EMERGING POTENTIALS
AND PROBLEMS
The Southeastern Coastal 
States
Agricultural Conference
July 7-8, 1977
?4
1977
Gainesville Hilton Inn
2900 S. W. 13th Street, Gainesville, Florida
S 25.E4 1977 main
3 1706 007 681 
294
DATE DUE
AUB3URN UNIVERSITY
I IB RARIES
S
25
.E4
1977
/ Y77 Introduction
JUN 1 2 '84The 
southeastern 
coastal states 
have an 
agricultural 
diversity and 
potential
3JWAunequaled by any other region of the United States. The milder climate, soil
resources and abundant solar energy for plant growth indicate a promising
agriculture to help meet national and global food needs.
Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, Florida, and South Carolina have
the additional advantage of ready access to world markets through deep
seaports, and the added bonus of an excellent road and rail network linked with
major US markets.
But there are also serious problems to be solved if the southeastern coastal
states are to achieve their agricultural production potential. The mild climate so
favorable to plant growth is equally favorable for the growth of plant and animal
pests and diseases. The large number of different crops in the region require a
larger total research investment than in states with only two or three major
crops. Water, weather and economic problems continue to hamper southeastern
agricultural development.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture works to solve these and many other
problems through its direct research programs and cooperation with state
departments of agriculture and Cooperative Extension Services and Agricultural
Experiment Stations of the state land grant universities.
With this background in mind, Florida U.S. Senator Richard Stone
provided the leadership for organizing the Southeastern Coastal States
Agricultural Conference held July 7-8, 1977, in Gainesville, Florida.
Agriculture leaders from Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, and
South Carolina participated. The conference was coordinated and developed by
commissioners of agriculture, farm bureaus, and land grant universities from
the six states.
The five major topics discussed were in keeping with the conference theme:
"Emerging Potentials and Problems." Topics covered included energy and
conservation, marketing, plant and animal pests and diseases, state-federal
regulations, and rural economic development.
U.S. Senator Richard Stone opened the conference with the following
remarks:
The purpose of this conference is to examine the problems of Southeastern
agriculture.
While our conversations will no doubt focus on the specific problems we
face, the issues this conference raises are national and international in scope.
Energy, pests and diseases, marketing, state-federal regulations and economic
development are by no means problems solely in the Southeast.
As a member of the Senate Agriculture Committee I know the 
balancing act
that must occur to develop farm legislation. Regional priorities and interests
compete for attention -- and limited funds. And, while I have tried to be a
strong advocate for Southern agriculture, I recognize that problems 
in the Mid-
west and West must be addressed as well.
But there are unique elements of Southern agriculture. Florida and 
much
of the South have a subtropical climate and because of 
that we have an
increased danger from disease and pests that breed to the 
south of us.
History has shown that the spread of insects and disease to other parts of
the United States once they have been introduced here is a 
continual problem.
That is one of the reasons we wanted to meet with Secretary 
Berglund today and
tomorrow.
AUBURN 
UNIVERSITY
RALPHBROWN 
DRAUGHON 
LIBRARY
AUBURN UNIVERSITY, ALABAMA 36,c
The fire ant is but one example of that process.
This pest entered the United States from Brazil possibly as early as 1918.
Since then its population has grown to an estimated 5,000-trillion It entered in
Mobile, Alabama, but has spread to South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Alabama,
Mississippi, Louisiana, and parts of Texas, Arkansas and North Carolina. These
ants love overgrazed pastures, plowed fields, parks, lawns and roadsides.
Crop damage occurs when a field is plowed, destroying the insects the ant feeds
upon. Instead of moving on to another home, the ant turns to young vegetation
for its food.
The fire ant may not be a serious pest, but it is a broad-range nuisance.
Its potent sting has driven farm workers from fields and afflicted city dwellers
as well. Its effect is magnified by its astronomical numbers and its ability to
keep coming back.
The control of the fire ant also illustrates the changing nature of pest
control. Research funds in the 50's resulted in the discovery that the chemical
Mirex controlled the ant. And, as a result, research funds declined in the 60's.
We now know that many chemicals can cause cancer in humans. The
Environmental Protection Agency thinks Mirex could be one of them. Indeed,
Mirex has been found in the tissue of one in three southerners. And heavy
doses have produced cancer in animals. Because of that, the EPA has ordered
that its use be discontinued as of July, 1978.
The conflict between environmentalists and farmers whose livelihood is
threatened by such pests has on occasion approached open warfare.
Yet, research funds to develop biological control methods has lagged far
behind the necessity to do so. Right here in Gainesville at the University of
Florida, researchers have made great strides in developing biological controls on
the fire ant. But more effort -- and more federal research dollars -- are
needed.
In the Senate Agriculture Committee, we have, in my view finally begun to
turn the corner in this fight. This past year we boosted funds for control of
the fire ant, citrus blackfly and brucellosis.
The Omnibus Farm Bill passed this year makes some provisions for
continued agricultural research.
But if we are to avoid long-range environmental and health damage caused
by pest-killing chemicals, we need long-range biological methods to control
these pests. And that takes research and research dollars.
To control the fire ant, for example, the University of Florida researchers
should be able to go to Brazil and study the ant in its natural habitat. But
until money is available to do that, we must continue to second-guess a solution.
I hope this conference can point the direction for future governmental
efforts. Too often government involvement has stifled rather than stimulated
progress.
When we put this conference together, it was our hope that this would not
be the case -- but that stronger cooperation between farmers and growers and
the Department of Agriculture would result.
Thank you.
Following Senator Stone's
Florida's Institute of Food and
conference discussion. Following
remarks, a multi-media presentation from
Agricultural Sciences set the stage for the
is the script for the multi-media show.
3
SOUTHEASTERN AGRICULTURE
THESE DAYS PEOPLE FROM OTHER PARTS OF THE COUNTRY TEND TO THINK
SOUTHEASTERN AGRICULTURE CONSISTS MAINLY OF PEANUTS. FOR SOME
REASON PEANUTS HAVE CAPTURED THE PUBLIC'S IMAGINATION IN THE
LAST COUPLE OF YEARS. WELL, PEANUTS ARE IMPORTANT IN THE SIX
SOUTHEAST COASTAL STATES. . .WE PRODUCED ABOUT 65 PER CENT OF
THE NATION'S OUTPUT IN 1975. BUT PEANUTS ARE JUST PART OF OUR
STORY. . . TODAY WE'D LIKE TO TELL YOU THE REST.
OUR LATEST INFORMATION SHOWS ABOUT 360-THOUSAND FARMERS IN THIS
REGION. . . 13 PER CENT OF THE NATION'S TOTAL. WE PRODUCE 45 MAJOR
COMMODITIES WORTH 5MILLION DOLLARS OR MORE PER YEAR. IN EIGHT
IMPORTANT COMMODITY AREAS OUR YEARLY OUTPUT IS WORTH A HALF
BILLION DOLLARS OR MORE.
OUR GROSS FARM INCOME 
FOR 1975 WAS 9.4-BILLION 
DOLLARS. WE HAD A
COMMERCIAL FISH CATCH OF 1.5 BILLION POUNDS. . .ABOUT A THIRD OF
THE NATION'S FISHERY OUTPUT. AND, OUR TIMBER PRODUCTS
HARVESTED IN 1975 WERE WORTH ABOUT ONE-AND-A-HALF BILLION
DOLLARS IN STUMPAGE VALUE. . ABOUT SEVEN BILLION DOLLARS WITH
MANUFACTURING VALUE ADDED. IN THESE SIX STATES WE CONTRIBUTE A
VITAL SHARE OF THE NATION'S FOOD, FIBER AND RELATED PRODUCTS.
AND, IN SPITE OF SOME PROBLEMS, AGRICULTURE IN OUR REGION IS A
HEALTHY, GROWING INDUSTRY. BUT IT WASN'T ALWAYS SO..
THE TURN OF THE CENTURY FOUND SOUTHERN AGRICULTURE BACKWARD
AND UNPRODUCTIVE. UNCERTAINTY AND LACK OF RELIABLE
AGRICULTURAL INFORMATION SOMETIMES LEAD FARMERS IN WHOLE
SECTIONS TO PANIC AND ABANDON THEIR CROPS. SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC
PROBLEMS HAD SLOWED DEVELOPMENT AND APPLICATION OF NEW
TECHNOLOGY. SOUTHERN SOILS. GENERALLY INFERTILE TO BEGIN
WITH. . .WERE EXHAUSTED AFTER YEARS OF WASTEFUL FARM PRACTICES.
THE UNPREDICTABLE WEATHER SEEMED TO FAVOR WEEDS AND INSECTS
MORE THAN CROPS. AS FRONTIER LANDS WERE OPENED PRODUCTION OF
MAJOR COMMODITIES HAD SHIFTED NORTH AND WEST. EVEN AS LATE AS
1930 FARMERS IN SOME PARTS OF THE REGION LIVED AT BARE SUBSISTANCE
LEVEL. . .ENGAGED IN A KIND OF GENERAL FARMING COMPARABLE TO
AGRICULTURE IN LESS DEVELOPED COUNTRIES LIKE GREECE OR MEXICO.
THIS LOW POINT FOR THE SOUTH'S AGRICULTURE STOOD IN SHARP
CONTRAST TO THE REGION'S HISTORY OF AGRICULTURAL LEADERSHIP.
THE EARLIEST AGRICULTURAL EXPERIMENT STATIONS IN NORTH AM ERICA
WERE ESTABLISHED HERE. . .A PLANT TESTING GARDEN AT THE ASHLEY
RIVER SETTLEMENT IN SOUTH CAROLINA IN 1669. . .AND A BOTANICAL
GARDEN TO TEST DRUGS AND DYES FOR COMMERCIAL PRODUCTION
ESTABLISHED IN SAVANNAH GEORGIA IN 1735. COMMERCIAL RICE
PRODUCTION WAS INTRODUCED IN SOUTH CAROLINA. OUR FIRST SUGAR
CANE WAS GROWN IN LOUISIANA AND THE FIRST COMMERCIAL SUGAR MILL
WAS ESTABLISHED IN NEW ORLEANS.
THE FIRST COTTON EXPORTED FROM NORTH AMERICA WAS SHIPPED FROM
CHARLESTON SOUTH CAROLINA IN 1764. ON ARRIVAL IN ENGLAND THE
4
CARGO WAS SEIZED. CUSTOMS OFFICIALS SAID IT MUST HAVE BEEN
CONTRABAND BECAUSE THE COLONIES SUPPOSEDLY COULDN'T HAVE
PRODUCED SUCH A QUANTITY. . .8 BALES.
OF COURSE THE FIRST COTTON GIN WAS DEVELOPED NEAR SAVANNAH
GEORIGA BY ELI WHITNEY. THE FIRST FEDERAL FORESTRY LEGISLATION
ESTABLISHED A 350-ACRE RESERVE ON GROVER'S ISLAND GEORGIA IN 1799.
AND PERHAPS THE MOST IMPORTANT OF ALL THE FIRSTS CLAIMED FOR
SOUTHERN AGRICULTURE IS THE FIRST PLANT BREEDING FOR DISEASE
RESISTANCE. DEVELOPMENT OF A COTTON VARIETY WITH RESISTANCE TO
COTTON WILT BEGAN AT DILLON SOUTH CAROLINA IN 1899. THE IDEA OF
BREEDING FOR DISEASE RESISTANCE HAS SINCE BEEN APPLIED TO MOST
OTHER CROPS GROWN IN THE UNITED STATES.
AND THIS KIND OF BREEDING WORK SIGNALED THE BEGINNING OF A NEW
ERA. .WHEN SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY WOULD REVOLUTIONIZE THE
REGIONS AGRICULTURE. PLANT AND ANIMAL BREEDING HAVE CONTINUED
TO PROVIDE THE SOUTHERN FARMER WITH CROPS AND LIVESTOCK SUITED
TO THE UNIQUE GROWING CONDITIONS HE FACES.
MECHANIZATION CAME TO IMPORTANT SOUTHERN CROPS ALLOWING OUR
FARMERS TO SUBSTITUTE CAPITAL FOR LABOR. IN 1960, COTTON
PRODUCTION IN MISSISSIPPI REQUIRED 82 MAN HOURS PER ACRE. SEVEN
YEARS LATER MISSISSIPPI FARMERS GOT EVEN HIGHER YIELDS WITH A
LITTLE MORE THAN 13 MAN HOURS PER ACRE.
THE DEVELOPMENT OF FROZEN CONCENTRATE WAS AN IMPORTANT FACTOR
IN THE GROWTH OF FLORIDA'S CITRUS INDUSTRY.
SCIENTISTS LEARNED THE SECRETS OF MINOR ELEMENT DEFICIENCIES IN
THE SOIL AND THE IMPORTANCE OF TRACE MINERALS IN LIVESTOCK
NUTRITION. .PEST ERADICATION HELPED INCREASE PRODUCTIVITY.
.ANIMAL HEALTH WAS IMPROVED THROUGH INSECT CONTROL, NEW
VACCINES, BETTER METHODS OF DISEASE DETECTION AND A BETTER
UNDERSTANDING OF NUTRITIONAL REQUIREMENTS.
THE MODERN CULTURAL AND MANAGEMENT PRACTICES THAT ENABLE
TODAY'S SOUTHERN FARMER TO PRODUCE AND COMPETE DEPEND ON
ADVANCING TECHNOLOGY.
IN FACT, A BROAD, CONTINUING COMMITMENT TO SCIENTIFIC PROGRESS IS
VITAL BECAUSE WE PRODUCE SO MANY COMMODITIES IN SO MANY
SITUATIONS. SINCE TIME IS SHORT, WE'LL LOOK AT JUST A FEW.
COST-PRICE RATIOS GENERALLY HAVE NOT FAVORED SOUTHERN
LIVESTOCK OPERATIONS. WE HAVE ABOUT 10 PER CENT OF THE COUNTRY'S
CATTLE AND CALVES ON HAND. WE DON'T DOMINATE IN LIVESTOCK
FEEDING BUT WE ARE A MAJOR SUPPLIER OF FEEDER CALVES. WE HAVE
ABOUT SEVEN PER CENT OF THE HOGS AND PIGS AND ABOUT THE SAME
SHARE OF THIE DAIRY COWS. . . ALTHOUGH DAIRY PRODUCTION IS
IMPORTANT IN SOME AREAS.
WE'RE UNSURPASSED IN POULTRY PRODUCTION. THIS MAP, BASED ON THE
LATEST CENSUS OF AGRICULTURE, SHOWS THAT WE HAVE 31 
OF THE
NATION'S TOP 100 -COUNTIES IN NUMBERS OF LAYING HENS. THE REGION'S
FARMS HAVE 23 PER CENT OF THE LAYING HENS AND. 
PULLETS AND
PRODUCE 24 PER CENT OF U. S. EGGS. WE HAVE 50 OF THE 
TOP COUNTIES
IN NUMBER OF BROILERS AND OTHER MEAT-TYPE BIRDS. OUR 1975 OUTPUT
WAS WORTH 1.1-BILLION DOLLARS .S .39 PER CENT 
OF THE NATION'S
TOTAL.
OUR PRODUCTION OF AGRONOMIC CROPS WILL SURPRISE 
PEOPLE WITH
PRECONCEIVED NOTIONS ABOUT SOUTHERN. AGRICULTURE. OF COURSE,
WE PRODUCE RICE, SOYBEANS, PEANUTS, COTTON, TOBACCO AND 
SUGAR
CANE. BUT .WE ALSO GROW WHEAT, 
RYE, FIELD CORN, OATS, BARLEY,
SORGHUM 
AND HAY.
IN 1975 WE HAD 12 OF THE COUNTRY'S TOP RICE PRODUCING 
COUNTIES.
OUR OUTPUT, JUST UNDER 32 MILLION BAGS, WAS ABOUT 25 PER 
CENT OF
THE US TOTAL.
WE HARVESTED SOYBEANS FROM MORE THAN 9-MILLION ACRES, 
ABOUT 17
PER CENT OF THE COUNTRY'S TOTAL ACREAGE AND ABOUT 
A MILLION
ACRES MORE THAN ILLINOIS. WE HAVE ABOUT 20 OF 
THE NATION'S TOP.
SOYBEAN PRODUCING COUNTIES AND WE PRODUCED 213-MILLION 
BUSHELS
IN 1975, 14 PER CENT -OF THE NATION'S OUTPUT.
WE PRODUCED ABOUT 2-MILLION BALES OF COTTON IN 1975 . . . NEARLY 
A
QUARTER. OF THE NATIONAL TOTAL. WE HAVE 
15 OF THE TOP COTTON
PRODUCING COUNTIES.
IN TOBACCO, 16 OF OUR COUNTIES RANK AMONG THE 
TOP 100. OUR 1975
OUTPUT WAS VALUED AT 376-MILLION DOLLARS.. JUST UNDER 
.17 PER
CENT OF THE US TOTAL.
WE PRODUCED, 1. 7 MILLION TONS OF SUGARCANE.. ALMOST 
60 PER CENT
OF- THE NATION'S OUTPUT. AND, WE HAVE 50 OF THE TOP 
100 PEANUT
PRODUCING COUNTIES. OUR 1975 OUTPUT WAS 2.5 BILLION 
POUNDS.
WE PRODUCE A VARIETY OF NUTS AND FRUIT CROPS 
IN OUR REGION. OUR
1975 PECAN CROP WAS 140-MILLION POUNDS. . .56 PER CENT OF THE US
TOTAL. WE HAVE 48 OF THE TOP PECAN PRODUCING 
COUNTIES.
IN PEACHES WE HAVE 30 OF THE TOP 100 COUNTIES. WE PRODUCED 
ABOU
320-MILLION POUNDS OF PEACHES IN 1975 . . .11 PER CENT 
OF THE TOTAL US
OUTPUT.
6
VEGETABLES, ESPECIALLY WINTER VEGETABLES ARE MAJOR CROPS HERE.
WE PRODUCE ALL THE WINTER SNAP BEANS, OVER 60 PER CENT OF THE
WINTER CABBAGE, ABOUT HALF THE WINTER CELERY AND ALLTHE WINTER
SWEET CORN, GREEN PEPPERS AND TOMATOES.
SEVEN OF OUR COUNTIES ARE AMONG THE TOP 100 IN VEGETABLES
HARVESTED FOR SALE. THAT DOESN'T SEEM LIKE MUCH. . BUT ADD IN
THE TOP COUNTIES FOR SOME SPECIFIC COMMODITIES. . .SNAP BEANS..
.SWEET CORN. . .CUCUMBERS, PICKLES, LETTUCE AND ROMAINE. . .GREEN
PEAS. . .AND TOMATOES. . .AND A DIFFERENT PICTURE EMERGES.
PEOPLE ARE ALSO SURPRISED TO LEARN THAT WE HAVE EIGHT OF THE TOP
POTATO PRODUCING COUNTIES. WE PRODUCE OVER 60 PER CENT OF THE
COUNTRY'S WINTER POTATOES AND JUST OVER A QUARTER OF THE SPRING
POTATOES.
WE HAVE 12 COUNTIES IN THE TOP 100 IN VALUE OF NURSERY AND
GREENHOUSE PRODUCTS SOLD. . OUR OUTPUT IS VALUED IN THE 250-
MILLION DOLLAR RANGE. IN VALUE OF FOREST PRODUCTS SOLD, 54 OF
OUR COUNTIES ARE AMONG THE NATION'S LEADERS.
WE PRODUCED ALMOST 33-MILLION POUNDS OF HONEY IN 1975. . .JUST
UNDER 17 PER CENT OF THE US TOTAL.
FINALLY, LET'S CONSIDER LEADERSHIP IN CROP SALES PER ACRE. AMONG
THE NATION'S COUNTIES WITH ANNUAL FARM PRODUCT SALES OF 20-
MILLION DOLLARS OR MORE 13 OF OUR COUNTIES RANK IN THE TOP 100 IN
VALUE OF PRODUCTS SOLD PER ACRE. IF WE ALSO DISPLAY OUR LEADERS
IN VALUE OF CROPS SOLD PER ACRE HARVESTED AMONG COUNTIES 
WITH
SALES OF 10-MILLION OR MORE AND THE NUMBER IS TWENTY-SEVEN.
