U.S. President-elect Donald Trump will name former Georgia Governor Sonny Perdue as his nominee for secretary of agriculture on Thursday (19 January).
Perdue, a Democrat-turned-Republican who founded a grain and fertilizer business, served on Trump's agricultural advisory committee during his presidential campaign.
By nominating a former governor from a Southern state, Trump eschewed candidates from major Farm Belt states in the Midwest that produce the bulk of crops such as corn, soybeans and wheat which dominate agriculture exports. Georgia is a key producer of crops such as cotton and peanuts.
Perdue, 70, led the southern U.S. state for two terms as governor from 2003 to 2011 after previously representing a rural swath of central Georgia about 100 miles south of Atlanta in the state Senate.
Zippy Duvall, president of the American Farm Bureau, praised Perdue as a strong voice.
But environmental groups opposed the nominee.
"Farmers need a champion in the USDA who will fight for conservation programs to help farmers be more resilient in the face of extreme weather, not pray for rain," Kari Hamerschlag, deputy director of food and technology at Friends of the Earth, said in a statement.
The American farm belt
The rural vote in America is one of the key principle catalysts which helped secure a Trump victory, battleground states like Ohio, North Carolina and Pennsylvania - large rural areas - helped catapult his campaign to victory.
Trump received strong support from the agricultural community as the farm economy slumped amid falling prices for key commodities.
Trade, a signature issue during the campaign in which Trump accused China of unfair practices, is critical for the farm economy. U.S. farm and food exports to China were more than $20.2 billion in 2015.
Read more - What does a Trump victory mean for farming?
