[Congressional Bills 105th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 3339 Introduced in House (IH)]







105th CONGRESS
  2d Session
                                H. R. 3339

  To amend the Agricultural Market Transition Act to ensure that rice 
   farms covered by a production flexibility contract remain in rice 
production during the term of the contract when the principal producer 
            of rice on the farm is a tenant or sharecropper.


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                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                             March 5, 1998

   Mr. Paul introduced the following bill; which was referred to the 
                        Committee on Agriculture

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                                 A BILL


 
  To amend the Agricultural Market Transition Act to ensure that rice 
   farms covered by a production flexibility contract remain in rice 
production during the term of the contract when the principal producer 
            of rice on the farm is a tenant or sharecropper.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

    This Act may be cited as the ``Rice Farmer Fairness Act''.

SEC. 2. ENHANCED PROTECTION FOR TENANTS AND SHARECROPPERS WHO PRODUCE 
              RICE ON FARMS COVERED BY PRODUCTION FLEXIBILITY 
              CONTRACTS.

    Section 111(c) of the Agricultural Market Transition Act (title I 
of Public Law 104-127; 7 U.S.C. 7211(c)) is amended--
            (1) by inserting ``(1)'' before ``In carrying''; and
            (2) by adding at the end the following new paragraph:
    ``(2) Notwithstanding subsection (a)(4), if eligible cropland 
covered by a contract includes rice cropland and a tenant or 
sharecropper was the principal producer of the rice before the contact 
was entered into, the owner or producer who entered into the contract 
shall be required, as a condition for the continued eligibility of the 
owner or producer for contract payments, to retain the rice cropland in 
rice production or a cropping system rotation that includes rice 
production during the term of the contract. For purposes of this 
paragraph, the term `rice cropland' means eligible cropland that, in 
the crop year immediately before the crop year in which the contract 
was entered into with regard to that eligible cropland--
            ``(A) was used for the production of rice; or
            ``(B) was not used for the production of rice, but was in a 
        rice cropping system rotation for the purpose of producing 
        rice.''.
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