April 1, 2016
CapitalPress.com
5
NAWG’s CEO stepping down after three years
The head of the National
Association of Wheat Grow-
ers will step down May 31.
NAWG recently an-
nounced CEO Jim Palmer’s
decision to leave in a press
release.
“Jim has been a tremen-
dous and tireless advocate of
the U.S. wheat grower spe-
cifically, and the U.S. wheat
industry in general, during his
tenure as our CEO,” NAWG
president Gordon Stoner, a
Montana wheat grower, said
in a press release.
Stoner said that Palmer
“strongly desired” to reduce
or eliminate his “professional
and personal obligations” to
spend more time with his “far-
flung family.”
NAWG will immediately
begin its national search for
a new CEO and has asked
Palmer to assist the organiza-
tion’s executive committee in
managing that effort. Palmer
First Amalgamated grower
becomes ASGA president
By JOHN O’CONNELL
Capital Press
NEW PLYMOUTH, Idaho
— For the first time, an Amal-
gamated Sugar Co. member
occupies the American Sugar-
beet Growers Association’s
top post.
Galen Lee, of New Plym-
outh, was sworn in for a two-
year term as ASGA president
in February, becoming the
first Amalgamated grower to
hold the position since the or-
ganization was formed in the
mid-1970s.
“It is a watershed event,”
said Duane Grant, a Rupert,
Idaho, grower who serves
as chairman of the board of
Snake River Sugar Co., which
runs Amalgamated.
ASGA, the industry’s po-
litical arm, serves 10,000
family farmers in 11 states,
with a goal to “unite sugarbeet
growers in the U.S. and pro-
mote the common interest of
state and regional beet grower
associations.”
Lee’s schedule has been
hectic in the weeks since he
was nominated by a secret
ballot and won the ASGA
presidency uncontested. He’s
consulted on issues frequent-
ly with ASGA Executive Vice
President Luther Markwart
and traveled throughout the
country attending events.
Lee, a fourth-generation
farmer who raises beets,
peppermint, asparagus, hay,
grain, corn, beef and dairy on
1,200 acres in southwest Ida-
ho, has been president of the
Nyssa-Nampa Beet Growers
Association for the past seven
years and has served on the
board for 17 years. He serves
on Snake River Sugar’s board
of directors, and he was vice
president of ASGA before be-
coming its 21st president.
“It’s a very talented group
of board members — very
progressive,” Lee said.
Though Amalgamated is
the No. 2 beet sugar produc-
ing company in the U.S., pro-
cessing sugar for growers in
Idaho, Oregon and Washing-
ton, Markwart said it’s never
had a president due to sched-
uling challenges with growers
in the Northwest, who use
irrigation and have a harder
time freeing their schedules
will coordinate the receiving
of resumes, but not serve on
the search committee.
Palmer said it is a good
time for NAWG to have a
CEO with different skillsets.
“While financial and staff
management acumen are cer-
tainly necessary in any CEO
position, top-level agricul-
ture policy development and
advocacy experience is very
much needed by NAWG as
we enter into negotiations for
the next Farm Bill,” Palm-
er said in the press release.
“This particular skill set
would complement perfectly
our current excellent advo-
cacy and technical support
staff.”
NAWG will begin accept-
ing qualified resumes imme-
diately. Anyone interested in
the position should send a
letter of interest, resume, ref-
erences and salary require-
ments to Palmer’s attention
at National Wheat Growers
Association, 415 Second St.
NE, Suite 300; Washington,
DC 20002 or email ceo@
wheatworld.org.
NAWG
should receive resumes and
documents by May 2 to be
considered.
Palmer joined the organi-
zation in 2013. He previous-
ly spent most of his career
working for the soybean in-
dustry, serving as executive
director of the Minnesota
Soybean Growers Associa-
tion and Minnesota Soybean
Research and Promotion
Council from 1997 to 2012.
He also served as lead
staff for the Joint American
Soybean Association and
American Soybean Devel-
opment Foundation Farmer
Directors Committee and is
a past acting administrator
and executive director of the
United Soybean Board, ac-
cording to NAWG.
Business grew from salvage
yard to international player
By ERIC MORTENSON
Capital Press
Courtesy of Galen Lee
Galen Lee, of New Plymouth,
Idaho, was recently sworn in
as the first president of the
American Sugarbeet Growers
Association from Amalgamated
Sugar Co.
to travel. Typically, Markwart
said, Amalgamated growers
have served ASGA as its trea-
surer, a position that doesn’t
require them to leave home.
“This has never been about
the quality of people. Idaho has
got as good a quality of people
as anybody in the country,”
Markwart said, describing Lee
as “bright, articulate, thought-
ful and a good listener.”
Lee, who partners in farm-
ing with his parents, credits
skilled employees with making
the opportunity possible. Mark-
wart said the only other ASGA
president from the Northwest
was the organization’s first
president, Pete Funk, of Moses
Lake, Wash., who wasn’t with
Amalgamated.
