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Corn Growers make suggestions to farm bill confereesHigher marketing loans and renewable energy top ACGA recommendations
In a letter to the farm bill conferees in late February, Keith Bolin, President of the American Corn Growers Association made a few suggestions as to his organization's preferences on a few key points of the pending farm bill. "We understand the political and budgetary climate in which you are currently engulfed and we offer these recommendations and suggestions in an attempt to help, not hinder you," wrote Bolin. ACGA stated that they would have preferred more consideration of the Food from Family Farms Act, especially considering it was endorsed last year by more than 60 other organizations, but said they were prepared to endorse the new bill as it will be far superior to the current bill. "We respectfully suggest that you investigate one option to help you advance the farm bill past the current funding obstacles and improve the safety net for farm families," said Bolin. "Given the current prices being paid to producers for most farm products, many farmers may find it easier to survive without Fixed Payments. We feel that the $5 billion per year required to fund the Fixed Payments may be better spent in an initiative to increase Marketing Assistance Loan rates. We recommend that you investigate how much we can increase MAL rates if all or a major portion of the $5 billion per year is used." Bolin explained that although farmers are now experiencing higher prices, they are also facing much higher production costs. In the event that market prices erode to the more traditional low levels of the past decade, ACGA deems higher MAL rates to be much more critical to the financial survival of family farmers. Using either the current budget baseline, or the updated budget baseline to be released next month, higher loan rates should cost very little. Should the market crash, the Loan Deficiency Payments and Marketing Loan Gains provided by higher MAL rates would be mandatory federal spending and therefore provide the best safety net for the budget. "Transferring the Fixed Payment spending into higher support prices is the best risk management tool for the money," said Bolin. ACGA also supports the beneficial interest requirements included in the Senate bill for the MAL program. This provision was a part of ACGA's 2002 farm bill proposal and would help strengthen domestic and international market prices. "The problem is that farmers tend to exercise their options on LDPs and MLGs at times when the market is at its lowest, thereby driving the market even lower," explained Bolin. "By limiting the MAL options to the date that beneficial interest is actually lost, we can partially reinstate the benefits from the overall price supporting aspects of the classic nonrecourse loan program. Such price support will help reduce farm program expenditures and help farmers in the U.S. and around the world receive more of their income from the market." As for renewable energy, ACGA has been a leader for our entire existence. We not only support the expansion of the Title IX programs, but we also fully support all of the renewable energy and biomass provisions contained in the "Heartland, Habitat, Harvest and Horticulture Act" (4 H Bill) in the Senate bill. Moreover, since ACGA has been the nation's leading farm organization in the development and utilization of wind powered electricity generation, we wholeheartedly support the measure for residential wind power development. The American Corn Growers Association represents 14,000 members in 35 states. If you believe in the work of ACGA and want to be a part of the organization, please join and/or find additional details at www.acga.org. 3/17/08 Date: 3/13/08
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