Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack was in the Peach State earlier this week talking with peanut growers and visiting an ethanol plant.

Ethanol plants in the southeast are pretty rare – in fact, First United Ethanol, LLC (FUEL) is really the only one to speak of that is operating at any capacity. FUEL is a 100 million gallon per year corn-based ethanol plant with 860 mostly rural investors from the local Georgia-Florida area. “Most of the ethanol plants in the Midwest are ‘rubber in and rail out’ and we’re sort of ‘rail in and rubber out,'” says FUEL CEO Murray Campbell. While most of their corn comes in by rail from the Midwest, they are starting to buy more local corn as farmers in the agricultural area surrounding the plant are starting to put more corn back in their crop rotation with peanuts and cotton.

Murray is pictured here (right) giving Vilsack and Congressman Sanford Bishop (D-GA) a tour of the plant on Monday.

I interviewed Murray about the timeliness of Vilsack’s visit, coming right on the heels of the biofuels initiatives announced by USDA last week, and the importance of having ethanol production in all areas of the country. Listen to or download my interview with Murray here: Murray Campbell Interview

Vilsack also visited with Georgia’s peanut growers on Monday at the American Peanut Shellers Association office in Albany at a meeting hosted by Congressman Sanford. During the meeting, the secretary heard from representatives of the Georgia Peanut Commission about their concerns that peanuts were excluded from a recent disaster assistance package, even though other commodities like rice, soybeans, cotton and sweet potatoes were included. Vilsack was also encouraged by the peanut industry to increase peanut butter purchases for federal nutrition and food aid programs, and to continue offering storage and handling in the next farm bill.

The secretary is pictured here with Tyron Spearman, who is known as “Mr. Peanut” in the southeast. Among the many hats he wears is official peanut reporter for Southeast Agnet and you can listen to his report about the peanut growers meeting with the secretary here. You can also read more about it from the Georgia Peanut Commission. Thanks to Joy Carter for the photo!