Mud.

This single, three-letter word has caused many South Dakota farmers and ranchers to consider using several four-letter words during the struggles of the past year.

Between the wet, snowy spring that adversely affected calving, lambing and planting to the moisture plaguing us at harvest, 2009 was a difficult year.

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Despite these setbacks, our all-too-familiar experiences with mud (and gumbo) serve to remind us of the need for good, high quality roads.

These farm-to-market roads are indispensable to agricultural producers; without a way to get our crops and livestock out of the field and into the stream of commerce, our hard work would not show any return.

Our family farm near Humboldt is surrounded by four different farm-to-market roads —unimproved dirt, township gravel, county gravel and a state highway. We use these roads throughout the year and are familiar with the use, maintenance and repair issues facing each of these jurisdictions.

South Dakota has almost 75,000 miles of these roads and as producers we recognize we could not run a competitive, 21st century agricultural operation without them.

Agriculture has changed dramatically in the 80 years since many of these roads were built. Our harvesting methods have advanced from horse-powered threshing machines to combines.

The way we transport grain to market has improved from unlicensed 200 bushel gravity box wagons that paid no wheel tax to semi trucks capable of hauling more than 1,300 bushels.

These improvements in technology increase efficiency, but they also place a greater burden on our roads — roads we as taxpayers own and have a responsibility to maintain.

But road needs extend beyond agriculture.

Rural residents, city workers who commute from small towns and acreages, businesses and production agriculture all depend on these roads to facilitate commerce. They are crucial to our state’s economic future.

Likewise, who owns the vehicles or what is in the vehicles does not matter. This is not an issue of class warfare, urban versus rural or a laundry list of specific, isolated road problems.

This is a question of road and bridge age and how we can strategically position ourselves to allow agriculture to continue to be a powerful economic engine for South Dakota.

Agriculture and its related industries have a $21.3 billion economic impact each year and employ more than 173,000 South Dakotans. Today’s farms and ranches operate in a global environment that transcends township, county, city and state jurisdictional boundaries.

Our rural road needs transcend these same boundaries. The United States became a world leader by developing the best, most comprehensive infrastructure in the world.

Ownership equals responsibility and we have an obligation to ensure our infrastructure can continue to support the demands of a modern economy.

We can continue to use a “band-aid” approach to help relieve specific pressure points in the short-term, but South Dakota roads require a comprehensive, long-term solution that recognizes our needs and adequately addresses the costs.

Our economic future depends on it.

Bill Even is the Secretary of Agriculture for the state of South Dakota.