Minnesota Agriculture & Rural Leadership (MARL) completes international study tour to China; applications for next tour being taken

Marshall, Minn. -- The current class of the Minnesota Agriculture and Rural Leadership (MARL) Program recently completed its two-week international study tour to China. The 31 participants in MARL Class III and two staff members returned to Minnesota on March 1. The whirlwind MARL international study tour agenda had the group travel across the most populated and developed areas of China.

The trip started in eastern China with three days in Beijing, where the group was briefed at the U.S. Embassy by staff of the embassy, Agricultural Trade Office (ATO) and representatives of commodity organizations like the American Soybean Association and U.S. Grains Council. MARL Class III also met at Beijing Hormel Foods. Time in Beijing also included a visit to a traditional local market, a modern hypermarket, the Beijing Dairy Cattle Center as well as exploring Chinese culture and history with visits to sites like The Great Wall, The Forbidden City and Tiananmen Square.

The group traveled by overnight train to Shanghai where they spent one day.

The Shanghai agenda included an appointment at Cargill Shanghai, a tour of the port city from a boat on the Huangpu River, and visits to cultural sites, including the Jade Buddha Temple.

An early-morning flight took the group to Chengdu in the Sichuan Province of central China, where it spent three busy days. Time in the Sichuan Province was filled with official visits with local government and university officials. After touring lab facilities of the Sichuan Provincial Department of Agriculture (SPDA) and the National Agricultural Products Quality and Safety Inspection Service, the group met with a delegation of officials of the SPDA, before the officials hosted the group for dinner.

The agenda also featured tours of the Dijiangyuan irrigation system, a river diversion system more than 2,000 years old, that is the lifeblood of the Sichuan Valley agriculture; the Wheat Institute of Sichuan Agricultural University and its research facilities; wheat, vegetable, flower, and hog farms in the area; and a county agricultural/vocational middle and high school.

MARL delegation members also served as speakers on cooperatives, pork production, and beef production at a symposium hosted by faculty at Sichuan Agricultural University. Small groups of participants visited sites in the province with officials involved in education, medicine, wholesale farm product marketing, city and rural planning, and a local enterprise zone.

Time in Sichuan also included cultural visits including the Chengdu Giant Panda Breeding Research Station, city tours, and a visit to the Chinese opera in Chengdu.

At the conclusion of the third day in Sichuan, the group departed by bus to Chongquing, the largest city in China, where it boarded a boat on the Yangtze River. The next three days were spent traveling east on or near the river, which is being dramatically and permanently impacted by the construction of the 3 Gorges Dam.

The boat trip included side trips to the ghost city of Fengdu, and a smaller boat tour up one of the gorges. The boat passed through the locks of the 3 Gorges Dam. After touring the 3 Gorges Dam, the boat trip continued to its destination of Yichang, where participants visited a museum with artifacts discovered in areas now covered with water after the construction of the dam, businesses, and street food markets. The group caught a night flight from Yichang to the south China city of Guangzhou, the gateway to mainland China.

In Guangzhou, the group had a breakfast briefing with the Counsel General from the U.S. Consulate in Guangzhou and several members of the Foreign Agriculture Service (FAS) and the Agriculture Trade Office (ATO) of the Consulate. FAS and ATO officials accompanied the group on tours of a wholesale import market for fruits and vegetables entering China from around the world and a model farm enterprise zone with aquaculture, flower, and vegetable production, and a feed mill making extensive use of soybean meal.

The group departed Guangzhou on an early-morning train to Hong Kong. Upon arrival, meetings were held with officials from U.S. Consulate and ATO. The officials included the ATO director, representatives of the Consulate's political section - who explained the Hong Kong/China one-country/two-systems system - and the commercial cooperator division, who talked about non-agriculture trade issues. The group also toured Victoria Peak, the highest point in Hong Kong, as well as the Aberdeen fishing village in the Hong Kong port.

The trip concluded the next day with an early-morning flight from Hong Kong to Minneapolis, via Tokyo, Japan.

The MARL Program is a private/public partnership. The program is funded privately. Participants pay tuition and the majority of the program funding comes from contributions from corporations, businesses, individuals and foundations. Public institutions administer and deliver the program. Staff from Southwest Minnesota State University administers the program and the University of Minnesota Extension Service delivers the program. The direct costs of these staff positions are paid with tuition and private raised funds. The partner institutions provide generous in-kind support for the program.

The Minnesota Agriculture and Rural Leadership (MARL) Program is a dynamic cohort leadership development program for active adult agricultural and rural leaders from across Minnesota with the mission: To develop the skills of Minnesota agricultural and rural leaders to maximize their impact and effectiveness in local, state, national, and international arenas.

Over 18 months, a cohort group of approximately 30 leaders participate in nine three-day in-state seminars, a one-week national study tour to Washington, D.C., and a two-week international study tour. Two-thirds of the participants are involved in production agriculture and the other one-third are agribusiness people and other types of rural leaders. Seminars are held nearly exclusively in the winter months from November to March to best accommodate the schedules of busy participants.

Applications for the next MARL class, which will begin in November, are currently available at www.MARLprogram.org. The application deadline is March 31.

For more information, please visit the MARL Web site, www.MARLprogram.org, or contact Tim Alcorn, MARL Executive Director, Bellows Academic 250 - Southwest Minnesota State University, 1501 State Street, Marshall, MN 56258; alcornt@SouthwestMSU.edu; (507) 537-6280.