FARGO, N.D. -- The North Dakota Soybean Growers Association has a new executive director -- Nancy M. Johnson of Hillsboro, N.D.
At the organization's Feb. 19 annual meeting in Fargo, officials introduced Johnson as their choice as a full-time executive to replace Jeff Hamre of Leonard, N.D., who had been part-time executive.
Johnson, 59, has worked in agricultural magazines and in advertising agencies where she worked for about 20 years on accounts including agricultural chemicals, fertilizer and seed. Most recently, she has been in a corporate writing business, working for Corn and Soybean Digest. She grew up on a farm in southern Minnesota and she and her husband, David, raise corn and soybeans north of Hillsboro.
The grower group is member-based and works on policy advocacy, while the North Dakota Soybean Council uses checkoff funds to work on research and promotion.
Johnson says one of the issues the association is working on is making sure North Dakota non-oil roads are supported as a vital infrastructure to move soybeans and other crops to market. The state group also will work with the American Soybean Growers Association to put an adequate farm bill in place. She says the two groups are in agreement about federal soybean policies.
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All 6,000 soybean growers in North Dakota pay the checkoff. The grower group has about 550 members. "That's one of our focuses for the next few years, is to increase the membership support," Johnson says.
