Arthur R. Brown, Jr.

Since growing up on a Massachusetts dairy farm, Arthur R. Brown Jr. has dedicated his professional life to preserving agriculture and farms. He served as a county agricultural agent with Rutgers Cooperative Extension for several years before Governor Tom Kean named him New Jersey’s Secretary of Agriculture in 1982. He was reappointed to that post by Governors Jim Florio and Christie Whitman, serving for nearly 20 years. Brown instituted the Jersey Fresh marketing program, which has become a national model. Brown’s Farmland Preservation Program led to the permanent preservation of more than 100,000 acres of farmland. He also was instrumental in establishing the Garden State Trust Fund to ensure the preservation of 1 million acres of farmland, open space, and historic properties. In 1996, Brown helped create the public/private partnership Farmers Against Hunger, which distributes surplus produce from New Jersey farms to local hunger relief organizations. Brown has served as outreach director at Rutgers’ Food Policy Institute and senior associate dean of agriculture and natural resources at the School of Environmental and Biological Sciences.