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Op-Ed on I’m
often baffled by accounts I read in editorials, syndicated
columns and news articles about issues I follow as a farmer
and as the CEO of the state’s largest agricultural
organization. I
have read, with great interest, recent accounts and editorial
cartoons reporting the passage of the new farm bill.
For all the ink I’ve read that claims this is nothing
but a farmer’s pork and gravy train dream come true –
I’d like to counter with the facts of the story.
Not as they relate to farmers, but as they relate to
consumers, taxpayers and even to environmental watchdogs. Consumers
often take for granted the fact that American farmers produce
the world’s safest, most abundant, and most affordable food. This new six-year farm bill is designed to insure that
production will continue – despite mounting efforts by other
countries to put us out of business.
What’s the alternative?
It’s simple – without this insurance consumers
could see an unstable food supply that is potentially unsafe
(chemical and carcinogen laden), scarce (most all of our food
coming from unreliable foreign sources with no US
environmental safeguards), and very expensive. Federal
support of farmers helps keep us in business at a time when
commodity prices are lower than what our grandparents earned
for the same produce, in the midst of a four-year drought, and
when farm costs (fertilizer, crop protection products,
equipment and labor) are at an all time high. Recent
accounts would lead one to believe that US farmers are getting
a free ride from the government at the cost of the taxpayers
– that they are unique among the rest of the world’s
farmers. Nothing
could be further from the truth.
In fact, it is because of our American bred fortitude
that we are willing to make a sacrifice and struggle to make a
living in spite of these very challenging economic times.
For many of us, were it not for government agricultural
assistance we would be forced to sell our farms, take other
jobs, and move from the very rural towns we have historically
helped to sustain. We
receive far less than farmers in other countries due to their
vast systems of farmer support. Take
Europe for example. Recent
data shows that the average government support for European
farmers is $313 an acre of farmland.
The comparable level in the US is a mere $38 an acre. The
inequity doesn’t stop there.
Consider government help to farmers for commodity
exports. Europe accounts for 84 percent of the entire world’s
agricultural export subsidies.
In the US, it’s LESS than three percent.
Europe is out-supporting their farmers over the support
of US farmers by a ratio of 30:1.
It’s no wonder our foreign competitors are edging us
out of the world marketplace. Many
reports would lead you to believe that the new farm bill is
far too expensive and that it will cost MUCH more than the
bill it replaced. Once
again, not all the facts have been presented.
While it’s true that the new farm bill appears to
cost $70 billion more than the previous bill, that does not
account for the Federal disaster payments made to farmers
under the old bill. Because
of the way the new bill was written, disaster payments will
not be paid out like they were in the past.
So if you figure the cost of the old farm bill PLUS all
those disaster payments, the cost of the new farm bill is
substantially less. Carry
that projection into the future and you’ll see what a great
deal American taxpayers are getting for a very trustworthy
food supply. Over
the next 10 years, Federal Government outlays for everything
are projected to be $22.245 trillion.
Over the same period, at the current bill’s rate, all
the government spending for agriculture will total $206.2
billion – that’s 0.93 (point-nine-three) percent of all
the Federal government is projected to spend over the next ten
years. That’s
LESS than one penny out of every dollar the Federal Government
spends to sustain the world’s best food supply, the most
productive capacity in the world, the most affordable and the
safest food produced anywhere on the globe! – A very small
price to pay. But
there’s more. For
the first time I can recall, this bill contains something that
even the most ardent environmentalists can be proud of.
The new farm bill has an 80 percent increased
commitment to soil and water conservation through incentives
to farmers as we work even harder to conserve and protect our
precious natural resources. The
new farm bill is nearly 500 pages long.
Before you believe what you hear about the bill being
pork barrel politics, I urge you to read it.
Do the math. Check
the numbers and make your judgement based on facts and on what
this bill does to preserve one of America’s greatest assets
– our ability to freely feed the nation wholesome healthy
affordable food. Are
we really willing to turn our backs on conservation and the
economies of rural America?
Are we willing to send our farmers to the auctioneer
and turn over the production of our food to foreign
governments? I
dare say not! #
# # David
M. Winkles, Jr. is a Sumter County farmer and is also the
President of the 130,500-member South Carolina Farm Bureau
Federation, a non-profit agricultural advocate organization. |
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