Ron Sparks is Alabama’s 25th Commissioner of Agriculture and Industries. A Fort Payne native, Sparks served the previous four years, January 1999 –2003, overseeing the day-by-day operations of the Department of Agriculture and Industries as Assistant Commissioner. A successful businessman, Sparks was elected DeKalb County Commissioner in 1978, becoming, at age 25, one of the youngest county commissioners in Alabama. He now has three children and a grandchild. For more than 20 years, Sparks has been active in youth athletics.

Sparks is a veteran of the United States Coast Guard, where he served as a member of the U.S. Coast Guard Honor Guard. After Coast Guard service, Sparks graduated from North East State Community College before being elected to the DeKalb County Commission. Later, Sparks served as director of the DeKalb County 911 Emergency Response District and he was elected State President of the Statewide E-911 Association, a position he held when he accepted the job of Assistant Commissioner of Agriculture and Industries.

Sparks places the economic viability of the family farm as the most important issue facing Alabama’s farmers. Alabama is losing farms rapidly and now it has fewer than 47,000 operating farms. Sparks is committed to work with the governor, the Alabama Legislature and the Congress in a bipartisan effort to develop policy that will be more beneficial to farmers, provide leadership to promote crops and to create jobs in rural Alabama. Sparks promotes food safety and consumer protection and he is pushing strongly for country of origin labels on food.

Since taking office in January, Sparks has worked hard to improve the quality of service provided by the department to Alabama’s farmers and consumers. He recently took a leadership role among his peers as Secretary-Treasurer of the Southern Association of State Departments of Agriculture (SASDA).