AND, AS THIS BRIEF SUMMARY SHOWS, IF SHEER PRODUCTIVITY WERE THE
ONLY GAUGE TO SUCCESS, THE PROSPECTS FOR SOUTHEASTERN
AGRICULTURE WOULD BE BRIGHT, INDEED. UNFORTUNATELY, WE FACE
MANY PROBLEMS. . . SOME UNIQUE TO THE REGION, SOME WE SHARE WITH
FARMERS ACROSS THE COUNTRY.
TO MEET THE TIMBER DEMAND PROJECTED FOR THE YEAR 2000, WE'LL HAVE
TO PRODUCE TWO OR THREE TIMES MORE TIMBER PER ACRE THAN WE DO
NOW. BUT 72 PER CENT OF OUR FOREST LAND IS OWNED BY SMALL, NON-
INDUSTRIAL OWNERS WHO AREN'T ABLE TO APPLY THE PRODUCTION
TECHNOLOGY AVAILABLE TODAY. ALSO, MANAGERS IN FORESTRY AND
ALLIED INDUSTRIES DON'T ALWAYS HAVE THE PRODUCTION AND
MARKETING STATISTICS THEY NEED TO MAKE THE BEST DECISIONS. IN
FACT, THE NEED FOR MORE AND BETTER PUBLISHED STATISTICS IS A
PROBLEM IN FORESTRY, FARMING AND COMMERCIAL FISHING THROUGHOUT
THE REGION.
THE ENERGY SHORTAGE, OR WHATEVER YOU CARE TO CALL IT, IS
BECOMING A REALITY HERE. SOME FARMERS ARE FINDING NATURAL GAS
AND NITROGEN FERTILIZER SUPPLIES TIGHT AND PRICES HIGH. THE
IMMEDIATE RESULT SEEMS TO BE FEWER ACRES OF FERTILIZED PASTURE.
THE LONG RANGE IMPLICATION MAY BE A SLOW DOWN, OR EVEN A
REVERSAL OF THE CAPITAL FOR LABOR SUBSTITUTION WHICH BROUGHT
TECHNOLOGY TO SOUTHEASTERN FARMS.
WE'HAVE RURAL DEVELOPMENT NEEDS. AND PROBLEMS ASSOCIATED. WITH
AGRI CULTURE. RURAL AND URBAN ECONOMIC OPPORTUNITIES, ARE
IMPORTANT TO THE REGION'S' FARMERS BECAUSE ABOUT HALF OF THEIR
PERSONAL INCOME IS FROM NON-FARM INVESTMENT OR EMPLOYMENT.o
OUR AVERAGE FARM SIZE IS STILL ABOUT 160 ACRES BELOW THE NATIONAL
AVERAGE. SO, WE NEED TO SUPPORT THE PRODUCTIVE OPERATION OF
RELATIVELY SMALL FARMS. YET, WE LOST ABOUT 15 PER CENT OF OUR
FARMS BETWEEN 1969- AND 1974, AND MOST OF THE LOSS WAS IN FARMS. IN
THE 50 TO 179 ACRE RANGE. LARtGER FARMS, 2000 ACRES AND UP, ARE
INCREASING IN NUMBER AND PERCENTAGE.
DURING THE SAME PERIOD, FARM LAND VALUES IN THE REGION ROSE
SHARPLY, AS- THESE EXAMPLES SHOW. WE NEED A BETTER CREDIT SYSTEM
TO ENABLE YOUNG PEOPLE TO ENTER FARMING. IN FACT , WE NEED
BETTER CREDIT SYSTEMS FOR FARMING, FORESTRY AND COMMERCIAL
FISHING. .. TO ALLOW, YOUNG PEOPLE TO ENTER THE INDUSTRIES AND TO
FINANCE EXISTING OPERATIONS.
W E NEED FARM POLICIES GEARED TO THE, SOUTHEASTERN FARMER. AS
THESE ESTIMATES FROM THE USDA FIRM ENTERPRISE DATA SYSTEM SHOW,
FARMERS IN REPORTING AREAS THROUGHOUT THE REGION HAVE BEEN
LOSING MONEY ON SOME CROPS INSTEAD OF MAKING A PROFIT AGAINST
REALISTIC COSTS FOR OVERHEAD AND RISK.
AND, WE NEED BETTER MEANS TO CONTROL PESTS AND DISEASES. INSECT
DAMAGE, CONTROL AND LOSS OF LIVESTOCK AND CROPS IN THE REGION IS
ESTIMATED AT MORE THAN 1. 5-BILLION DOLLARS- A YEAR. THE IMPORTED
FIRE ANT INFESTS BETWEEN 120 AND 160-MILLION ACRES IN THE
SOUTHEASTERN UNITED STATES IN SPITE OF THE MILLIONS OF DOLLARS:
SPENT ON CONTROL MEASURES.
PESTICDE CANCELLATIONS HAVE CAUSED PRICE S FOR SUBSTITUTES. TO
INCREASE TWO AND THREE TIMES. ECONOMIC FACTORS PLACE GREATER,
EMPHASIS THAN EVER ON THE CONTINUED DEVELOPMENT OF INTEGRATED
PEST MANAGEMENT TECHNIQUES. AND ANIMAL DISEASES LIKE
BRUCELLOSIS AND TUBERCULOSIS MUST STILL BE CONTROLLED.
AT THIS POINT, A CLOSING IS CUSTOMARY, BUT MR. SECRETARY, THIS.
PRESENTATION IS ONLY A BEGINNING!
8
Secretary of Agriculture Robert L. Bergland 
attended the conference at
the invitation of Senator Stone. Due to the existing drought conditions, the
secretary in his opening remarks dealt with some immediate concerns of critical
importance to the southeastern region. He outlined some major U.S. Department
of Agriculture actions underway to directly benefit Southeastern agricultural
producers:
"I am prepared to do that which government can do to help communities
and individuals help themselves," he stated. "We cannot do anything in
government which can make up for the economic losses which farmers,
businessmen and the local goverment must suffer as a consequence of a
devastating freeze, flood or pestilence as they strike our country from time to
time. But there are some things that are taking place currently in Congress
and within the Department of Agriculture that I know will be of importance to
those of you today who are leaders in communities which have been hit very
badly by the driest weather in many, many years.
One of the several changes which we are contemplating has been advocated
by Senator Stone, Chairman Talmadge and others in the Congress which indeed
we are going to endorse. It will be acted upon by the House of 
Representatives
when the farm bill dealing with the question of disaster relief payments will be
considered. As you recall, the current law under which we have operated for
many, many years establishes a feed grain base, a wheat allotment and certain
other strictures -on agriculture which have been rendered obsolete by changing
times. With some minor adjustments the feed grain base and the corn allotment
is the average of the 1959-1960 planted acreage."
There have been thousands of changes in farm management plans and
systems since those early days. The current requirements are that the disaster
payments, one-third of the target price, be limited to corn planted on the old
allotment. I know that here in the Southeast since the days of 1959 to 1960
substantial changes have been made in the farming practices. Senator Stone
and Chairman Talmadge have written me urging me that there be a change in law
in this regard and they are introducing an amendment next week. We are
pursuing the matter in the House of Representatives and the change which we
are recommending would be to provide or apply the disaster relief payments on
the 1977 planted acreage for corn which means that farmers will receive some
income protection on the corn actually planted not the corn base which was
established long before most farmers had any control over the enterprise.
This will provide some relief although not anywhere near the kinds of
losses which people will unfortunately be forced to carry.
Another change goes to the area of the livestock feed program. Again,
this region has been hurt doubly by the freeze of last winter and the present
dry weather. It does appear that with the poor pasture conditions and forages
and now with the loss of corn there will not be adequate forage to sustain
livestock during this winter.
We have a livestock feed program and also a disaster program in the
federal government which I have branded a disaster in and of itself. We are
about to change the livestock feed program from the current half-baked haywire
scheme which we have been forced to run to a new program which again has
been recommended to us by leaders in this region and we endorse. .. (it's now
a part of the Senate bill, thank you Senator Stone,) and it will be incorporated
by the House and supported by the administration, which will allow us to
approve a voucher system for all livestock producers who suffered a loss as a
consequence of this drought.
9
I'm talking about a loss of forage. With this authority we will provide a
voucher representing up to half the cost of purchasing the necessary feed to
run the livestock enterprise through this winter to the next grazing season. We
will not be forced to use those so-called loyalty or poverty oaths which have
plagued us as an administrative pain in the neck but rather we'll be able to
approve the kind of support that can be demonstrated by any livestock
producer whose forage has been damaged or destroyed as a consequence of the
drought.
Instead of the government going out to find hay and arguments with
truckers and confrontations with dissatisfied farmers who find the hay not up to
standards, the voucher system would simply apply to 
the producer who in turn
would go into the market place and buy hay, corn or any other form of forage.
We would pay up to half the cost of that feed supply which will help keep the
livestock alive.
It will not be a profitable venture for livestock producers. We will not
guarantee a profit by this means but it will enable thousands of people who
otherwise would be forced to give up, to stay in business because, we hope,
next year the weather will turn for the better.
In the field of credit we have new authority. I will not go into all the
details but assure you that we're watching the credit situation very carefully.
While we don't have all the money we would like to have to administer this
program, we are bringing people from across the United States, where they
were more fortunate, into staffing the field offices of the Farmers' Home
Administration in all the drought striken areas so that we can process these
loans in avery timely fashion.
We recognize that credit is no substitute for income, but these measures,
taken as rapidly as possible within the authority of law to help the community
adjust and adapt to these most difficult circumstances 
not of their own choosing.
And so with that, ladies and gentlemen, I would prefer to sit and listen, parti-
cipate in the panels, take careful notes, and bring backto the halls of the
administration those recommendations which you can pass on to me. We will not
guarantee that all can be incorporated into policy but I guarantee that every
idea presented here will be given its fair test 
and hearing. Mr. Chairman, Im
pleased to be a part of these proceedings and I do intend 
to spend the next day
listening very carefully."
Following Mr. Bergland's remarks, the conferees moved to the first 
major
topic:
A. Establishing energy conservation priorities for the food system 
was
commented on by Mr. Hugh Arant, president, Mississippi Farm 
Bureau
Federation, Jackson, Mississippi.
Following is a summary of the highlights of Mr. Arant's remarks:
The need of high priority for agriculture in energy use becomes 
apparent
with every passing day. The need for energy users to be conservers of 
energy
is also recognized by the agricultural producers.
It is clear though that conservation alone is not going to get the job done.
There must be a plan to bring the full resources of this nation to bear on
finding new sources of energy to meet our needs. Volunteer conservation will
not necessarily do the job. President Carter is to be commended for making
energy one of the most important issues of his administration, even though all: of
us do not agree with all of his points.
Conservation cannot produce a single drop of oil. The agricultural
community must have a dependable energy supply if it is going to produce the
10
food and fiber necessary to feed and clothe this nation as well as a sizeable
portion of the world's population. The efficiencies of today's farmers are tied to
the use of fossil fuel. There is not way to go back to the horse and plow
without causing serious economic consequences. We in the sun belt are
particularly blessed with the crops we produce since agriculture today uses
more solar energy than any other segment of the economy. A high level of food
production is dependent upon the uses of many ingredients produced from fossil
fuels.
The drying of rice, corn and other crops is at the 
present tied to the fuel
supply. This is one area where additional solar energy for heat can already be
utilized. Cotton fiber production requires considerably less fossil energy than
synthetics, therefore, cotton production should take a higher priority in any
plan that might be approved.
Transportation is a major factor in the food distribution system. During
peak harvest times when the transportation system is overloaded, we already
see farmers taking a licking in the price they receive as a result of being unable
to get their products to the marketplace.
Food holds an important place in all our lives, and energy that of the
agricultural community, because there is no point in having energy if there is
no food to eat.
Dr. Gerald L. Zachariah, chairman of the Agricultural Engineering
Department, of the University of Florida's Institute of Food and Agricultural
Sciences, commented on "Economic impact of energy requirements of
southeastern coastal states" as follows:
For energy conservation in agriculture to be effective, conservation
methods must be practical, and if not profitable, they should not contribute 
to a
reduction in profits. We must be careful in how we calculate the energy inputs
in the production system in establishing criteria for evaluating energy
conservation. It should be done on the basis of production and not acreage.
For example, irrigating corn may double the energy input per acre 
but increase
the yield by four times. Even though this might appear to be a more energy
intensive operation from the standpoint of total energy going 
into the given
operation, the production per unit of energy input is doubled.
There is also the insurance factor associated with an 
energy investment.
Cold protection as well as irrigation are good examples - that is, with perhaps a
minimal energy input, the crop can be saved and without 
the input it might be a
total loss. This can also be true for certain livestock enterprises.
New technologies, such as those in the areas of pest management, water
and fertilizer placement, and tillage practices will result in energy conservation
and a possible associated improved economic position.
Substitution of energy sources is possible in certain fixed operations but is
less feasible in field operations. Some substitutions may require significant
capital to implement, which will limit acceptability unless the long range
situation looks promising. This will require some assurance that the long range
plan on the part of the individual producer is consistent with national long
range plans.
Farmers are both producers and consumers and are subject to a double
squeeze resulting from higher energy costs. Not only are his production
operating costs increased and consequently his profits, decreased, unless he
can pass on this cost, but his consumer goods and services increase in cost.
We need to know much more about the interrelationships among three
areas: products and services, agricultural production and processing, and
11
distribution and consumer demands. For example, energy intensive products
will become more expensive and substitutions will occur. This could cause major
shifts in demands for certain products and especially those not considered to 
be
essential or those with a more elastic demand factor.
Regional shifts in production could occur with increased energy 
costs due
to changes in competitive positions and even shifts to production in other
countries could occur.
Considering the essential nature of food and fiber, the balance of payments
situation and preservation of our proven agricultural system, energy must 
be
available to agriculture and at a cost that will preserve the competitive position
of our producers.
Agricultural energy requirements are characterized by two critical factors:
the seasonal nature of the demand and the need for uninterrupted 
service
during critical periods. Florida is rather unique in regard 
to certain aspects in
both of these areas. In Florida for example, 64% of the agricultural 
energy
consumption occurs in the four winter months. This is the same time that 
the
greatests demand for heating occurs in the North, creating a strong competition
for energy. The perishable nature of these winter crops, 
especially in regard
to harvesting, handling and transportation, creates a critical need 
for energy at
the appropriate time. The need for cold protection also 
occurs during the
same period and an uninterrupted supply of fuel must be available 
or a total loss
might be incurred. This is especially important in citrus and 
greenhouse
operations.
High value speciality crops represent a particularly high investment 
in
production costs. They also require a high energy input when plastic 
mulch,
drip irrigation tubing, field operations, fertilizer, pesticides, 
etc. are
considered. When such a crop is lost, it not only results in an 
economic loss
but a waste of energy.
Transportation is a more critical factor for the Southeast, in regard 
to
both the perishable nature of many of the products and also the distance to
northern winter markets.
Significant changes are occurring in Florida agriculture. New cropping
systems are being introduced, and in particular grain crops 
are receiving
increased emphasis. Along with these changes or perhaps we should say that
these changes are associated with a significant increase 
in irrigation.
The very critical seasonal nature of energy consumption 
in the Southeast
and distances to regions where winter fuel reserves 
are normally held make it
important that fuel reserves be maintained in 
appropriate locations to meet the
needs of Southeastern agriculture.
Alternative energy sources were commented upon by 
Dr. W. B. Anthony,
Professor, Department of Animal and Dairy 
Science, Auburn University,
Auburn, Alabama.
"We certainly need to explore alternate energy sources. 
Let's look at a few
of them. We all know that the sun is the ultimate source of all of our energyf",
and photosynthesis is the basis upon which we depend to provide food for all.
There is: an important reason to pay particular attention to particular crops
because some of them are far more energetically efficient than others and we are
in the situation where we need to select those crops that are more photosynthe-
tically efficient. The major research in this area, is nitrogen fixation, 
the
reduced photorespiration which is selecting for C-4 biochemistry over 
C-3.
We've made much progress in the production of livestock, poultry and fish,
especially with respect to confined rearing and confined feeding. Those are 
the
12
areas where there are noteworthy advancements but much more research 
is
required.
There is an important area of livestock production--the beef 
area--where
there is an array of confusion. The leadership is poor, 
there are conflicts of
interest, the grading system is wrong, and the 
feed efficiency is low. We feed
steers instead of bulls; the beef are too old at 
slaughter, and we misunderstand
the forage feed production. We do not understand 
the biochemical similarity
among animals and MPN utilization is not making 
the progress it should with
cattle. The small livestock producer who 
undergirds the livestock business
loses money every year but he keeps the beef cattle 
business going.
An alternate source of energy is the waste heat 
from industrial plants.
This energy can be used to dry products, 
to grow vegetables as is done with
the TVA system, and use it to heat buildings. 
For example, one Alabama brick
producer loses the equivalent of 70 barrels 
of oil a day, that is a thousand
dollars a day, waste heat, heat that could be used 
to dry agricultural products.
Water is more basic than fuel and we should have 
this slogan on every farm
because this is the way to improve food production 
efficiency. We've got to be
mindful of shipping water from east to west. 
We have an abundance of protein
in the world but it is poorly utilized. Such things 
as plant fractionnation for
research is needed. We do need to use 
more wood as a source of energy,
building and fuel but particularly for animal feed. 
As an example, waste wood
can be used as an effective animal feed and this is already being done. There
are a great volume of residues that are best used 
as animal feed rather than as
an energy biomass.
In Alabama we produce enough crop residue to 
feed all of our livestock in
the wintertime. Animal waste represents 
a very large organic source of feed.
The wastelage concept originating at Auburn 
and much wQrk done on it at other
places since then has brought this into view 
as an effective energy source for
cattle.
So, Mr. Secretary, where all this leads, 
if we are valiant, persistent,
innovative, determined and if we do, in 
fact, act instead of talk, at the end of
the dark tunnel of hunger there will be 
food aplenty for all of us and the
southeastern part of the United States will play a leading role in this.
Informing the public on agriculture and energy was commented 
upon by
Dr. Robert H. Brown, chairman of the 
Agricultural Engineering Division,
University of Georgia, Athens, Georgia.
Mr. Secretary, the public knows that something is 
wrong as far as energy
is concerned. They aren't at all 
certain what but definitely know that
something is wrong. Many express 
their suspicions and lack of confidence 
in
the realness of the situation. They are waiting 
to learn what hardships it will
bring, what it is going to cost, and what 
changes in their lifestyles are going to
occur. A few are asking, "What can I do to help?" 
Another few are still hoping
it will go away.
S This is a critical period for all of us. We must reach the public with
reliable, factual information about energy in America, including facts about the
amount of energy there is in various links of the food chain. We must build a
public awareness of the fact that their food supply depends upon the availability
of energy.
There are several possible delivery systems for~ this message: the public
schools, the Cooperative Extension Service and a new Energy Extension Office
might be established under a new department of energy.
13
Two things the delivery system must possess are credibility, and expertise
in education. What about the deliery system of the Cooperative Extension
Service? It is in place. The personnel are talented and experienced in edu-
cation. They live in the community. They are neighbors with high credibility.
The public is accustomed to seeking their advice, their information and
assistance.
The credentials we seek are inherent in their structure 
and in their mode
of operation. A new Energy Extension Office would have to establish its
credibility before it could be as effective. If the Cooperative Extension Service
is assigned the information task, three special provisions should be imposed.
The energy information mission must be directed by a new division within
the service. It should not be scattered and absorbed within the routine and
existing programs and departments for it would then surely go down the drain.
Provision must be made to extend the services to meet the need of large
industries and large metropolitan areas. Provision must also be made to include
the humanistic social inputs, such as those that would come from an institute of
government, within this informational. structure.
With these arrangements, I feel that we would have an efficient and
successful vehicle for educating the public about energy, its conservation, and
its place in the food chain.
Land and water conservation were commented upon by Mr. Clair Guess,
Jr., Executive Director, South Carolina Water Resources Commission, Columbia,
South Carolina.
