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OPPORTUNITIES FOR GROWTH: 

MICHIGAN AND THE 2012 FARM BILL 

FIELD HEARING 

BEFORE THE

COMMITTEE ON AGRICULTURE, 

NUTRITION AND FORESTRY 

UNITED STATES SENATE 

ONE HUNDRED TWELFTH CONGRESS 

FIRST SESSION 

MAY 31, 2011 

Printed for the use of the 

Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry 

( 

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.fdsys.gov/ 

COMMITTEE ON AGRICULTURE, NUTRITION AND FORESTRY 

DEBBIE STABENOW, Michigan, Chairwoman 

PATRICK J. LEAHY, Vermont 

TOM HARKIN, Iowa 

KENT CONRAD, North Dakota 

MAX BAUCUS, Montana 

E. BENJAMIN NELSON, Nebraska 

SHERROD BROWN, Ohio 

ROBERT P. CASEY, Jr., Pennsylvania 

AMY KLOBUCHAR, Minnesota 

MICHAEL BENNET, Colorado 

KIRSTEN GILLIBRAND, New York 

PAT ROBERTS, Kansas 

RICHARD G. LUGAR, Indiana 

THAD COCHRAN, Mississippi 

MITCH MCCONNELL, Kentucky 

SAXBY CHAMBLISS, Georgia 

MIKE JOHANNS, Nebraska 

JOHN BOOZMAN, Arkansas 

CHARLES E. GRASSLEY, Iowa 

JOHN THUNE, South Dakota 

JOHN HOEVEN, North Dakota 

CHRISTOPHER J. ADAMO, Majority Staff Director 

JONATHAN W. COPPESS, Majority Chief Counsel 

JESSICA L. WILLIAMS, Chief Clerk 

MICHAEL J. SEYFERT, Minority Staff Director 

ANNE C. HAZLETT, Minority Chief Counsel 

(II) 

(III) 

C O N T E N T S 

Page 

FIELD HEARING(S): 

Opportunities for Growth: Michigan and the 2012 Farm Bill ............................. 1 

Tuesday, May 31, 2011 

STATEMENTS PRESENTED BY SENATORS 

Stabenow, Hon. Debbie, U.S. Senator from the State of Michigan, Chairwoman, Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry ............................ 1 

Roberts, Hon. Pat, U.S. Senator from the State of Kansas .................................. 3 

Panel I 

Coon, Thomas G., Director, Michigan State University Extension, East Lansing, Michigan ...................................................................................................... 10 

Gray, J. Ian, Vice President For Research and Graduate Studies, Michigan 

State University, East Lansing, Michigan ......................................................... 8 

Simon, Lou Anna K., President, Michigan State University, East Lansing, 

Michigan ............................................................................................................... 6 

Panel II 

Blauwiekel, Peter B., Pork Production; Member, Michigan Pork Producers 

Council, Fowler, Michigan ................................................................................... 23 

Gerstacker, Clark, Corn and Soybean Production; Member, Michigan Corn 

Growers Association, Midland, Michigan ........................................................... 13 

Lacross, Ben, Cherry Production; Chair, Young Farmers and Ranchers Committee, American Farm Bureau, Cedar, Michigan ............................................ 15 

Nobis, Ken, Dairy Production; President, Michigan Milk Producers Association, St. Johns, Michigan ..................................................................................... 21 

Rothwell, Julia Baehre, Apple Production; Chair, U.S. Apple Association, 

Belding, Michigan ................................................................................................ 19 

Van Driessche, Ray, Sugar Beet Production and Conservation; Director of 

Community and Government Relations, Michigan Sugar Company, Bay 

City, Michigan ...................................................................................................... 17 

Panel III 

Armstrong, David, President and Chief Executive Officer, Greenstone Farm 

Credit Services, East Lansing, Michigan ........................................................... 46 

Davis, Eric, Director, Food Initiative, United Way For Southeastern Michigan, 

Detroit, Michigan ................................................................................................. 41 

Holt, Kristen, President, Quality Assurance International (QAI), and Senior 

Vice President, Food Safety and Quality, NSF International, Ann Arbor, 

Michigan ............................................................................................................... 39 

