[Congressional Record Volume 168, Number 41 (Tuesday, March 8, 2022)]
[House]
[Page H1345]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]





                           FOCUSING ON ENERGY

  (Mr. LaMALFA asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. LaMALFA. Mr. Speaker, it is time to focus on our energy crisis 
and our energy costs, but that also relates to food.
  In our country, we are already seeing bare shelves of food items. You 
might recall years ago when Boris Yeltsin visited this country. They 
took him to a supermarket, and he was amazed by what was on American 
shelves. Now, we are moving in the direction of having shelves like in 
Russia.
  In my home State of California, as they cut off the water supply, the 
Klamath Basin got zero water last year to farm crops, and in the San 
Joaquin Valley and part of the Sacramento Valley, zero water 
allocations.
  As we look at conditions around the world, Russia is deciding to cut 
off some of the imports of fertilizer, which will make it harder to 
plant crops. Hungary has decided they are not going to export grain 
anymore this coming year. This is going to have a ripple effect through 
all food supplies and certainly on prices. The price of wheat is way 
up, maybe 100 percent--wheat futures. We are going to feel this at the 
stores if we are not planting our own food in this country.
  We have the water to do it in California, but it is all going out in 
the ocean in order to support fish that no longer live there. And the 
salinity issue is misused.
  We have to focus once again.

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