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Texas Agriculture Archive

November 21, 2003

Is COOL policy shift
in the works?

By Mike Barnett
Editor

The weather may have been unseasonably warm for a mid-November day but the topic was decidedly COOL as the Texas Farm Bureau Resolutions Committee completed its work recently at the TFB state headquarters in Waco.

The committee, chaired by TFB Vice President Lloyd Arthur and composed of three farmers or ranchers from each of TFB's 13 districts, plus the chairman of the Young Farmer and Rancher Committee, recommended that TFB's policy be changed from mandatory country of origin labeling (COOL) to voluntary.

"Cost was the issue," Arthur said of the recommendation, noting that implementation costs of anywhere from $500 million to over $3 billion have been bandied about. "The biggest concern was the cost being put back on the producer. Agriculture doesn't have the means to pass that on down the food chain, so it's a major concern to our producers, since the cost is going to be on their back."

Texas Farm Bureau policy currently supports mandatory COOL, which covers everything from livestock to vegetables (with exceptions). The recommendation to change to a voluntary system was proposed both for the state and national levels.

The Resolutions Committee is charged with reviewing all policy recommendations from County Farm Bureaus, combining and streamlining them for consideration by TFB voting delegates at the organization's annual meeting during December in Waco.

Packer ownership of cattle also caught the committee's attention.

Delegates at the American Farm Bureau Convention last January, after heated debate, voted to remove AFBF policy that called for a prohibition of "packer ownership of livestock for more than 14 days prior to slaughter." After that debate, however, AFBF assigned a committee to study the issue. That report was studied at the county Farm Bureau level.

"Our counties did propose that they prohibit the packer's ownership of cattle for 14 days or less," Arthur said. "I think the thing they're concerned about with cattle is that packer ownership will lead to a more integrated industry like you see in poultry..."

With water issues stretching "from one end of the state to the other," several resolutions on that precious resource were introduced.

Water marketing and the transfer of water from one water district to another were major topics.

"Even though people have the right to capture or enjoy the rule of capture, they also like the opportunity to market that water," Arthur said. "But once it's marketed, where does it have to go? If it's left there on the land, it's one issue. But transferring it to the end user is going to be a big burden that our folks are going to have to address."

School finance, likely to be considered by a special session of the Texas legislature in 2004, was also discussed. As always, Arthur said the state's largest farm organization wants to alleviate the burden on landowners.

"And any shift we can do to lessen that burden on them is what our folks are looking for," he said.

The debate comes when sales tax is suggested as a partial solution. Then the issue for farmers and ranchers is paying taxes on those goods and services.

"It's kind of a Catch-22," Arthur explained. "When you alleviate part of the problem on one side of the fence, you're creating new ones. So I think the part we play here is to be at the table when these things are negotiated, and I think our policy that we've passed in resolutions will reflect that concern."

On another tax related issue, the committee suggested that a recommendation be made to the American Farm Bureau Federation board to study the FairTax and release information to AFBF members. The FairTax would replace current income taxes with a consumption tax on goods and services.

Arthur said the three day session was a good one.

"The biggest appreciation I have here is that we have a lot of good county leaders from throughout the state," he said. "They bring good topics and good issues to the floor of the committee. And I think you'll see that passed on as the resolutions hit the floor."