March 3, 2000

According to a statement from the two companies, Performance Finance will offer straight loans and a range of financing choices tied to farmer contracts to deliver grain or buy farm inputs like seed.

"It is basically a one-step process that will help farmers manage time as well as cash flow," said Jerry Sullivan, John Deere Credit division manager.

Performance Finance offers four options, with two giving farmers competitive interest rates to buy crop inputs for expenses below and above the $150,000 level.

A third alternative permits farmers to use forward contracts for future delivery and receive a loan based on part of the projected future value. Farmers settle the loan when the grain is delivered and can deliver well after harvest time if they want, the statement said. The fourth option allows producers to receive a loan on any grain they currently possess.

John Deere Credit is an affiliate of the farm-equipment dealer maker Deere and Co. John Deere Credit has 500,000 accounts and a managed portfolio of more than $11 billion.

Cargill is the world’s largest commodities trader and a leading processor and exporter of farm goods.

The declaration, drafted by Professor C.S. Prakash of Tuskegee University, calls biotechnology "a powerful and safe means for the modification of organisms," and says that biotechnology "can contribute substantially in enhancing quality of life by improving agriculture, health care and the environment."

Professor Prakash added that "despite the nonsense being spread by anti-biotech activists, this technology can actually improve environmental conditions while helping to boost world food production.

"There is no scientific reason to believe that genetically-engineered foods are any less safe to eat than the foods we’ve been eating for centuries," said Prakash, "so we members of the scientific community felt it necessary to counter the unfounded attacks that anti-biotech activists are spreading about these products."

A list of signatories can be viewed at www.AgBioWorld.org.

However, as reported by the Texas Cattle Feeders Association Newsletter, in a concurrent opinion on the case, Appeals Court Judge Edith Jones said, "Raising cattle...is within the language of the (Texas agricultural disparagement) statute; fed cattle are ‘beef on the hoof,’ hence a food product."

"Moreover, beef is a ‘food product of agriculture’ and is ‘distributed in a form’ that is perishable. The district court’s denial of coverage to live fed cattle overlooks this aspect of the statutory definition."

Commenting on the ruling, Judge Jones said, "This interpretation... is irreconcilable with the legislature’s purpose. Food disparagement acts...are designed to prevent false information from flooding and then destroying the market for a perishable food product."