E for all of our health care workers that we have a plan in place for enough testing and for contact tracing so those are things that you know. I definitely look at when I look at the numbers and statistics say do we have those plans in place? and of course, you know we we all you know. we all miss our families. You know my my whole family is down in South Florida haven't seen them since all. This started probably haven't seen them actually in session you know and so we all are definitely wanting to go out and you know I'm a gym rat. I'm at the gym every single morning and so I certainly miss being at the gym and so we're all eating. Or to to start our lives and get our economy back running. That's why I called for ours to shut down us earlier than it was then it actually got done because I knew that we would have to beat the virus in order to restart our economy and the quicker we did that the quicker we were going to restart because we already started seeing the the destruction of our economy even before we did the shutdown. So so now I'm talking about reopening. you know we gotta be smart. We gotta be planned. we have to be you know. Based on science based on health experts and do this properly, you know the lucky thing about Agriculture is that we weren't shut down per se. you know we the problem is you know, obviously the markets that we sell to got shut down. So of course, you know we wanna see the cruise lines back up and running. We wanna see obviously the restaurants back up and running if nothing else for our social insanity but you know, certainly once those markets are coming up and again a agriculture is gonna be able to resell and again to those communities. So, you know the things that we're doing is talking through what one thing is can we do to fix this moving forward and I'm giving you know very thorough and you know comments and recommendations to the governor's task force of things that we could be doing to get the stimulus dollars down to be having the the the state of Florida really spending more of their it's resources on buying fresh Florida produce like the Department of Corrections or Nursing homes, any other type of state agency should be purchasing fresh produce. and really more that synergy between our communities and you know and again it's same with the workforce, making sure that all of our workforce are still kept safe that we're still doing the proper social distancing. we saw a huge outbreaks out in the Midwest. Some of the the plans Smith fields actually I think I have one of the the largest clusters of 700 people in their plant that they had to shut it down and we don't wanna see that here in the state. so we're gonna continue to have discussions with the agriculture. I have a biweekly. My weekly calls Monday and Thursdays with every single one of our agriculture producers in the state. going through some of these is just you know safety standards hearing from them what they need from us lifting regulations, making sure that we start lifting some of the weight limits on our trucking. so tracking of commodities can happen a lot faster and and a lot smoother. there's a lot of things that we are certainly working on and I have complete confidence our agriculture community and and our growers are some of the most resilient in the entire world. and I. That everyone that I speak to you and all the Association members are excited for the opportunity for the state to open back up, but they also realize that we gotta do it safely. Yeah absolutely and actually if you have time, we have one or two more questions, sure this one actually comes from a guy who served with on on a submarine. When I was in the Navy, It was my first engineer. He's a stationed he's in the Navy station in England. he's in Orange County absentee voter and he's asking me how much opportunity is there for export of product overseas of produces the furnish shelves there in the UK are empty for pretty much every. Trip he's going on in the past two weeks. well, first of all, thank you for your service. please be safe out there. yes and so yes we have an entire marketing Department that is that's all they do that they they are focused on foreign markets and so we are constantly working through that we are already export to a hundred and 64 different countries in the world on a normal basis and so we are certainly are looking at all the marketing opportunities. The problem is is that a lot of countries are shutting down imports right now that there's just a. Not knowing you know if they don't have you know they're showing this down but we are around the clock trying to come up with new ways to actually export out and then unfortunately there's also different standards for exporting that a lot of our farmers here in our state, a little bit smaller and so don't have the same opportunities to really ship out. the commodities. It's just a different type of how we package it and and and bundle our food isn't sometimes some of those growers are just not conducive to exporting but certainly we are looking at every single angle and that's including our export opportunities. Okay and then One is more of a long-term question. it's a little long, so you guys have a family farm in Florida has been in trouble for a long time for those that survived the crisis. What plans exist in the state programs to assist them over the long term, while there's a short-term problem, which obviously needs to be addressed. This concern is for the long-term problem that has been with us for several decades and we'll and that's says we'll play us for many years to come. So what's in the long term plans, the Department has to help family farms. Yeah, you know so one of the biggest things that really hit our state and I alluded to it a little