IN THE SPOTLIGHT

Larry D. Steward
President and CEO
Minn-Dak Farmers Cooperative

"NAFTA, GATT, WTO, sugar finding
a way into this country by circumventing
trade barriers are all impacting the
American sugar industry. "
- Larry D. Steward

Po-op description:
473 farmers own Minn-Dak Farmers Cooperative, founded in 1972, at Walipeton, N.D. In 1999, they planted 102,900 acres of sugarbeets, the result of a three-year expansion approved in 1994. That vote included $14 million in environmental projects over a five-year period along with a $63 million, three-year plant expansion. Minn-Dak is a member-owner of United Sugars Corp., Minneapolis; and Midwest Agri-Commodities, San Francisco. The co-op's interest in valueadded processing led to the 1989 founding of Minn-Dak Yeast Co. As a stock company, Minn-Dak Yeast operates with Minn-Dak Farmers as its majority stockholder. Universal Foods (Red Star), Milwaukee, Wis., is the minority stockholder. Mirm-Dak also holds an equity position in ProGold, the limited liability company that owns the Wahpeton corn wet-milling plant.

Personal information:
Steward holds a bachelor's degree in math and chemistry from the University of Nebraska-Kearney. Before joining Minn-Dak in 1990, he was with Great Western Sugar, Billings, Mont. He serves on the boards of United Sugars Corp. and Midwest Agri-Commodities, chairs United Sugars' executive committee and serves as chair of Minn-Dak Yeast. He is a trustee of the United States Beet Sugar Association, Washington, D.C. Steward is a member of the National Council of Farmer Cooperatives' executive council.

What concerns him?
"Like all of agriculture, Minn-Dak must become more efficient, fine-tuning our whole system from the grower all the way through marketing," Steward says. The issues that will plague the sugarbeet industry and family farms in the 21st century include global environmental regulations, international trade agreements, technology and American consumerism. "But my major concern right now is low commodity prices. Sugar prices are flat and there's too much sugar. Our growers have been paid less the last two years, and that trend is not good because poor commodity prices are impacting this area's entire rural economy, " he adds. Steward is concerned over how rural Minnesota, and especially North Dakota, are going to fund public infrastructure such as building and maintaining roads. "There aren't enough dollars in these sparsely populated states to meet all our public service needs," he says.

Other key issues?
"A major challenge for agriculture and rural America is finding a way to make the urban consumer care about the status of agriculture. We need to make these consumers realize they have a vested interest in an economically-healthy agricultural system," says Steward. "This nation's consumers spend the lowest percentage of disposable income on food of any developed nation. That could change unless the current farm crisis is turned around. And we cannot turn it around without the support of that urban consumer base. This may be the greatest challenge in the first few years of the 21 st century," he adds.