Congressman
CHARLIE STENHOLM
17th District of Texas

AG TALK
By Charlie Stenholm
June 29, 2001

House passes $5.5B in Aid to Farmers

On Tuesday, the House passed the “Crop Year 2001 Agricultural Economic Assistance Act,” providing $5.5 billion to aid producers hurt by low commodity prices. The bill has been referred to the Senate for further
action.

Once the House and Senate have finished action, the legislation will go to the White House for the President’s signature. I am hopeful that President Bush will receive this legislation before the August congressional recess.

Prompt action will be essential if these funds are going to be distributed to producers before September 30, the end of fiscal year 2001. If we don’t get this aid out by September 30, we lose it.

This is the fourth year in a row that Congress has taken action to provide emergency funding to the nation’s producers, and questions have been raised about the adequacy of $5.5 billion to meet agriculture’s critical needs.

It is important to note that this $5.5 billion in funding is fifteen percent less than the assistance given last year.

Providing more than this amount would have jeopardized getting out any assistance at all, and would have hindered our ability to write the 2002 farm bill because it would have taken funds set aside for that purpose.

Having passed a lower figure, we now have a chance for a better farm bill and a better disaster program in the future.

It is also worth noting that the White House’s Office of Management and Budget indicated that, if Congress had approved a higher amount, they would recommend that the President not sign the bill.

As I have mentioned previously, the House Agriculture Committee is currently working on the next farm bill.

The budget and tax cut legislation passed by Congress this year have “bet the farm” on future surpluses, however, and it looks more and more likely that these surpluses are not going to appear.

This makes it even more critical that Congress complete action on a farm bill this year in order to make sure that the funding will be there when it is needed.

If you think agriculture has problems now, try to imagine what would happen if the farm bill does not get written and signed into law by the end of December.

We can only preserve a doubling of AMTA payments for next year by completing a farm bill by Christmas.

There were lots of folks in and out of agriculture who supported the tax cut package that was recently signed into law. Now that we have it, we are going to have to live with it and it won’t good for agriculture.

Agriculture Research Programs Examined

This past Wednesday, a House subcommittee continued to review the provisions of the Research title of the upcoming farm bill.

One statistic was mentioned during the hearing that I thought was particularly interesting:
In the 1960’s, one farmer supplied 25.8 people in the U.S. and abroad with their food. In 1994, one farmer supplied food for 129 people.

There is no question that agricultural research has benefited both the producers and consumers of this great country.

As I have said so many times, we are blessed to live in a country that has the most abundant quantity, the best quality and the safest food supply at the lowest cost to the consumer of any country in the world.

We have been able to achieve this by hard work and through the agricultural research that has led to better technology and allowed U.S. producers to become so efficient and productive.

This is no time to sit back and take a rest, however. If we are going to meet the demands of a growing world population, more remains to be done.

While we have improved our technology, we can make even further improvements in the safety of our food supply, and at an even lower cost.

As the Ag Committee considers the research portion of the farm bill, we need to focus on how we can use agricultural research to get more dollars into the producers’ pockets.

Subcommittee Examines Rural Development Issues

Rural development programs were the subject of a subcommittee hearing this past Tuesday as an effort is made to determine what is most important to rural America.

Some witnesses were concerned about housing, while others advocated water and water disposal loans and grants.

There are also those who believe more priority should be given to education and determining how communities can create economic growth.

Agricultural Credit Programs Reviewed

A House Agriculture subcommittee met to discuss current and future agricultural credit conditions with witnesses from the agricultural lending industry.

While agricultural producers are facing low commodity prices, the farm credit community has not experienced the same problems.

According to testimony, the solid condition of lending institutions is due in large part to the emergency economic assistance that has been provided to producers over the past four years.

The witnesses who appeared before the subcommittee talked about the importance of being able to predict just what economic assistance will be available to producers from year to year.

They testified that such predictability would provide lenders and their customers with greater ability to make better financing decisions, and to have a better picture of cash flow statements.

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