{"id":2044,"date":"2023-08-25T15:57:00","date_gmt":"2023-08-25T15:57:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/?p=2044"},"modified":"2025-04-22T16:03:44","modified_gmt":"2025-04-22T16:03:44","slug":"cultivating-hope-creating-equity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/2023\/08\/25\/cultivating-hope-creating-equity\/","title":{"rendered":"Cultivating hope; creating equity"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Patrice Bailey, who grew up on the streets of New York, just five blocks from the Apollo Theatre<\/a>, said he didn’t want to work in agriculture at first.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He wanted to be a lawyer. But with six months left in his senior year of high school, his mother changed his mind, saying, “There are too many lawyers. Why don’t you find a way to support yourself in any part of the world you may find yourself?”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When he asked what her profession was, she said agriculture.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“I said, \u2018Well, I don’t want to be a farmer,\u2019” he says, recounting how his mother went on to tell him that agriculture was more than just farming.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He admits it wasn’t a vision he shared with her until he ended up at Prairie View A&M University<\/a> in Texas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After seeing all of the different aspects of the field, he realized that his mother was right and followed her advice.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Today, it is his mother’s wise, knowledgeable advice that has earned him a B.S. in Agriculture as well as a Master’s Degree in Agriculture from Iowa State University.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bailey now is Assistant Commissioner of Agriculture att he Minnesota Department of Agriculture.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The department began as the Minnesota State Dairy Commission<\/a> in 1885 to eliminate the sale of adulterated milk and block the sale of oleomargarine as a substitute for butter. Since 1921, all commissioners, deputy commissioners, and assistant commissioners have been white.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It wasn\u2019t until June 2019 that the first African American MDA Assistant Commissioner was named.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI am the first Assistant Commissioner of color since 1885. And so there’s a lot of responsibility with that in terms of leaving a legacy for those that are coming behind us to be able to do amazing things\u201d, he says with an earnest voice that conveys his humble pride.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Leading up to this title, Bailey has served the Twin Cities in several positions focused on bridging underrepresented communities of color to various available resources and advocating for them legislatively at the Capitol.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

His position plays a vital role in the department\u2019s operations as he assists the Commissioner in carrying out important agriculture initiatives and roles. The two work to support and promote the State\u2019s agricultural industry, ensure food safety and quality as well as provide resources and assistance to farmers, producers and consumers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

His position is also especially important in driving the growth and development of Minnesota\u2019s agricultural sector and maintaining its reputation as a leading agricultural state. Minnesota ranks fifth in the country for agricultural production, despite having only the 14th largest land mass.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Minnesota\u2019s largest agricultural commodities are corn, soybeans, hogs, cattle, and dairy. The state is also a top producer of sugar beets, oats, turkeys, and wild rice.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bailey says his Department\u2019s Emerging Farmers<\/a> office, which opened a year and half-ago, is leading the United States in creating an office dedicated to helping emerging farmers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe are looking for the best of the best energetic, we are looking for people that want to be world changers. So we are looking for, for people from all over the state, all over the region. But we really do need to be able to have the best person in this role in order to show that agriculture does have an entry point and this Emerging Farmers office would actually be able to help farmers that are not able to advocate for themselves,\u201d he says. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Patrice Bailey, who grew up on the streets of New York, just five blocks from the Apollo Theatre, said he didn’t want to work in agriculture at first. He wanted to be a lawyer. But with six months left in his senior year of high school, his mother changed his mind, saying, “There are too many […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"off","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[1180,1179,32],"class_list":["post-2044","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-lifestyle","tag-minnesota-department-of-agriculture","tag-patrice-bailey","tag-twin-cities","et-doesnt-have-format-content","et_post_format-et-post-format-standard"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2044","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2044"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2044\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2045,"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2044\/revisions\/2045"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2044"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2044"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2044"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}