When one cow was found with BSE in 2003, many of our trading partners closed their borders to our beef.

The president has been a true friend of the ag industry, because he continues to invest large amounts of money at a time when savings is really the goal of the federal government to deal with the deficit.

We're going to do everything possible to make sure that food safety is always paramount, and that we work with the industry as aggressively as we can to make sure that we're paying attention to the food-safety issues.

The goal is to normalize trade relations based on sound science and consumer protection.

On the professional side, those 18 years on the farm instilled my love for agriculture.

There is a tremendous amount of support for the approach we have taken, which again is to base our decisions on risk analysis and thoughtful scientific process.

Fortunately, when it comes to meat and poultry, I have the really wonderful situation of having producers and processors that produce and process a very high-quality product.