Would you be interested in a rousing, common-sense defense of production agriculture made by a well-known cable TV news personality? If so, you might want to read Chapter 8 of "Your Teacher Said What?!" by Joe Kernen and Blake Kernen. They wrote the book after Blake, then nine years old, shared with her parents questionable economic ideas she learned in school.

Joe Kernen has the impressive credentials needed to comment on agriculture and the many other subjects in the book. He co-anchors top-rated "Squawk Box," CNBC's longest-running program. According to his CNBC bio, Kernen has a Bachelor's Degree from the University of Colorado in Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental Biology and a Master's Degree from Massachusetts Institute of Technology. In younger days he worked at leading cancer research institutes, and just before joining CNBC he had a 10-year career as a successful stockbroker.

Kernen has taken it upon himself to demythologize the economic information (disinformation?) Blake gets at school. In Chapter 8, "August 2010: The $40 Ostrich Egg," the Kernens explore agriculture within the context of a visit to the local Whole Foods store, which explains the chapter headline. If you want to be able to purchase ostrich eggs that will make an omelet for 12-14, and you want to pay $40, free-market choice is also for you.

But there's much more. Kernen clearly wants his daughter to better understand and appreciate the huge value and significance of modern agriculture technology. It's not just because he's a CNBC financial expert and machinery manufacturing companies are good businesses that provide jobs and productivity.

Kernen knows that producers, using advanced technology, feed the world; "Food production in the industrial world increased 5 percent between 1990 and 2004 - on 4 percent less land, producing 4 percent less greenhouse gas emissions, and using 17 percent less synthetic nitrogen. The reason is largely an infusion of technology…. GPS-equipped tractors that automatically keep equipment on straighter paths and plot location down to the meter, allowing them to use chemicals only where needed."

He gets it, and he wants his daughter to get it, too. Kernen understands why food has never been so abundant and cost so little as he asserts that modern equipment and technology are essential to producing enough affordable food.

Demonstrating a wide breadth of current debates in agriculture, Kernen cites both Norman Borlaug and Michael Pollan, one positively and the other not so much.

Regarding Pollan, Kernen does not begrudge him his own choices: "If Michael Pollan, professor of journalism at UC Berkeley and author of local-organic-and-slow-food classics like "The Omnivore's Dilemma," wants to eat pat? made from a wild boar he killed, gutted and dressed in the Berkeley hills, then good for him. At the very least he's probably helping to defend Berkeley from wild boar attacks."

The problem for Kernen is Pollan's desire to "make everyone (else) just as virtuous." Pollan himself said that eggs "should cost $8 dozen." (Emphasis in original.) Pollan apparently thinks all of us should be locavores whether we choose to be or not.

Norman Borlaug is no longer with us, but for those of us who heard him speak and have looked at his work, Kernen's comments are deeply appreciated. Borlaug is perhaps best known as the father of the Green Revolution, but he was also a Nobel Laureate. As Kernen says Borlaug's science and his technological innovation "freed nations like India and Mexico from famine." Borlaug's work changed the course of history for the better.

Why do we need Borlaug's advances and similar science to feed the world? Here's but one answer from Kernen: "If Europe tried to feed itself organically, it would need to put under cultivation an amount of land equal to the remaining forests of France, Germany, Britain, and Denmark combined."

Blake Kernen understands much more about the world after her two-year book writing effort with dad: " ...a farmer can tell his cows where they can go and what they can eat because they're his property. But people aren't cows. And in my opinion, we should mostly leave them (people) alone, to make up their own minds how hard to work and what to buy and sell."

Joe Kernen writes that he and his wife want their children to "believe in God, love their country, and respect the principles of hard work and fairness" and to "value honesty, courage, and kindness, to be polite and respectful. Simple, right?"

Simple, maybe. Hard, definitely. But we know at least one little girl in New Jersey is getting the message.

About the author: Rich Jefferson is senior director of public relations for the Association of Equipment Manufacturers (AEM).

This article first appeared in the AEM Ag Executive Advisor.