[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 126 (Monday, September 21, 1998)]
[Senate]
[Pages S10645-S10646]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                THE ADMINISTRATION'S FARM RELIEF PACKAGE

  Mr. JOHNSON. Mr. President, I wish to touch on the status of 
agricultural disaster legislation this morning, which is pending in 
both the Senate and in the other body.
  As many know, for the last several months the northern plains--in 
particular including my home State of South Dakota--have suffered 
through an extraordinarily difficult time in the agricultural sector. 
We face extremely low prices in both the grain and the livestock side 
of agriculture. Many parts of the northern plains as well have suffered 
from grain disease, as well as flooding and other natural calamities 
that have further caused extreme stress on agricultural producers in 
general. Now we find prices at remarkably low levels.
  I received a report just recently from Winner, SD, indicating that 
corn there was bringing only $1.10 a bushel, and wheat in Alpena, SD, 
was bringing in around $2. Cattle in our State, as they are throughout 
much of the country, are bringing in the mid-$50 range. This represents 
a loss for each animal raised by our producers, and it creates a 
situation where hedging those losses with profitability in the grain 
sector is not possible either. It is a double-barreled hit. It is one 
that is unique--one that is not common. Even though we all understand 
that there are cycles of price in both the grain and livestock sector, 
for them to both be at the calamitously low level, complicated by 
further natural disasters at the same time, is just simply wreaking 
havoc across much of rural America and the United States.
  My farm State colleagues and I have twice brought up our legislative 
response. We have, frankly, had mixed success on the floor of this body 
and in Congress in general. The economic relief package that we earlier 
offered would have provided a lift in the caps on marketing loan rates 
and an extension of terms of those loans from 9 to 15 months, a 
strategy that I believe is the most effective strategy that has been 
debated on this floor relative to addressing the problem of grain 
prices.
  There is much that we can do in terms of disaster relief, and much of 
that is fine and good. But I think anyone who doesn't understand that 
the crisis we face both in livestock and grain is reflective of price 
simply doesn't get it. While disaster relief will tide some people over 
and address the cash flow problems that they face now over a short 
term, this body needs to be addressing the long-term problem of price 
in grain and livestock. And anything that doesn't do that is simply 
buying us time for yet another calamity to come down the road sometime 
soon.
  A second provision in our package that provided disaster indemnity to 
assist producers who suffered from multiyear disasters--natural and 
otherwise--is a provision to provide market transparency through 
mandatory price reporting of livestock sales and mandatory labeling of 
beef and lamb products for their country of origin. We were successful 
in incorporating several of these provisions into the agricultural 
appropriations bill when it was considered on the floor of the Senate. 
The one measure that we were not successful with, unfortunately, was 
the lifting of caps and the extension of the marketing loan rates on 
grain. We have twice now voted on that marketing loan provision, and 
twice we have been defeated.
  The Senate passed a $500 million indemnity program which, as is now 
agreed on by everyone essentially, is inadequate given the scope of the 
losses that have taken place, not just on the northern plains but in 
Texas, Louisiana, and other parts of the country that have suffered 
from the dire drought circumstance.
  This legislation now is tied up in conference committee. It is my 
hope that we will see sufficient bipartisanship and statesmanship on 
the part of the conferees that a final product will return to the House 
and Senate that will, in fact, be constructive. In the meantime, 
however, released this weekend and announced this morning is an 
initiative promoted by the administration that I think this body and 
the conferees need to look at with the greatest care.

  I applaud my colleague, Senator Daschle, in particular, for his 
unstinting work on the agriculture crisis problem and for his work with 
the administration to promote yet another constructive, positive 
approach to the kind of prices we face. Senator Daschle, who could well 
have been in our home State campaigning in his own reelection campaign, 
chose instead to remain here working around the clock and through the 
weekend with the administration, with our colleagues on the Senate 
Agriculture Committee, with both political parties, trying to see what 
we could do to augment the relief that had earlier been discussed and 
which had partially been passed by the Senate.
  I again applaud Senator Daschle's extraordinary leadership, his 
willingness to stick with the real business of getting this legislation 
into shape, for getting it to the floor of the Senate, and for working 
with the administration to make sure that it has both congressional and 
administration support.
  This relief package would come to slightly over $7 billion for 1 
year. It would involve, again, uncapping of the