bit in the earlier part of this is U S M. Which was the old Nafta and so what it's done is it's really has decreased our agriculture and we've lost a lot of our farms. a lot of our ranchers because the fact they just can't compete with the Mexican imports. they are able to undercut our prices significantly and we were very vocal. I was actually the only Commissioner across the entire country to vote no on supporting the USMCA because of the direct impact. we know that if, in fact it's US. A stands as is, we're gonna lose another 40000 workers in our state. another hundred 200 and I think in 20 million dollars of ad produce so what we have done is we unified our congressional delegation as well as all of our ad producers in the state and spend a lot of time in Washington, DC. I've personally testified twice in front of Congress on this issue and so we had gotten some really big movement that while we. Stop USMCA we did have in the language additional enforcement at the border to make sure that they are in fact, a shipping in only fruits and vegetables and not drugs and people and making sure that there's an increase in inspections at the border. as well as then collecting the data, you know that was one of the problems is that there is no data that was being collected about how much was actually coming into into the States. so that's been one big component that we got added into the USMCA. Others is that we have gotten a commitment from Commerce and Department of Commerce that they were going to work with us on creating and having another standalone piece of legislation that's in the Rubio was actually pretty instrumental as well. to make sure that we have different enforcement opportunities that we see illegal dumping from inside from from Mexico or even any other state, but really more so the country more so Mexico that there is actually an opportunity to enforce it and punishment and so. Was supposed to happen on April the week of April seventh. that week is that they're supposed to do town halls all across our entire state to hear specifically from our growers, the impact of what USMCA NAFTA had on their operations and the base on those comments and those conversations was going to be how Commerce was going to help work on that piece of legislation. Obviously, those town halls were cancelled and propose phones because of Coed I have asked specifically to both the the Commission. Of Commerce, but in the deputy to either one of two things one to extend the comment period that people go online so if you are in fact, a farmer and you have been impacted, I'm assuming by you know MTA, the Department of Commerce website. Give your your your comments and your stories let them know what's happening to you and then two I've asked for them to start doing it virtually there's we are we all doing it virtually there's no reason why they can't host town halls virtually. And allow our farmers to log on and to tell exactly what is happening so those are just some of the things that we're starting to do. I our team has got lots of ideas of how to help farmers, including you know alternative crops really amping up and amplifying the for the products making sure again all of our retail stores are buying fresh from Florida and I really do think that there is a silver lining again on on all of this is that there is a consumer awakening that. Really happening and understanding the connection between our farmers and and and really buying locally and you know there's always been a disconnect. You know I'm I'm born and raised in Miami and grew up in South Florida and unless you know how big a agriculture here is of our state so much of our cities and our urban communities don't understand that a agriculture that is a second largest economic driver of our state, a hundred and 37 billion dollar impact, and I think during this time. you're starting to see a connection between the two and that people are starting to realize you know how big agriculture here is in our state. we also started this past the last year during my first term an innovation Committee. I'm coming up with new innovative ideas between Precision agriculture. GPS technology is why I went to Israel for our first trade mission to hear and see some of the companies and some of the technology that was there bring that here which will really make Florida farmers more competitive than any place else in the. Because they're gonna be able to reduce their cost produce better products and really be better for the environment. so the things like that we're we're constantly brainstorming all the time and again in the same thing on the exports is looking for new markets across the entire world. to expo, we're actually supposed to be going to a trade mission in Canada next month that was cancelled to also have those conversations and while Canada is one of our largest partners for imports from us it always. The the different commodities that we can sell, It's a Canada and to other parts of the world. it's always a priority for us. Absolutely well. I wanna thank you so much for spending your time with actually run over a little bit and thank you again Commissioner Fried for joining us. you know we can tell that there's there's a lot going on in the state. you're not just in response to the current of virus, but also you know it's long term plans to help Florida's farmers. you know whether the storm and then come back even stronger. So thank you again so much for being on and look for updates from her Department as well as from from the State House and the Senate, and of course from the governor's office. What's happening here in the state and we hope everyone stays, stay safe and and and healthy. Thank you absolutely thanks for representative appreciate Bye everyone. Bye. Bye.