Mr. Secretary, the subject I have is the land and water conservation and I
would like to add a word to the title--dilemma. I think this nation at this tie
both in the West, Midwest and Southeast, is probably shaping up with one of
the greatest crises we've had for quite a number of years purely 
from the
standpoint of either overmanagement or the lack of management of water
resources.
Sometime during the thirties when we came into a rather decent volunteer
system of land and water conservation across 
this country it took nearly 40
years to bring it to its fullest flower. And suddenly we find techniques of six
and eight row tractors--one hundred to one hundred fifty horsepower--which
could not really accommodate a terracing system of the past. 
We have been able
to accommodate and add to, through our research 
and technology, parallel
terracing systems. We've come into some areas of land leveling and we've 
come
into areas now in which the technology and utilization of water on the land 
is
quite productive. But we haven't touched 
the subject yet. A decent well for
forty, fifty or one hundred acres of irrigation, if you take it from 
grouad
water, needs an investment from fifty thousand dollars per well just to move
into that area. This is a good example of what capital intensive means.
Then on top of that is the utilization of this water in the concept of the'
land to which it is being applied. And here I think is where one of our
dilemmas is today throughout the nation and especially 
in the Southeast. It
used to be that we could go to one or more substantial federal 
agencies and come
back with a level of integrity and apply these techniques 
with some hope of
results. Today we have to get permission from the Water 
Resources Council,
the Environmental Protection Agency, the Council on Environmental 
Quality, the
Office of Management and Budget, the Department of Interior 
and several of its
bureaus, the Corps of Engineers, Department of Agriculture, 
Department of
Commerce, Department of Transportation, and the Federal Fowl 
Commission.
14
Now, these things have led to the major dilemma of whose right and
prerogative it is to make decisions about the land under local guidance. This
question is leading to a great deal of confusion.
To top this off, if you've followed your compatriot Secretary Anderson of
Interior, and President Carter, apparently within the next few days hearings
will be held all over the United States (most of them will be on July 27th and
28th, August 1st and 2nd,) to begin shaping a proposal to the President on a
new national water policy. I have been working very closely with this--as a
matter of fact this is of prime interest to me at this point-- and I hope neither
agriculture nor any other of the private segments of this country are left out of
the act of shaping or helping to shape the policies that 
I think are coming down
the road.
For example, we are talking about and in terms of new federal and/or state
institutional arrangements to handle water and natural resources, new methods
of conservation, entirely new methods of funding and cost-sharing, and we are
even going out to worry about, and I think probably it's right to do it at this
time, the Indian water rights and reserve water rights felt by the Justic
Department to be the sole right of the federal government.
Now, Mr. Secretary, among other things if you combine this--and I look
upon this probably with a sense of fear though I hoped I was over fear--to
combine the current proposal and actual regulations that went into effect on
July 1st under Section 404-92500 which the Congress has not seen fit to change
at this point, this means that every landowner, private or public interest, must
get a permit before he can move any bit of soil to drain any part of his land and
that extends to the headwaters in the mountainous areas to a point now of five
cubic feet per second. That's one foot wide, one foot deep, over a two percent
slope of average roughness. My greatest fear in combining federal invasion
water rights and these conservation problems is that in time even though we
have respected the riparian rights and the rights of states and local interest to
make their own decisions, all these combined could, if they aren't very carefully
guarded, ripen into a federal water right and there will be no rights left for
those of us who would like to use it in agriculture and otherspheres.
With that, I intend to close but I do think the door is left open and I hope
we have more discussions before this meeting is over as to how we can cope with
these particular problems that are taking us over when in fact--and I'm honest
because I've been with this thing thirty years,--the states could have and
probably should have moved more forcefully, more effectively, in time past.
But be that as it may, there are a good many tomorrows that can be very
unpleasant unless we are willing to put our shoulder to the wheel and protect
those rights which we think, or have thought, to be our own.
Following these comments, the panel engaged in discussion. Here are some
selected questions and statements:
-- Mr. Secretary, in the event of another Arab embargo, fuel shortages will
occur in this country. Is any thought being given to priority ranking for the
type of crop or crops that would be grown and harvested in the event that such
a thing would take place?
Secretary Bergland replied, "I'm not aware of any law which would
establish a priority between crops. There is however, authority to establish a
list in which agriculture, food production that is of course, transportation and
processing would rank I think second only to residential heating, and public
buildings like hospitals. This would be used only in the event of a situation
such as that which you've described. We do not believe that there would be any
15
effective way of trying to enforce a rationing program that would allot fuel for
one type of agriculture but not another. And so we've simply established
priorities based on the importance of agriculture as an industry which 
will
receive priority over almost all other industries in the US should it become
necessary."
-- Mr. Secretary, we went through this past winter, probably one of 
thecoldest
winters in history in our region of the country and we don't know what's 
in
store for the coming winters. But we do know that we had more 
problems than
we knew what to do 
with, especially a shortage 
of natural gas. We 
found in
Georgia, our principal supplier is the Atlanta Gas and Light Company, we 
found
that some suppliers of raw products, basic supplies like cartons 
for milk or
eggs, did not fall in the same category as the processor himself. Is 
there a
possibility we can work on that problem and make sure that 
we bring all the so-
called suppliers of our perishable products into the same category 
as the
processor himself?
Secretary Bergland replied: "I think not only we can, but we should
because the purpose of establishing a system of allocations 
is to insure a food
supply to the American 
consumer and if the supply 
chain is broken along the
way, obviously the whole program would collapse. We have to 
have fuels
provided for the packaging, distribution as well as the production of food and
fiber.
-- Mr. Secretary, we are a vertically integrated livestock 
operation consisting of
a packing house, feed lot, and feed mill operation in Florida. 
We are probably
unique in our field in that we are environmentally sound. Our 
energybill this
year, Mr. Secretary, 
in the packing house 
operation alone, increased 
to
$415,000 and that's only one form of energy 
I'm referring to. We have been
experimenting for the last two years with the possibilities 
of converting animal
wastes into methane gas and we are currently working 
with ERDA in developing
asubcontractor relationship to build an on-site production plant. 
This plant
could not only power the entire boiler capacity of our packing plant 
but could
supply enough methane gas to supply energy for Bartow, a community 
of 15,000
people. One of our frustrations, Mr. Secretary, is that 
in dealing in this area
we find that we are more obstructed than we are 
assisted by the federal
government. We have carried out the function of environmentally 
protecting Our
operation in, Bartow without any federal assistance. At 
the present time we are
soliciting federal assistance because-we don't have the technical 
know-how and
ability to carry on this experiment. We need your help. 
There has been a lot
of talk about streamlined government agencies helping 
us find alternate sources
of energy but when you 
have to deal with five 
or six different agencies 
with all
their own axe 
to grind it's 
very difficult 
to reach a sound 
solution.
Secretary Bergland replied, "It's a matter about which 
you and I should
get-together and discuss. I'm not familiar with the project but if there's
something I can do to help, I will."
- -Mr. Secretary, I'm going to take this opportunity to talk about 
water. I try
to make my living in the cattle-feedlot business but I spend 
most of my time
trying to worry about Florida's water problem. I'm not going to 
blame the fed-
eral government because I don't think they have any blame in the 
problem. I
think we've brought it on ourself. We find that people want to 
live in Florida,
they want to live in the sunbelt and they are going to compete with 
us for these
16
water supplies far more rapidly than we thought possible. 
The fuel problems in
the north seem to be encouraging them to move here and we 
find ourselves faced
with an urban versus agricultural competition that we did 
not foresee. We see
the United States Geological Survey saying agriculture 
is the big user, what are
we going to do about it? I chair a regulatory agency of fifteen 
counties, which
in this year alone has regulated and passed permits 
to 4,414 irrigators. But
now we find ourselves in the dilemma of not knowing 
what agricultural needs to
prepare for the future. We have the dilemma of 
not knowing what agriculture is
actually using so we have the pressures of the urban 
group pressing on us to
shut down agriculture, shut down phosphate, 
and we find ourselves
approaching the dilemma for which we have no 
answer. We can force a $1,270
meter on every agricultural well in our district, 
which I'm sure they cannot
afford particularly at this time. Florida is facing 
an unprecedented drought and
in its southern half an unprecedented shortage, if 
its not already here. So I
would propose to you, narrowly and specifically, 
would you through one of the
agencies under your office, help us find 
a method, either statistically or
actually, to determine how much water 
we are using, how much water we are
going to need, and what will be the competitive 
outcome of the sunbelt urban
versus agriculture situation? We don't care who does 
it. We simply do not want
to, those of us in agriculture but who are also involved 
inthe regulatory effort,
we do not want to see agriculture punished yet want 
to see it do its part, carry
its load and sing its own song by knowing 
what its doing and what its needs
are.
Secretary Bergland pointed out that about 
ten percent of the crop land is
irrigated in the U.S. and it produces 
about one-fourth of the total food and
fiber. About 5,000 wells are being drilled 
a year and in some places this is
creating a real problem with ground water 
supplies. The Department of
Agriculture is not involved in the ground 
water business at all. That's left to
the Geological Survey Service of the Department 
of the Interior Are they able
to help you monitor and keep track of those 
things which you need to do in the
Southern part of Florida?
The reply: .... Yes sir, they are doing 
an excellent job, but their whole
pitch to us today is, "We don't know what 
agriculture is using," they don't have
any meters, they don't know themselves not even our largest agricultural 
opera-
tions. And the only self-regulatory effort 
among agricultural interests has
been the cost of energy. They are getting 
a little more concerned about how
much water they are using than they 
have been in the past because of costs,
but the USGS is the prime one who 
is pushing us on the regulatory end 
to clamp
down on agriculture and either force them 
to go to total meterization or to shut
them down until they can come and tell 
us how much water they are using. 
So,
yes, the USGS is doing an excellent job but 
they don't take sides, they are not
concerned whether it's agriculture versus urban, they are 
nonpolitical as far as
possible but they are still going to listen 
when the most number of people are
standing on the podium and doing the hollering. 
This is somewhat of an
oversimplification but indicative of the truth.
Secretary Bergland replied: I think that the matter is going to receive
much more attention as time goes on. I was recently out in California and in the
big Central Valley the water table has dropped 35 feet in the last year and they
are now suffering salt water intrusion and the fact is that nobody knows what to
do about it.
A panelist replied that Florida has experienced a water table drop of 30
feet in just the last six months. Another panelist commented that in Georgia,
they needed to find out just how much water they have because if you are going
17
to advise farmers to go t.o the expense of irrigation, you need to make sure that
if they are going to spend that money to put that irrigation system in, then
they are going to have a supply of Water available.
Secretary Bergland asked if the USGS had the ability to take a water
inventory survey.
A panelist replied that USGS did not totally have the ability, pointing out
that funding was a joint effort from local ad valorem taxes in southwest Florida.
-- Mr. Secretary, the bulk distributors who are supplying the farmers with their
fuel have a problem. They were put on allocation based on their 1972 volume
regardless of new land taken out of woodland and put into cultivation. They
still have the same allotment. But as all of us know there are certain periods of
the year when the farmer is using his equipment and needs fuel and there are
other times of the year when he needs less. But the bulk distributor has to
take it in each month or he doesn't get it and diesel fuel for instance, after
about three months starts breaking down. This is creating a great problem. In
addition to that some of the distributors tell me that many of the major suppliers
are encouraging them to go other places to try to buy the diesel from, maybe an
independent company stating that they would prefer to use their petroleum for
the production of chemicals because they can make more money out of it. As a
result they are having trouble getting their allotment. 
(Following this question,
there was discussion to determine if this was a common problem in other states.)
Secretary Bergland pointed out that because energy and agriculture are so
interrelated, he had designated Deputy Secretary John White to head the USDA
Energy Task Force. He pointed out that Dr. Schlesinger and President Carter
fully understood the need for a high energy supply for agriculture.
Another panelist requested that the Secretary help agriculture deal with
restrictive legislation specifically mentioning section 404 of 92-500, considering
it a definite violation of the right of private use of land. The panelist pointed
out that with choice land on the decrease in this nation, there is a need for the
use of strong soil conservation planning, soil surveys, and soil conservation.
He pleaded with the Secretary for his help in feeding this nation and the rest of
the world and cautioned against becoming so emotionally involved 
on
environmental issues that agricultural production needs were overlooked.
The Secretary responded saying that this problem caused him a great deal
of concern. He pointed out that the nation loses 2 million acres of the world's
best crop land each year largely due to the expansion of highways, airports,
suburbs and the like. Mr. Bergland stated that during his lifetime, the 
nation
had paved over cropland equaling in size the state of Ohio and by the end of
the century, at the present rate, will have paved over the equivalent of the
state of Indiana. State and local municipalities have the responsibility to figure
out some land use strategies because we cannot go on forever and forever
destroying the world's best crop land.
Another panelist mentioned recent experiences with people advocating the
substitution of muscle power for fossil energy in producing food and fiber. The
panelist pointed out the urgent need to create a better public understanding of
the role of energy in agriculture and the impracticality of the many suggestions
made to the general public. He recommended further research in the utilization
of waste heat from generating plants as an energy input for agriculture.
18
RURAL ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT
The second panel dealt with problems of Rural Economic Development and
was chaired by Dr. Henry W. Garren, Dean and Coordinator of the College of
Agriculture of the University of Georgia, Athens Georgia.
Dr. Garren pointed out that during the generations following the Civil
War, the rural areas of the South were plagued with severe economic disaster.
As a result of this, many of the rural people migrated out of the South, out of
the rural areas. Many of these people went into the urban areas within and
outside the South. In doing this, they created a dual problem. They created 
a
problem in the community they left and in some instances they created a problem
in the community where they settled.
An even more serious problem was the inclusion among the migratory
groups of some of the most talented young people of leadership quality. 
Now
today while there are signs that this trend of out-migration of the rural South 
is
reversing, the serious economic problems still remain. Dr. 
Garren then
introduced the panel commentators.
Problems of small farms were commented upon by Dr. Robert Hurst, 
Vice
President, Research, Planning and Extension, South Carolina State College,
Orangeburg, South Carolina. He remarked as follows:
If we take the new definition of small farmer, we would find that those
grossing $20,000 and more are the large farmers and they are the ones who
produce some 80 percent of the food and fiber that enter into the channels 
of
commerce. We have left then, about 20 percent of the product, producing 
by
some 75 percent of the total farm population of 2.8 million farms.
It is especially this latter group, the small group, that we in 
the Southeast
are interested in because this group constitutes a substantial number, 
a
substantial percentage of the total farms with which we have to work. These
farms we find in three different classes. Some are the retired farmers who are
doing a little hobby farming and that is one of the reasons 
why their incomes
are as low as they are. But two major groups, 75 percent of it, constitute 
a
group of people who must have some help to upgrade themselves. 
These
household heads, many of whom are senior citizens, own tracts of land or
portions of land, 10 to 15 acres of cultivatable land, but as individuals they have
serious difficulty in making any profitable agricultural production with what
they have.
Many of them are mentally and physically debilitated. Most of 
them have
grandchildren and great grandchildren who are too young to work. 
But all of
them need one-to-one leadership through our Cooperative 
Extension program
and the other programs addressing these kind of needs. It is this 
latter group
that I plead for this afternoon.
We were privileged in the 1976 budget to get a small bit of money from the
Congress of the United States to work with the small farmers and we pooled our
bits of money and started working with a model that we think will be acceptable,
that can be used by the small farmer.
We have developed a good, workable model but what we need at the
moment, is additional personnel to carry this model through demonstration to
these people. In addition to that, many of these people do not have any
productive equipment and the Extension Service with which we are presently
working has a rather rigid string tied to the use of money. We therefore are
not able to use our funds, except in demonstration purposes, to assist these
people in getting started. It is clear that some kind of a credit system,
19
different from what we presently have, must be devised to assist these people in
getting started.
What we are saying here, in effect, is that many of these senior citizens
and many of these crippled people do find time and energy to produce crops
with proper leadership and with the proper facility to carry it out.
Another thing that we have discovered, local markets. We must have local
markets, they can't compete in the regular markets, so we must have local
farmers' markets to do this. It's a community effort but it must be generated,
it must begin with some organized effort, preferably with the Agricultural
Experiment Station working out means with which this can be done best and
then the Agricultural Extension effort can carry the message to the individual
farmers. It is in that light then, that we present the need of the farmers,
especially the small farmers,- to the 'Secretary and hopefully we can get some
favorable consideration in trying to push this thing so we would bring into
production a large quantity of this wasteland that we see when we fly over
America.
Expansion of agricultural industry was commented upon by Dr. Edward
White, Director of the Rural Development Center, Tifton, Georgia. He spoke as
follows:
A healthy agricultural system is the basis for a prosperous rural America.
We all recognize the continuing national imperative for major attention to agri-
culture and in no sense are the following remarks intended to minimize the
importance of this initiative. In most rural areas, farmers are the main source
of economic activity for communities. However, it is clear that in most rural
communities, farming alone cannot provide a viable economic base. The
processes of rural development and agricultural development are neither
mutually exclusive nor identical. The expansion of agricultural industry is only
part of the answer to the ills that plague rural America. It is important that all
agricultural leaders understand that the processes of agricultural development
and rural development are not synonymous terms. The very nature of the
formal training and professional experience of agriculturalists predisposes their
commitment to servicing production agriculture which is increasingly commercial
farming on a large scale.
One problem we face in rural economic development is that definitions of
programs and policies are not sufficiently precise to accommodate real communi-
cation. The topic, expansion of agricultural industry, is similarly elusive. I
would define agricultural industry to include all agricultural inputs, the
producing operations of farms and the processing, storage and distribution of
farm commodities.
On a recent trip to Washington, I heard people from various departments
speak in glowing, searching and appealing ways of a new rural initiative.
Seemingly, traditionalists in USDA and other departments are ready for a new,
expanded and potentially exciting role in rural development. The expansion of
agricultural industry today must be thought of in terms of global agriculture,
geoagriculture. In most instances, our thinking about agriculture and the
expansion of agriculture and the industry that goes along with it is in a local or
a regional framework.
Agriculture is losing its uniqueness and is entering into the mainstream of
global economic life. It is becoming an undifferentiated part of global society.
Another key to the expansion of agricultural industry is manpower. From the
production standpoint, regular working hours for agricultural workers have
never been seriously considered until just recently. One of the key issues in
20
the near future for the production phase of the agricultural industry isgoing to
be regular working hours for the employees and shifts of employees on an eight
hour basis similar to plant and factory workers. It should also be pointed out
that we are not very far from rigid land use or resource use laws that will
control agriculture more and tend to put it on a regional crop specialization
basis within a given geographical area.
Expansion of agricultural industry will require the introduction of new,
readily adaptable crops that are not currently being produced. Research will
continue to play a key role in the expansion of agricultural industry. Improved
research is needed to reduce reliance on chemical fertilizers, to perfect solar
drying of grain, to create usable energy on the farm, to improve and introduce
new crops and more efficient use of all of our resources
If agricultural expansion is viewed in the context of production, it should
be noted that production for production's sake will not result in economic
development in rural areas. Expanded production will require the simultaneous
development of expanded markets as well as adequate delivery systems.
American agriculture today, as never before, is highly 
dependent on
international markets.
Roughly one-fourth of the cash receipts of American farmers today come
from exports. The unvarnished truth is that most of the recent expansion in
agriculture has been based on the assumption that agricultural exports will
continue strong. In agriculture, it is now a matter of export or perish. Our
world today is truly headed toward marketing internationalism, a two-way flow
across national boundaries of marketing ideas, marketing practices, 
and
marketing people. Agriculture does not operate in a vacuum. It needs to 
be
constantly alert to the shifting international scene.
Manpower was commented upon by Mr. George Sorn, Manager, Labor
Division, Florida Fruit and Vegetable Association, Orlando, Florida. He spoke
as follows:
In a discussion of manpower in the Southeastern states, I think it
important to understand that the basic manpower continues to be the farmer and
his farm family. With the exception of Florida, the composition of manpower 
is
approximately 60 percent farmers and their farm family. In Florida, this
reverses to where there is approximately 30 percent farmers and their farm
family and 60 percent hired workers. The trend is down in both cases. 
In the
last ten years, farmers and farm families are 30 percent less than they were in
1967. The only exception to that is Florida where the reduction was 8.6 percent
in the last ten years.
