NASHVILLE, TN – National Cotton Council Chairman Kenneth Hood
told those attending the 2003 Beltwide Cotton Conferences here today
that the NCC’s primary challenge since passage of the new farm bill
and one that persists -- has been maintaining that policy in the
face of a constant flow of misinformation and negative
publicity.
“Most of the Congressional criticism is coming from members who
want to see more restrictive payment limits and they are looking for
a legislative vehicle to amend those provisions,” the Gunnison, MS,
cotton producer said during the Cotton Production Conference. “The
Council has been working to repel further restrictions on program
benefits since early last year and continues those efforts as
Congress renews the appropriations process this month.”
Hood’s
remarks came at the NCC-coordinated forum attended by 3,000-plus
cotton industry members, researchers, Extension personnel, county
agents, consultants, agribusiness representatives and others with a
vested interest in the U.S. cotton industry.
The NCC, he said, also has joined an array of general farm,
commodity, bank and manufacturer organizations in urging
Congressional support for emergency disaster assistance for crop and
livestock producers who suffered losses during the 2001 and 2002
production years.
“Our goal has been to persuade Congress to provide this
assistance on a truly emergency basis, just as other disaster
assistance is provided for losses due to severe storms, without
requiring offsets. As we continue our efforts to secure disaster
assistance . . . we also are doing everything possible to put a
firewall between disaster assistance and farm program spending. We
are especially concerned about offsets that would be achieved
through more restrictive payment limits or reductions in payments
authorized in the new farm law."
Hood reiterated the NCC’s support of enhanced proven,
incentive-based conservation programs – programs that should be a
complement to effective commodity programs and not a substitute.
He noted that the NCC had arranged educational tours for key
Congressional and Natural Resources Conservation Service staff to
help them in their development of new Conservation Security
Program.
Regarding technology, Hood said the role of research, education
and technology in achieving production and processing profitability
will be increasingly important.
Among examples he cited of NCC action in that arena was its work
to secure government approval of transgenic varieties, and to ensure
that resulting cotton and cottonseed products are not confronted
with marketing restrictions.
Hood said in recent months trade issues have taken on added
importance, given the Administration’s strong emphasis on trade
liberalization. He cited as a major cotton industry concern, China’s
restrictive implementation of its quota agreement, which, together
with the announcement of a new standard for neps and short fiber,
puts limits on market access that violate terms of the WTO accession
agreement.
In a
later report, NCC President and Chief Executive Officer Gaylon
Booker said with trade liberalization inevitable, the U.S. cotton
industry can no longer afford to allow U.S. trade negotiators to be
generous with U.S. market access without getting something
meaningful in return.
He said the U.S. textile industry has not been a high priority
for those negotiators in the past as evidenced by the U.S. tariff
rate average of 8.9 percent compared to effective rates for textile
and apparel products entering Argentina of 40-50 percent; Brazil,
40-70 percent; China, 20-36 percent; India, 50-70 percent and
Pakistan, 40-60 percent.
“We have the same kind of unlevel playing field in agricultural
product tariffs,” Booker said. “The U.S. faces a 62 percent average
allowable tariff rate when it ships agricultural products abroad,
with the rate in many countries exceeding 100 percent. Our
competitors abroad can ship their products into the U.S. and pay a
modest 12 percent tariff.”
Booker also noted that as the U.S. Trade Representative presses
the Administration’s trade agenda, it will be crucial to make
policymakers understand that “global farm policy and international
trade policy must be compatible and fair. For the cotton industry,
good farm policy and good trade policy must take into account the
interests and needs of the U.S. textile industry. All of us have
become keenly aware of the economic stress that our domestic textile
industry is experiencing. We cannot export enough cotton to maintain
a viable U.S. cotton industry – we must find a way to provide better
underpinning for the domestic textile industry.”
Booker said the following principles must be maintained if global
farm and trade policy are to reconciled so that developed countries
such as the U.S. can be viable: 1) U.S. farm programs cannot be
unilaterally reduced or phased out, 2) U.S. agricultural and textile
tariffs cannot be further reduced until other nations reduce their
tariffs to US levels, 3) market access must be reciprocal, 4)
non-tariff barriers must be eliminated, 5) export subsidies must be
eliminated, or harmonized, and 6) improvements must be made in
international trading disciplines and dispute settlement procedures
(and the U.S. must have the will to use the tools that are
available).