August 5, 2001

Washington, D.C.- After a long and meticulous effort over the last two years to learn from agriculture producers their opinions on the direction of federal agriculture policy, the House Committee on Agriculture has finally passed its 2001 farm bill. We've cleared a big hurdle in updating the bill that will direct federal agriculture policy for the next several years. Although we still have several steps to go in passing the bill both on the House floor and in the Senate, I think this bill is a good step in the right direction.

I have met with representatives of every group affected by this bill. I've held hearings to listen to grain and cattle producers give input on what they think the bill should look like. And I've listened to literally hundreds of farmers and ranchers in town hall meetings across every county in my western Oklahoma congressional district give me their perspective on what they think works in the current farm bill, and what they think could work better.

Whether it was face to face in dozens of town hall meetings, through literally thousands of letters and phone calls from concerned constituents, or even via the internet TV town hall meetings I participated in with farmers and other members of the agriculture committee, I feel confident all the input I've been given has helped to make a bill that does more to help more farmers and ranchers succeed in doing what they love - providing this country with a healthy and safe food supply.

One thing producers said they liked in the current farm bill was the flexibility to plant what they wanted, when they wanted. This farm bill will continue to give producers the flexibility they need. Under this bill, the decisions on what crops to plant will continue to be made by those that are doing the planting, not government bureaucrats.

And what producers have come to know as the AMTA payment will now be known as the fixed-decoupled payment. These payments, which were establish to help producers weather the recent years of unusually difficult world economic conditions for U.S. commodities, will be retained, along with the marketing loan program.

The bill will also provide a new counter-cyclical protection program to help farmers weather adverse market conditions. For wheat, the most popular crop in Oklahoma, the payments will be triggered when the price of wheat, adjusted for the fixed decoupled payment, is below $4.04.

A comprehensive conservation bill I introduced in July has been incorporated into this farm bill as well. I'm proud to see by adopting my bill, the committee agrees with me that the current conservation programs need to be fully funded and updated.

The bill will devote more than $16 billion over 10 years to soil, water and wildlife programs. This represents over a 75% increase in spending. Program changes include reauthorizing the Environmental Quality Incentives Program, known as EQIP, through 2011 at $1.2 billion per year. The funding will be divided equally between row crop producers and livestock producers. In addition, a $675 million fund is created in EQIP to address ground water conservation issues.

The bill will also expand the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) to 39.2 million acres. And it will reauthorize the Wetlands Reserve Program (WRP) and the Wildlife Habitat Incentives Program (WHIP). New to this farm bill will be the program from my bill to authorize 2 million acres in a Grassland Reserve Program to be enrolled in 10, 15 and 20 year contracts. It will also fund my Small Watershed Dam Restoration project at $150 million over the life of the bill.

This bill addresses the myriad of concerns that agriculture producers have given me over the years, and I believe it will be a significant improvement on the current farm bill.