Reid, James, Reid Dairy Farm, Grant Township, Michigan ................................ 45 

Serfass, Karen, Forestry Production; Past President, Michigan Forest Association, Dafter, Michigan .......................................................................................... 37 

West, Dennis, President, Northern Initiatives, Marquette, Michigan ................ 43 

Page

IV 

APPENDIX 

PREPARED STATEMENTS: 

Armstrong, David ............................................................................................. 58 

Blauwiekel, Peter B. ......................................................................................... 63 

Coon, Thomas G. .............................................................................................. 78 

Davis, Eric ......................................................................................................... 84 

Gerstacker, Clark ............................................................................................. 88 

Gray, J. Ian ....................................................................................................... 91 

Holt, Kristen ..................................................................................................... 96 

Lacross, Ben ...................................................................................................... 122 

Nobis, Ken ......................................................................................................... 124 

Reid, James ....................................................................................................... 130 

Rothwell, Julia Baehre ..................................................................................... 133 

Serfass, Karen ................................................................................................... 144 

Simon, Lou Anna K. ......................................................................................... 152 

Van Driessche, Ray .......................................................................................... 155 

West, Dennis ..................................................................................................... 161 

DOCUMENT(S) SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD: 

Serfass, Karen: 

Additional letter to Hon. Pat Roberts ............................................................. 174 

(1) 

OPPORTUNITIES FOR GROWTH: 

MICHIGAN AND THE 2012 FARM BILL 

Tuesday, May 31, 2011 

UNITED STATES SENATE, COMMITTEE ON AGRICULTURE, NUTRITION AND FORESTRY, East Lansing, MI 

The committee met, pursuant to notice, at 9:08 a.m., in the Kellogg Center, Michigan State University, East Lansing, Michigan, 

Hon. Debbie Stabenow, Chairwoman of the committee, presiding. 

Present or submitting a statement: Senators Stabenow and Roberts. 

STATEMENT OF HON. DEBBIE STABENOW, U.S. SENATOR 

FROM THE STATE OF MICHIGAN, CHAIRWOMAN, COMMITTEE ON AGRICULTURE, NUTRITION AND FORESTRY 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Good morning. We are so happy to have 

all of you with us today for our first official field hearing of the 

Senate Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry Committee. I am particularly pleased to have Senator Pat Roberts, who is my partner, 

my Ranking Member, and friend, who is here with me, from Kansas. We are doing our first two field hearings, first in Michigan and 

then in Kansas, and then we will be listening, of course, to folks 

from across the country. But it was important to me to start here. 

As you all know, I have said many, many times, I do not think 

we have an economy or a middle class unless you make things and 

grow things, and that is what we do in Michigan. We make things 

and we grow things and we do, I think, a doggone good job of it. 

So when we talk about what is important to the farm bill and the 

fact that I think every page affects us because of the diversity of 

crops, I think it is really terrific that we are able to start here in 

Michigan and at Michigan State. 

Just last week, we held our first official farm bill hearing in D.C., 

where we discussed how U.S. farmers and ranchers help to feed the 

world and the importance of agriculture as part of the global economy. Today in Michigan, where one in four jobs rely on agriculture 

and where agriculture contributes over $71 billion to our economy, 

when we talk about the farm bill, as we all know, it is really a jobs 

bill. 

You know, we had to postpone our hearing back in April due to 

a looming government shutdown, and even though we were able to 

keep the government open, we still have a very tight budget to 

work with and it is going to be critical as we are focusing on larger 

issues around budgets and deficits that we examine every part of 

the farm bill, every program, evaluate whether it is working or not. 

2 

With the cold, wet spring and planting delays in Michigan, it is 

more important than ever that the farm bill risk management programs work for our farmers. 

Difficult budgets also provide reason and opportunity to simplify 

and streamline programs so that they work better for the people 

that are relying on them. We need to stretch every single taxpayer 

dollar to get the absolute best return on our investment, and that 

is what we intend to do. 