The use of hired farm workers is down for the six states as a 
whole 17.5
percent in ten years, except for Georgia which for some reason increased their
hired work force by 35 percent in that ten year period.
The family farmer and his family farm workers is the topic of virtually all
of this conference. My remarks from here on are primarily directed at the hired
farm workers which continue to be vital to the Southeastern growers and to the
continued production of agricultural commodities in the Southeastern states.
In the last two decades, mechanization has replaced manpower in many
areas of agricultural production. How far or how fast this trend will continue is
mostly not in the hands of the agricultural employer. G]rowers who use hiredI
labor in particularly those crops in intensive farming operations, and t~hose arC(
the ones I am most familiar with, would prefer to continue using hand labor for
harvesting in particular as much as they can. However, there are many forces
working on the employee-employer relationship in agriculture which could, un-
21
fortunately, for many employers and their workers, substitute capital for labor
and mechanize.
Let me briefly review just three of those problems as we see them. They
are all related to the cost of using labor and to the problems related to the use
of labor, and again primarily in the labor intensive crops.
Citrus, fresh vegetables in Florida, sugarcane growers find that the cost
of labor is the highest single cost of production, ranging from 30 to 50 percent.
Of course, any increase in this cost will affect whether the grower decides to
continue to use hand labor or to mechanize.
Number one, as a problem, there has been a proliferation of laws and
regulations as they apply not only to the farm employer but to the worker good
and bad. It will cause a rethinking of the employer-employee relationship with
more emphasis on human relations in that relationship. Let me indicate several
of the problems that we have. In this proliferation of laws and regulations, we
tend to get similar state and federal laws which are causing problems. A prime
example is in the area of farm labor housing where the laws, state and federal,
tend to do the exact opposite of what they intended to achieve: Instead of our
having more and better housing for workers, we may be having 
better housing
but not more, in fact much less.
A farm employer in the right situation in Florida would be subject to a
state sanitary code. If he goes to the employment service to obtain labor, he
would be subject to the US Department of Labor OSHA housing standards and
just within the last 30 days I understand that there are some employers in
counties that do obtain HEW funds for housing improvements in that county
where a grower with migratory or farm labor housing would also have to comply
with the housing code of the HEW. I think the general stand of the growers is
that they don't mind complying to a code but it seems ridiculous that they would
have to comply with four different codes in order for someone to say they have
adequate housing.
Number two, there is a problem with enforcement and interpretation of
laws. One particular example here that is causing growers most problems is the
federal farm labor contractor registration act. We understand and I believe it is
correct that the intent of Congress was to insure that the farm labor contractor,
the individual without physical assets who moves from place to place and is an
employer of farm workers would have some laws or regulations that apply to
him. We don't disagree with that intent.
However, in the enforcement and interpretation of the law virtually every
grower, particularly if for a few days in the year he would be helping his
counterpart, the farmer down the road, in harvesting his crop, would be under
the interpretation that is in effect now, be a farm labor contractor even though
he has physical assets. The enforcing agencies could get to him much quicker
than they could in many other cases.
There is a problem in relation to the proliferation of laws and regulations
in just education, educating the growers in knowing that there are such laws
and also in what those laws contain. We see a need for education, particularly
through the Cooperative Extension Service directly to the growers in advising
them what these laws and regulations are.
The second area of problems that will affect costs is the introduction of
third parties into the employer-employee relationship in agriculture. This is
relatively new and here I'm referring to union organization, the organization of
agricultural workers. In our estimation, (I'm referring to three or four of the
key associations in the state of Florida, who represent growers of labor
intensive crops,) there is a need for federal legislation versus state legislation.
22
There are peculiar problems we think federal legislation should handle and not
state legislation. We are working towards federal legislation in this area.
Again, here in dealing with these third parties, good and bad, there are
many government financed programs, educational programs, day-care centers,
monitor advocates, all directing their activities towards the farm worker. Here
is again a need for the Cooperative Extension Service in training in-human
relations, in good labor management relations with the farm employer.
Number three, and always a factor in the cost of using labor is the supply
of labor. We see several areas where it is very possible that in the years ahead
there could be a shortage of labor, contrary to what it has been in the last two
or three years. All of these will affect mechanization and how fast growers will
mechanize.
In spite of the seasonality of the crops there will continue to be a necessity
to maximize employment opportunities in agriculture, particularly in the 
hired
labor force that we are talking about now through farm management skill
enhancement and where possible improved work environment. Farm workers
need to be offered the same opportunities in their communities as 
our other
workers. For migratory workers, this leaves a lot to be worked on.
These basically are some of the problem areas as far as manpower is
concerned.
Rural credit was commented upon by Mr. Tom E. Hankins, Vice President,
Bank of Dixie, Lake Providence, Louisiana, as follows:
Because of the cost price squeeze that farmers have been in, in 
the last
few years, severe operating losses have been taken by many farmers and
because of this, agricultural lenders of our area are faced with unusual 
credit
problems.
I have to preface my remarks about the experience that I have had in
North Louisiana and the Louisiana Delta. I'm sure that the state of 
Mississippi
is the same and I'm sure that Georgia and Alabama and Florida are also.
The severe operating losses sustained by the cow-calf operators and cotton
producers during the past few years have 
resulted in seriously weakened
financial conditions of many of the farmers. According to livestock experts, it
appears that cow-calf operators will continue to be confronted with 
these
problems.
Cotton and soybean producers have experienced erratic weather
conditions, low prices, low yields, or erratic prices and the profit picture has
been somewhat bad in our area. Rice farmers in North Louisiana 
have had
difficulty in moving their inventories right after harvest. 
They've had to hold
crops and sell over in the spring which created credit problems. Also, the
bumper crops have created storage problems and resulted in lower prices.
In the banking or lending industry, we realize that farmers have
responded well to the encouragement of different 
people to increase production
and to provide plenty of food and fiber for our people without any assurance of
any price structure being satisfactory and sufficient to move these commodities
above the cost of production. We are very much concerned, Mr. Secretary,
about the activities of the government that will certainly damage farmers at the
time of marketing such as the moratorium on grain sales to Russia a few years
ago. We trust that you will help us in this matter. As I mentioned earlier, the
lack of net repayment ability of our farmers is increasing in our particular area.
We have a large number of farmers who are operating entirely on 100 percent
credit. This is a serious problem, gentlemen. The equity in the land has been
used up and with just a few more bad crop years we will see a good many
farmers go out of business.
23
There are many indications that the rate of inflation has begun to slow
down throughout the nation. But this does not necessarily carry over into the
agricultural sector. We are still seeing tremendous increases in the cost of
chemicals and fertilizers, fuels and so on. Those farmers who are continually
having to buy new equipment see a tremendous increase in price trend. One
four-wheel tractor in our area with a big disc will cost $50,000. Credit demands
certainly will increase. There are adequate funds available to meet legitimate
credit needs of those farmers and ranchers who can offer sound and workable
credit proposals. Certainly we have alot of farmers in the top ten percent or so
making good money. We have a larger percentage of farmers in this middle
section who carry on the volume of farming that have major credit weaknesses in
their loans. With a few more droughts and few more pricing problems certainly
they could be in real serious problems.
Land prices have somewhat aggravated the situation in our area. Land
prices the past three years have doubled. We are having an influx of people
out of the midwest and international interests coming into our area and buying
land that three years ago sold for $400 an acre is selling for $1000 an acre at
this time. Of course, this is alright for the seller but it will certinly have a
tremendous influence on the renting of land in this area.
As I mentioned, funds are available for short term credit, the banks and
PCS's have money. Long term credit is a little bit different. We do need higher
ratios to borrow with the high land prices. We are told that the total farm debt
now is about $90 billion and this will go to $150 billion in the 1980's. I think the
lending institutions of this nation, certainly have a challenge and we do have a
problem. Of course, the name of the game is profit and we are very much
concerned right now about the repayment capacity of a lot of our farmers.
Panel questions follows:
-- Mr. Secretary, many county loan officers with the Farmer's Home
Administration are overworked and a great many more of them are undertrained,
they don't know how to read a farm financial statement, they don't know
anything about financial ratios, they don't have an effective credit scoring
system and they don't know whether a 20 or 30 or a 40 thousand dollar tractor
is a good buy or not, and their small farm customers don't know these things
either. I'm wondering if you have considered in this new legislation, or if you
would consider the employment of state specialists who are trained in
agricultural financial management who would work individually with county loan
officers and more importantly, institute a training program within the state to
upgrade the effectiveness of these very hard working people?
Secretary Bergland replied that. . .you've put your finger on a most
difficult management problem. There are 31 laws run by the FHA, 21 of which
have been funded. There's no way that a single FHA supervisor can be up and
expert on all of these 21 different programs they are obliged to run. And so to
try to meet those needs, and you've correctly stated the problem, we are in the
process of examining the reorganization of the Farm Home Administration. We
would set up regional offices, several within a state. Those would be staffed by
experts and would take on the task of processing loan applications for rural
water and sewer systems, municipal supply systems of community development
loans, and the business and industrial loan portfolios and other matters which
are not directly connected with farm loans. With the regional experts, that
would reduce a lot of the paperwork and burdens imposed upon the county FHA
supervisor. The other problem we have is that under current law when a
county is hit by a natural disaster, too often the private credit sources are
24
obliged to send several hundred loan applicants to the FHA. We're not ready
for that avalanche. The best we can do is move people in as we are doing here
in the Southeast now, many of whom come here from other regions of the United
States and are not familiar with local agriculture--but we have no other way.
We can't go out on the street and hire a loan officer for this very difficult and
specialized matter. So, we are in the process of developing some amendments to
the Farm Home Administration charter which we will submit to the Congress
when we get it ready to make many changes. The most important of which
would be a change in law where we would ask the borrower to stay with his or
her private lending agency, whether it be a private bank or Production Credit
Association or a credit union or whatever. FHA would come and guarantee that
paper, that which is needed to make the loan possible on the part of the private
lender, reducing again the paperwork and management that is imposed upon the
county FHA supervisor. This means we would have more credit 
outlets, it
means that the bank or the PCA familiar with the borrower's strengths and
weaknesses could stay with that borrower rather than put the borrower 
in a new
credit position. I farmed 27 years and I'll tell you when I started farming in
1950 it was tough going. I didn't have any money, I didn't marry money and
Dad didn't have any and we bought a piece of land on a contract for deed and I
had nothing to pay down. But I had a good creditor. We had tough going. 
We
were into FHA for a while and into the bank and into the contract for deed. I
haven't forgotten how it is to serve many credit masters We need 
to
consolidate these loans and have them in a portfolio that can be managed by 
the
borrower with lender supervision. The more we can get out from under 
direct
supervision on the part of the FHA supervisor, the better off the agency 
will be
and we are sure the borrowers will be better off. This will remove some 
of the
work load now thrust upon the hard working supervisors. I think they 
are an
excellent lot who work overtime they are not paid for. They can then 
confine
their attention to those who really have no other way of getting credit. So then
the FHA is truly a lender of last resort and under that new authority, 
we would
propose to take many chances with those borrowers and not just finance those
who can get credit elsewhere.
Another panelist commented: The balance sheet of agriculture is very
favorable but in our dealing with the Land Bank System and the Production
Credit System for Southeastern states' 124,000 farm families, the big problem
and the greatest need is for increased farm income. Anything that USDA can do
to enhance farm income will meet one of the greatest needs of agriculture.
There are many farmers with a good financial statement. Their 
debts are
low in relation to the value of their assets. But they lack Sufficient cash flow to
service those debts. Of course this is aggravated by the bad weather
conditions and the price structure of ranch cattle.
The second point of the panelist requested the Secretary to give serious
consideration to expanding the "wrap-around" financing whereby FHA can come
behind a commercial bank, or a PCA or a Land Bank with a junior mortgage and
provide the supplemental financing needed. This is especially important to
young farmers getting into and expanding their farm business. Many of these
young farmers need this added effort and its also helpful in some trouble cases.
Our experience has been pretty favorable with this tool in working with
the FHA in addition to the guarantee program.
The third point of the panelist was: I believe that lending institutions
generally are looking beyond the current crisis of drought and bad weather
hoping for better days. We have said to our people that we are going to stay
with farmers who can't pay because of bad weather conditions. If the farmer
25
acts in good faith and does the best he can, we are going to, not only carry
over some of the 1977 credit to be repaid but also advance money for next year.
I believe that will be the philosophy of most lending institutions.
Another panelist commented: Mr. Secretary, turning to the problem of the
small producers, more than a quarter of the producers in the Southeast have
less than $10,000 sales. Canada has a small farm development program which
consists of land transfer programs, assistance to buyers and sellers of land,
information, rural counseling, and farm management assistance. Could you
please comment on the possibility for a similar type of program to help the small
producers. The small producers have serious problems in the acquisition of
inputs and access to market outlets.
The Secretary commented: I am familiar with the program to which you
refer. It is operating in the province of Alberta. We are examining it very
carefully. I'm not sure it would fit in the U.S. but we're not discounting it
until we've looked at it and other alternatives. I think the biggest mistake in
the attempts at rural development over the last fifteen years in the United
States has been 
made by the notion 
that you can put 
people on poor 
land and
produce a living.
I know it was tried in my state of Minnesota. We went into the wasteland
and tried to set up a rural development program and of course it fizzled. As
soon as the federal subsidies were removed, the whole enterprise collapsed. It
is the cruelist kind of deception. It seems to me that we desperately need to
construct a federal rural development policy that can stand on its own two feet.
We need to develop a program in Washington that can help the small farmer make
a living. I saw something in California that gave me real hope. We're going to
apply that and encourage its construction here in the Southeast.
I was in the Salinas Valley of California where 52 families who had been
working in the migrant labor force formed a cooperative, borrowed money, and
set up a farm lease from a bank. They produced strawberries. Together they
bought an irrigation system and some big machinery. Individually they had
about four and a half acres of strawberries apiece. They hired professional
marketing guidance. Their incomes went from $4,000 a year to over $12,000.
They've been in it five years and I saw their financial report and talked to their
banker. It's a proposition which works. They have FHA loans for building
houses. There are 52 families that have found a piece of the United States, but
on good land, labor intensive, with good management and proper credit. Now
that's something that maybe we can duplicate here in the Southeast and we're
going to look at it very carefully.
Another panelist commented: Mr. Secretary, as you know I'm sure, the
South because of its climate and fast growing species is one of the best timber
growing parts of the United States. And as we look on down the road all the
projections are that our fiber needs are going to increase tremendously in the
years ahead. The South must be looked to supply that need. One of the
problems, and the problem at the present time is that approximately 75 percent
of the small private woodland owners own 75 percent of the land. They are not
reforesting, they are not as a group practicing good forest management. Why?
There are many reasons. One is the cost of the cultural treatments and the
planting. Another is the state taxes. If they are not going to benefit
personally, they are concerned about what they will leave for their heirs.
Another, is the problem with vendors. Historically in the South, particularly
with the small private owner, any major progress in forestry has been made with
significant federal involvement beginning with the 1924 Clark-McNary Act. It
was followed by the Civilian Conservation Corps of the 1930's which worked on
26
private land and public land and did a tremendous amount of improvement and
development. The soil bank in 1950. . many industries now are harvesting
almost entirely their raw materials from the soil bank plantations. We now have
the forest and city bank which is very encouraging but there is a problem
there. . . some of the restrictions need to be looked at. The funding has been
on-again, off-again, here again, gone again. I hope its stable now. There is a
new program which may be coming down the road, the National Young 
Adult
Conservation Corps which is a modern CCC. I hope and believe the program 
to
do the things that it can and should do. But the point I want to make is that it
should be expanded to allow to plant and provide cultural treatments for small,
private woodland owners. The extension of the program has been considered,
but I understand, it was rejected on the basis that it would enhance the 
value
of private lands. That would of course happen, but as we all know, the private
landowner receives only a very small fraction of the benefit of that wood fiber.
From the stumpage to market place, its estimated that is multiplied 26 times. I
believe that in addition to the cash incentives provided by the forest incentives
act that is now operating, this labor in lieu of cash provided by this modern
CCC, would be a tremendous boost to forestry in the South. It would be 
a tre-
mendous boost to rural areas because the economic stability of many rural areas
depend on the productivity of the forest land in that area. It provides jobs,
provides products, provides things that the people need to keep them on the
land and keep them from going to the inner cities to again build up and balloon
our welfare program. There is a social benefit here that I think the Congress
should, and I'm sure has looked at, and should speak to. This NYACC
program, National Young Adult Conservation Corps, could very well bring inner
city kids out to the rural areas, make them aware of rural America, make them
know what is out there for them and bring them back from the cities. As 
a
result of this action we would have a stronger America economically as well as
socially.
Another panelist commented: It seems to me there are two problems in the
United States: one is the energy shortage and the other is percent of unemploy-
ment. Yet we've just heard that there is not enough labor for farm work
Maybe the government makes it too easy for people not to work. What 
has
happened to our ideals?
Another panelist added: I'd just like to call attention to one point on this
matter of unemployment. 
Over two million 
people in the 
southeast are said 
now
to be in need of employment or better employment and the fact that we aren't
giving consideration to those people as seriously as we might. No piece of land,
no tree, no animal is expendable but there are a great many people out 
there
beyond the superhighway fences that are regarded as expendable. The
Department of Agriculture said for years that twenty percent of the farmers can
produce the food and fiber necessary and those little fellows, the other 80
percent, are expendable. I have been a sociologist investigating what has been
happening in these rural areas. There are those people marooned out there in
these rural areas who are being fed political dogma while the bureaucracy of the
Department of Agriculture is not giving them the needed attention. Mr.
Secretary I hope you'll give some attention to these poor people who really are
suffering a lack of inclusion in what should be the rural development program.
Developing a transportation System for agriculture and supl and
utilization of transportation equipment was commented on by Mr. Roy
Vandergrift,-Jr., Vandergrift-Williams Farms, Inc., Florida Fruit and Vegetable
Association, Canal Point, Florida. His remarks were as follows:
27
We are at the crossroads in the transportation of fresh fruits and vege-
fIables, especially in the Southeastern states. With the help of some railroads
and our1 own blindness, we are now in the position of having only one mode of
1. 'nsl)ortlallion . As of June 18th, 3 percent of the vegetables were shipjped by
rail, 97 percent. by truck out of Florida. Citrus. . .99 percent plus by truck,
less than one percent by rail.
No industry can stay healthy and survive in this condition. I can say as
an industry we must strive to develop a balanced truck, rail and water system
reintroducing a competitive system that will provide adequate service to all
concerned.
Rails need to work on on-time arrivals at destinations, having closing
hours that are appropriate, and cut out dishonest claims at shipping points.
Trucks should be regulated. There'st a lot going on about truck regulation as
exempt carriers now. In my opinion, the only thing you can do is regulate the
tariff, leaving the trucker on his own independence from here on.
If we do have a real energy crunch, I can see into the future where these
big semis will eventually go one or two on a flatcar and one engine will pull all
80 or 90 loads to marketing points.
With regard to cooperative marketing, the advantage as I see it is that the
grower has more to say about what he gets pricewise. Banded together legally
the growers can run large promotionals on radio, consumer magazines,
newspapers, and buy point-of-sale materials and have it distributed. I skipped
television because as a farmer we can't afford to pay the price there yet. But
we are still trying.
The point in telling this story, is that cooperative marketing is not only
good for the consumer, but growers can cut out the peaks and the valleys.
Recently in the District of Columbia lettuce to the grower was worth two cents a
head while the stores were getting 49 cents a head. That's an example of the
peaks and valleys we're trying to avoid. In Florida we moved in one week, 
this
past season, by cooperative work, 900,000 crates of corn at a livable market
price of $3.50. The housewife paid, according to what her freight and destina-
tion costs, approximately 9-12 cents an ear for the corn, not a prohibitive price.
Effect of transportation regulation on Southeastern agriculture was the
subject of comments by Mr. Robert Hicks, Attorney and Transportation
Consultant, Atlanta, Georgia. He spoke as follows:
In viewing the program (transportation regulation) as a whole, it is
apparent to me that the emphasis must be put on the word regulation which in
context includes nonregulation and perhaps deregulation. In the time alloted no
adequate or meaningful comment can be made on the always hot debates that go
on between the railroads and water carriers over 
locks and dams, whether and
to what extent water carriers rates should be regulated, the use of vast
additional funds in the building of more highways, user chargers, freedoms of
entry, or routes and motor carrier situations or indeed on whether there should
be regulation at all.
