**Ag Committee Hearing---Opening Remarks As Drafted**

**August 16, 2006**

**College Park, Grand Island, Nebraska**

Mr. Chairman: I want to thank you for holding this Agriculture Committee
field hearing in my home state of Nebraska. Hosting a field hearing in
Nebraska is important to our farmers and ranchers because it allows them
to have an opportunity to help shape this nation's agricultural policy.
In a state where one in five jobs is related to agriculture and nine in
ten acres of land is farm and ranch land, today's hearing is significant
because so much that affects the daily operations and the bottom lines
for our farms and ranches is intricately involved in the policies set at
the federal level and especially in the next farm bill.

Agriculture is the Number One industry in Nebraska and our farmers and
ranchers lead the nation in many areas of production. They are in the
trenches -- producing our food and our fuel - their input is extremely
valuable and I appreciate your recognition of that fact in agreeing to
hold this hearing in Grand Island. I thank you for granting my request
for this field hearing. I appreciate it, Nebraska appreciates it, and
our producers appreciate it.

As you will be able to see, this hearing is very important to Nebraskans
because the next farm bill \-- which I'm calling the Food and Fuel
Security Act because of its potential to feed our nation and fuel our
energy needs \-- affects so much of the state. I'm pleased that
Nebraskans will be able to provide valuable input for legislation that
touches so many of them. It's also a great opportunity for local
viewpoints to be heard in Washington, and I'm looking forward to
listening to the testimony of all these witnesses here today.

The Doha collapse presents a unique opportunity to change our farm
policy not because we have to but because we want to.

Without the outside pressures of Doha and the WTO, we can better improve
our farm policy, on our own terms, with a focus on securing American
agriculture for the future.

Do our current policies work for agriculture and rural America
considering that in Nebraska we've lost 8,000 farms in the decade since
1995 and considering the continuing loss of people, jobs and
opportunities in rural America?

At the very least, an effective farm policy should: provide farmers a
reliable safety net; protect the environment and our natural resources
by rewarding farmers for good conservation practices; increase
opportunities for farmers to make a good living off their lands and stay
in business; help farmers compete both locally and globally; and seek to
improve the overall rural economy by helping rural communities and
businesses succeed and flourish.

We must also take into consideration the increasing federal budgetary
concerns and the growing public discontent with our current farm support
programs

Food security is vital to our nation because a country must be able to
feed its citizens if it hopes to survive. American agriculture has long
led the world in food production with one farmer producing enough food
for 129 people but I am concerned that we are importing an increasing
share of our food products.

Food security requires farmer security so that we help keep farmers in
business during a time of historically low commodity prices and
historically high input costs.

Food security also requires land security so that we sustain our
valuable cropland through conservation, good land stewardship and
sustainable agricultural practices. Our conservation programs must be
fully funded as well as properly implemented and administered as they
may provide the blue print for our future policies.

I am especially concerned about the problems Nebraskan farmers are
having with the Conservation Security Program, which is an innovative
program that rewards working-lands conservation practices. We need to
fix the problems with it in the next farm bill.

We know all too well the problems and dangers of our current energy
policies and consumption practices and agriculture can lead the way in
providing our country with clean, high-quality energy that can reduce
our destructive reliance on oil, especially foreign sources of oil.

Investing in biofuels will help break this destructive reliance while
being a catalyst for a new wave of innovation that can spur new
technologies, new jobs and new opportunities, especially in our rural
communities, just as we've seen in Nebraska.

Investing in biofuels must become a national priority and that should be
reflected in our agricultural policies, including making great strides
towards diversifying the feedstocks used to produce ethanol by growing
dedicated energy crops on retired or marginal cropland to produce
biomass for cellulosic ethanol. Corn will always play a vital role in
our ethanol production, but it can't be the only feedstock; we must
diversify if we want this to be a viable alternative.

To adequately ensure our food and fuel security for years to come, we
must be able to attract and retain a new generation of farmers and
ranchers by addressing the continuing declines in rural America through
effective investment in effective rural development.

We have to encourage entrepreneurship that will breathe new life into
our rural communities by investing in a community entrepreneurial
development programs and developing new opportunities for
farmer-entrepreneurs.

In the Food and Fuel Security Act we should reauthorize the value-added
producer grant and the Beginning Farmer and Rancher Development
programs; we should open a family farm innovation fund, expand and
enhance the beginning farmer land contract pilot program along with
other good ideas to help make agriculture a viable option for the next
generation of farmers and ranchers.

I envision biofuels production as uniquely suited to attract new farmers
who are interested in being a part of the solutions to revolutionize our
domestic energy production and lead us toward energy independence. What
better way to bring a new generation into agriculture production?

I look forward to working on the next Farm Bill \-- or the Food and Fuel
Security Act. You know, at a hearing in the Senate I once called it the
Food, Fuel and Fiber Security Act -- and the chairman who hails from
Georgia was so excited he endorsed me for president!

With the next farm bill we need to seize upon the opportunities and
challenges we face to craft wise farm policy that benefits more farmers
and more Americans, improves and protects our food supply and leads the
nation to energy independence. We need to move away from our reliance on
foreign oil fields and toward reliance on Nebraska corn fields.

America needs a farm bill that emphasizes protecting and growing rural
America from within rural America \-- it deserves nothing less. For
centuries, our farmers and ranchers have fed the people and the
prosperity of our nation. That's no easy task and we all must share the
burden if we hope to keep enjoying the benefits of a secure food supply
and if we hope to enjoy the benefits of a secure fuel supply.

Since its birth, America has only been as secure as the as the sum of
its parts. In this new century, we must continue supporting rural
America if we hope to achieve these goals.