11/26/07 Stallman Talks Agriculture

Stallman Talks Agriculture. I'm Greg Martin with today's Line On Agriculture. I recently came back from the National Farm Broadcasters Convention in Kansas City where many of the ag industry leaders met with us to talk about the issues and one of those that is as outspoken as any is Bob Stallman with the American Farm Bureau Federation. Bob was eager to talk about the Farm Bill or lack there of and said the slow process was really hard on farmers. STALLMAN: The process has been languishing or as a Texas rice farmer I would say buried hip deep in mud but it's really regrettable because America's farmers are trying to make their plans for next year, they're trying to go to their bankers to get their operating lines of credit but without knowing what the rules are, they can't do that and the longer we wait, the more difficult it is for America's farmers. Another major issue that Stallman was ready to talk about is the immigration issue. He says something has to be done. STALLMAN: Unfortunately the politics of this issue are just too good for both parties to try to come together to resolve it. You know our projects are  we've done a lot of analysis (that) indicates if we don't provide an adequate guest worker program for American agriculture, we're going to cost our industry about $9-billion dollars a year and lose about 30% of the fruit and vegetable production moving outside the borders of this country and I would think American consumers would prefer to have those products produced here as opposed to another country. Okay, now that I've got Bob on a roll, let's see what the crystal ball looks like from his perspective for the future of American agriculture. STALLMAN: Well we actually go through that exercise within Farm Bureau, we actually been through that exercise with a 2-year study. You know what we will see is a continuation of the trends we have now. We will have larger, more efficient farms. We will have more producers producing specialty products, niche market, high value kind of products; the traditional if you will kind of middle farm family kind of farm is going to go away because their either going to have to  or be diminished in number  they either have to go get off farm income to support their farms or become larger and get more efficient. Technology will play the key role. The incredible advances in biotechnology will provide a host of new products and better production methods and then when you look at machinery technology and digital technology, all of that is going to be a real driving force. That's today's Line On Agriculture. I'm Greg Martin on the Northwest Ag Information Network.