09/05/07 Ag Secretary urged to release CRP acres to meet grain demand

Farm and Ranch September 5, 2007 The National Grain and Feed Association has urged Secretary of Agriculture Mike Johanns to "seriously consider" measures to make tillable, non-environmentally sensitive acres enrolled in the Conservation Reserve Program more available to the market to meet what are expected to be significant commodity supply/demand challenges in 2008. NGFA vice-president Randy Gordon says the association conservatively estimates the United States will need to plant at least 4 million to 5 million additional acres of wheat, corn and soybeans in the 2008-09 crop year than were planted this year to avert potentially dangerous supply disruptions for U.S. domestic and export customers. Gordon: "Just looking forward we really sense that we are nearing what maybe pipeline level stocks where the market won't be able to allocate what quantities of grain become available any longer and we will inexorably will run into some kind of shortages in the next year or two if we don't begin to look at some, what we would think to be non-environmentally sensitive CRP acres that might help us replenish some of these stocks and avert some potential shortages." 33 Among the options available to Johanns is to allow producers to terminate CRP contracts without penalty. The NGFA urges Secretary Johanns to act relatively soon. I'm Bob Hoff and that's the Northwest Farm and Ranch Report on the Northwest Ag Information Network.