PHOENIX — Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack compared the Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee that recently sent him recommendations for rewriting the dietary guidelines to a 3-year-old, and said he would stick to nutrition and diet in writing those guidelines.

The Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee, which was composed of 14 experts on nutrition and health, included a recommendation that the government should tell Americans they should eat a “sustainable diet,” which would mean that people should think about the sustainability of future food production.

The committee said that eating a more plant-based, less-animal protein based diet would help accomplish that goal as well as improve people’s health.

The recommendations have upset many farm leaders as well as members of Congress.

In a speech to the Commodity Classic, Vilsack said that the “folks who put those reports together … have freedom. They are like my 3-year-old granddaughter. She does not have to color inside the lines.”

His 5-year-old grandson, he said, “is learning about coloring within the lines.”

“I am going to color inside the lines,” Vilsack said.