[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 141 (Friday, October 9, 1998)]
[Senate]
[Pages S12230-S12231]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




               THE FUTURE OF FAMILY FARMING AND RANCHING

 Mr. JOHNSON. Mr. President, today I rise to express--in very 
stark terms--my deep and increasing concern for the future of family 
farming and ranching in this country. The truth is, our country's 
family farmers and ranchers are under increasing economic pressure from 
concentration in agriculture--concentration in meatpacking, 
concentration in food-retailing, concentration in rail and other forms 
of transportation, concentration in banking, concentration in the 
grain-trading companies, and concentration in production itself.
  The strands of these varied concentrations are tightening around the 
throats of family farmers and ranchers, threatening not only the 
farmers and ranchers themselves, but also their families, the small-
town businesses that depend on them, their schools, their churches, and 
the very social fabric that makes rural America such a special and 
wonderful place to live--the reasons why we should do whatever we can 
to preserve and promote our system of family farming and ranching.
  But there is more at stake here than just our farmers and ranchers 
and their families, critically important as they are. What's also at 
stake is the very system that produces our food, that gives us life. 
Study after study shows that family agriculture is the most efficient 
way, the most environmentally safe way, to produce our food. And that 
is another reason why we should do whatever we can to preserve and 
promote our system of family farming and ranching.
  But, frankly, there is a troubling movement in our country toward the 
corporatization of family agriculture. Look at the pork industry--it 
has become increasingly dominated by giant corporate hog factories, a 
fact which has gone hand-in-glove with lower and lower prices for hogs, 
to the point that many family pork producers can't make a living at it 
anymore, and have simply given up.
  A case in point is the state of North Carolina, which has seen the 
biggest influx of corporate hog factories in the United States. In 
1984, there were 24,000 hog farmers in that state, just before the 
growth of hog factories skyrocketed. Now, there are 7,000 hog farmers 
in North Carolina, almost all of them working on contract, little more 
than hired hands working for outside corporate investors. However, at 
the same time that independent family hog producers have almost 
disappeared in North Carolina, the number of hogs produced there has 
tripled, thus leading to enormous environmental problems--fish kills 
numbering in the tens of millions, rapidly rising nitrates in 
groundwater used for drinking, increasing levels in airborne ammonia, 
stench that makes the eyes water, and a corresponding and unsurprising 
drop in tourism. The North Carolina experiment has clearly not worked.
  What has happened in North Carolina, and what is happening in many 
other states, is nothing less than a human tragedy. My ancestors, and 
the ancestors of many people here today, left Europe to escape the 
feudal system of agriculture, a system of inequality and unfairness 
where a baron controlled the land and the peasants worked for him as 
little better than slaves.

[[Page S12231]]

  I do not want to return to a ``new feudalism'' in which the baron is 
replaced by out-of-state corporate investors, nor do I believe that the 
people of my state desire to do so, either. It is for that reason that 
I have opposed the concentration in agriculture at all levels, because 
it ultimately is fair to neither food producers nor food consumers.
  And it is also the reason that I plan to vote for ``Amendment E,'' an 
initiated measure that will appear on the November 3rd, 1998 South 
Dakota general election ballot. This measure corresponds very closely 
to a similar measure in Nebraska, which has been deemed constitutional 
by the United States Supreme Court, and has allowed Nebraska to 
maintain both market share and number of producers much better than its 
neighboring states, including South Dakota. I'm not telling any South 
Dakotan how to vote on this or any other issue, but I do want to add my 
voice to those who believe the move toward the corporatization of our 
family farming system has gone too far. We have far too much at stake 
to simply sit silently by while the best food producing system ever 
devised by humankind is allowed to die a slow and painful 
death.

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