I don’t mess with politics much. I’m not good at it. But I think the next American Farm Bureau Federation president should have some particular qualities.

The next American Farm Bureau Federation president will be speaking for U.S. agriculture during what will be linchpin, historic years for agriculture, influencing more than in the last several generations the direction this country decides to go with its farming industry.

The next AFBF president should:

Be a farmer (a big duh! on this one.)

Be someone who holds hard and fast to the roots of a family farming operation.

Be someone who will stomp hard to clear the path for the next generation to make a living farming … and the next generation and the next generation. (Let’s be honest, the next person to lead AFBF humanly won’t live long enough to have much direct effect past the next few generations. So, that someone needs to stomp hard to define the path now.)

Be someone who knows how to get the right folks in a room or be in the right room and then sit down and listen.

Be someone who comes from an agriculturally diverse part of the country.

Be someone who readily smiles but can also chew hard on someone’s ‘backend’ when needed.

Be someone who has the ability to appreciate and digest our country’s complex farming and ranching issues and build a consensus with learned people, all in the passionate effort to lead the nation’s largest general farming organization.

Be someone who speaks softly but knows how to hold and swing the ‘big stick’ that still is the AFBF.

And, finally, the next AFBF president should be Zippy Duvall, the current president of the Georgia Farm Bureau.

The AFBF presidential election, which is for a two-year term, will be at the annual AFBF convention in Orlando Jan. 12.