[[Page S10646]]

marketing loan rate, which I have discussed and which I think we need 
to revisit, as the single best strategy available to us to address the 
issue of inadequate prices in the grain sector. It would lift these 
caps and extend the loan terms from 9 to 15 months. I think it would 
have an enormously positive economic impact all across rural America.
  Second, it would tie our relief to production agriculture, which I 
think is important.
  There is an alternative disaster package being talked about currently 
that would amount to augmenting the transition payments for producers--
actually not the producers so much as it would be for landowners.
  I applaud all efforts to go forward. I am not going to make the 
perfect the enemy of the good. I think there is urgency here that is 
critical. We need to proceed in an expeditious fashion as much as 
possible. I understand it may involve some give and take and will 
involve some of each side's strategy. But when I look at what the 
uncapping of the loan rates would do, even at this modest level, it is 
clear to me that it is a superior alternative.
  The wheat price, which is currently capped at $2.58 per bushel under 
the Democratic plan, goes to $3.22. That is up 64 cents per bushel. 
That is under the Democratic plan and the plan proposed by the Clinton 
administration.
  The alternative to that through the AMTA payments, if you were to 
equate it on a per bushel basis, would be not a 64-cent increase but a 
23-cent increase.
  On corn, the current cap is at $1.89. The Democratic proposal would 
increase that to $2.25, up 36 cents. The alternative through the AMTA 
payment increase would equate to about a 10-cent increase rather than a 
36-cent increase.
  The soybean cap would be increased modestly--from $5.26 per bushel to 
$5.33 a bushel, up 7 cents. But under the alternative AMTA approach, 
soybean producers would stand a chance of getting nothing if their 
soybeans were not planted on former base acreages.
  The AMTA augmentation also suffers from the problem of what to do 
about renters. Some 43 percent of the crops being grown in America are 
being grown by farmers on rented land. It has been our experience in 
the past that if we do the AMTA payment approach, there may be a great 
many instances where the money will go exclusively to the landowner but 
nothing to the farmer who actually is growing the crop.
  The Freedom to Farm legislation touted in the 1996 farm bill 
delivered planting and management flexibility to farmers. They have 
been able to take care of that flexibility. I think that has been 
positive. It has been a positive step in the right direction. I applaud 
that. No one is suggesting that we back up and retreat from that level 
of flexibility, that we back into some sort of micromanaged world out 
of Washington.
  But the fact is when Freedom to Farm passed, wheat prices were nearly 
$6; not gaining--around $2 in many parts of the country. Corn was in 
the $3 range. It is far less than that; it is in the $1 range now.
  Circumstances have changed. Many of us would say, ``I told you so.'' 
There is a certain amount of foreseeability that those prices were not 
going to stay at that high level in perpetuity. Now we find that with 
Freedom to Farm, although it contains some positive things, it is, 
frankly, grossly inadequate in terms of providing the safety net, 
providing some kind of stability for family producers.
  Now we find that declining transition payments and then ultimately a 
pat on the back and a ``good luck,'' reducing America's commitment to 
family agriculture from $26 billion at a high water mark over a decade 
ago to $5 billion and ultimately to nothing, while our European allies 
spend $50 billion to sustain agriculture there, because they know what 
it is like to be hungry, puts U.S. producers at an incredible 
disadvantage.
  It is my hope, again, that we will find the bipartisan will to deal 
with this in an urgent manner in the coming week or two of this 
Congress. The administration and the Democratic proposal, on top of 
these past efforts at meat labeling, price transparency, disaster 
payments and raising the marketing loan cap--which, by the way, is a 
marketing loan and not the kind of loan that results in massive grain 
buildup in supplies and inventory we suffered under in previous years--
this disaster package also includes significant funds for Farm Service 
Administration operating loans for producers who have been hit by a 
disaster, for land compensation for flooded lands, for payment for crop 
losses on uninsured crops and for the additional FSA county staff 
support that will be necessary to implement all of this in an effective 
and efficient manner.
  The bottom line, in my view, is price. We need to address both, 
however--the long-term strategy of what to do about price, as well as 
the short-term cash flow crisis that we have in rural America.
  I believe that the previous package which was adopted only in part 
took us a long ways in the right direction. The current package, which 
was announced this morning by the administration, by Senator Daschle 
and Senator Harkin, I think moves us far beyond the debate that has 
taken place so far. It is far more constructive. It is far more helpful 
as we deal with this crisis in rural America.
  I again applaud Senator Daschle's extraordinary leadership, the work 
of Senator Harkin and other members of the Ag Committee, Secretary 
Glickman and the Clinton administration for focusing with this kind of 
intensity in a timely manner on what needs to be done relative to 
American agriculture this year; not next year, not 5 years down the 
road, but this year.
  I am hopeful, again, that the conferees will evaluate this proposal 
with the greatest amount of care and earnestness, and that when we 
adjourn this coming October, we will, in fact, have addressed this 
issue in a bipartisan fashion and in a cost-efficient fashion in this 
body and that it will be on the President's desk and that the President 
will have an opportunity to sign ag disaster legislation which, in 
fact, is meaningful and timely and sufficient to get our family 
producers down the road into another productive year in the coming 
planting season.
  I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Kyl). Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. KENNEDY. I yield myself all of the time remaining on the 
Democratic side.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator is recognized.

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