Port is ag's doorway to the world
By Myron Just

During the Minnesota Agri-Growth Council's recent Tour-A- Rama to northeastern Minnesota, three busloads of leading agricultural people and a number of educators got a "bird's eye" view of the Port of Duluth-Superior.

While taking a special cruise of the famed Duluth Harbor, participants in this tour saw firsthand the important role the Port plays in the success of Upper Midwest farmers.

Myron Just

The shipment of grain through the terminals of Duluth-Superior is tremendous. Having this magnificent doorway to the world's oceans is of immeasurable importance to Minnesota agriculture.

One need only see the gigantic iron ore loading docks that we saw on our harbor tour to realize that taconite is still the Number One commodity in this Great Lakes port. Grain ranks third, according to Davis Helberg, executive director of the Duluth Seaway Port Authority. (Coal, in case you wondered, is the Number Two commodity shipped out of the Port.)

The Duluth-Superior Port has storage capacity for 65 million bushels of grain, and easily ranks as America's most important inland doorway to the world export markets that are so critically important to the success and profitablity of Minnesota agriculture.

As most Minnesotans are aware, Duluth is a huge export resource for agricultural commodities, but few in our state realize that the Port also is an inbound center of great importance to agricultural processing. For example, limestone - used in the processing of sugar beets (as well as taconite pellets and some chemical applications) - is the Number One inbound commodity, most of it coming from Michigan.

While we on the harbor tour had the benefit of Duluth Port officials like Mr. Helberg on board our cruise vessel to answer our questions, tours of the Port are available to anybody for a modest price. Just make your way to the tourism and visitor information building adjacent to the Duluth Entertainment and Convention Center at the water's edge. There you can make arrangements to take a guided cruise of this great Harbor to see for yourself the amazing activity that takes place there that is directly related to agriculture.

Watching the loading operations of grain from elevator to ship is mind-boggling as the equivalent of thousands of rail cars and trucks full of grain are transferred in a surprisingly short time. The loading is just one of the vital steps in moving food from a farmer's field through transportation and processing to a consumer's table anywhere in the world.

Without the Port of Duluth-Superior, Midwestern farmers would have to rely on longer, more costly shipping methods to get their products to world markets. It's because of the St. Lawrence Seaway and the visionary efforts of Canadian and well-remembered Minnesota political leaders like John Blatnik and Hubert H. Humphrey that Minnesota farmers and agricultural processors have the ability to compete in the world market.

Duluth, St. Louis County, the Minnesota Department of Agriculture and the Minnesota Legislature are to be praised for their unbroken support of this great inland Port at Duluth - our doorway to the world - for the past half-century.

Myron Just is the executive director of the Minnesota Agri-Growth Council, a statewide organization representing the many facets of the state's agriculture industry - from farmer's field through processing, retailing and international trade.