In today’s hearing, we will continue the farm bill process with a 

focus on principles and bottom lines and focus on the folks who actually are using programs and what all of you think—what is 

working, what is not working, what we can do better, what we 

should continue to do from the 2008 farm bill. We want to hear 

about your farms, your communities, our needs across Michigan 

that should be addressed in the farm bill. And we want your input 

as to the most effective ways to do it, because that really is what 

the process of the farm bill and the next several months are all 

about. 

Fundamentally, we write farm bills to help producers in the face 

of real challenges and to conserve natural resources. We help real 

people who struggle to put food on the table in difficult economic 

times. We help rural communities improve their economies and 

offer good jobs to their citizens. And we help our nation take important steps toward a better energy future. 

We have got three great panels today of witnesses. Our first 

panel features our wonderful hosts, as you know, my alma mater, 

Michigan State University, founded over 100— yes, let us give a 

round of applause to Michigan State. 

[Applause.] 

Chairwoman STABENOW. President Simon, I think you brought 

your fan base with you today, and I am one of them, so—but founded over 150 years ago as America’s first land grant college, MSU’s 

pioneering advances have changed the face of agriculture in our 

country. It was here that Malcolm Trout first discovered how to 

link pasteurization and homogenization of milk, which revolutionized the dairy industry. William Beal pioneered the hybridization 

of corn. And Robert Kedzie organized the forerunner of MSU Extension back in 1876, and I do not think you were there at that 

time, Pat—— 

Senator ROBERTS. No. 

[Laughter.] 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Today, MSU continues that legacy, 

leading the country in advances in controlling invasive species, 

fighting plant and animal disease, biotechnology and bio-based 

manufacturing. 

Our second panel is made up of farmers and others involved in 

agriculture that represent the broad diversity of agriculture in 

Michigan. We will hear about traditional commodities, specialty 

crops, the sugar program, dairy and livestock operations. We will 

also hear about some of the challenges and risks our farmers deal 

with on a daily basis and how they balance those challenges and 

risks in their operations. 

In our final panel, we will hear about nutrition, rural development, energy, conservation, credit, and forestry, which is also very 

3 

important to Michigan’s economy, rounding out the most significant 

titles in the farm bill. 

I have to say, Senator Roberts, we are very excited to have you 

here, and I know you often joke about how the State Tree in Kansas is the telephone pole, but we have got a lot of trees all around 

Michigan and national forests and great beauty and we are so glad 

that you are here to be able to hear from key leaders about some 

of our great natural resources and to meet our wonderful people. 

Agriculture in Michigan continues to be one of the bright spots 

in our economy. Our agricultural sector has grown at a faster rate 

than the rest of our economy, and as Chair of this committee, I am 

committed to doing whatever I can to keep that momentum going 

and to continue supporting the great men and women, the great 

families of our State who work so hard, day in, day out, to produce 

a safe and abundant food and fiber supply that powers our nation’s 

economy. 

It is now my great pleasure to turn to Senator Pat Roberts for 

his opening remarks. He indicated a little while ago that he has 

been through eight farm bills, I understand, and was Chairman 

during 1995 and 1996 in the House of Representatives of the Agriculture Committee and has a wealth of knowledge and expertise 

and I am very pleased to have him partnering with me as we go 

forward in writing the next farm bill. Senator Roberts, welcome to 

Michigan. 

STATEMENT OF HON. PAT ROBERTS, U.S. SENATOR FROM THE 

STATE OF KANSAS 

Senator ROBERTS. Yes, ma’am. Thank you. 

[Applause.] 

Senator ROBERTS. Good morning and go Green! 

[Applause.] 

Senator ROBERTS. That sounded pretty good. Let us do it again. 

Go Green! 

[Audience responds.] 

Senator ROBERTS. All right. Part of my remarks here, and the 

appendix I am not going to read to you—it is the playbook of the 

University of Nebraska—— 

[Laughter.] 

Senator ROBERTS. Dr. Simon, I will just give it to you. It is like 

everything else. It is ‘‘top secret,’’ so I am making it public. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator ROBERTS. But I got a glimpse of Spartan Stadium. My 

staff and I were testing my time on the 40. I still have some eligibility left for Kansas State—— 

[Laughter.] 

