Protecting American Farmland Bill Pt 1
From the Ag Information Network, I’m Bob Larson. The House of Representatives took steps for protecting U.S. farmland last week with the passing of House Bill 9456, the ‘Protecting American Agriculture from Foreign Adversaries Act.’
The bill’s sponsor, Washington state Republican Dan Newhouse says the Chinese purchasing of U.S. agricultural assets is something he’s been working on for a few years …
NEWHOUSE … “What it does is it adds the Secretary of Agriculture to CFIUS, the Committee on Foreign Investments in the United States, for the reason of paying attention, monitoring those transactions that include farmland, biotechnology, transportation, storage, processing of agricultural products.”
And that, Newhouse says is an important role …
NEWHOUSE … “It takes a big step towards requiring the Secretary to report any transaction that could be considered a threat to national security.”
So, Newhouse says we need to be more careful …
NEWHOUSE … “I think it’s an important step to get us to the goal of preventing adversarial nations from gaining a foothold in our agricultural industry, which as I’ve said many times, an issue of food security truly is national security.”
Listen tomorrow for more on preventing our adversaries from buying up too much U.S. farmland … before it’s too late.
