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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Oklahoma's latest farm and ranch news
Your Update from Ron Hays of RON for Friday December 8, 2006
A
service of Midwest Farm Shows
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-- Coburn says he supports the Frank Lucas plan for Disaster Aid- and
has fresh ideas on Farm Policy.
-- National Cattlemen call on Cattlemen everywhere to write President
Bush regarding the Korean Bone Chip Mess!
-- American Farm Bureau asks for the same budget baseline-plus a
little for inflation in 2007.
-- The replacement for J.B. Penn gets an easy OK from the Senate Ag
Committee.
-- OWGA meeting tomorrow
-- Tulsa farm Show is up and running!
Howdy Neighbors! Here's your morning farm news headlines from the Director of Farm Programming for the Radio Oklahoma Network, Ron Hays. Our email this morning is a service of Midwest Farm Shows, featuring the Tulsa Farm Show December 7-9, 2006 and the Southern Plains Farm Show in Oklahoma City April 19-21, 2007. Check out details of both of these exciting shows at the official website of Midwest Farm Shows by clicking here. If you have received this by someone forwarding it to you, you are welcome to subscribe and get this weekday update sent to you directly by clicking here. | |
Coburn says he supports the Frank Lucas plan for Disaster Aid- and has fresh ideas on Farm Policy. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Oklahoma's
Junior Senator, Dr. Tom Coburn, talked with reporters yesterday in a
telephone news conference- and spent a fair amount of time on ag issues.
There were two ag issues that were brought up- first his fight over
Disaster Aid that some northern states Senators had wanted to attach to
the Ag Appropriations Bill which they already knew was going nowhere as
the Republican leadership had announced several days back they planned on
doing a Continuing Resolution to fund government through mid February and
defer the current year's budgets to the Democrats who will now have to
wrestle over their pet projects and their stated goal of not allowing any
new spending without a way to pay for it by reducing other federal
spending.
Senator Coburn says he is not opposed to Disaster Aid for farmers and ranchers that have been hurt by the drought- but that he was not in favor of across the board direct payments to one and to all in disaster hit areas. He is especially unwilling to pay a dime to anyone who could have bought crop insurance but chose not to make the purchase. He was also questioned about his ideas on the 2007 Farm Bill- and told reporters that he would rather use some or all of the commodity title money in making direct payments to farmers- with a cap not on receipts but rather on net assets owned by the farmer- in order to allow the family sized farmer to become better capitalized. He also spoke about the future of agriculture- he thinks it will be bright if we follow through on what is being talked about in the biofuels arena. We have linked his thoughts below and thought you might find them of interest. Click here to hear Senator Tom Coburn talk agriculture yesterday with reporters. | |
National Cattlemen call on Cattlemen everywhere to write President Bush regarding the Korean Bone Chip Mess! ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ In response to
the third shipment of beef that has been rejected by South Korea because
of bone chips that size of a pea, and in addition to NCBA’s December 1st
letter to the White House, cattle producers across the country are urged
to send a letter of their own to President Bush. The organization is
fuming over this latest rejection by South Korea and has urged USDA to
pull the export protocol now in place with South Korea- and has further
urged the White House to have President Bush get in the face on high level
officials of the South Korean government and call for a double helping of
some cowboy common sense when it comes to these bone fragments that are of
no consequence to anyone else in the world.
For your reference, the National Cattlemen's Beef Association has updated their most recent fact sheet regarding the ongoing situation with South Korea. We have linked to it below. Their Chief Economist, Greg Doud, prepared the overview and it gives you a feel of how we had opened up the Korean market in recent years and how it was one of our fastest growing markets before BSE- and what has happened since to get us to this point of being stonewalled by South Korean officials. The irony of this current mess we find ourselves in with South Korea is the fact that in 2003- before we discovered the Canadian Diary Cow that stole Christmas- they imported 184 million pounds of bone- in beef from the United States- the most popular cut of beef from the US before the ban that followed was the beef short rib. If they discovered a whole bone in one of the boxes of beef that we might ship them now- they might demand the UN Security Council bring sanctions against us- it's gotten that goofy! Click here for the Fact Sheet from the NCBA on South Korea stonewalling our beef shipments | |
American Farm Bureau asks for the same budget baseline-plus a little for inflation in 2007. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ American Farm
Bureau tells the President funding for the upcoming farm bill should be at
the same level as that authorized in the 2002 farm bill - with an
inflation adjustment. In a letter – Farm Bureau states that an adequate
baseline is necessary to provide flexibility and appropriate funding for
the agriculture, conservation, and nutrition communities when writing the
next farm bill. According to Farm Bureau President Bob Stallman - the 2002
farm bill was carefully constructed to provide predictable program
support. He says Congress struck a balance in funding each of those
programs. But even more importantly – Stallman says - Congress determined
the tax dollars they were willing to spend on those programs over the life
of the farm bill.
