This week, members of the House Agriculture Committee for the 118th Congress were chosen, and I am proud to serve on the committee once again. With the 2023 Farm Bill on the horizon, I continue meeting with farmers throughout the First District. Thursday, with the assistance of Arkansas Farm Bureau, I visited producers in Lawrence County who provided great insight about an emerging crop insurance issue facing some farmers in five counties. Crop insurance, input costs, reference prices, and skyrocketing interest rates were among the top concerns I heard from farmers at the Farm Bureau breakfast. Biden-flation has tripled production loan rates leaving many producers wondering if they can continue farming.
The ag communities in Lawrence, Craighead, Greene, Jackson, and Randolph are facing significant crop insurance rate increases because the Risk Management Agency has redesignated 20,000 acres. With a February 28th deadline looming for crop insurance enrollment, farmers that participate in the program are growing increasingly anxious. I haven’t seen any reasoning for this increase and have directed my staff to investigate vigorously.
Rising input costs remain a top concern as fuel and fertilizer prices linger at historic highs, with producers paying 115 percent and 125 percent more respectively for diesel and fertilizer. One of the problems with input costs is that we have outsourced production of many fertilizers and chemicals. When we put 50 percent of critical nutrients in the hands of foreign entities, we shouldn’t be surprised when they start manipulating and doing things that increase costs to farmers. Last year, I co-sponsored the Reducing Farm Input Costs and Barriers to Domestic Production Act and joined over 100 of my Republican colleagues in sending a letter to President Biden outlining policy changes that could lower these costs.
An integral part of the oversight and review process for Farm Bills is getting direct suggestions from producers, other stakeholders, and consumers on how various programs are working, or are not working, for them. I’ve always said that food security is national security, and America's farm families need policies from Washington that empower them to continue doing what they have always done: feed the globe. Conversations like this one in Lawrence County allow me to weave grower feedback into my legislative work so we can best meet their needs. Doing so allows them to continue to produce the safest, most affordable, and most abundant food and fiber supply in the world.
