Wild Horse Auction & Combating Overregulation

Wild Horse Auction & Combating Overregulation plus Food Forethought. I’m Greg Martin with today’s Northwest Report.

We all have to deal with regulations...from traffic regulations to codes for buildings. But it seems that farmers are having to deal with an undue amount and Kansas Senator and ranking member of the Senate Ag Committee, Pat Roberts in a Farm Bill hearing last week brought to light his attempts to rein in overregulation.

ROBERTS: So often I hear from producers that the heavy hand of government intervention impacts them more than any other program. With this in mind last week I sent the President a list of proposed regulations put forth by his administration that impact our agriculture industry. I’m hopeful that he will take a close look at them. By the way the chairwoman help out very first hearing with the head of EPA and the Secretary of Agriculture on the impact of regulations.

Wildfires in Idaho have destroyed hundreds of thousands of acres and one in particular last year, the Long Butte fire left close to 200 wild horses without a home. Those horses were removed from the land, de-wormed and given vaccinations for common equine diseases and put up for adoption last week. The Bureau of Land Management was concerned that the animals would starve and conducted an emergency roundup that included bays, sorrel, palomino, pinto, roan and black mares and geldings.

Now with today’s Food Forethought, here’s Lacy Gray.

I grew up in rural America so I have a continued interest and concern for the day to day struggles that rural communities are faced with in today’s hard hit economy. That being said it is no surprise then that I take a strong interest in the current administration’s implementation of the first White House Rural Council. In the words of President Obama, “the WHRC has been established to make sure we’re working across government to strengthen rural communities and promote economic growth.” It certainly appears that it is across government as a member from nearly every department of the federal government has been chosen to serve on this new council. But it remains to be seen whether or not the federal government will start pumping money into the nation’s rural farmlands in a true effort to create “economic opportunities to improve the quality of life in rural America”, or if this serves a completely different agenda. Reportedly, the WHRC, the USDA, and the President have been reaching out to farmers and those in rural communities to get their opinions and input towards what needs to be done, but the key is, will they listen?

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