‘A Huge Success’: MSGA Starts New Conversations During Annual Hill Visits

Feb 23, 2024

As the nation’s longest-running state soybean advocacy group, a dozen directors from the Minnesota Soybean Growers Association (MSGA) met with a slew of state legislators for the first time during its annual Hill Visits in St. Paul on Feb. 21. For farmer leaders, the initial conversations offered a platform to explain to legislators the basics on MSGA’s mission and policy priorities.

“Our Hill Visits were a huge success,” MSGA President Bob Worth said. “Not only did we get to see both sides of the aisle a lot, but we got to see people we’d never seen before. We had lots of good feedback through these new conversations.”

In 2024, MSGA is working to build on – and protect – its policy wins from 2023 while continuing to improve the outlook for Minnesota’s 25,000 soybean farmers. And with over 30 one-on-one legislative meetings during its Hill Visits, MSGA spread its messaging to both sides of the aisle.

“We want to thank MSGA for their advocacy and support,” said Andrea Vaubel, Minnesota Department of Agriculture deputy commissioner. “We’re excited to work with you on opportunities at the Port of Duluth and the amazing inroads we’ve made in Morocco.”

The push to B100

Biodiesel has been a big-ticket item for MSGA for two decades, beginning with the landmark move to B5 in 2005. This session, MSGA farmer leaders are encouraging any and all biodiesel implementation avenues, including the adoption of B100 (100% biodiesel) in state trucks, especially snowplows, through Optimus Technologies.

“We are drumming up support for B100,” said Jamie Beyer, who represents Minnesota on the American Soybean Association. “Farmers need to be part of the cutting carbon conversation; we’re part of the solution.”

Cities in states surrounding Minnesota have already started upgrading dozens of multi heavy-duty vehicles to B100 (100% biodiesel) to reach net-zero emission goals. Biodiesel is already cutting carbon in Minnesota; if the state wants to meet its environmental goals, it can continue to lead by adopting B100, MSGA Treasurer Ryan Mackenthun told Sen. Bruce Anderson.

“We already have the technology, and it’s reliable,” said Mackenthun, who farms in Brownton. “Biodiesel brings back value to rural Minnesota and our farmers.”

Talking shop

While on the Hill, MSGA highlighted the pressing need to continue addressing deer depredation. Farmers from across the state have reported substantial yield losses and damages totaling tens of thousands of dollars. In 2023, MSGA sought a bill that would assist Minnesota farmers whose operations and feed storage areas have been decimated by deer. Though the legislation didn’t pass, MSGA is continuing to urge legislators and state agencies to find solutions and assist affected operations.

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Video: From Students to Solutions | On The Brink: Season 2, Episode 14

Ask Canada’s most decorated soybean breeder his favourite part of the job and he doesn’t name a single variety. He names the students.

Istvan Rajcan is a professor of soybean breeding and genetics in the Department of Plant Agriculture at the University of Guelph, where he has run the soybean breeding program for 28 and a half years. In that time he has developed 87 soybean cultivars, published 140 refereed papers and trained 51 graduate students. In 2025 he received the Public Sector Impact Award from the National Association for Plant Breeding.

He is also worried. In this episode he says Canada is at a crossroads, pointing to recent government cuts to plant breeding programs and to the facilities that support them. His prescription is structural. "Plant breeding funding formula has to be a long-term one," he says.

The formula he is defending is the public-private matching arrangement his program runs on. Private seed companies fund the work, provincial or federal money matches it, and the combined pool stretches each dollar further than either source could alone. At the National Association for Plant Breeding annual meeting in June, he says American public breeders were often surprised at how well that collaboration works in Canada.

He also describes how the people entering plant breeding have changed. His early graduate students came mostly from farms. More recently they include, in his words, "city kids who just became excited about genetics."

Topics covered:

Why public-private plant breeding funding in Canada needs a long-term

commitment rather than a larger one

How matching private seed company investment with provincial and federal

dollars multiplies research capacity

How the graduate student pipeline into plant breeding has shifted from

farm kids to city kids