have information out here of what farmers believe is working and what is not work. willing to share that. as i indicated earlier will release we think is the appropriate dance between the usda and congress and i don't think it's the responsibility of the usda to write a farm bill. i don't think it's responsibly to be hands-on. he will give broad principles that we think should be included in the farm bill and we will go further. at the request will do a deep dive based on the facts and the data that we have to support our views over those principles. i will give you a little metaphor that i think of farm bill should contain is a good safety net for producers. i heard this and it's not original to me to think about a safety net think about going to the circus and looking at a high wire act, a trapeze act. if the net is put right under the wire there's not much thrill there but if it's put on the concrete floor you could get really hurt. the balance is to have it at the right area for there's risk in farming, farmers don't mind risk they just don't want to lose the farm literally if the crop for whether or hurricanes or floods come in and destroy all of their equity. >> a few more minutes for questions. feel free to bring in and submit some more questions from the audience. please write legibly. it greatly increases your chance of having a question asked. here is one from the audience. dealing specifically with crop insurance which will undoubtedly be a large conversation in the farm build. will usda do with 1.4 billion it seems to be saving from plant printing press mark what happens is the aftermath of that policy? >> i guess you are referring maybe to the up charge or the up purchase of the 10% on preventive planning but if you can help me find that $1.4 billion i'd like to know where that is. that is not our calculation so whoever wrote the question, if i contacted you "after words", tell me where the $1.4 billion is and i'll tell you what will do that. >> another question dealing with the farm bill on which funding and dealing with international agricultural development. the us for decades has been a leader in supporting developing world through the land-grant university and research programs worldwide. how does that vision of helping developing world farmers sits with the presidents america first vision in a more competitive agricultural landscape? >> i think it fits with his vision and i think we probably have some persuasion to understand what the opportunities are for investment in our land-grant and developing farmer perspective. i told the president face-to-face that if american manufacturing had the same level of basic research in agriculture applied research in agriculture and delivery system like the extension service i don't think we'd be talking about the demise of american manufacturing. i'm a big believer and proponent in user of the extension service in the land-grant university along with agricultural research service i believe it's a great partnership for discovery that i think what we're seeing with the productivity of american agriculture is exhibit a for what that is meant to american farmers. >> discussing an issue that certainly came up in her discussion outside of washington and one that is ravaging world america is the opioid crisis. recently in a unified effort the american farm bureau released the results of survey on farmer opioid addiction which shows startling numbers. farmers three times as likely to report an addiction as a general tuition. what role does the usda play in this challenge facing farmers and ranchers in the real communities they live in? >> sadly, these are true numbers and this is one of the reasons why i charged stan our director, to develop a cooperative program other agencies and federal government. we don't want to throw money unnecessarily but whether it be rural treatment centers, helping in rural communities mrs. an addiction that is just as rampant in rural as in suburban and areas and i know secretary bella sec told me earlier that this is something they've worked on and we hope to be a part of the solution. any drug addiction is no silver bullet. it takes a lot of things but again i think the improving of the economy in the rural economy will help in the hope and diminish much of the despair that leads to certainly prescription drug addiction leading to opioid addiction. >> next month the trump administration will be one year old. you were the last cabinet secretary to be sworn in and pace of hiring at the usda, you remarkable times, has not been at the pace would like to see. we some reinforcements arriving but several positions still open. one of them is the undersecretary position for research in education which has been the nomination and he later withdrew. what progress is the administration making specifically on naming the nominees for this post and will this person have scientific background? >> this progress -- yes. >> to expand. >> certainly, after doctor clovis withdrawal we were looking strongly across the united states the best person with a scientific background the pulls away the committee that can have no questions about that. as you might know academia can be a comfortable environment. it's not very many people who want to leave a good safe, tenured home in academia to come to a political position. we think there are people out there that we are looking at right now that would make a great chief scientist for the department of agriculture. >> how comfortable are you feeling at usda patrick what is your big goal for the next year? >> i'm feeling good. our goal this year, next year, the year after this to be the most effective, most efficient, most customer focus and the best managed federal agency you have ever seen. not by what my communications people say that we will be judged by you. >> take you for speaking with us today, secretary produced. but we are not done with you yet. [applause] do not be seated. we still have the tradition, long-standing tradition, we give this to all of our speakers and we hope that this be the first of several that you can receive. some people get entire dinette sets by the time your out of office. this is the esteemed prize national press club bug. >> thank you very much. [applause] >> we are still not done with you. yes, we have final announcement that we have the other tutors which is our final question. before we conclude our program with the final question we want to know an upcoming headliner event that we don't want you to miss. walter isaacson, former editor of time and former chairman of cnn and the president talked about cnn? >> never heard of it. [laughter] >> reasons to get along with the president. walter isaacson, former editor of time and former cnn german will be discussing his new book leonardo da vinci, have you heard of him? >> even though i went to university of georgia, i have heard him. >> you said it here first. on december 18 for more details please go to the national press club website. one of the things we try to do here at the national press club, 110 organization which recently elected a new president we want to congratulate andrea snyder as well as all of the other folks who are officeholders and have a trust in this challenging time for journalism one of the things we like to do is stay timely and go with current events. you are a former governor of georgia. understanding that all states are not the same. i've had to dealt with iowans as the native minnesota in and i'm on this lots of times over the years. there's an important election going on to one state to your west in alabama. i'm not going ask you to even to get the race but as a state official in state government and iran estate in the southeast for two terms i'm wondering what your thoughts are in terms of how in the president political environment local and state races will get nationalized. when alabama voters are going into the voting booth today how much is the national attention going to matter and what sort of message could result in alabama in any case potentially means the nation? >> that is a great question. probably more than we think. again, that is the washington bubble versus the outside. i'm not sure a lot of people in alabama are thinking about the national consequences. as a former governor having run twice, i'm a big believer in the ballot box and i think alabamians will vote for what they believe is in their best interest and to practice what people outside of alabama thing. i think i was sharing with my lunch partners here today that we see this in the presidential office years and president obama, while popular in his two runs, we didn't see any transfer in the off years and back, just the opposite in that regard. i don't think there's a lot of nationalization even though the press, you all love to write about that i don't think when the voter goes in the voting booth they think about that nationalization or what it means to president trump what it means to president obama or that. i think they're voting for what they believe is their right as a voter to select their representatives in congress. >> once again, please offer him a want of applause secretary of agriculture, sonny perdue. [applause] thank you so much for being here today at the national press club luncheon. once again, coming back for the special event for secretary of agriculture again, thinking the members of our headliner steam who are responsible for this event as well as the national press club staff led by our executive editor. also, once again, don't forget to miss walter isaacson former editor of time and former cnn increment discussing leonardo da vinci on december 18. more details at www. press .org. this is going to be one of the last luncheons of this year. check on the national press club events on the calendar for next year. once again on behalf of the national press club today's meeting of the national press club is adjourned. [applause] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] >> we will take you back to capitol hill just a few minutes. the senate is in recess so

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