To me, it seems inevitable that we will continue to have transportation
regulations as we have since 1887 when Congress created the Interstate
Commerce Commission. So, how much regulation and what kind?
For agricultural commodities from our region which gives our nation much
of iits peanuts, poultry, tobacco, pecans, peaches, soybeans, watermelons,
citrus, fruits, vegetables, and others, today, moves in large volumes by
vehicles. These vehicles, either by virtue of the vehicle ownership or by
virtue of the commodity, are exempt from economic regulation by the exemptions
28
contained in sections 203-B-5 and 6 of the Motor Carrier Act of 1938. The
marketing system has developed around these exemptions which grew out of the
perishable and seasonal nature of the shipments themselves.
Vast capital has now been invested in fleets by people depending upon the
exemptions remaining in the motor carrier act. Yet, there is an annual threat
by certain members of Congress to the continued existence of these exemptions.
And some of the arguments used to support the removal of these exemptions are
persuasive. Nevertheless, I believe that they are essential to the best
marketing results for our farmers and I urge you to lend the weight of the
Department of Agriculture in that support. I also urge you to help see that
these exempt carriers find their proper place in any rationing system that may
be imposed on fuels.
On-farm storage was commented on by Mr. J. R. Hurst, Economist,
Cooperative Extension Service, Auburn University, Auburn, Alabama. He
spoke as follows:
This statement is based on some Alabama data but can be applied to the six
Southeastern coastal states. My statement is also conditioned by my personal
knowledge of industry problems which have resulted from inadequate on-farm
storage in the southeast.
Having been responsible through last harvest season for market
development and elevator operator operations for a major farmer cooperative in
the Southeast, I can appreciate on-farm storage as a valid part of an efficient
marketing system. Farmers having no alternative but to come to market at
harvest have plugged up marketing channels, resulting in rail embargoes of the
terminal facilities, grain going out of condition and crops deteriorating in the
field.
Let me now move to something more specific. In Alabama, production has
more than doubled in the past ten years but on-farm storage has certainly not
kept pace. Our best estimate of on-farm storage in the state is slightly over 20
million bushels. This is enough to store about one-fourth of the annual
production of grain.
This indicates that three-fourths of the crop must move into market
channels during harvest. Another indication of the problem is to note the
January 1 soybean stocks held in farm storage is 27 percent in Alabama
compared to 48 percent in the U. S. as a whole. An analysis of annual price
received for soybeans reveals that Alabama prices were 18 cents per bushel
below the U. S. average for the last five years, even though we have a locational
advantage in relation to domestic and export markets.
This can be explained by the fact that a larger share of the crop is sold
during harvest when the prices are lower. We therefore conclude that
inadequate on-farm storage has resulted in a lack of marketing flexibility, lower
prices and reduced gross income to Southeastern farmers. In closing, we would
like to commend the Department (of Agriculture) for improving the maximum size
and some of the terms of federal loans to construct on-farm storage but
respectfully request your action in the following area; (1) increase maximum size
and longer repayment periods for storage facility loans to farmers and farmer
cooperatives; (2) the authorization for federal-state statisticians to obtain data
on the type, size and location of on-farm storage t~o facilitate educ~tiondl
fd)l) rifrim S for imlj)r',)VJimai'ke.ing efficie ncy . rI'hiIt , Li (I last, ( St.Il )iishD(.nl Ioi"
loan r'ate.'s at. levels nea rr t~he out-of'-p)cket, co)sts ofl I)ro(.luct~ion , e spe.(ially I 01'
soybeans. This would aid farmers in f'inancing their f'arm stlorage inventories.
29
Export marketing and the role of the Foreign Agricultural Service was
commented on by Mr. Alex Ramsay, Jr., Director, American Soybean
Association, Mt. Olive Mississippi. He spoke as follows: I've been asked to
sp:eak todlay about export marketing, and specifically the role of the Foreign
Agricultural Service.
I must preface my remarks by saying that I'm primarily interested in
soy beans. Serving as president of ASA, Market Development Foundations, it
should be understood that even when I'm talking about soybeans, most of it will
refor also to other grains as well, as other commodities. I think there's no
point in expressing to this audience the importance of our export markets to our
overall farm marketing program. This is especially true in the Southeast where
we have access to the Gulf and also to the Atlantic coast ports I think the
government could do a great service to us and explain to the American people
the need for export markets and the importance of exports, not only to the farm
interests, but to the country as a whole.
There are many factors which enter into marketing. It isn't just a case of
putting up a billboard, sitting back and letting the orders roll in. We have to
have dependable supplies, and the farmer is doing his part in seeing that these
supplies are available. We had temporary shortages of soybeans this past year
but we never ran out and we immediately responded by indicating our planting
intentions for next year. But we should not have any embargoes on shipments,
we must not have dock strikes which will interfere with our delivery to our
customers, and we must have internal transportation systems which 
enables us
to get our supplies to the docks. We must have free access to the markets!
With soybeans we have been very fortunate in this respect but some other
commodities have been hindered by restrictive tariffs of one sort or another.
Certainly our government could help us in their trade negotiations to have these
barriers removed.
We cannot compete against unfairly 
subsidized competition if we're 
going to
be producing for a free market. We cannot compete against subsidized
commodities from other countries, or from this country. And we must attempt
long term efforts. We cannot say that because soybeans are $10.00 we don't
need to do anymore about soybeans. We all know how quickly that has changed.
They're down bumping $6.00 today, just over $4.00 down from just a few months
ago. So this is not an in-and-out proposition, it's a long'term proposition that
must be uniformly funded and the effort must continue over a long period of
time.
How can the USDA help us with this? First of all, I would like to say that
I've been very impressed with the agricultural attache, particularly the younger
agricultural attaches, with whom I've been in contact. I would like to see and
hope that this will be a good career field, that we will be able to train and
retain these young attaches that we have now on board. I would like 
to
comment and commend the Secretary at this time, for what I feel, is the most
statesman-like effort which has come out of this administration so far, at least
as far as farmers are concerned, and that is the absence of an embargo on
soybe:ans. It proved to be the rig'ht decision. I think in previous years it
would have been the right decision had we been given a chance to find out.
Having said that, I would like to go on to offer some rather strong criti-
cism of some things which are coming out of the administration. I hope Mr.
Secretary, that you won't consider this a personal attack. I think that the
purpose of this meeting is to have free exchange of ideas and not be a mutual
admiration society, and I would hope that the press would not categorize this as
an attack on administration policy. But, the soybean industry especially, has
30
been very disturbed by some comments relative to palm oil We feel 
that palm oil
is indeed our strongest competition, the greatest threat to 
the soybean industry
other than drought and natural pestilence over the next 
few years. I have a
copy of a report prepared by the United Nations for the palm 
oil producing
countries, and it very clearly stresses that palm oil can be 
substituted for other
vegetable oils, and that the success of their marketing 
program depends on
displacing soybean oil and other oils in the world markets. 
We've also heard, (I
have not seen a complete text for this, so perhaps I'm wrong,) statements 
to the
effect that this is somewhat of a cottage industry, that palm oil 
is produced by
small farmers giving them an economically viable source of income 
that prevents
them from going communist, and therefore this is for 
our best interests. Well, I
think it is debatable whether this industry is 
on large plantations or small
farms; nevertheless, I don't feel that the American soybean growers 
should bear
the responsibility for the economic recovery of 
the entire Southeast Asia.
Especially, when these palm trees come on strong, 
they'll be bearing for the
next 40 years. No one knows what's going to be done 
with this palm oil. There
might be a shortage of vegetable oil and we 
might be able to absorb it short
run. But we're going to have to face this for 40 years 
and no one knows what
we're going to do with all this oil when it hits the world market.
Another thing I would like to bring up is the 
Foreign Agricultural Service.
It is not receiving the funds that it really deserves. It's 
not as well known as
it should be. It's performing a vital service, and the 
question is not what FAS
can do better but, let it do what it can do. Give 
it the funds, support it.
There have been some letters, and we feel that the 
administration perhaps
hasn't supported the cooperators in their attempts 
to get increased funding for
FAS. We would like to see the role of FAS 
strengthened. We would also hope
that whatever reorganization is necessary, will be put 
behind us as quickly as
possible since morale is low because of the reorganization. 
It is the prerogative
of any administration to reorganize as it sees 
fit, but it is also a fact of human
nature that if a person is worried about keeping 
his job he's going to be
manuvering to keep his job. This needs to be 
settled quickly and get back to
the business of exporting this crop. We have the largest 
exportable supplies of
all commodities that we've had in many years facing 
us at this time. One other
thing that we need to do at all areas of government is to reduce red tape.
Sometimes the cooperators feel that it takes 
them $2.00 to get $1.00 of FAS
funding but the FAS is doing a good job. 
Do not allow the State Department to
overrule the Agriculture Department in what is 
best for the American farmer.
Keep those dock strikes off, and don't put on embargoes.
Mr. Cravey--
Probably one of the greatest needs that we 
have in the area of marketing is
in the area of export marketing. Presently 
about 40% of the grain is handled by
cooperatives at its first point of sale. However, when 
it comes time to export
this grain, only about seven percent of it is handled 
by cooperatives. Now,
Mr. Secretary I think we ought to take a look at the "why". The reason might
be laws, rules or regulations why co-ops don't handle a large share. I see no
reason why co-ops can't be as competitive as other export marketing companies,
and we farmers are spending a good deal of money in developing these foreign
markets. I think we need to share more of this market. Also, co-ops have a
real need for stronger and better defined marketing laws so that they can be
more effective in the marketplace. In the Southeast we need more integrated
and coordinated co-ops to let the farmer retain the ownership of his product all
the way to the consumer. We're looking into some areas now in Alabama in the
31
milk market. We realize that we need to maintain co-ops and federal market
orders that operate on a market basis and not on a regional basis. Our federal
milk market orders at present are getting larger and further away from the local
dairy farmer and his marketing needs. To be very brief, cooperative marketing
in my opinion, is a vital step in preserving the family farm which as we all know
is the backbone of the American system.
Questions and Comments ---- Bernie Lester from Florida.
Mr. Secretary, the Florida citrus industry is very much interested in the
export market and has a very active program as it relates to orange juice going
to Europe and fresh grapefruit going to Japan. One of the issues that we're
concerned about, that we feel need some government negotiations, mentioned
previously by Mr. Ramsay, is of trade restrictions. We're concerned parti-
cularly about trade restrictions in countries wherethey do not produce citrus.
Our industry can appreciate the desire to protect a domestic industry. But
we're facing some of our greatest restrictions in countries with no domestic
industry. For example, in European industries they have a tariff on orange
juice in their communities, even though they produce essentially no orange juice
in any of the countries. They also give a preferential reduction in that duty to
other citrus producing areas of the world, which of course is contrary to the
general agreement on trade and tariffs. We're also concerned by the fact that
they have a value added tax on citrus or on orange juice which is twice as great
as the value added tax on all other food products. In Japan we confront the
situation where Japan does not produce any grapefruit. They do produce a lot
of the Mekong oranges and they have a import duty of 20% during the time that
Mekong oranges are being consumed in their country. However, at the time
that the Mekong orange production is about to complete its season, they raise
the import duty on grapefruit to 40%. So that we feel that these are unusual
restrictions and restrictions that need to be negotiated away.
Our industry would be interested in your comments to a two-part question.
First, have you had an opportunity to have dealings with the Japanese and
European officials at this point, and do you see any interest on their part in
liberalizing trade barriers where there is not a domestic industry to protect?
The second part would be, if you aren't seeing any interest on their part, what
do you see as the working relationship between the Department of Agriculture
and the Special Trade Representatives Office in trying to work on some of these
problems in future negotiations?
Mr. Lester, the answer to both questions is yes, we have talked to the
leaders of Japan and the European community and they are interested in trying
to work out some accommodation in this matter. I was in Japan recently, and
the issue of restrictions against American citrus was discussed with the highest
officials in the Japanese Ministry of both Agriculture and Trade. They are
trying to work out some sort of an accommodation and we'll be working through
the MTN. I've discussed the matter with Ambassador Strauss and his
authorities are knowledgeable in this matter. It's something that will be
negotiated over strenuously, I might add. I'm meeting for the second time with
the Agricultural Commission of the European community on next Wednesday.
The Honorable Fin Gun dulag who is new to his job, hut who understands the
difficulties the European common agriculture policies encountering particularly
with the high variable levies and with the continued use of export subsidies.
They're in a most difficult situation. It's not: likely that the variable levies
scheme which they've adopted can be traded away because of some local political
problems which are just overwhelming them. There is a willingness on the part
32
of the commission to re-examine all of the fixed levy structure, and American
citrus is one issue which we have on the agenda next week to talk in detail with
Commissioner Gundulag.
Our relationship with Ambassador Strauss is rather unique. When his
nomination was first made public, it was suggested by many that we have an
agricultural expert on his staff. We discussed the issue with the Ambassador
and with the President, and decided that the best way to go would be to have
the Department of Agriculture's resources available to him on an instant basis so
that if we have all of our abilities that can be donated to him, both within the
foreign agricultural service and in our own marketing organizations, then we
now have the entire weight of the USDA behind the Ambassador's office. I'm
working very closely with him. I'm with Ambassador Strauss on the telephone
just about every day. We're getting set for these negotiations and we mean
business.
Mr. Bass --
We are of course, trying to protect the small people that try to make 
a
living on farms in our area. Some of them are still very much dependent on rail
service for their livelihood. Increasingly, we are faced with more and more
abandonment proceedings being filed which would force many of these people, 
if
approved, to be without rail service. Now admittedly, some of them do not need
the rail service but this needs to be studied on a priority basis to see what the
needs of our people really are. You have within your own organization the
Consumer Marketing Services of Transportation Branch which is active in this
area, and we would urge that they continue to be.
There is another matter which faces us now. The second part of which
crossed my desk today before I left to come down here. In the early 1960's
Southern Railways was instrumental in establishing multiple 
car rates on grain
moving in the Southeast. This was a new concept, moving cars 
by rail, and
this was a long, drawn out case before the rates were finally approved. 
The
other carriers in the Southeast were at first opposed to it, but 
were forced to
join in. They did not have similar equipment and this was the reason 
that they
were not in on the case in the beginning. This was moving in jumbo, 
covered
hopper cars. That has been past history, and has proven to be very
successful. The rates that move our grain in the Southeast are lower 
than in
other parts of the country. Other sections of the country 
have joined in. We
received a notice a month ago that the carriers were intending to impose a ten
percent increase on the rates during the period of September 
15 through
December 15, 1977, during the peak harvest season. Their reason 
for doing so
was that they are not able to furnish cars during the peak harvest 
season, that
they needed this increase to take care of the carriers revenue. 
Nothing was
mentioned about what services would be rendered additionally to those of us who
would be subjected to the increase. So, as we dashed off our opposition to it, a
reply came back from the Southern Trades Association in Atlanta that they had
decided to increase it to 20 percent instead of ten percent. So now we're faced
with a 20 percent increase in rates if approved by the chief executives of the
railroad which operates in the Southeast. I do not believe that we can stand
this sort of increase. We would urge your group again to be most active in
this, in giving us every assistance that they possibly can. We're going to need
everything we can get to combat this increase which we cannot afford.
Secretary Bergland--I might just comment - - not on the issue of the twenty
percent increase in the tariff, because I know nothing about that -- but I did
33
meet with the Secretary of Transportation, Mr. Adams, and with the new
chairman of the ICC, Mr. O'Neil. The Department is being asked to join in a
federal government-wide transportation study. The transportation industry is a
difficult industry, some call it a jungle, and we're trying to develop a balanced
policy where that. mode that can do the job the I)est is given the opportunity to
(10do so. And, it may be in some cases, that intermodal competition will settle
down .o the point that the best system, the most economical transport for that
particular application, will be given support, and some of the impediments
removed, some encouragement given. Of course, in agriculture transportation
is vital. Our first study will be in the trucking area to see what should be done
if anything, to aid particularly in the transport 
of perishables. They virtually
all go by truck and with the high and rising cost of fuel, the business of
transporting lettuce from California to New York by truck may not be viable
forever. So, we're going to be spending from now to the first of January in a
very intensive study of agricultural transport. Anyone who has anything to
offer us, believe me, we're all ears. We need good, solid, hard business data in
this matter.
Mr. Floyd Volty--
There has been very little said about the livestock market. In 1973 it was
about a $42-billion industry, in 1974 it dropped to a $22-billion industry, and it
gradually climbed up to a little better than a $30-billion 
industry at this time.
The livestock transportation 
industry is certainly inadequate.
I am part of the livestock marketing industry in the state of Louisiana.
There are literally thousands of small farmers in the state of Louisiana, and I
would assume throughout the Southeast, that have problems in getting their
cattle to the markets. In fact, in the last five years, all the so-called bob tail
trucks have disappeared from the scene. We rely solely on pickups and goose-
necked trailers to haul cattle to the markets. In our market we have
approximately two thousand shippers that ship an average of 18 cattle per year
to the market. It's obvious that these people have no way to haul cattle. They
depend on us to secure transportation. We're not in the transportation
business, but it's difficult under the conditions that exist now throughout the
Southeast, for these thousands of farmers to be serviced adequately at the
marketplace. Not only are the problems in the marketing of their cattle, but in
the transportation of their cattle, because of the adverse conditions which exist
in the Packers Stockyard Administration. I'm sure the industry has already
made you aware of the problems which we are faced with. We were able to
secure the willingness of 
these people that own these 
trucks to hire to haul
their neighbors' cattle by carrying a blanket insurance policy that would cover
them from the time that they loaded their cattle to the time they assigned their
cattle to our market. It is unfortunate that the packers stockyard
administration does not see fit to allow trucking insurance on the tariff. We
think this is a disservice to the industry.
We are a farmer owned group in Shreveport and we do not care to place
this on the tariff. But there are literally hundreds of small markets throughout
the Southeast that I think would help provide market transportation through
this method of insurance if they were able to put it on the tariff. Certainly,
when we look at transportation from an interstate level, this is highly
inadequate in our area. In fact, we only have in the entire northwest Louisiana
area one private carrier to service the needs of thousands of small farmers in
that area. We ship ahnost all of the cattle inter'state and we cannot compete or
meet the requirements of the insurance and interstate requirements to haul
cattle.
34
We believe that the Department of Agriculture has a role to play in the
marketing of cattle in view of the fact that they can better coordinate the
trucking industry to serve the needs of the people. To give an example of this,
we feed a great many cattle that go out of our area and to the commercial cattle
feeding areas of the nation. Week before last we needed approximately 12 trucks
and all were busy and could not haul the cattle in our area. We had to get
trucks out of Nebraska and Kansas to transport these cattle from the Louisiana
area back to the Kansas area. They came to Louisiana empty At the same time
we had local packers that were buying packer cattle coming out of the plains
area of Texas who were coming out there empty and coming back. This 
is a
double expense, a waste of energy. We believe that you can be a part 
of
settling this problem. The greatest needs which the Department of Agriculture
and the packers stockyards administration can play towards transportation 
and
livestock marketing in the Southeast area is to redirect the efforts which 
are
being made to regulate the industry and assist the farmers. A broke cattle
market in the Southeast United States cannot be of any value.
Secretary Bergland--I have only one comment. The issue of back haul is one
matter which we are going into very deeply. The unregulated can 
haul
unprocessed agricultural produce without registration. We do not know 
how
many unregulated carriers there are in the US and we do not know what 
their
financial conditions are like. We don't know what kind of turnover there is, 
we
don't know what kind of service is being provided. We are looking into that 
I
appreciate your advice and it's a matter which will receive a lot 
of attention
between now and the first of January.
Marshall Bennett, Assistant Attorney General in Mississippi in charge 
of
consumer protection.
