Immediate
Action Needed to Incorporate Payment Limitation Reform into the 2002 Farm Bill!
Please
Contact Your US Senators and US Representatives and Ask Them to Instruct the House/Senate
Farm Bill 2002 Conference Committee to Support the U.S. Senate Position on Limiting
the Annual 'Counter Cyclical', 'Marketing Loan' and 'Loan Deficiency' payments
under the Commodity Title of the 2002 Farm Bill. For
more than 20 years the National Grange has supported legislation to target the
benefits of federal farm programs to smaller and moderate sized family farms.
At the 135th Annual Session of the National Grange, held last November in Cedar
Rapids Iowa, National Master Kermit Richardson again addressed this issue in his
annual address to the delegates: "We
should be concerned about the distribution of Federal farm program payments. Half
of all production based farm program payments go to just 8% of our largest farmers.
The smallest 50% of our farmers divide only 13% of the farm program payments.
We cannot sustain public support for agricultural programs if we provide the majority
of our farm program dollars to farmers least in need to receive them."
Instead of a farm program where a majority of farm program payments continue going
to a small minority of large farmers, Master Richardson outlined a set of alternative
policy goals for our national agriculture programs more in line with Grange philosophy
"[O]ur recommendations
for the next Farm Bill should encourage increased participation in agriculture
by the largest number of individuals and families through the broadest practical
distribution of agricultural production assets possible. We should embrace participation
by individuals and families in our agricultural system, without favoring one production
philosophy, one commodity or one region of the country over another. Our Federal
farm programs must allow our current generation of family farmers to retire with
dignity and attract a new generation of families and individuals to manage the
resources we have invested in agriculture. We should reject farm policies that
facilitate the consolidation of farm production assets into the hands of fewer
and fewer individuals, families or corporations. Our nation does not have too
many farmers. Our nation's food security is threatened by having too few farmers.
Our strength is our diversity and the dedication of millions of individuals and
families who choose to participate in U.S. agriculture. " As
part of the formation of the 2002 Farm Bill both the U.S. House of Representatives
and the U.S. Senate have included provisions to cap or limit the total amount
of farm program payments that any one farmer may receive. The Senate version would
set the limit of farm program payments per farm at $275,000. The House of Representatives
version of the payment limitation would set the limit effectively at $5500,000
per farm. The Senate version also closes or tightens loopholes that allow existing
farm operations to receive multiple program payments for the same farming operation
through the use of corporations, trusts, partnerships and off-farm relatives.
The House version of the Farm Bill leaves these loopholes substantially intact.
After
reviewing both provisions carefully, we believe that the payment limitation provisions
in the Senate version of the 2002 Farm Bill come much closer to achieving the
farm policy goals of the National Grange than the House of Representatives provisions.
Sensible payment limitation provisions are not "social policy" as critics allege.
Instead they are valuable tools for providing financial discipline and structure
to the entire market based U.S. agriculture production system. In recent years,
farm economists and other observers, including U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Ann
Veneman, have noted that rather than provide broad financial assistance to the
agriculture sector, federal farm program payments that are concentrated in the
hands of a few large farmers instead increase pressure on land prices and cash
rent for production agriculture land that discourages beginning farmers from entering
agriculture. They encourage larger farmers to take on greater levels of debt,
which in turn leads to a greater number of farm bankruptcies when commodity prices
fall. They drain finances intended to bolster the rural economy by allowing a
substantial amount of farm program payments to go to significant numbers of wealthy,
non-resident farmland owners and non-farm corporations. Finally, unlimited farm
program payments lead directly to over production of farm commodities that, in
turn, reduces farm income for all farmers. With your assistance, the 2002 Farm
Bill can include reasonable farm program payment limitations that will reduce
the incidents of abuse of federal farm programs and that will improve the financial
health of the general farm economy. Action
Plan---The 2002 House/Senate Farm Bill conference committee is now writing
the final version of the 2002 Farm Bill. Please Ask your US Senators and US Representatives
to immediately instruct the 2002 Farm Bill conference committee to support the
following Grange supported compromise payment limitation programs as part of the
2002 Farm Bill! -
Support including the Grassley-Dorgan Payment Limitation Amendment from the U.S.
Senate Farm Bill that effectively sets an annual payment limitation of $275,000
per farm as part of the final 2002 Farm Bill.
-
Oppose the U.S. House of Representative Farm Bill payment limitation provisions
that would set a nominal payment limitation of $550,000 annually per farm, but
with loopholes that effectively eliminate most payment limitations.
Thank
you for your grassroots participation in the National Grange Legislative Program. | 
