03/29/07 Groups detail wants for Farm Bill

Farm and Ranch March 29, 2007 Correcting inequities and imbalances from the 2002 Farm Bill was a common theme of commodity organizations that testified Wednesday before a House subcommittee about what they would like to see in the commodity title of a new farm bill. National Association of Wheat Growers President John Thaemert was one of those testifying at the hearing of the House Ag Subcommittee on General Farm Commodities and Risk Management. Thaemert: "While wheat growers generally support the structure of the current policy much of the safety net provided by the 02 bill has not been effective for wheat growers due to the fact that the support levels, namely the target price, was set too low. The 2007 Farm Bill has an opportunity to correct these imbalances." Thaemert says NAWG recommends increasing the direct payment for wheat to $1.19 a bushel and the target price to $5.29. Thaemert: "I want to make this point quite clearly. Make no mistake about the fact that NAWG members understand the needs of producers of other crops and we certainly do not advocate a decrease in support for any crops. However wheat producers need an equitable increase in support to maintain their operations." House Ag Committee Chairman Collin Peterson was at the subcommittee hearing and made this comment. Peterson: "I tried to improve the situation for wheat and barley in 2002. Unfortunately at that time I didn't have enough clout. It is a little different this time, but we'll see what we can do here." The National Corn Growers Association promoted its revenue based plan at the hearing. I'm Bob Hoff and that's the Northwest Farm and Ranch Report on the Northwest Ag Information Network.