My job is to catch folks telling lies. There are a lot of 
lies being told in
the marketplace today. In agricultural oriented states like Mississippi in 
the
Southeast we find that farmers and rural homeowners are especially targets of
consumer fraud. One thing that I wanted to make you aware of, is that 
recently
there have been schemes posing as farmers cooperatives that have 
swept
through Missouri, Arkanasas, Mississippi, Kentucky, Virginia, 
Alabama and
even into Florida. They are selling memberships in what they call farmers
cooperatives. The pitch was to cut out the middle man so that the farmer won't
get too little for his produce and the consumer won't pay too much. The results
have been that these schemes have never gotten off the ground but have taken
in millions of dollars from farmers and millions of dollars from consumers. There
obviously is a need for farmers cooperatives, farmers want it and consumers are
ready for it. I hope that the Department of Agriculture 
will give some special
emphasis to this marketing of the future, which I think 
is with farmers
cooperatives and the expansion of them.
Very quickly, I would like to tell you that problems are arising with
farmers being sold liming activators to increase the content 
or to activate it in
the soil; all kinds of soil emollents; soybean electrolysis, sending soybeans
through electrical impulses which are supposed to increase the yield; additives
to catfish ponds to increase production, which is nothing more than distilled
water; we've been through the chincilla ranches now we're into the worm farms,
and while some worm farms are good and there's a market for it as fish bait,
now they're telling us there's a great market for worms to make worm burgers,
worm cookies, and worm casseroles. The chemicals that some of our farmers
have been receiving Mr. Secretary, have been diluted, they've been using
antifreeze in farm implements, and it's not what it's made out to be, not
35
ethylene glacol but methanol which has a very low boiling 
point. We've had
something which I think the Department of Agriculture should 
really look at,
that's the tuckagrama, the little wasps that are supposed to eat the boll worms.
This is :something new that is coming into our state. Most 
of these are coming
out of Texas, I don't know what's happening over in Texas, 
but that seems to
be a fertile field for ideas.
Last, with President Carter's energy program, energy 
saving devices, I
think the farmers are going to be especially targeted in the areas of 
energy
saving devices. It's something that has come to our attention 
very recently.
I'm not saying that the public utilities are going to 
be obsolete, but I am saying
that Westinghouse and General Electric are predicting by 1980, 
which is only
two- and-a-half years away, that the solar energy market is going 
to total $186
million in the US and by 1995 that figure is going to be between 
three and four
billion. So, solar energy is coming, and the con man is going to have to have 
a
way to make money and rip people off. We've already found 
that solar energy
panels in water heaters in rural areas have been cut to where they 
are not
working and not producing hot water. After the person has 
it installed and has
the money, he leaves. Of course, solar energy generators 
for feeding and
staple machinery on farms is something in the future, and 
while there's going to
be some good ones, there's going to be some bad ones. 
I hope the Department
of Agriculture will assist in screening or looking 
at these energy saving
devices.
Mr. Caffey--
Mr. Secretary, what role will the department play, or does play, in 
labor
negotiations as it pertains to dock strikes, truck 
strikes, rail strikes. Because
these severely affect the Southeastern area in rice and perishables. 
We know
thai it's generally bad, but do you have some mechanism 
to quantify this, or do
you plan to initiate some methods so that we cart, 
quanlify the effect this has on
our producers, because we the producers, are 
the disadvantaged in
agriculture. This would be very helpful if this 
were implemented in your
nego)tiations that you discussed earlier with the various 
other agencies.
Secretary Bergland--Mr. Caffey, we don't have 
any legal authority in these
matters. I have however, discussed the issue with Secretary 
of Labor, Ray
Marshall. He's been most cooperative and 
helpful in this regard. There's some
talk of a dock strike this fall. The implications 
regarding agriculture are
obvious and enormous. It is our intention 
that should such a strike occur, that
we would bring to the attention of the 
Secretary of Labor all of the economic
implications of the strike, domestically and 
internationally. So that, he and his
negotiators are fully armed and fully equipped 
and fully cognizant of the
importance of this matter. It's not a trivial 
little issue of a few people being
out of a job, it's the innocent persons being 
held hostage in these matters, and
often times it's disastrous. It's in that context 
that we're going to discuss the
matter. The extent to which we increase 
our activity to press for settlement
will be governed by the attitudes of the participnts in the dispute.
Hal h~arrison--
Mr. Secretary, I would like to turn to son-ie points Mr. 
Hurst made earlier
abou t the fact that in Alabama, despite the apparent 
locational advantages,
particularly with some of the grains and soybeans, 
that the prices that the
farmers receive often do not reflect this. This is not limited 
to Alabama, it's a
problem throughout the Southeast. Inadequate farm storage 
is a big part of the
cause of the price aberrations that we see. There's also 
a need for continued
36
improvement over the market information, market news programs of the
department, so that producers will be able to compare and get the best possible
price of the sometimes all too limited alternatives they have open to them.
Norman Epson, Louisiana State University--
I would like to expand just briefly on Mr. Ramsey's comments relative to
some of our export marketing problems. One of the major problems that the
Southeastern farmers have, is the lack of rapid, accurate intelligence
information. When our farmers get ready to sell soybeans or rice, or some of
the other things, grain in particular, Continental, Corgill, or Cornell or one of
the other big companies, knows what's happening in Japan and some of these
areas a week or two weeks earlier than we do. This is not exactly a fault of our
attaches, I think they do a good job for the most part, one or two I find are
missionaries, and they forget that they are employed by the Department of
Agriculture to serve US farmers, but for the most part they do know what their
job is. But the information is filed, sent to Washington, assembled and
published two weeks later, and in the mean time the big companies have realized
that the market situation has changed and they have bought up all the products
from the farmers, and the farmers find themselves on the losing end of the deal.
Somehow or other we need a hot line from these major companies where our
export market prices are determined, directly to farmers and farm cooperatives
so they'll know it as rapidly as the other companies do. Right now they don't,
they're always two weeks, and sometimes it only takes a few hours, to be
behind. I don't know the answer, but it's something that needs to be looked at.
Gene Ball--
My business-is transportation of agricultural commodities and this seems to
be a very serious problem at this time. It's one that several people up here
have addressed. One of the things that I would like to bring out is the fact
that the high cost of fuel has been blamed for much of the transportation
problems. It contributes to it, but it's not the major cause as I see it.
Secretary Adams was right on target recently when he said that revolving
bankruptcy is a thing that we have relied on to move these products to market
for n many, many years. With inflation the way that it is today, the high cost of
equipment has more or less put this out. In revolving bankruptcy as he was
talking about, we've had a cycle of newcomers and the ones that could not. make
the grade were phased out. The trouble that we're in now is that therie are
more being phased out than we have newcomers. That's why the gentleman
talked about his problems in trucking service to haul cattle to market. The
independent truckers are the ones that normally haul the cattle and perishable
commodities to market. They've traditonally not been good businessmen, they
don't put aside funds to replace equipment when it wears out. The high cost of
equipment today has prevented them from taking their old, worn out equipment
and trading it in to the dealer for a new piece of equipment. So they're fading
out, we're getting fewer and fewer of these people to haul these commodities to
market. One of the things that I think needs to be considered, we hear a lot of
talk about deregulation of the two systems, those hauling exempt commodities,
and those under regulations. The one under regulations is still healthy, while
the ones hauling the exempt commodities without regulation is in a terrible
situation. I recently read that in Texas Star Produce couldn't harvest 2,000
acres of produce because no transportation was available. At the same time,
there were 10,000 boxes of peppers already for market and there was no
transportation. They had to dump the product. This tells me that we have
37
serious problems. I think that instead of so much talk about deregulation,
maybe we ought to consider some form of limited regulation to move these
commodities so that we can have a stable transportation system to move these
things. The trouble with the high cost of equipment, whether it's an individual
owner-operator, independent trucker, or whether it's a company that makes it
their business to move these commodities, the lending institution wants to know
two things when they're securing a loan. First, is there going to be enough
business to justify the repayment of this loan, secondly, are the rates going to
be high enough that he'll have enough for the normal, everyday operating
expenses, and to retire the equipment obligation? These are the things that
plague the people hauling the commodities in the past, unstable rates and
unstable supply of business. So these are the things that I think need serious
consideration, instead of so much talk about deregulation we need to talk about
going with the system that 
is working.
Mr. Secretary, our time has expired and I would like to take this time to
express our appreciation to you for taking the time to come to the Southeast to
discuss with us the problems we have.
How the Federal Government Interfaces with Southeastern Agriculture was
commented on by Mr. Emmett Reynolds, President, Georgia Farm Bureau
Federation, Macon, Georgia
I don't know if I can in two minutes make a very substantial remark about
the importance of farm programs and policies in the Southeast. Certainly, all of
you share this with me and it's not necessary for me to make a statement that
would imply the importance of this. For many years, in the late thirties and
early forties, we found ourselves trying to develop a farm program in the
barren areas of south Georgia,where there was a great deal of poverty. We
looked for stability of income, and this was in the farm policies at this time.
Our people were looking for quality and production, adequate supplies, and this
was there. We find ourselves today with inadequate supplies of some things and
very adequate supplies of others, although, those that are in a diminishing
supply seem to find themselves on the way down at the marketplace.
Mr. Secretary, we're very concerned with soybeans and cotton at this time
and their price relationship. Our American consumers have adequately cashed
in on the investment that has been made in American farm programs. All the
costs that's ever been put into any of these have been passed on to the
consumers in the form of adequate supply of the highest quality product in the
cheapest or lowest possible price paid by consumers of any country in the
world. These programs have basically provided the stability of many farm
enterprises. Whereby these would be the primary, and our diversification
would allow us to produce fruit, vegetables, poultry, pork, beef and other
commodities on these farms where we have farm policies that protect it. I
realize that there are many opportunities for us in agriculture. Agriculture has
been the most successful program in America in so far as the part it played in
the economy of this great country. Even counting our space program
agriculture has succeeded in being our most outstanding achievement. Still,
we need more research and education to find better ways of production in
agriculture. We need stability of income for farmers so that they won't be;
"Broke this year, and out next year, but back in again." This doesn't happen
anymore and we're very happy to report that in the past few days we've had
remarkable success in focusing the attention of Congress and the departments in
Washington on our disaster programs. This must be one of the essentials of
38
Federal policies in Southeast agriculture because if we look at consumer
protection or consumer supplies, they're there, if we look at exports, they're
there, if we look at balance of payments, our agricultural products bring ii
home to our nation. This is the reason we feel that our agriculture is in a very
good position. Let me say in closing, (it's been said many times) that the
survival of any nation rests within the top four inches of its soil, America is no
exception. Federal farm policies have provided us security in soil and water
conservation. By doing this we have provided the most efficient agricultural
system in the world.
Dr. Jon Bartholic, Professor, Climatology Department of Fruit Crops,
University of Florida commented: The decade of the 70's has certainly been
dramatic relative to the changes in food production that we've seen from year to
year. These changes in production are as we know, largely a result of climate
and weather changes. The Southeast is very susceptible to climate and weather
changes. There have been a number of things that we have attempted to do
about this. For example, about four years ago, Florida, Georgia and Alabama
combined their NOAA agricultural meterologist into an Ornamental Sciences and
Services Center that essentially takes weather information and interprets it for
the growers and puts it into a form that can be used by them in their day to
day operations. It informs them of what the chance of a disease outbreak is,
the need of irrigation timing, soil temperatures relative to planning, and so on.
There are two other projects I would like to mention in cooperation with
other federal agencies which are important to agriculture. These are projects
where we cooperate with NASA and the National Weather Service of NOAA using
satellite data to try to obtain information on weather and forecasting which can
be used directly in agricultural operations. For example, on cold nights during
this last freeze we were able to use satellite data in real time temperature
patterns over the entire surface of the state in color which could go to the
forecasters. They in turn, can put out better forecasts and give better infor-
mation to growers, so that they can make better operational decisions about 
th(
use of their heating and protection practices. Our grove protection 
can cost
millions of dollars on a single night. This kind of information can help them to
make better decisions. There's also a project using satellite data to aid cotton
growers in the South. These are just some examples. There are others which
are relative to the comments that were made yesterday about water resources.
We need to better inventory water resources. To do this we need to know the
amount of water being used. Certainly there's technology from other agencies
which are available and can be brought to play to help us inventory our water
resources in agriculture.
One of the main points I would like to make is that we've seen a change 
in
the past few months in the interest of the USDA in weather and climate and we
certainly want to encourage this. We feel that there is a lot of money and effori
going into other technology of NOAA and NASA, but to date they haven't hao
sufficient input from the agricultural community to direct that technology to us
in agriculture. I think there's a lot more that could be done in this area.
Mr. B. F. Smith, Executive Vice-President, Delta Council, Stoneville,
Mississippi.
While we recognize the fact that administrators of' federal departmen ts afl(l
agencies must use rules and regulations to operate programs, farmers are: being
hit from every direction by regulations which will seriously impair the ability ol
US agriculture to produce the food, fiber and agricultural raw materials which
are essential to the nation's welfare.
39
Regulatory agencies created by Congress such as the Environmental
Protection Agency and OSHA, have been granted broad and far reaching
authority. Rules issued by these agencies has the same effect as 
law.
Agriculture is being inundated by regulations that are often 
issued without
regard to adverse economic or social consequences even though the 
weight of
scient.ific or economic evidence has demonstrated the unrealistic nature 
of the
fallacy of the proposed action. Many of our most important chemical toolshave
already been removed by restrictions. EPA regulations are 
throttling research
and development in testing new pesticides. The rebuttal presumption against
registration process now under way threatens to deny farmers 
of the use of
many chemicals now available simply because of the astronomical cost 
connected
with the process. The time period required for issuance 
of a pesticide label,
even after all the scientific work and tests have been completed, 
is measured
not in months but in years.
The cotton industry is being threatened thoroughly by unrealistic cotton
dust regulations that are being proposed by OSHA. To 
make matters worse,
OSHA has disregarded the government's own authorities and their own 
research
agency, who recommended that the standards not apply to all sectors 
of the
industry. In addition, these officials let it be known that they would 
ignore the
cost or inflationary impact of their actions.
Mr. Secretary, these actions merely illustrate a few of the regulatory
problems of this phase of agriculture . We face actually more serious 
problems
with serious pollution controls under Section 208 of the Clean Water 
Act, with
Section 404 which was mentioned yesterday. Among other things it 
will require
a Corps of Engineer permit to install an overfall pipe in a drainage ditch.
I haven't even mentioned USDA regulations. We will soon 
have a new farm
bill, and 'm sure your department will issue reems of new regulations. 
But at
least the USDA regulations, for the most part, are written by people 
who know
something about agriculture. We sincerely hope that farmers 
will have the
op)por'tunity to sit. down across the table and discuss needed 
revisions when
such changes are needed. Our problem as we see it, is not 
with the Department
of Agriculture and their regulations, but with OSHA and EPA, whose 
actions
directly threaten agriculture's ability to produce. They don't even 
appear to be
concerned about the consequences. Currently only about four percent of our
population is engaged in agriculture. 
This small minority, produces all the
food, feed, fiber and basic raw materials for the 
nation's needs and for export.
This minority cannot continue to produce efficiently 
if they are to be threatened
and harrassed by red tape and unrealistic regulations. 
We need your help and
earnestly request your assistance.
Dr. R. Dennis Rouse, Dean, School of Agriculture 
and Director of Agricultural
Experiment Station, Auburn University. 
He commented on
Funding Public Supported Agricultural Research 
and Extension.
One of the important interfaces of the federal 
government in Southeastern
agriculture is publicly supported agricultural research and Extension. Those of
us here today know the Congr'essional acts that provide for the continuance 
of
interface to the USDA, land grant universities and the people in support 
of
science and technology based agricultural industry and for the improvement 
of
rural life in America. Mr. Secretary, this close interface, this partnership,
is the base, the foundation that has provided the confidence in agricultural
science and technology that has made possible the revolution that has 
taken
place in American agriculture since 1940. Unfortunately, during the past 
two or
three decades, the federal government has not adequately funded and supported
40
the federal side of this interface. We have used the process of budget
development that we think is sound. It begins in every state, and is put
together so that what is sent to the Secretary of Agriculture has the input and
support of the total land grant university system built from the grass roots up
the national program of research and Extension. In the past when we have seen
this next as the executive budget it has gone through a most effective shrinking
process. We sent in a budget request designed to make job strides for
agriculture in rural America, but it comes out shrunk to the place where we can
barely keep our heads above water in this struggle with nature. In 1940, 40% of
the research and development of the federal government was in support of
agriculture. Today, less than two percent is directed toward agriculture. This
cannot be permitted to continue if we value this federal-state interface in
agricultural research and Extension.
It would require a 15% increase in federal funding of the state experiment
stations for 1978 just to restore federal support to the level it was 10 years ago.
A similar situation exists for the cooperative Extension service. When new
programs such as F&F are excluded, Extension has also lost 15% in capacity of
federal funds to finance Extension in the state. Certainly, we all recognize the
increase in complexity in agriculture that has occurred in recent years, and the
need for even greater investment in research and Extension. Our most
conservative estimates show a rate of return of over 25% for investments in
agriculture research and Extension. Why has it not been possible to get needed
support for this interface from the federal government when the evidence of the
value of this partnership is overwhelming? Mr. Secretary, we look to you to be
the strong voice for agricultural research and Extension. You nre the key,
agriculture's key to President Carter and the executive br tnch of the
government.
Questions from the panel--
Mr. Dennison--Mr. Secretary, I am a rice farmer from southwest Louisiana, and
I think I express the strong desires of not only rice farmers, but cotton, rice,
soybean, wheat, and corn farmers. We all realize the need because of the food
crisis in the last two years, to move towards open-end planning and the new
philosophy of target price. Many of us had reservations about it, we've
adjusted to it, but frankly Mr. Secretary, we're very concerned with the
tremendous equities of feed grains, rice and soybeans which have been planted.
We know that the farmer has the potential and the ability of overproduction in
relation to our markets. Frankly, many of us feel that the present provisions
and the present farm programs will not effectively control production in years of
over abundance. We feel that we are facing that today. You have seen what
the commodities market has done in the past few days when the soybean acreage
came out. Corn had already reacted on the downward side, cotton is still in
pretty good shape, but what's going to happen this fall when the dock strikes
hit us? What are we going to do in the crop year of '78? We're geared up for
full production and frankly Mr. Secretary, we feel that you need to get some
directions set aside. We're going to have to reduce production in the years
ahead when we have full bins. I can speak with experience from the rice
section, that the taxpayers will not accept us on the public dole under target
prices with deficit payments for very long.
Secretary Bergland- -Starting on the 18th of July, the House will commence
debate on the farm bill. They expect to have that action completed on July 22.
On the next day Chairman Foley and Chairman Talmadge will convene the
41
conference of the two bodies to reconcile the differences, expecting to complete
their work on, or about the 5th day of August. There are many differences
between the two bills, however, I am confident they can meet that objective. If
they can reconcile the differences, even though the President may not sign the
matter until September, because they have to go through the printing process
and various other delays they encounter, with the completion 
of the work of the
conference, we can start making plans for guiding the 1978 wheat set aside. On
the 10th of August we will get the first really good international grain situation
reports, both regarding wheat and rice. The two crops are to some extent
substitutable and do indeed cross lines in the traffic in the world. We will know
on the 10th of August what the situation will be like in the Soviet Union, the
rains are late in India, they may come in time to make another large rice crop.
We do not know what the situation is going to be like in the corn belt in the
month of July, it's a very critical period for corn and soybeans. Subsoil
moisture, (we know because we are monitoring those certain conditions 
daily),,
reserves are very low, temperatures are very high, the rate of evaporation is
critical. The crop was planted early and it's now in the tasseling stage.
Blooming soybeans in some places in the mid-West are being subject to some
very distressing weather circumstances. By the 10th of August we'll know what
the grain crops in the mid-West will be like. And after all these things have
been taken into account, we'll make a decision whether to go with a set aside for
the 1978 wheat. I'd have to say at this juncture, that if the crop of the world
comes through as good as it now looks, it is probable that we would announce a
set aside for the 1978 wheat crop, however, under current law we have no such
authority.
Mr. Flowers--We do appreciate your comments about accepting ideas from grass
roots farmers. I am a farmer from South Carolina, and we do appreciate this.
