When he’s not busy investigating cover crops or helping to forge an expanded East Coast broccoli industry, Thomas Björkman serves as National Issues Task Force chair for the American Society for Horticultural Science.
On April 25, Björkman was part of an ASHS delegation that visited the offices of 21 Senators and members of Congress, and attended the Horticulture subcommittee hearing on the 2013 Farm Bill.
At the visits to New York members Reed, Maloney, Collins and Gillibrand, Cornell horticultural research and extension were warmly praised and favorable funding for our work enthusiastically supported, reports Björkman.
The delegation also met with Krysta Harden, Sec. of Agriculture Vilsack’s Chief of Staff (right). “We discussed the Secretary’s intention to plan for who our farmers will be in 2062 (USDA’s bicentennial), how they will be trained and what support resources they will have available,” says Björkman.