Markwart said ASGA
members fly annually to
Washington, D.C., to lobby
Congress on a host of issues,
including defending the na-
tion’s no-cost sugar policy.
Lee believes the top priority in
the near future will be support-
ing passage of a voluntary na-
tional standard for labeling of
foods containing a genetically
modified ingredient.
Almost all U.S. beets are
engineered to resist glyphosate
herbicide, but Lee emphasized
GMO protein and DNA are re-
moved during processing.
Amalgamated President
and CEO said Lee’s presiden-
cy is good for both the indus-
try and Idaho. “It demonstrates
in addition to growing good
beets, we grow good leader-
ship,” McCreedy said. “He’s
going to be required to ad-
dress some of the most press-
ing issues facing any agricul-
tural industry.”
TANGENT, ORE. — From
Oregon 34, cutting west off In-
terstate 5 toward Corvallis, it
looks like a tractor graveyard.
Skeletons of old International,
Case and John Deere tractors,
combines and other farm and
construction equipment sit in
neat rows. Most have been
plucked of parts.
That was Randy Raschein
Sr.’s original vision for Farm-
land Tractor Supply when he
started the business in 1980.
A recession was draining the
country’s economic life, and
Raschein figured a tractor sal-
vage yard would find a market
with farmers who were patch-
ing old equipment instead of
buying new.
“There was a need here, for
sure,” Raschein said.
His instinct was on the mon-
ey, and the business has grown
steadily over the past 36 years.
The view of the original sal-
vage yard from the highway is
misleading, because Farmland
Tractor Supply now covers 30
acres and has two acres of cov-
ered parts storage plus a ma-
chine shop and other manufac-
turing, storage and office space.
Individual parts are tagged and
tracked by computer.
“A lot of people think it’s an
old junkyard, but it’s not,” Ra-
schein Sr. said.
The business still carries
used parts, from crankshafts to
radiators and rims, but in many
cases they were salvaged from
newer equipment that was dam-
aged in a fire or accident. Farm-
land also carries after-market
parts made by other manufac-
turers to fit various equipment
lines. The business also over-
hauls and sells engines.
A significant number of cus-
tomers are small or beginning
farmers. For them, a business
such as Farmland could fill an
important niche, said Garry
Stephenson, director of Oregon
State University’s Center for
Small Farms and Community
Food Systems.
New and small farmers are
interested in used equipment
for the cost savings and because
older equipment is often small-
Eric Mortenson/Capital Press
Farmland Tractor founder Randy Raschein Sr. takes a seat on one of his favorites, a 1941 nar-
row-tracked International Harvester that he bought used in 1963 and later sold. As a surprise, his
family found it about 10 years ago, bought it and secretly restored it before presenting it back to him.
On-line:
http://www.farmlandtractor.
com
Eric Mortenson/Capital Press
Randy Raschein Sr., founder of Farmland Tractor Supply walks
down a line of tractors in various stages of salvage. The business,
near Tangent, Ore., sells new and rebuilt parts and engines as well.
er and a better fit for the scale
of their farms, Stephenson said
by email.
Fellow OSU Extension
small farms specialist Heidi
Noordijk agreed, noting that
new farmers who don’t inherit
family gear struggle to buy new
equipment. A tractor is the big-
gest need for most farmers, she
said.
Thanks to the Internet, new
farmers and even internation-
al customers find their way to
Farmland Tractor Supply.
“We’ve sent parts to Africa,
Greenland, Australia — we had
a guy in here from New Zea-
land,” Raschein Sr. said. His
son, Randy Raschein Jr., has
traveled to China to meet with
suppliers. He’s also introduced
a new line of LED lighting sys-
tems called Tiger Lights that
can be plugged into existing
equipment and provides more
light, for longer periods, with
less demand on the tractor’s
electrical system.
Farmland remains a family
business. Randy Raschein Sr.’s
grandsons, Ty and Dustin, also
work in the business, as does
his daughter, Suzy Klein. His
9-year-old great-grandson, Wy-
att Eastman, spends time at the
business as well.
The family worked together
to pull off a surprise for Ra-
schein Sr.
In 1963, when he was farm-
ing in California, he bought an
unusual narrow-tracked 1941
International Harvester from
the U.S. Forest Service. He sold
it when he quit farming, but al-
ways retained a fondness for In-
ternational equipment. He sold
parts for them at dealerships,
including one that brought him
to work at a store in the Willa-
mette Valley before he started
his own business.
About a decade ago, his
son, Randy Jr., came across his
father’s paperwork from the
sale. He tracked down the buy-
er, convinced him to sell back
the International and set about
restoring it in secret. “I didn’t
want to let it get away,” he said.
The family hauled the re-
stored tractor to a show in
Brooks, Ore., and took Ra-
schein Sr. to look around. Com-
ing across the tractor, and not
yet knowing it was his, he ex-
pressed surprise because he’d
never seen another one. “It’s
not even in the parts book,” he
said. A sign at the display told
the story, and he happily real-
ized he’d been had.
“They rebuilt it under my
nose,” he said with a laugh.
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