[Congressional Record Volume 158, Number 88 (Tuesday, June 12, 2012)]
[Senate]
[Pages S3935-S3937]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                           Agriculture Reform

  Ms. STABENOW. Mr. President, in a short while--I think this 
afternoon--we will officially be back on consideration of what is 
dubbed the farm bill--the Agricultural Reform, Food, and Jobs Act. This 
is something we do every 5 years to secure the safest, most affordable, 
reliable food supply in the world. We are very proud of what our 
farmers and ranchers do.
  The largest investment in land and water conservation we make as a 
country on working lands is made through the farm bill--protecting our 
Great Lakes, the Chesapeake Bay, and supporting farmers who have 
environmental challenges and managing those on their lands. So these 
are very important investments.

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  We also make important investments in nutrition for families who need 
temporary help, as many families certainly have during this economic 
downturn, and many other exciting opportunities that create jobs.
  The Presiding Officer, I know, cares very deeply about manufacturing, 
as do I. One of the areas in which we are growing the economy is by 
making things, growing things, and bringing those together in something 
called bio-based manufacturing, which I will be talking more about as 
we proceed, but the idea is to use agricultural products to offset 
chemicals, to offset oil and plastics. This is an exciting new 
opportunity for us. We expand upon that through opportunities in what 
we call the farm bill.
  The bottom line is this is a jobs bill. There are 16 million people 
at work in this country--and there are not too many bills that come to 
the floor that have the number 16 million--that are in some way related 
to agriculture and food production. It may be processing, it may be 
production, it may be in the sales end, but 16 million people work in 
this country because of agriculture in some way, and so it is important 
we get this right.
  We also have a major trade surplus in this country coming from 
agriculture. So we are producing it here and then we are selling it 
overseas. I certainly wish to make sure we are focusing on exporting 
our products, not our jobs. The shining star of that is in agriculture, 
where we have seen just in the last few years a 270-percent increase in 
agricultural exports. So this is a big deal for us and it is part of 
why this is a jobs bill and very important.
  We also know we need to reform agricultural production policies. This 
bill is very much about cutting subsidies as well as creating jobs. So 
what are we doing? We have taken the view in this farm bill where 
rather than focusing on protecting individual programs that have been 
with us a long time, we have focused on principles: What is it we need 
to do to have a strong economy, to support our farmers? Whether it is a 
weather disaster, such as we have had in Michigan, or whether it is a 
disaster in markets and prices, we don't want our farmers losing their 
farms because of a disaster beyond their control. We all have a stake 
in that. There is nothing more risky, in terms of a business, than 
agriculture, where one is at the whim of the weather and other market 
forces. So we want to make sure we are there.
  We also know that for too long we have paid government money to folks 
who didn't need it for crops they didn't grow. We are not going to do 
that anymore. This is a huge reform in public policy, where we are 
moving to risk-based management. We are focusing on what we need to do 
to cut the deficit and strengthen and consolidate and save dollars but 
also provide risk management. In fact, in this bill, we are reducing 
the deficit by $23 billion.
  We have not had the opportunity to have in front of us a bill on the 
floor that cuts the deficit, with strong bipartisan support around 
policies that make sense and that we agree to. This is an area where we 
have come forward. In fact, I am very proud of the fact our Agriculture 
Committees--in the fall, when the deficit reduction effort was going 
on--came forward with a House-Senate bipartisan agreement on deficit 
reduction. In fact, if every committee had done that, we would have 
gotten to where we needed to go.
  I wish to thank my friend and ranking member Senator Roberts for his 
strong leadership, as well as the chairman and ranking member in the 
House for their joint efforts in that way.
  But when that didn't happen, we decided we would keep our commitment 
to deficit reduction and move forward on policies that would achieve 
that and we have done that with $23 billion in cuts. We do that by 
repealing what is called direct payments that go to a farmer regardless 
of what is happening, whether it is good times or bad.
  In fact, we replace four different farm subsidies with a 
strengthening of crop insurance and additional risk-management efforts 
when there is a loss by the individual farmer, at the county. We focus 
on loss. As I indicated, we will support farmers for what they plant.
  We strengthen payment limits in terms of where we focus precious 
taxpayer dollars, and we also took a scalpel as we looked at every part 
of the USDA programs. We looked for duplication, what made sense, what 
was outdated, and we eliminated 100 different programs and 
authorizations within this farm bill policy. Again, I don't know many 
committees that have come forward with that kind of elimination.
  That doesn't mean we are eliminating the functions, the critical 
areas of supporting farmers and ranchers or conservation or expanding 
jobs through renewable energy or our nutrition efforts or so on--farm 
credit, other beginning farmers, and all the efforts we are involved 
in. We are just doing it in a more streamlined way. We are cutting 
paperwork.
  In rural development, which affects every single community, every 
town, every village, every county outside our urban areas, we want to 
make sure a part-time mayor can actually figure out rural development 
and use the supports that are there to start businesses, to focus on 
water and sewer infrastructure or roads, that it is actually simple and 
available and doable from their standpoint. We have spent our time 
working together to come up with something that makes sense for 
taxpayers, for consumers of food, for those who care deeply in every 
region of our country about how we support farmers and ranchers and for 
those who care very deeply about our land and water and air resources 
on working lands and how we can work together to actually do that.
  We are moving forward now to the next phase on our farm bill 
consideration. Senator Roberts and I are working closely together to 
tee up some amendments--both Democratic and Republican amendments--so 
we can begin the process of voting. We know there is a lot of work to 
do. Colleagues have a lot of ideas. Certainly, some of those ideas I 
will support, some I will not support, but the process of the Senate is 
to come forward and offer ideas, debate them, and vote.

