Farmers, Ranchers, Foresters, and Consumers Deserve Certainty
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Mr. THOMPSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, turmoil in the Middle East heightened over the weekend, and my prayers are with all involved. I trust our Nation's leadership can rise to the task at hand.
However, in another matter of food and national security, this evening I am taking the opportunity to discuss how farmers, ranchers, foresters, and consumers deserve certainty.
Agriculture remains the backbone of America, but our Nation's dedicated producers have been burdened with fractured supply chains, considerable input costs, relentless inflation, natural disasters, volatile markets, and labor shortages.
Each is consistently worsened by ill-conceived, half-baked executive action by our own elected bureaucrats in Washington.
Our Nation's farmers are bearing the brunt of it. Adding insult to injury, we are now a net importer facing the most significant decline in farm income in our history.
Farmers impact our everyday lives, so how do we support those who provide so much to our families, to our Nation, and to our world? The answer is a 5-year farm bill.
The Committee on Agriculture spent the last 3 years listening to concerns of America's producers and turning their words into legislation.
We have received input, ideas, and suggestions from stakeholders and members alike through our public portals and listening sessions across the country. Through this transparent and exhaustive process, we have produced a bipartisan product that will provide effective tools to our producers by bolstering the safety net, strengthening nutrition programs and access opportunities, and revitalize rural America.
Since our last farm bill was passed in 2018, our producers have faced countless challenges. The needs of farm country are self-evident. We have developed a bill to meet them and a responsibility to fund them. For nearly a year, I have tried to educate my colleagues, and the hand- holding has yielded nothing.
My colleagues and I are here tonight to showcase our work and show that House Republicans have done their job.
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Mr. THOMPSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his leadership and dedication to America, and I know Ohio's number one industry.
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Mr. THOMPSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his leadership in agriculture.
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Mr. THOMPSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Washington State (Mr. Newhouse). I thank him for his hospitality, too, and for being able to tour his farming operation and a lot of others while I was there.
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Mr. THOMPSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his leadership.
He is also vice chair of the full Agriculture Committee and a recently appointed member of the Rules Committee.
Mr. Speaker, I appreciate him joining us. I know Rules is busy tonight.
Mr. AUSTIN SCOTT of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, I thank Chairman Thompson for doing a wonderful job.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to express my unwavering support for our Nation's farmers and emphasize the importance of the farm bill.
Let me be clear. If you are a person who eats, and I suspect everyone is, then you should care about the farm bill. The farm bill sets a foundation of support for America's farmers and ranchers who produce the food and fiber that we depend on on a daily basis.
Right now, farmers are struggling with rising input costs that make it more difficult for them to produce the food that we need.
The House Agriculture Committee must make major improvements to title I in the farm bill and address the impact that high-input prices are having on America's farm families. The farm safety net in title I is decreased due to the increases in production costs, and current reference prices for most commodities do not reflect the increased costs of farming today.
The current statutory reference prices were established in the 2014 farm bill using 2012 cost of production data. I want to say that again. We are using the 2012 data to determine the point at which support under Price Loss Coverage kicks in if the market prices fall below the reference price during a time when producers are seeing record-high input costs.
This has created a no-win situation for our farmers, and it is vital to our country that they are able to do their jobs. No part of the farm safety net should guarantee a profit. The farmers know this. It is something our producers agree on, but if reference prices don't move, then our producers are effectively left with no stop loss assistance in the event of a commodity collapse.
Supporting our farmers through increased reference prices in the farm bill means that we support those who grow the crops to sustain our food supply.
Without reference price increases in this next farm bill, there is not enough assistance from Congress and the USDA for many farm families in our country to continue to grow the food and fiber that we depend on.
As the chairman of the Subcommittee on General Farm Commodities, Risk Management, and Credit, I am committed to making significant improvements to title I and giving the support that our farmers deserve.
Mr. Speaker, I thank Mr. Thompson for his work on this farm bill.
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Mr. THOMPSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, may I inquire as to the time remaining.
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Mr. THOMPSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his passion for what is I know Missouri's number one industry, which is agriculture, and the number one industry in this great Nation.
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Mr. THOMPSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for her service and her dedication to agriculture.
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Mr. THOMPSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his leadership on the Committee and his Subcommittee as well.
Mr. Speaker, I will next recognize the Representative from California's First Congressional District (Mr. LaMalfa). He is a good friend and member of the House Committee on Agriculture.
I had the privilege of spending quite a bit of time with Mr. LaMalfa. We had what I would describe as a very emotional visit to Paradise, California, where so many lives, almost 100 lives, were lost due to wildfire.
I also had an opportunity to ride in a combine on his rice fields in northern California. I really appreciated that opportunity.
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Mr. THOMPSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from California for his leadership on forestry and all of American agriculture.
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Mr. THOMPSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his leadership and dedication to this great industry that serves every American family.
