Adam Torres and Dan Hunter discuss Texas FFA.
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Show Notes:
Listen to coverage from the 96th Texas FFA State Convention in Houston, Texas. In this episode, Adam Torres and Dan Hunter, Assistant Commissioner at State of Texas – Texas Department of Agriculture, explore Texas FFA and the Texas Department of Agriculture.
Watch Full Interview:
About Dan Hunter
Dan Hunter serves as the Assistant Commissioner for the Texas Department of Agriculture. He is the top advisor on the critical issues of the economy, trade, and water. He oversees matters on U.S. policy and the important role it plays in agriculture and the Texas economy. He also provides direct oversight on programs involving rural affairs, including rural health care and marketing. Hunter directs the International Marketing Programs for Texas Agriculture.
He currently serves on the Board of the Texas Wine Advisory Committee and the Texas Olive Oil Advisory Board. He also serves on the Ag Workers Insurance Advisory Board. Hunter has served on numerous international trade, commodity, policy advisory committees.
About Texas Department of Agriculture
The Texas Legislature established the Texas Department of Agriculture (TDA) in 1907. The agency’s key objectives are to promote production agriculture, consumer protection, economic development and healthy living. The agriculture commissioner oversees the agency and is elected every four years. The current commissioner, Sid Miller, was elected in 2014 and began his third term serving Texas agriculture in January 2023.
TDA is a diversified state agency that provides value-added services through our regulatory and marketing and initiatives. TDA is headquartered in Austin and has five regional service offices, two sub-offices, three laboratories and five livestock export facilities.
Full Unedited Transcript
Hey, I’d like to welcome you to another episode of Mission Matters. My name is Adam Torres, and today I am in Houston, Texas at the Texas FFA convention. This is my third convention. And my guest today is Dan Hunter. Dan. Hey, welcome back to the show. I got you on here last year. I know Aaron wrangled you for me.
He did. No, it’s great to be back. This is a lot of fun. Appreciate the opportunity to visit with folks out there that you get your podcast out to every, every day. So very excited to be here. Yeah. So Dan, maybe for some of the people that didn’t catch our episode, we did with each other last year. Maybe just talk a little bit about your role and what you’re doing.
Sure. So I serve as the assistant commissioner for the Texas department of agriculture. So commissioner for agricultural state of Texas elected position. So I’m a political appointee, but essentially what I do. is overseeing directly multitudes of different programs. But I work with the whole agency as a person who oversees all of our federal and state government relations activities.
In addition to that, a lot of people don’t realize all the different things we do at the department. So we feed about 5 million school kids every day. We’re in charge of all the food and nutrition programs in school, lunch, after lunch, or after school programs, summer feeding programs. We’re the ones who also.
Give grants out for your meals on wheels, your feeding programs for your homebound folks. In addition to that, of course, we do our part on regulatory issues, you know, pesticides, organics, grain warehouses, you know, everything from that standpoint. And then one of the things that I enjoy most about my work is I oversee our communications and external relations division, which allows us to tell a story about agriculture, which is critically important.
And helping people understand not only what we do, but how important agriculture is not only to the state of Texas, but to the world and the economy. And that, you know, there’s, there’s one thing when you start looking at security and we talk about people think of security and the thing about, you know, armies, navies and all those types of things.
But food security is as important as personal security. And what I mean by that, it’s not just about people who, you know, afford food, but it’s also being a country that can be able to produce your own food. Because once you can no longer feed and fuel yourself, you’re no longer an independent country.
And in addition to that, I get to spend a lot of time with our folks. Throughout the state on economic development. A lot of people don’t realize we oversee the state office of rural health, so all the rural hospitals in the state of Texas counties. We work with communities on economic development through federal funds.
We bring down to the community development block grant programs. Mm-Hmm. . And then in addition to that we have our Go Tex and marketing program, which is probably one of the more famous marketing programs. You see that little Oh yeah. Iconic symbol with the state of Texas and a brand on it and the go. And we help.
You know, whether it’s a mom and pop salsa company or someone who’s just starting up a new business to find a way to get their products not only on shelves in the state of Texas, but all around the world. So we spend a lot of time, I think last year we were on 26 different countries and so we try and work to put products from Texas, not only on Texas shelves and US shelves, but also around the world and give our folks an opportunity to do that.
And to be quite honest, it’s, it’s one of the easiest jobs in the world because, you Everybody wants a little something from Jackson. Oh yeah. How many I know, I know we interviewed, I interviewed you last year. How many conventions have you been to? Like, how long have you been involved in this area? You know, we’ve tried to add this up, you know.
So I was a state FFA officer 41 years ago. I know that dates me. So you’ve been to one or two? I’ve been to one or two, you know, even, even during that time. You know, I, I think we’re, I’m probably, I’ve attended probably between 20 to 25. That’s just state conventions. Y’all did a few national conventions as well, but.
Yeah, this is one of those places that you come back and you just, the energy all of a sudden captivates you once again, and it makes you realize how wonderful this group and this organization is and what a difference it makes in people’s lives, man. So I want to take you back those, you know, a couple of years ago, we’ll say to back when you were a member in the FFA.
How do you feel that helped prepare you through your life and for what you’re doing? Yeah, no doubt. And I was just speaking to the group of ambassadors and I kind of told them the story, you know, I’ve been very fortunate in the fact that I was at the ambassadors real quick for the ambassadors or the, or the folks who help with the convention, they help with special members, their members, their FFA members, their juniors and seniors in high school, very talented individuals who found a way to serve, you know, their fellow members, but also serve their communities as well.