Farming is the only industry in the world that can buy everything retail, sell
everything wholesale, pay the freight in between, and survive and be
profitable. But this profit can't continue with the oversupplies. I just wanted
to give the old farmer a pat on the back with this, and we appreciate your
comments on this.
Mr. Pete Bently--Mr. Secretary, I'm a sugarcane farmer from Louisiana. Does
the Carter administration want a domestic sugar policy? If the answer is no,
then tell us quickly so that we can cut our losses and get out. The domestic
sugar industry is being forced to compete with foreign producers on the world
market. This is unfair since most foreign producers pay less than one tenth of
the wage rates we pay, and have less expense in complying with costly
regulations of agencies such as OSHA and EPA. We must have protection
through import quotas imposed unilaterally by the US. Sugar import controls
have been recommended by all spokesman from growers and processors of
sugarcane and sugar beets, by the International Trade Commission, and by
you, Mr. Secretary. Yet, President Carter has declined to use his legal
authority to invoke such controls. If sugar import limitations are not imposed
immediately, Mr. Secretary, a large part of the domestic sugar industry will be
destroyed.
Secretary Bergland- -Perhaps I should comment briefly, because the situation of
sugar is so disastrous that it does merit more than attention, it merits action.
There is no world free sugar market, the world sugar market is a dump ground.
About 80%. of the sugar produced in the world is sold under some kind of trading
agreement on a bilateral basis, such as the Cubans have with the Soviets and
42
the Australians have with the PRC, and so on. The rest is sold in the so-called
world market, and a very small change in the world supply or demand is
magnifed many times over in the world market. Two years ago when we scuttled
the Sugar Act, for reasons I never could understand, we went on this so-called
dump ground and we know the results, boom or bust. I was in the Philippines
recently and talked with President Marcos and leaders of the Philippines sugar
industry. They are losing their shirts. In spite of the fact that they have
$1.25 daily wage rates, they can't produce sugar for ten cents--no one in the
world can produce sugar for ten cents. The entire industry in the world is
being devastated by the current market situation. We regard the international
sugar agreement route as the best hope of restoring some business-like sanity
to the sugar industry. Now, if that fails, and those talks are underway, the
most critical period will be in the last week of July in Geneva, when the
ministerial level meets again and tries to reconcile differences. If that fails,
then I think the US should seriously consider developing a sugar policy of its
own. But we're really hoping that that international arrangement can be made
to work. We cannot afford to dismantle the American sugar industry. We're
going to have a $25-billion trade deficit this year. We import more than half of
the sugar we consume. If we were to dismantle the domestic industry, and
depend increasingly on offshore suppliers, we'd not only worsen the trade gap,
but we'd increase our vulnerability to curtailment from foreign suppliers of a
food item which is a very essential part of the American diet.
Mr. Nelson Fairbanks, Sugar Industry of Florida.
Mr. Secretary, the President opted for a famous program which we never
recommended and we really don't like, so we're quite concerned about the
payment program which was developed as an interim measure. Really, the only
beneficiaries of that program as we see it, are the industrial users who are
making windfall profits. They're buying sugar very cheap now, and the prices
of sugar containing products have not gone down, they were raised when the
price of sugar went up. The consumer is not benefiting from it, so really the
interim program is not benefiting us and we're going to catch the flack in the
press about the payments. We hope that we can get a program where we can
get our money out of the marketplace.
Mr. Danny Logan, Louisiana--
I want to very 
briefly state 
the problems 
and concerns 
of cotton farmers.
One problem that we have--John Dennison has already talked about--is the
concern of price and oversupply. Cotton price right now is fairly good and
thank goodness the whole country can't plant cotton. We're concerned about
this and we hope that you would 
use the tools in this new bill that 
is coming up,
to help us control the supply of cotton. Historically, the producers will
definitely overproduce if they get the chance.
The second concern is, that at the present time we don't have an effective
insecticide to control the tobacco bud worm. We think some of the reasons were
pointed out by Mr. B. F. Smith; the regulations of EPA and OSHA which cover
other areas also. We're concerned about this, and what we think that, these
regulatory agencies need to be responsible to someone. At the present, I don't
think they are. More than anything in these agencies, I think we need good
judgment and common sense which I think could work out a whole lot of our
problems. If this can't be done, and we continue not to have an effe.ctive
insecticide, then I would like to talk to the gentleman from Mississippi who was
on the previous panel, who knew some one who had wasps that ate boll worms.
43
Secretary Bergland--I was in Malaysia in the rice fields, and they have
prcblems with rodents, rats as a matter of fact. They had found a very fine
predator control program, they imported snakes from India. But I wouldn't
recommend such biological controls for boll worms.
Mr Mixson--
Dean Rouse has pointed out an area that is of concern to us, the relative
deficiency in the appropriations for research and Extension by the federal
government in relation to the commitment of the state in this area. We haven't
done very well in the state. With reapportionment in the state legislatures, as
they are, even in Florida, our collective bodies don't equate the values that are
derived from experiment work for the consumer as they do for the producer
themselves. It makes it more difficult for us to get adequate funds from the
state legislatures. So with this mix between the state effort and the federal
effort, it's going to suffer even more unless the federal effort picks up in this
area:. Senator Talmadge understands this thing very well and he's been making
some suggestions which would be very helpful. I just hope that we can instill
the importance of this continued mix which we have traditionally enjoyed by the
federal effort because its hard to get money from the state.
Secretary Bergland--Dean Rouse correctly stated the demise in commitment to
research over the years. We're creatures of habit, and we don't get thirsty
until the well runs dry. The fact is that in the United States we've been
blessed with an abundance of almost everything, and most of us take this for
granted. So we've reduced our research in the area of agriculture because we
thought surpluses were going to be forever and we really didn't need increased
production. Well, that's all changed and the problem that we have is that
research is a long range, life time proposition, which you don't turn on and off.
I have asked Frank Press, the President's new science advisor, if he would
share a small task force of scientific authority to give me advice on the precise
and proper role of USDA research in agriculture so that we're sure we're not
wasting the taxpayers money reinventing the wheel, so that we're sure the
federal money is used to complement state land grant college research programs,
the work of the 1890 schools, and others which are so important. I don't know
what will come of this, but Dr. Press has agreed to help. I think from this we
will be able to sort things out and come up with a program that 
makes some
sense, and where scarce tax money is maximized in the results.
Mr. James May--
I am highly concerned about the policies of the US Department of Agri-
culture in relation to the family farm. I'm under the impression that there 
is no
policy because when the various agencies are asked about it they don't have 
any
answers. I would like to have a definite statement in regards to what 
we're
going to do, 
if we're going 
to industrial 
type of farming 
or going to 
continue to
support the family farms.
In the Southeast there's a large number of small area farmers who are
trying to exist and they're finding it almost impossible to exist. Some of the
reasons for this is because of the services the Farmer's Home Administration is
giving. One of them, we find that the local Farmer's Home Administration agent
has a way of picking his own people to meet these specific groups other than the
people who are being served. We think that these regulations should be
streamlined.
Another service that could be added is to enable the Farmer's Home
Administration to allow people, individuals, and private sources to guarantee or
44
assist the local farmer in making the payments as well as carrying on the farm
operation as well as the supervision and the inadequate supervision of th,
Farmer's Home Administration.
I would like to see the agency concerned with people as well as their
regulations. It appears that in the process, it is considered most important that
the regulations are carried out, while the people they are supposed to serve
come off second best. We hope that you will give some special attention to 
these
problems. I can say this because I am not representing other people 
in thi.s
particular case I am here for myself. I'm like the fellow who when 
the press
visited his farm and asked him what he wanted to say, said: "Are all 
the
microphones open?" Then just hollered, "Help!"
Secretary Bergland--I have directed the department's director 
of economics to
undertake a study as to the probable impact of the tendency towards large 
scale
farming in the United States. We generally pride ourselves 
in the fact that over
the years the US has developed what we generally regard 
and advertise as the
world's most efficient system. In terms of producing foods 
cheaply, that is a
correct appraisal. However, if all the world were as efficient 
in terms of land
use as are the Dutch, there's enough cropland in this world to 
feed 60-billion
people. So in terms of land use we are not comparable 
to either the Dutch or
the Japanese. The Japanese feed 65-million people on land which is comparable
to the state of California. They do it by a very intensive kind of 
agriculturat
management. We know what's taking place in the US is largely 
a result of
mechanization. My former farm was once four farms, 
at one time managed by
people who used horses. And that's happening all over the US. 
The tendency
toward large scale farming is obvious everyplace. So I 
have asked Howard Hjorl
and his experts to examine this question very, very carefully; 
is the trend
toward large scale 
farming in the best 
intersts of the US 
in the long haul?.
Taking into account many factors: energy; the increasing 
need for food,
particularly those food items which are labor intensive-specifically 
vegetables;
the impact it has on the labor market, farm labor. On the plus 
side obviously is
the demand for goods and services made in the cities which 
are necessary to
service large scale agriculture. My own gut feeling is 
that the United States
has, since the days of the homestead, developed a system 
of agriculture that
has provided incentive, the results of which are self-evident. Those incentives
in many cases have been removed by countries that have developed 
large scale
farming in their own way. The Soviet Union is an example with 
extremely large
farms. But the profit motive has been removed and the incentive 
to do a good
job is oftentimes non-existent. I regard the American system of individual 
farm
owner operators to be far more efficient than the very 
large scale farming we
find in the Soviet Union and other places. Now, that's not 
to confuse the
efficiency of Soviet agriculture with large scale 
mechanized farming in the
United States. We're far better even in that context than are they. 
The fact
is, I think there 
is much to be 
said for the family 
farm, individual 
owner
operated enterprises which are typical of the United States, and 
do represent
the backbone of American production. I do believe that the incentives inherent
in that system are so important that that system itself must be preserved. We
therefore are going to carefully examine all resources of the USDA to see what
we can do to be sure that we stimulate and encourage people to go into the
business of farming, provide them with the necessary resources and credit,
technical assistance, marketing assistance, cooperative business institutions,
because as Mr. Flowers said, farmers buy at retail, sell at wholesale and pay
the freight both ways. You really have some economic disadvantages that needs
some attention.
45
If I might in a way of a wrap-up apply that to the region here in the
Southeast, tomorrow this time they'll be 200,000 new appetites in this world. We
have to take a global view of any agricultural policy nowadays, because if we
were to curtail trade, obviously, our own economy would collapse as would the
economy of the world. So it's necessary that we sell oranges, it's necessary
that we buy oil, and that kind of trade activity must expand. It's difficult and
slow, it's painstaking, it'll take time. But it must be the centerpiece of an
economic policy of the US. It's my responsibility to develop and support
programs within the Department of Agriculture that tend to complement a global
view in agriculture. And so, as we look at the growing world-wide demand, we
match that in the context that Dr. Bartholic has mentioned, weather patterns
and their impact, and we find a situation in which the world commodity markets
are increasingly volatile. The gentleman who spoke last night said that We must
be certain that when we produce we have some idea that we can sell it at a
reasonable price. That makes good sense. I've farmed 27 years and I found it
never makes sense to grow a crop that I couldn't sell. So, we have tokeep in
mind that weather trends and conditions internationally are going to have an
impact on the markets of the United States. We are not ever going to be able to
precisely predict what the demand will be. We're always going to have ups and
downs., We're not going to try to devise a system that will eliminate those kinds
of market trends. We do need however, to keep in mind that the world will
increasingly need that which we can 
produce. The Southeastern region is
unique in many ways. As Jim Ross told me here a few minutes ago privately,
the Southeastern region had certain assets that are not common to the entire
United States. One, you have adequate underground water supplies; two, you
have good reserves of energy nearby; you have weather which is unique to this
region; and we see in the United States a shifting in the population to the
Sunbelt brought on by the energy problem. 
When we match that with a growing
international demand for food, it's my guess that the Southeastern region will be
playing an increasingly important role in the food production needs of the US
and indeed, an increasingly hungry world. 
Therefore, we in the department in
Washington need to do all we can to help you. We can't wave a magic wand and
make things work, but we can help your state universities, we can help your
state departments of agriculture, we can help 
the private entrepreneurs,
through the use of resources of the Department of Agriculture. It's very
important that those resources be used wisely. I have tough budget problems
in Washington. President Carter is a tough task master. No waste is tolerated
anyplace. I have to prove to him that the money invested in research or any
other mission, is indeed, going to return dividends to the taxpayers manyfold.
I would invite you to send any suggestions or advice on anything that may
have .been discussed here, or anything that you think we should be doing that
we're not. We regard the coastal region as very, very important,
agriculturally. Its development is really only beginning and anything that we
can do to aid and foster the growth and expansion, we will do. Keep in mind
that it must be done on an orderly, businesslike basis. We can't go off blindly;
we have to be sure to produce crops that can be sold and keep a businesslike
balance to the industry. We do not regard the Southeast as the retirement home
of the United States. We regard it as a very important economic region.
Mr. Charles Stevenson--
I will speak very briefly on peanuts. As you and the audience are well
aware, we are under extreme drought conditions throughout the entire
Southeast . At this time peanuts are the only stable commodity in our economy.
I wanted to point this out to the Secretary, so I'll send it in a letter.
46
Panel: Plant and Animal Pest Diseases
Moderator: Commissioner Jim Buck Ross, Department of Agriculture and
Commerce, Mississippi.
The Mississippi Fire Ant authority in cooperation with the USDA and the
EPA, is carrying on a research project with a fire ant bait. We're approaching
it in three directions. First, we want to see how far downward we can go with a
formulation of mirex corn cut grits emulsified in soybean oil, (the present bait
is a 10-5 bait composed of 40.47 grams of mirex emulsified in a pound and a
quarter of corn cob grits with soybean oil). We've been down to an infinitesimal
amount, approximately .10 grams and are still getting control of the fire ant.
Now I'd like to give research a pat on the back. We're very fortunate at
Mississippi State University to have, in my opinion, some of the most eminent
scientists in the country. And one of them is with us, a gentlemen by the name
of Dr. Earl Alley. Dr. Alley is working toward the biodegradation of mirex.
The man has made remarkable strides in this direction.
The third direction that this research is pointing to, is an alternate.
We're using masking agents in the addition of already existing pesticides and we
have several which are showing good promise.
The next subject is pest managment. It will be addressed by Dr. Fowden
Maxwell. I've had the honor of serving with Dr. Maxwell on the Board of the
Division of Plant Industry in the state of Mississippi.
Dr. Maxwell--
Integrated Pest Management is simply defined as bringing all known control
measures to bear on pests. In recent years we've found that there are a
number of forces that are focalizing in this particular area or approach as being
absolutely essential for the future. One of these is the continuing buildup of
resistance in pests to major pesticides, the continuing loss of pesticides over
health and environmental issues, and the increased developmental costs and
questionable life span of pesticides that is discouraging development by
industry. Of course, the spiraling cost of energy, both in production of
pesticides and the use of energy and application at the farm level is
discouraging. In addition, we've had increased demand for increased food
production, and the possibility of doubling food production in the next 20-25
years. These are forces which will continue to emphasize and dictate the-need
for pest management in the future.
I think unfortunately, the increased regulation and the continued loss of
many of our agricultural chemicals will continue to be a fact of life. I hope that
we can defend many of these, but we shouldn't fool ourselves and think we can
successfully defend every pesticide that comes up for review.
I think that pest management is beginning to be recognized. This is
evident by increased funding of research at the national level and through the
Extension effort through pilot programs. Several National Academy of Science
reports have focused upon the need for increased emphasis in pest managment.
This need has also been exemplified in President Carter's recent environmental
message.
I think that the challenge for us in the years ahead is not only to research
and develop 1PM information, but to devise methods and simple systems for the
implementation of integrated pest management. A paramount need that I'd like
to point out is increased funds for a proposed 1PM system in relatively large
acreages to determine effectiveness of individual suppression components
interactions, impact on cultural, management, harvesting and overall economics.
47
This type of complete production system of integrated pest management is
usually beyond the resources of a landgrant institution and is still in such a
developmental stage that the risks are too great to form a cooperative and test
this kind of system on large acreage. Because of the greater complexity of
integrated pest management as a control procedure, our current delivery, system
will have to be markedly changed. It is exemplified by a current trendthat we
see toward computer based communications systems that tie Extension personnel
in the field and the specialists and researchers at the universities for rapid
transit of technical information relating to pest control. Environmental
monitoring is also a vital necessity to IPM as well as all other agricultural
programs.
The importance of agriculture in the South has been increasing at a
phenomenal rate and much of the success has been dependent upon our control
of pests; mainly with chemicals in the past. Our agriculture, by virture of our
milder climate, allows a greater diversity of crops and more intense farming
practices. Multiple cropping, sequential cropping, keeping the land producing
year round is increasing rapidly in importance, and this will probably be the
rule in the future rather than the exception. Diversity can be exemplified by
the situation in Florida where row crops such as soybeans, peanuts and corn
are important crops in the northern part of the state, citrus and vegetables in
the mid-section, and vegetables and tropical fruits in the southern section. We
have 30 major vegetable crops alone, all with their unique pest problems. This
greater use of the land, diversity of crops, mild climate intensifies our pest
problems. In addition to large numbers of native species of insects, we're also
constantly being besieged with any new pest from the Carribbean area, Latin
America, Mexico, and other semi-tropical areas of the world. Examples of
these, are bole weevil, fire ant, fruit fly, citrus black fly, sugar cane bore,
love bug and on an on. A long list of plant diseases, nematodes and weeds can
also be cited. Another example of diverse pest 
problems facing us in one crop
common to all Southeastern states is the soybean. With this crop alone we must
deal with four to five primary insect pests, at least five major diseases, and
three important nematode pests. The challenge in the South lies in how fast we
can successfully develop IPM information and successfully implement these
rather complex programs in one of the many diverse and very important
agricultural crops before we lose through pest resistance and environmental
concerns many of our defective pesticide chemicals.
These special pest problems that we face in the South are unique, differing
from other sections of the country and it's hoped that this need can be
recognized at the national and state levels of government. The magnitude and
complexity of the problems of pest control in the decades ahead dictates that we
must deviate significantly from our traditional system which we followed in the
past. Emphasis on integrated pest management must not only be multi-
disciplinary within universities and the USDA, but must transcend to organize
regional and national programs on given pest problems. This concept has been
successfully pioneered recently by a national integrated pest management known
as the Houghaker Project. I think that this type of regional and national
programs needs to have the leadership come from within the USDA. Funding
should be primarily within this agency rather than through sponsoring agencies
such as the National Science Foundation and EPA. I think that strong, joint
leadership by the USDA and the landgrant universities will markedly increase
funding by state and federal agencies in complete dedication by scientists to the
concept of integrated pest management. It'll be essential, if we're to maintain
high agricultural production in an ever increasing sensitive environment.
48
Animal Diseases was commented on by Mr. Louis Lawson, President,
Lawson Dairy Inc., Okeechobee, Florida.
On the topic of TB, many people have felt for many years that there is no
more TB around. To those who have herds of cattle it is a very serious
disease. There are infections in Florida that I know of, and it's a threat to any
livestock operation. Maybe there needs to be some tests done on a new TB test
because the one we're using now has been used for many, many years. It's the
only tool we've had, and it's done a pretty good job of cleaning up infections,
but the real satisfaction in making sure you're clean is to depopulate. To be
sure that you're rid of it once and for all you have to depopulate and your
premises cannot be used for cattle for a period of time.
The deemphasis on testing when you have clean herds is common around
the country. When you have bulls, or breeding cattle that go out to commercial
channels, testing is very important so that you don't scatter a possible infec-
tion. The buyer needs to make doubly sure that when he's buying cattle he's
getting clean cattle. The surveillance at slaughter houses for inspection for TB
needs to be done a little bit better. It is cropping up more now than it has for
a long time. We've nearly had it whipped and we need to have a concentrated
effort to get rid of it once and for all.