Farm Bureau is concerned that Congress is limited to the current Congressional Budget Office baseline which projects spending for 2008 to 2013 at 488- billion dollars - up from the 465-billion Congress committed to funding for the 2002 bill. Unfortunately - the division of those funds is substantially different from that approved for the 2002 farm bill. In fact - expectations are that a CBO baseline to be released this coming March will reduce the commodity baseline to 57-billion over six years. Farm Bureau notes that's down from the 99-billion Congress was willing to spend on commodity programs during the past six years. That's why Stallman says it's not just important to maintain the support levels - but also the funding for the 2007 farm bill at the levels authorized for the 2002 version of farm policy. One thing is for sure- the new Democratic leaders of the House and Senate Ag Committees can't write farm policy until they have that budget number. | |
The replacement for J.B. Penn gets an easy OK from the Senate Ag Committee. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ President
Bush's nomination of Mark Keenum as USDA Under Secretary for Farm and
Foreign Ag Services is headed to the full Senate after it sailed through
the Ag Committee. At his confirmation hearing - Keenum defended government
involvement in farming. He told the lawmakers that thoughtful food and
fiber policy in this country benefits everyone in the United States- and
helps keep our rural infrastructure strong.
Mark Keenum worked on the last three farm bills in his position as agricultural aide to Mississippi Senator Thad Cochran and said that experience would come in handy during the writing of the 2007 farm bill. He was the key ag person on Cochran's staff during his years as the chairman of the Senate Ag Committee. No opposition to Keenum's nomination has surfaced. | |
OWGA meeting tomorrow ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ A quick
reminder that the Oklahoma Wheat Growers will be meeting on Saturday,
December 9th at the Express Event Center on State Highway 3 (Northwest
Highway) in far northwest Oklahoma City. It's a most of the day meeting-
and along with a good group of speakers- the wheat growers will be setting
new farm policy for the coming year- and will also be electing officers.
Current President Jeff Krehbiel will be stepping down after serving a couple of terms as the leader of the organization. Before wrapping up his tenure as OWGA President- he will brief members about the National Association of Wheat Growers' ideas on farm policy- including the hope to get a higher target price for wheat and a bigger direct payment. | |
Tulsa farm Show is up and running! ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Day one is in
the books for the Tulsa Farm Show- and the aisles seemed to be pretty full
and the attitude among those we visited with at the Show was pretty
upbeat- especially with the moisture that we have received in some parts
of the state.
Today- Show hours are from nine am to five pm- and they will be nine to four on Saturday. If you are in northcentral or northeastern Oklahoma- we invite you to listen to our hour radio remote broadcast later this morning on 690 on the AM dial- KGGF out of Coffeyville. That starts at 11:05 AM this morning. During that broadcast- we will be able to announce the winners of the FFA Livestock Handling Skills Contest that will be going on this morning at the Tulsa Farm Show. We will also have a story on our website over the weekend about the winners- and give you a rundown on Monday here on this E-mail update. | |
Our thanks to Midwest Farm Shows for their support of our daily Farm News Update. Go to their website at the link at the top of today's email for more information on either the Tulsa Farm Show or the Southern Plains Farm Show. We also invite you to check out our website at the link below to check out an archive of these daily emails, audio reports and top farm news story links from around the globe. | |
God Bless! You can reach us at the following: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
email: ron@oklahomafarmreport.com
phone: 405-473-6144
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