And I think it does. You know, one of the big things that selfless service out there is a critical part of what this organization is about. And so, you know, you look at what this organization did for me and how it made a difference in my life, I’ve, I’ve. I’ve had a very varied career. I’ve had an opportunity to spend time in in government, both the beginning and end of my career working in, in both Washington, DC, I’ve had an opportunity to speak to people around the world.
I’ve had a chance to meet presidents, prime ministers, princes, kings, queens, you know, speak at the UN in Rome. I’ve been around the world multiple times. I’ve been on the tallest three buildings in the world. You know, I was in the Burj Khalifa about three months ago. And I remember sitting up there and it’s not the first time I’ve been there, but you’re out looking over at the city of Dubai and I’m going to have this kid from nowhere west Texas end up here and the answer is always the same.
And it’s that blue corduroy jacket. You see these guys wearing, you know, that had not been. For this organization, you know, there’s no reason why I would have ended up doing the things that I’ve done in my life. Why is it so important and why would the Department of Agriculture send a representative like yourself to a conference like this?
Other than your connection, like, why is it so important to have representation here? So, a couple things. I think, you know, it helps us an opportunity to visit with some of these folks that may or may not know exactly what we do at the department. But in addition to that, it gives us an opportunity to expose ourselves to these.
To these young folks and say, look, there’s always opportunities outside of, you know, just the typical farm and ranch. And what we do at the Department of Agriculture, as I mentioned earlier, isn’t just about being on the farm and ranch. It’s about economic developments, worldwide selling of products. It’s about technology.
You know, we were talking about the AI technology and the different things that we do here. You know, in addition to that, you have a, the Commissioner of Agriculture, Sid Miller, is He’s not only a true believer, but a product of the FFA. He grew up in the FFA, came up through, it was a district officer, district president, you know, he actually went after he went to school.
He was a FFA agriculture, agri science teacher for the first part of his career. So once again, it’s been you know, it’s one of those things that when you say to us, what do we do here? It’s really as much for us to get an opportunity to, to let ourselves be known to what these, what these young people do.
And then also you look around the supporters of this, you know, all the different businesses, you know, the opportunities to get the word out through. You know, Alex, such as yours, just incredible. Yeah. Do you still have fun here? Oh, I’m trying to, I try to let people know. I’m like this is, I do a lot of conferences.
I hope, hope none of them see it. And some, I have to go to, that’s my job. Right. But this one I get to, and I want to, and I turned out a lot of places to come here and they’re like, where are you going? Or what are you doing? I’m like, nope. Texas FFA. What’s that? I’m glad you asked. Anybody that’s asked, like, what’s the next generation doing?
Or are we secure? Or what’s going on? Are they this generation doing this? I’m like, come to Texas FFA and you will see a respectful young adults that yes, ma’am. Yes, sir. Like it’s a different breed. And it’s not just like a You can talk to anyone and it’s a completely different conversation that anywhere else I’ve been into in the country.
That’s right. And what I would tell people, you know, for those of you out there who feel like you don’t know where the future is going to go, you don’t understand, you know, how we’re going to, you know, what the next generation is going to be like. Yeah. Come here. Yeah. This is what is going to be the leaders of the future.
This is, these are the, these are the young folks who are going to be leaders of business. They’re going to be leaders in government. They’re going to be leaders in your community and it gives you hope. It makes you understand that what you’re seeing on the news day in and day out is not really what’s happening in a lot of places in the world.
Because you’ve got, you know, a group of 177, 000 members, 15, 000 of them are here. And like you said, every one of them are as impressive as the other, you know, where they come up and they visit with you. They want to understand and talk with you. And the energy is phenomenal. You mentioned this week. They started off with a hurricane in Houston, and you don’t see a single person complaining about that hurricane.
It’s so true. You know, they were, they were, which is unbelievable. They faced, you know, adversity. They had to rework their schedule. Some of these kids. Didn’t have a place to stay and I did an interview with this, with this young member. I did an interview with her and she, and we’re talking, talking, talking, I’m like, how are you doing?
Like, we’re, I mean, we’re probably like 80 percent done with the interview. And I finally was, I finally asked like a very direct question where she could just Give me a direct answer. Specifically on the drive in. Was it okay? Did you carpool? She’s like, Oh, well, you know, the, the car’s wrecked and this, the, I’m okay.
Everybody’s fine. Whatever. And I’m just like anywhere else, like that type of adversity, like would ruin your week. If you would have seen her, you thought she just like, it was amazing. I’m like, I was like, wow. And here I am complaining because I had my coffee an hour late, Adam. Good job. If you want to see the future, if you want to see hope, if you truly have lost hope in one.
You know, where our country’s going, come here, it’ll be restored. And last question for you, Dan, for the corporate sponsors or potential corporate sponsors, whether they’re, you know, big fortune 500 companies, whether they’re, you know, mom and pop shops, whether the midcap, whatever, why should they be in this room?
So I think there’s, it’s, it’s a multiple, multiple phrase answer. And from what I would say, first of all, is that. Going back to where I just talked about, if you want to find out and see what the future leaders of this world look like, I’m talking about business, government, those types of things, but these are actually going to be the people that are going to make a difference in what your business does in the future.
It’s, this is not you coming here to sell them. This is you coming here and having an opportunity for them to see what you do and be interested in your product. I would say this, that, you know, whether you’re a fortune 500 or you’re a mid level company, Are you just someone that’s starting out? If you want to find the best talent in the world, there’s not a better place than Texas education.
Well said Dan, well, thank you for coming back on the show. I really appreciate it. And to the audience, as always, thank you for tuning in. If this is your first time with us and you haven’t done it yet, this is a daily show hit that subscribe button or that follow button and we’ll see you next time.