Brucellosis is very hard to talk about in two minutes. I think the
brucellosis program was down to what we call the two minute warning in a
football game. The outcome of the program was in sight; we knew that
eradication was going to win. Some of the authorities began to talk about
discontinuing vaccination. But with that, and the lack of interest on the part
of producers, the brucellosis has come back and come back hard. It's probably
the most vicious and common diseases problem that exists in the livestock
operations in most of the states that are here today. The problem is
compounded in the South by the movement of the cattle, the density of the
cattle population, our climate and the attitude of many of our ranchers and
farmers about brucellosis. The farmers and ranchers feel that it's here and
we'll have to live with it. Many people spend more time fighting the 
program
than they do the disease. When you go into an infected herd it takes a lot of
work to clean it up. It can be done.
The economic impact on cattle and the dairy industry is fierce. Cattlemen
in many parts of the South have cattle on large ranges and the cost of gathering
the cattle for testing, putting them through the working chutes, and
restraining them (you generally lose some cattle), hiring men to help in this, all
this can be prohibitive. But this is the only way to go, otherwise the problem
is going to stay.
When a farmer or rancher has an infection in their herd they should check
all of their herds, not just the one the infection shows in. The economic impact
to a dairyman is substantial, because when you have a good Holstein cow go
down on a test, you'll have to pay six to seven-hundred dollars to replace her.
You might get back three hundred dollars and the indemnity from the federal
government. It takes about two thousand plus this indemnity to buy back one.
It'll put you out of business if you get it bad enough.
There's quite a bit of research going on at the present. There's s;ome
being done at the University of Florida. Research for adult vaccination, new
testing procedures. There are herds being properly adult-vaccinated. I think
we need to put real emphasis on getting our calves vaccinated. Here in Florida
we recently had a law enacted, stating that all female hefer calves raised for
replacement in dairy herds, shall be vaccinated at the proper age. We are also
setting out to make sure that cattle coming into Florida will be vaccinated by
49
1979. I think the other states visiting here should take note of that because we
buy many of our cattle from these states. We do have a source of vaccinated
dairy heifers. We want vaccinated heifers, not heifers that have had ink put in
their ears. I-how we're going to enforce that., I don't really know.
The problem of getting dairy and beef cattle vaccinated where you have
serious threat of brucellosis is probably the key to surviving with 
this disease.
Vaccination will not clean it up, but it will keep you from having an epidemic in
your herd.
FDA Regulations and Southeast Agriculture was commented on by Dr. Art
Novak, Head, Department of Food Science, Louisiana State University, Baton
Rouge.
Experienced professional personhel in our agricultural experiment stations
and related state and federal agencies have the capability of solving most of our
scientific and technical problems. However, we have limited resources for
assisting the farmer and food manufacturer to cope with the growing number of
regulatory problems which confront him.
I've been employed in industry and academic institutions for forty years
during which time I have seen endless new regulations which become almost
impossible to locate, much less conform to although we are not questioning their
desirability at this time. Most executives in the food industries cannot name all
the agencies to which they are responsible. Therefore, I would like to
recommend that we encourage our regional agricultural experfient stations to
create new divisions or departments within their organizations for the purpose
of disseminating information and assisting food and fiber producers to
understand and obey laws for the purpose of avoiding as many regulatory
problems as possible. These are costly, could cause food producers to lose
their business, and might even result in a prison sentence. It is a consumers
right to expect foods to be safe in compliance with the law.
Let me tell you very briefly of a project that we have just introduced at
the Food Science Department at the Louisiana State University. For effective
accomplishment of this objective, at LSU Food Science Department, we have
developed a program whereby we go into the plants and examine each one on an
individual basis. We examine the plant site, the equipment, the processing, the
packaging operations, and the quality of raw and finished products. Such
visits include group sessions with the appropriate executives of the company to
review the past, present and future programs which they intend to use. We
discuss and offer them information on how to cope with some of these regulatory
problems. The study group concept encourages development of projects of
mutual concern and interest to industries and to our scientists in our
universities. It provides information for establishing priorities in future
research. Also, the information gathered from plant visits and laboratory data
enable us to analyze what, when, where, and how foods can become hazardous
to human health. This then enables us to take the necessary steps to prevent
such food health hazards.
Regulatory problems are usually the last thing on the program. We hope
that their solutions have a high priority with the Secretary of Agriculture.
Meat Inspection Programs was commented on by Dr. Bill Brown, ABC
Research Corporation, Gainesville, FL.
We need more emphasis on processing meat and food products in general.
The meat and poultry industry have some real problems now with nitrite. We
desperately need some research money, both at the state and federal level to see
50
if we can find the real facts about the nitrite issue. Some recent estimates hav,
indicated that as much as 15% increase in food bill is likely if the nitrate is
eliminated from our cured meat products.
I have not had a chance to read the consultants report that studied the
meat and poultry inspection, but I assume that it ended up with less dollars and
less people. We really need to go back to basics as far as our inspection
program is conerned. We need to look and see if the disease problems and con-
demnation problems are the same in 1977 as they were in 1904. It may be
possible to put some emphasis where the real problems are, and even shift part
of this burden on to the meat and poultry industry.
We've got some unbelievable differences in work load laid on the various
circuit supervisors and even the lay inspection program of the meat and poultry
inspection. State lines may not be valid boundaries for having supervisors in
the meat and poultry inspection program. We need extensive retraining for our
lay inspectors if processing is to go to total quality control programs.
Basically, I don't feel that the inspectors in our meat and poultry plants really
have the background, interest, experience, or the educational level to handle
quality control programs that are being looked at seriously as a means of
increasing the effectiveness of the meat and poultry inspection program.
We need to look at things like nutritional labeling and the costs of these
nutritional labels on these small plants. I just don't think they can hold up
under this kind of burden.
Water usage is a real problem. Some research money needs to be spent on
water usage. It still takes about a thousand gallons to process a thousand
pound steer. One animal per thousand gallons is not very efficient. We really
need to do some work in this area.
At the local level, condensate is a real problem in our plants in the
Southeast. Condensate does not necessarily mean contamination. But we keep
at least a half dozen or a dozen plants in some real problems because of the fact
that the local inspector has equated condensate with contamination. And as you
know, if you have a hundred degrees outside and ninety percent humidity and
you roll hot beef in a cooler, you've got a condensate p-oblem.
The local inspectors would be wise to look at formulation a little more and a
little less at the facilities in the plant. We get into occasional problems with
local head inspectors versus the lay inspectors. The lay inspectors have a
rather strong union and in a lot of our plants we get into some real suffering by
the plant itself because of differences of opinion between the men in charge, the
local head inspector and his lay inspector.
Labels and the entire handling procedure need to be reviewed. In
summary, I think the thing that would help our meat and poultry processors the
most would be some very carefully conducted cost benefit studies and some more
money to solve some of the major problems.
Mr. Brian, President, Centerhill Packing Company, Centerhill, Florida.
I'm here to represent the Florida Cattlemen's Association and Commissioner
Conner not the meat packers. What I've been asked to talk about is grading
rather than inspection. The subject we're talking about is the recent grading
change that was implemented in 1976. It was first proposed in September 1974
and implemented in 1976. I think Dr. Anthony of Auburn touched lightly on it
yesterday. There've been some problems with this five significant changes in
the proposed rules: 7c of R part of 53. To begin with, when different
industries met, and were talking about one change (which happens to be the
third of these five,) there was a change in the marbling score in the A maturity
51
cattle to keep it straight through to the A plus. But in this there was several
other changes, the other four particularly hurting the Southeastern cattle.
The first item, to take confirmation out as a factor in the quality grade
made yield grade mandatory. This means that it'll be hard to get the money out
of yield grades fours and fives that we can make when merchandized as an
extent with the grade on it mandatory. Of course, on this particular item you
would probably run into trouble; you might open up a bucket of worms-. Now
what would happen if you went back to the old specs? You would hurt mid-
Western cattle.
Number four which raised the marbling score one-half degree from typical
traces to slight minus of the good grade, put a real goal on the very young, 15
months old cattle. This is an estimate because it's based on bones.
Number five where they've put the maximum age group and the old specs
those animals could be sold on is based on bone structure. On the new specs
that animal could grade good. Under these changes, they've changed this and
raised the maximum maturity to the same as the choice and prime. This threw a
lot of our older cattle into the standard grade.
There are several options which I've suggested to cattlemen that they
should ask for. The ideal situation would be leaving number three in there.
None of us realized quite what the changes were, the only part much talked
about were the changes I referred to, not realizing these other things that were
tied into it. It was so confusing that the consumers actually thought that every
grade of beef was going to be great. When the Southwestern cattle feeders
decided to join the department in implementing this, a judge's decision in Omaha
was that, "It looked like it was hurting everybody, but the man who made the
decision had the right to do it." This was the actual statement made. It sort of
scares me.
We do need some conference in Washington, or somewhere, to discuss this.
Moderator--
If I could, I'd like to make a statement to the Assistant Secretary to carry
back to the distinguished Secretary. The cattlemen of the nation need all the
help they can get. The Secretary need not worry about brucellosis because if
we don't get some rain, and the price of cattle doesn't go up, there won't be
anybody left in the cattle business. They're selling out. The cattlemen can't
stay in this business much longer.
I think it might be in order, Mr. Moderator for the Commissioner to give a set of
figures on his own cattle.
Commissioner Conners--
We've been running some rather interesting tests here at the University
coming out of the baby beef program which these states in the Southeast are
acquainted with. Because of the plight that we found ourselves in, we've run a
lot of tests on younger animals particularly. We cut 67 hefers out of a herd and
sent them here to the University to be slaughtered for accurate record keeping.
Fortunately, I'd already sold these animals, so I didn't sell on a grade, I'd sold
them as a lot. This very vividly depicts what's happended to the forage feeder
Southeastern type cow man. Sixty-seven hefers slaughtered, technically called
herferettes, ranged in age from 13 months up to 16 months. Fed rye and rye
grass and not one pound of grain. There was one choice under the new grade.
Roy McDonald flew down from Atlanta to work with Dr. Palmer here at the
University in handling this batch of cattle. There was one choice, 12 good and
52
54 standard. Mr. McDonald and Dr. Palmer told me that it was interesting to
note that under the old grade it would have been, one choice-52 good-and 14
standard.
We kept very accurate records, and our cost of gain was twenty cents per
pound, which I would hope the cattlemen could share in and the consumer could
share in. I don't know, someone could speak better than I, on the cost of gair,
in the feedlot. But would someone like to say it would cost on the average less
than 45 cents per pound.
The story in a nutshell is that we managed to make $46.00 a head. I hope
some consumer benefited from our low cost of production. The Southeast cart
produce this kind of product and when the USDA grade indicated one choice-526
good-and 14 standard under the old system, it's a pretty good grade of meat.
Question--In the studies that you've made, has anyone cost this out to the
difference to the producer, the loss in the grading to the producer?
Conner--I have sold these cattle as a lot, and I'm going to ask them to give me
the price, the quotations. Anyone can pull their sheets from mid-May. I wilt
compute that, I just 
haven't had the time 
to do it. The difference 
to the
producer is roughly $14 to $18 a head on the forty difference.
USDA Quarantine Regulations was commented on by Dr. John Block,
Supervisor, Division of Plant Industries, State Department of Agriculture,
Montgomery, Alabama.
One of the most important requirements in the field of regulatory
operations lies in the close relationship with scientists conducting research. Al
successful attacks on newly introduced pests, comes from research translated
into field operations. Research and supporting research is essential to
quarantine operations as well as control practices. We urge a clear departmental
policy regarding the relationship between support research and plant regulatory
operations. PPQ and ARS should be on the same frequency. Additionally, the
use of state experiment stations, land grant colleges, and other state agencies
for supporting research, should not be overlooked.
There's a lot of pesticides occurring almost daily, and it becomes very
important in the nursery certification program. Those states that are blessed
with insect problems such as, Jap Beetle, IFA, and White Fringe Beetle, are
threatened with the loss of pesticides such an chloradane and those that have
been utilized before. We urge the USDA to conduct necessary work required to
develop alternate methods of certification.
There appears to be a trend for the USDA to de-emphasize and withdraw
from federal-domestic quarantines, placing the burden of regulating these pests
upon the state for interstate and internal movement and also at ports of foreign
embarkation.
Mrs. Chambers- -
I'm a hog and poultry farmer from Georgia. You've all mentioned
something which interests me and that's research into the control of diseases in
our industry. One of the things that is bothering me is that I haven't heard
the USDA take a position on FDA proposals to ban the use of penicillin and
tetracycline in our feed and medicate our animals without a prescription. We
commercial farmers cannot manage to get a prescription when we need it. We
could end up on the same boat on medication as you are in your pest control.
53
Also, we have in our industry a disease called microbacteriosis. Nobody
knows what it is, they don't know where it comes from, what causes it, the only
thing we do know is that it results in the condemnation of our animals when we
get to the Ipacking plant. We're losing millions of dollars every year because of
this.
Senator Dick Stone--
Commercial farmers are gentlemen, but gentlemen farmers are not
necessarily commercial farmers. What we did in having the commercial farmers
as panelists, participants and members in this conference was to bring in the
real world to this conference. I think this must be the first meeting in which
you have over 450 panelists and presenters and two in audience (the Secretary
and Assistant Secretary). The puirpose originally was to bring down the
leadership of the USDA which is the Secretary, so that the agriculture
commissioners of the southern states, the landgrant colleges, and the
agricultural industry leadership, all three groups working together could
present to the secretary the special and unique problems, needs and capabilities
of our agriculture. That was the purpose. 
This was not lightly done, the idea
might have been kind of casual to start with, but I want to thank the more than
28 active planners and participators from the six states who met in Atlanta to
pre-plan this conference. They did this so that the quality of the panels that
we've had here could be as high, expert, relevant and as pertinent as it proved
to be. I want to thank Dr. Ken Tefertiller of IFAS, Walter Kautz and Doyle
Conner, our hosts, and I 
want to thank the state coordinators, 
Dr. Stan Wilson
of Alabama, Dr. Tom Aaron of Georgia, Dr. Ralph Caffey of Louisiana, Mr.
Garland Vaughn of Mississippi, and Mr. Roy Bryant of South Carolina. I think
we all owe a debt of gratitude to the conference coordinating committee in
Florida, made up of Dr. Jack McCown of IFAS, Mr. Raphord Farrington of the
Florida Farm Bureau, Mr. Wally Ortiz of the State Department of Agriculture,
Dr. B.B. Archer of IFAS, and Mr. Al Cribbett of IFAS. I want to thank the
multi-media people who put together that opener which really set the tone of the
meeting, Mr. Marshall Breeze, Dr. Ralph Eastwood, and Mr. Jim Nehiley of
IFAS.
I think that we accomplished our purpose. I thinkthat the Secretary and
his assistant are much more knowledgeable about our special capabilities and
needs than they were a day and a half ago. This will pay rich dividends, not
only in the long run in terms of more relevant support of research and
marketing assistance, but it will pay immediate dividends in such problems as we
suffer from right now, like the drought.
But as important as the original concept was and worthwhile as it was
thought out and carried out, something much more important has resulted. One
of the Southern commissioners came up to me last night at the banquet and he
told me that the best thing that he's seen here is the teamwork which our states
have fostered in putting 
this conference together 
and carrying it out. Most
states has substantial agriculture, so the U.S. Senate is generally able to pass
agricultural assistance legislation, but most congressional districts of the 435
districts, do not. It's a tough job for us to be able to pass legislation sup-
portive of agriculture in the House of Representatives. There's only one way
that agriculture is going to support itself and get the support we deserve from
the United States, that's cooperation among everybody that is connected with
agriculture, directly and indirectly. Unity among all those elements is
important, if there is infighting, it has to be solved on a preliminary basis.
Unity must be the watchword of agriculture; it's absolutely vital.
54
To conclude my part in this conference, I want to thank all of you, not
only for being here and participating, but for the teamwork 
which this
conference has demonstrated and which can carry Southern agriculture to new
heights.
Ken Tefertiller- -
I will just echo what the Senator just said. We've 
demonstrated that we
can unite for a common cause and it's been a tremendous example of how 
a group
like this can put together a quality program. I appreciate being 
a part of this.
Doyle Conner--
I feel that we have a vibrant agriculture here in the 
Southeast. One of the
reasons for it, is the kind of people we have 
involved in Southeastern
agriculture. The subject matter we've discussed here 
had knowledgeable people
involved. The subject areas we discussed must 
be pursued. We could have
gotten involved in interstate shipment of meat, out-of-state 
plants, whether
states have been required to meet all the requirements 
of the federal
government have been declared equal to, yet have not been 
able to ship across
state lines. We could have talked about, and there was 
considerable discussion,
on imports. Someone said, "I'm producing in competition 
with a dollar a day
labor in another country." On the way to the airport 
I was talking with the
Secretary about this problem. We like to maintain an 
open trade policy in this
country because that's the way the countries of 
the world ought to be. It's
unfortunate that we're the only country that thinks that 
way. I've developed a
new philosophy, "Do unto other countries as they 
do unto us", but this would
drastically change the policy of this country. It might 
change to some extent
the policies of some of the other countries as 
far as trade restrictions are
concerned.
Much has been said about our number one user 
of agricultural products,
Japan. We appreciate this fact, they're great people. 
I had a gentlemen inmy
office the other day who had purchased $20-million 
worth of grapefruit from
Florida. He's important to us. But you heard the citrus 
representative on the
panel ask why is it so difficult for us to get grapefruit 
into Japan when they
don't produce any in that country. I was in a feed lot there, we were giving
our cattle away, and they were paying $650 for a 550 pound 
steer to go into the
feedlot and were selling the finished steer for 
$2,000. You can buy them all
over the U.S., wellfed and better quality, for $300. 
I know that even though
they need some at a reasonable price, there's no way 
that we can possibly
deliver those cattle to them.
We're receiving an awful lot of products from New 
Zealand and Australia.
In jest, but I was also serious, I said I really 
want to get out a boatload of the
finest fed beef that we have in the U.S. 
and I want to find a market for it in
Australia. We receive hundreds of thousands of tons 
of their boxed beef in this
country, and surely they would be willing to receive 
some of our U.S. good and
choice beef. It's a fair exhange your lean meat, and our finished beef. Your
people need our products and you say our people need your products. It would
have rotted on the wharf, it never would have been delivered. That is
inequity.
I'm for an open trade policy with the people who practice it. The people
who don't practice it, if we're going to remain the vibrant agricultural
community that we are today, will have to practice fairness if we're to continue
trading. John Connally was in Japan recently and he told them that we're not
going to continue to put. up with t~his imbalance, we're going to put our f'oot
55
down because they're draining the U.S. economically. Those people said that
they knew someday that that was going to happen to them, they just didn't
know when. They realize that they're going to have to shape up. Well, it took
the State Department just 24 hours to say ignore it, that's not the policy of the
U.S. We were on our way to making some amends in that area.
Let's realize this, the only reason people around the world are buying our
citrus, corn, soybeans and wheat is because we have the best product at the
best price. If we ever lose that, there's no one going to purchase products
because they love us. Let's remain productive but also let's begin to join with
the people from our delegation and say that we're business people just like
anyone else. Let's firm up our policy.
I was in Detroit recently and had to make a talk that night. I said that I
would really like to compare unglamorous agriculture with this great automobile
industry, and just see how we stack up. We called the Commerce Department
and we would like to know the import-export information on American
automobiles. I already knew that we export in excess of $22-billion worth of
agricultural products while we were importing about half that amount. They
said that we're pleased to report to you that last year we exported four-and-a-
half-billion dollars worth of autombiles. I said that's great. We imported eight
billion dollars worth of automobiles into the U.S.
It's the people in agriculture that the people of this country owes a debt of
gratitude to. We must be smarter than the corporate heads of General Motors,
Ford, Chrysler and American Motors because they have met world competition on
a two-to-one favorable basis while those other people in the corporate community
have a two-to-one deficit, and the economy of our country is paying for it. I
feel that more and more members of Congress know this today than they did a
few years ago, that indeed, agriculture is our hope for a solvent nation. You
can see and hear so much said derogatorily about the American farmer and
American agriculture. I hope that the people ultimately agree that it's done
something good for us. It has, it's saved us from bankruptcy.
I don't know when a Secretary of Agriculture has ever taken the time
before to listen as much as Secretary Bergland did while he was here. Senator
Stone, Dr. Tefertiller, Walter Kautz and the many of you who have worked on
this conference, thank you. We appreciate your participation.

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I
I
I
U
I
I
I
I
I