Brooke Rollins will be the United States’ agriculture secretary in Donald Trump’s incoming administration, pending Senate approval.

The Texan is an agriculture graduate, but her career has been in law, conservative think tanks and director of domestic policy in the first Trump administration. Her first task will be to deal with the ramifications for US farmers of import tariffs. Trump says he will impose a 25% tariff on all goods coming from neighbouring Canada and Mexico, and increase tariffs on Chinese goods by 10%. Retaliatory tariffs on US food exports to those countries seem inevitable.

She also will have to cope with Health Secretary elect Robert Kennedy’s proposals to scrap processed food and pesticides.