  So we are working hard, hopefully to tee up some votes this afternoon 
or tomorrow that would give us the opportunity to move forward. We know 
there is a lot more work to do. We have a lot of ideas that colleagues 
have, and we will continue to negotiate moving forward on a final set 
of amendments. But we think it is important to get started.
  I wish to thank all our colleagues who came together on the motion to 
proceed. It was extraordinary. After a strong bipartisan vote in 
committee, we are very appreciative of the fact our colleagues are 
willing to give us the opportunity to get this done with such a strong 
bipartisan vote on the motion to proceed.
  Also, before relinquishing the floor, I notice my colleague from 
South Dakota is here, and I wish to personally thank him for his 
leadership on this bill, with extremely important provisions in the 
bill, both on risk coverage. The proposal to support farmers who have a 
loss came from a very important proposal Senator Thune and Senator 
Sherrod Brown put forward, along with other colleagues, which is the 
foundation of what we are doing to work with crop insurance to support 
farmers. Also, Senator Thune has been pivotal in a very important part 
of conservation that ties what we call the sodsaver amendment to the 
protection of prairie sod, prairie land, to crop insurance. If someone 
is breaking up the sod, there would be a penalty on the crop insurance 
side. So it is an important way of bringing together accountability and 
crop insurance and protecting our native sod. This is something, among 
many other things, Senator Thune has been involved in and shown real 
leadership.
  As I said, this has been a strong bipartisan effort. Again, I thank 
my colleague from Kansas who has been a partner in this effort.
  I look forward to having the opportunity to bring all our amendments 
to the floor and to give people the opportunity to move forward in good 
faith. It is going to be critical that we move forward in good faith so 
we can begin to debate, to vote, and to get this bill done.
  All the policies we have talked about actually end on September 30 of 
this year, with very disastrous results for farmers and ranchers if we 
don't get this done. They need economic certainty. The 16 million who 
work because of agriculture are counting on us to get this done so they 
can make their

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decisions on what they are going to plant and how their business is 
going to work.
  I am proud of the effort so far, our coming together and having folks 
join in this wonderful bipartisan effort to get to work.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Manchin). The Senator from South Dakota.
  Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that my Republican 
colleagues, Senators McCain and Ayotte, and myself be permitted to 
enter into a colloquy for up to 30 minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.