January 7, 2000

"There is no question that we have some serious challenges ahead of us. We have been tested by the fire of drought and by the cold reality of market prices that do not cover the costs of production.

"In agriculture today, the bad news is bad enough. The good news is that we are about to begin a new century—with all the hope and promise that goes with that.

"Our challenge is to make this new beginning ‘agriculture’s century.’

"The world now has 6 billion inhabitants... that’s with a B, all of whom must be fed.

"The agricultural production capacity of America is still the hope of a potentially hungry world. But to make this system work, it must work for the people on the land—where the miracle of American agriculture begins.

"Today, in these difficult times, if there were no Farm Bureau, we would have to invent it. Farm Bureau alone has the grassroots structure, the size and the resources to face down the greatest threat to agriculture that most of us have ever seen.

"Farm Bureau and agriculture will survive, and emerge stronger and better because of these trials. I BELIEVE THAT—because our organization has always met the test. We have always done whatever has been necessary to preserve agriculture as a business, and as a way of life.

"We will overcome—if we have the stomach for the fight ahead. And it will be a fight. That’s the only word that describes what must be done.

"Let me make it very clear—the Texas Farm Bureau will fight—we will fight for the rights of American agriculture, for changes in a system that seems to ignore farmers and ranchers until crisis forces action. We will not go quietly. We will not allow short-sighted, ill-conceived policy to cripple agriculture...instead we will seek those solutions that are rational, reasonable and right for agriculture!

"In Washington, and in Austin, compromise on the details of legislation is just part of the process.

"But there can be no compromise on the principle—the right of farm and ranch families to make a reasonable living from the land. We will accept nothing less.

"I don’t want to seem ungrateful, since Congress took steps both last year and this year to boost farm income. A total of almost $15 billion dollars in the last two years was necessary to keep enough farmers and ranchers on the land to prevent a disaster in American agriculture. We appreciate that, even though it is clearly in the best interests of all America to keep farmers and ranchers on the land. But for heaven’s sake, there has to be a better way!

"For too long, agriculture has been sent to the seat at the back of the bus, shoved there by whatever special interest group screams the loudest. Our government all too often sacrifices agriculture on the altar of foreign policy goals that are short sighted and foolish.

"They give in to ax grinding, extreme political groups with arguments that are emotional but empty. Government trade negotiators accept agreements that treat agriculture as a "poor cousin" in order to achieve foreign policy goals.

"Our friends and neighbors in urban America have a stake in this, too. Farmers and ranchers are being forced from the land in numbers alarming enough to consider what was once unthinkable. Does America think so little of its national security that we can allow the production of most of our food from the soil of other nations? Will America become a nation that is dependent on imported food?

"There are a host of questions that go with that, and I don’t like any of the answers.

" American producers grow the safest food in the world, and we can confirm that. We will never know about that grown elsewhere. If a foreign leader can order the flow of oil to America slowed or stopped, it could as easily happen with grain, milk and beef.

"All this is serious, and we have not even touched on the twisted maze of strangling regulations with which agriculture must deal on a daily basis.

"In the early 1960s a group of well intentioned people in our government, responding to public outcry over Rachel Carson’s book, ‘Silent Spring,’ began to think they could seek out and eliminate any risk in modern food production. Their ‘intentions’ were good. Their results have pushed farmers and ranchers into a nightmare of excessive regulation.

"We desperately need a unified and coherent national farm policy—a policy based on fairness—one that accounts for the inescapable fact that actions taken far from the farm can have serious impact upon the families who live there.

"A national farm policy as envisioned by Farm Bureau members is one that would have equal footing with foreign policy, trade policy and environmental regulation.

"A national farm policy should recognize that the ability to feed ourselves, and much of the world, is just as much an issue of national defense and security as airplanes and ammunition.

"But any attempts to forge such a policy are doomed if we fail to recognize one simple fact. The agricultural producer, so often forgotten—must have a reasonable opportunity to earn a profit from the land. Without that, Americans will face a new reality, that of food production moving into the hands of corporate managers, or worse, leave our shores altogether.

"There is a lot at stake in the agricultural policy battles of the new millennium and not just for farmers and ranchers. Let’s start this new century with a strong, consistent and fair national farm policy. That is our goal. Like most worthwhile goals, it will not be easy, and there will be setbacks.

"In Farm Bureau, there has never been any shortage of (willing) people. We have, at times, known failure...but failure has never stuck... We challenge it, rise above it, and defeat it.

"In these difficult times, we must remember that we are a team, and what we need most, will require all our best efforts. We will work as a team and lean on each other when necessary.

"There is nothing in nature more fragile than a snowflake...but when they stick together they can become an avalanche!

"We will combine our voices and our resources through the strength and power of this organization we’ve built together.