Hastings on Farm Issues

Hastings on Farm Issues. I’m Greg Martin with today’s Fruit Grower Report.

Washington Congressman Doc Hastings has been working for the ag producer in the state and there are a couple of issues that he has been dealing with. Market Access and the Mexican tariff issue.

HASTINGS: We have sent a letter to Ray LaHood who is the Secretary of Transportation asking him to try to get this resolved and also with some other members, I co-sponsored a letter to President Obama trying to get this thing rectified as soon as possible.

Hastings has some issues with this decision.

HASTINGS: What concerns me about this is the signal that this administration and this Congress sent on trade issues specifically in our hemisphere. This action of unilaterally stopping it really puts a crimp on trade relations and as a result now the Mexican government is putting these tariffs on products that we ship down to that area.

Recently, Ag Secretary Vilsack said even with the 20% cuts in the Market Access Program it was still being funded at a higher level than in the past and Hastings doesn’t see it that way.

HASTINGS: No, that’s not entirely correct because the MAP program has been funded if my memory serves me correct at $100-million dollars for the last several years so anything that would be below that obviously would be less than what we had in the past so I’m not sure what the Secretary is talking about but clearly we are going to work as hard as we can on a bipartisan basis to try to restore that funding to what has been levels in the past several years.

That’s today’s Fruit Grower Report. I’m Greg Martin on the Northwest Ag Information Network.