In January the NAPB Advocacy Committee selected and supported two students to take part in the Tri-Societies Congressional Visits Day in March. Chase Krug from the University of Minnesota and Emma Shipman from UC Davis took part, and share their impressions with us here:
Emma Shipman writes:
“Our time at the Tri-Societies’ Congressional Visits Day was split into two parts. The first day, we all met the people we would be lobbying with: others from our state or neighboring states, and established the major priority in our ask, increased funding for AFRI. Our groups were typically of four people. Then, to inform our strategy, we researched the members of Congress with whom we would meet: looked at their history of introduced legislation, campaign priorities, voting records, partisan and group affiliations, and the agricultural concerns and major crops of their districts. Naturally, a different set of talking points would sometimes be called for depending on party affiliation.
The second day, we headed to the Capitol office buildings for our meetings. These were typically with staffers: some were agriculture specialists, who asked pertinent questions and requested fact sheets and statistics to help with their communication efforts. Others worked in a more general capacity in the offices and our task was to educate them while also convincing them of the importance and relevance of agricultural research, in a way that would stick with them and be passed on.
The experience was positive and high-energy. The focus was firmly on effective, targeted communication; staffers were always polite and seemed interested, so it was rewarding to see true interest or connection spark up during a meeting.”
Chase Krugman writes:
“Congressional Visit Day is an annual event hosted by the Tri-Societies which provide undergraduate and graduate students the opportunity to learn how to advocate agricultural science policy on Capitol Hill in Washington D.C. We were able to visit with legislative assistants from offices of both the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives.
Our main objective was to inform the congressional offices about the importance of robust funding for agricultural research and how those funds support their state or districts. At each meeting we requested the following asks for fiscal year 2024 appropriations: increase funding for the Agriculture and Food Research Initiative (AFRI) from $455 million to $500 million and increase funding for the Agriculture Advanced Research and Development Authority (AgARDA) from $1 million to $50 million for high risk high reward research.
We also were able to talk about priorities we would like to see in the upcoming Farm Bill such as providing permanent baseline funding to the Foundation for Food and Agriculture Research (FFAR) and increasing the AgARDA funding authorization level to $200 million per year. I was able to meet with staff from congressional offices such as Senator Tammy Baldwin, Senator Amy Klobuchar, Representative Brad Finstad, Representative Betty McCollum, and Representative Mark Pocan.
Throughout my experience participating in Congressional Visit Day, I learned the importance of having individuals with scientific expertise be able to communicate science with policy makers to better legislation and policy development. I really enjoyed this experience and highly encourage others to advocate for increased agricultural funding by contacting your local, state, and national legislators. “