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Guest Commentary December 21, 2001
Farmers Deserve a Decent Living
The Honorable Jean Carnahan
This past year I had to face a decision that many people in rural communities face: "Do I sell the family farm?" It is a heart-wrenching decision-one that was further compounded when my house burned.
After much discussion in the family, we decided to rebuild, keep the farm and the cattle operation. As a Senator, I find I now have a greater personal interest in agricultural policy than I might otherwise have had.
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Quite simply, the family farm is a part of our culture … one that should be preserved and supported. But across America, one by one, family farms are disappearing. They have been hard hit by depressed commodity prices, droughts and other natural disasters, and failed federal policy. In fact, commodity prices recently took their biggest one-month drop in more than 90 years.
America needs a new farm bill. Before Congress adjourned, we had a chance to pass one. Our bill would have given farmers the security they deserve. But, as happens too often in Washington, a minority of Senators blocked the legislation.
This delay is unconscionable for the thousands of Missouri farmers struggling to make it. They will now be forced to live another year under the failed 1996 Freedom to Farm law. While that law gave farmers flexibility in deciding what, when, and where to plant, it left them without a safety net.
When floods came, the farm bill gave them nothing. When droughts cut their output in half, the farm bill gave them nothing.
When the bottom fell out of prices, when the cost of fuel skyrocketed, when armyworms destroyed an entire crop, the farm bill gave them nothing.
Only when Congress passed supplemental spending bills did farmers get relief. And Congress was forced to do that every year. We called those bailouts "disaster assistance," but the real disaster is our farm policy itself.
It is time for action on a new farm bill -- one that promotes competitiveness and consumer choice while providing adequate income to farmers. ...
The by-word all across America today is SECURITY. National security, airline security ... homeland security. It is time to think about farmland security.
Farmers can't be expected to put food on our tables if they can't afford to put food on their own.
For now at least, because of the objections of the minority, farmers will have to wait.
Ken Disselhorst, a cattleman I met recently in Palmyra, put it this way: "The farm bill is a farmer's roadmap for business planning. It sounds like our roadmap won't be ready for next year's crop."
These hardworking men and women feed the world. It is wrong to make them wait another year for a bill that will help them earn a decent living.
To the opponents of the farm bill I say this: this was a delay, not a defeat. I'll be back in January and I will keep working for a farm bill that gives America's farmers the security they deserve.
Jean Carnahan is a U.S. Senator (D-Missouri) and writes an occasional column, Plain Speaking; the above has been adapted from her December 20, 2001 column. To contact her, Click Here.
The above column has been distributed by PoliticsOL.com.