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Mr. THOMPSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from New York for his comments. He is doing a great job serving rural America, his district, and American agriculture.
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Mr. THOMPSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, may I inquire how many minutes are remaining.
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Mr. THOMPSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from California who is a valued member of the House Agriculture Committee for his work, leadership, and service.
Mr. Speaker, we have just heard a multitude of reasons why we need to pass this farm bill. This is a farm security, food security, and national security bill. Food security is national security.
My definition of American agriculture is pretty straightforward. American agriculture today is science, technology, and innovation.
America's farmers have suffered enough. They can't wait, and neither can we. Over the past 3 years, the Committee on Agriculture has traveled all over the country, to both Republican- and Democrat-held districts, with one goal in mind: to listen and report back. As I like to say, we use what God has given us, two ears and one mouth. That is why, when we go out, we call them listening tours, to be able to take the opportunity to listen to those folks whose hardworking families are providing us food, fiber, building materials, and energy resources all over this great Nation.
We have been to at least 40 different States and one territory. Probably some States, as we heard tonight, multiple times, so I have had the privilege of chairing probably close to 85 listening sessions around this great Nation.
We do that because we are building a farm bill listening to the voices outside the beltway of Washington, to the people who work so hard, some of them 7 days a week, to provide what is essential for this great Nation and for the families of this great Nation.
Frankly, our process has been transparent. It has been collaborative, and it has been done in good faith.
Mr. Speaker, I don't think there is a greater return on investment for a dollar spent in Washington than one spent through the farm bill and agriculture. I don't say that lightly. I point to the facts of the number of jobs that are created. It is the number one industry in, quite frankly, almost every State and certainly in this Nation.
The economic activity that is generated through the agriculture industry, both production and processing and everything really within that food supply chain, and the amount of taxes that are generated by farms, ranches, forestry operations, agribusinesses, they are paid at every level of government to really fund what we hope are the essential services.
It is the food security that is provided that results in national security. There is no more slippery slope to national insecurity than food insecurity. That is obvious to see when you look around the world today. We are blessed as a Nation because of our agriculture industry and the hardworking families that are working in it.
However, it is also, with American agriculture being based on science, technology, and innovation, about a better environment and a cleaner climate. When one looks at the data, it shows that American agriculture--livestock, plants, and trees because trees are a crop-- results in the sequestration of 6.1 gigatons of carbon annually, which is 10.1 percent more than what it generates. There are no better climate champions in the world than the American farmer, rancher, and forester. We have a lot to be proud of when it comes to this industry.
Again, there is not a dollar that has a better return on investment than one that is invested in American agriculture within this farm bill. It recoups tremendously just in terms of number of jobs, economic activity, and the taxes that are generated as a result of those entities.
Too often in Washington, the nay-sayers and the pundits drown out our progress on key issues, but not on the Agriculture Committee. There really is time to iron out the details, mark up the farm bill, and get it across the floor and have the Senate do their job next.
There are 12 titles to this farm bill. There is a lot to it, and we understand that. It is very diverse because it is everything that has to do with agriculture and, quite frankly, rural America. It has the safety net program. As I said, food security is national security.
Additionally, a strong commodity title ensures that Americans can continue to produce the safest, most abundant, and most affordable food supply in the world. In recent years, farm income has been on the decline. USDA's own data expects farm income to fall by $80 billion by the end of 2022 to the end of 2024. This is the greatest 2-year loss in the net farm income in history. This farm bill can do something about that.
Persistent inflation, rising costs of production warrant new investments in farm safety net. A robust title I aids the American producer in managing the risks of low prices or declining farm revenues.
On the research side, American agriculture is science, technology, and innovation. The farm bill promotes science, technology, and innovation, which are necessary for training the next generation of agriculturalists. It is necessary for keeping American agriculture at the forefront of productivity and maintaining our competitive edge with China.
It helps us deal with the sometimes deteriorating weather conditions that helps us in areas where soil health is not the finest and being able to turn that around. It helps us to be able to produce more on less acreage, which is what the trend has been.
Trade is an incredibly important part of the farm bill, as well. The farm bill trade programs have worked to build and maintain and expand markets for American agricultural products around the world. American producers not only feed, fuel, and clothe our Nation, but provide for consumers around the world.
The Biden administration's trade agenda, or lack thereof, has left America's producers with their hands tied, unable to engage in free trade and pursue new or expanded markets, and so this farm bill is an opportunity to bolster those markets.
We have heard about forestry tonight. The livestock program, we have heard about this evening.
Mr. Speaker, I am looking forward here, without a doubt, before May of moving this farm bill out of the House Agriculture Committee and then we will get it to the floor and we will get it through the Senate and we will get it to the President's desk.
We appreciate your presiding this evening, Mr. Speaker, and I yield back the balance of my time.
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