LITTLE ROCK — Arkansas Farm Bureau President Randy Veach, a cotton, soybean and corn farmer from Manila (Mississippi County), has been appointed to the United States Department of Agriculture’s Agricultural Trade Advisory Committee for Tobacco, Cotton and Peanuts. The appointment was announced Tuesday afternoon by USDA Sec. Tom Vilsack and U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman.

Another Arkansan, Dow Brantley of Brantley Farming Company of England (Lonoke County), was named to the Agricultural Policy Advisory Committee.

Veach and Brantley are among 130 appointees to the six ATACs and the Agricultural Policy Advisory Committee. The appointments run through 2019.

Veach is serving his seventh term as Arkansas Farm Bureau president and also served five years as the organization’s vice president. He has been on the state board of directors since December 1999.

Veach has been involved with agricultural trade missions to Mexico, China, Panama, South Korea, Japan, Belgium and Switzerland. A third-generation farmer, he and his wife Thelma farm on land cleared by his grandfather and father. He farms with his son Brandon.
Veach serves as a member of the American Farm Bureau board of directors. He also is on the Arkansas World Trade Center board of advisors. 

The advisory committee system was created by Congress in 1974 to ensure that U.S. trade policy and trade negotiating objectives adequately reflect public and private interests. The ATACs advise the Secretary of Agriculture and the U.S. Trade Representative about a wide range of agricultural trade issues.