Business owner meets with Trump

Tom Demaline, Founder and President of the Avonbased Willoway Nurseries Inc. recently met with U.S. President Donald Trump and administration officials as part of the Farmers Roundtable on April 25.

As part of the 14 member industry delegation, Demaline met with President Trump, Vice-President Mike Pence and newly appointed Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue and discussed some of the needs of their industry.

Demaline said the meeting came together as the administration seeks to reach out to different sectors of U.S. business and industry with agriculture being one of their priorities and the Avon business owner welcomed the opportunity to represent the industry.

“Not since the Reagan years has a president attended a formal meeting with agriculture leaders to better understand our issues,” Demaline wrote in a statement. “The door has been opened and we have been given the opportunity to make our world a better place.

“However it is up to us to make it happen. This administration will support a common sense solution but they aren’t going to do it for us, nor do we want them to.”

In discussing the state of industry, Demaline said the panel discussed a number of issues including labor, infrastructure, trade regulations and improving rural infrastructure and food security.

Demaline said the group discussed developing a guest worker program which meets the labor needs of the industry and making changes to federal regulations to make it easier and more cost efficient for farmers and agricultural producers to exports their products.

“We are at a breaking point where it costs you money to do business and you aren’t gaining any ground,” he said.

Demaline was very pleased by the outcome of the meeting and left with the impression that the administration will follow through in placing the needs of farmers and rural America at the forefront of their domestic policy agenda.

“I really think he is going to do something because he delegated it out to Secretary Perdue,” Demaline said. “He put initiatives out there and said we are going to move forward.”

Willoway Nurseries Inc. is one of the largest wholesale growers of quality nursery stock in the Midwest and ranks in the top 40 nationwide. Established in 1954, the Avon headquartered company provides over 2,000 different plant varieties.

AMERICAN HORT Tom Demaline stands outside the White House after meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump and administration for the Farmer’s Roundtable on April 25. Demaline, President and founder of Avon’s Willoway Nurseries, was part of a 14 member delegation sent...