Senator ROBERTS. —and I got it down to 40 seconds this morning. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator ROBERTS. But at any rate, thank you so much for bringing the committee to Michigan. This is a tradition of the Senate 

Agriculture Committee, to go out and have field hearings, and you 

always get a different perspective than when you have people come 

into Washington and read their prepared statement, and if you 

dare ask them to get away from that, they get a little nervous, but 

4 

not when you come to Michigan or Kansas, I can assure you, so it 

is a good thing. 

Dr. Simon, thank you so much for hosting this this morning. As 

I indicated, I do not think that Nebraska will walk onto your field 

until 2012, but when they do, rest assured, everybody in Kansas 

will be shouting ‘‘Go Green,’’ as well. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator ROBERTS. Madam Chairwoman, it is appropriate that 

our first farm bill hearing takes place at a research institution, and 

as you have indicated, the first land grant institution. I have said 

before, we face a great challenge. We have been trying to indicate 

that to those in the Congress and anybody that will listen, and we 

had a hearing last week that really concentrated on that, about 

American agriculture and the global economy, but even more than 

that, our national security and what agriculture can do as a tool 

for peace. 

Our population is now about six billion—I am talking about our, 

the world. It is going to go to about 9.3 billion in the next several 

decades. That is an awful lot of folks to feed, and we are not going 

to be able to do that unless we have the appropriate research base 

to give us the technology to enable us to do that, and why on earth 

would anybody in the Congress of the United States, or for that 

matter, any one of our numerous critics of production agriculture, 

why would they pass, or why would they enact spending cuts that 

would tear at the base of that effort, or for that matter, tax policy, 

or for that matter, regulatory overkill, which is one of the things 

that we want to touch on as of today. 

The Chairwoman is going to hold a hearing with EPA, or what 

Chuck Grassley from Iowa says, the End of Production Agriculture 

Agency—— 

[Laughter.] 

Senator ROBERTS. —but maybe it is not that severe or not. But 

at any rate, emerging economies are demanding higher-value proteins, grains, and specialty crops, so those prospects are out there. 

We have to take advantage of that. We must be very aggressive. 

I am very sad to see that the three trade pacts that we thought 

that we could pass on a fast track and that have been delayed 

years are now again in the midst of a political debate, but we will 

persevere and I hope that we can get that done. 

The key factor in doing all this is technology. That starts at universities like Michigan State, Kansas State, the home of the everoptimistic and Fighting Wildcats, and other institutions where agriculture research is a priority. 

And I really want to thank our producers and our witnesses on 

the second and third panels for joining us today. The three here, 

we are not allowed to ask them questions. They are at a higher 

level. But at any rate, it takes time to come here and to testify, 

to take time out of your valuable schedule, and I really appreciate 

it and I know the Chairwoman does, as well. It is your perspectives 

on current agriculture programs and the direction of this next farm 

bill that are critical to the committee’s work in drafting policies 

that provide producers in rural America with the tools necessary 

for success. 

5 

And some folks question the need for a farm bill with commodity 

prices where they are today. I do not have to tell you that prices 

can fall much more quickly than they rise. We have been through 

this before and people do not seem to realize the cost inputs and 

everything else that goes into this. 

The worst thing that can happen is happening out in Kansas, 

and more especially in the Southwest part. We are very dry. I wish 

you would send some of this rain back, if you possibly could. But 

here we are with a farmer with— now, this is going to sound to 

you like a big farmer, but out in our country, it is not particularly 

that big—maybe 10,000 acres. He had a pretty good crop there, 

but, bang, we end up with a hailstorm, and then, bang, we get into 

a drought, one of the worst since the 1930s. We have wheat at over 

$8, which is just incredible, and there he is, stuck with no crop. 

And so that indicates the tremendous value of crop insurance. The 

Chairwoman and I share that very strong feeling. So it is a paradox of enormous irony that when we have high prices and everybody thinks everything is fine in agriculture, that is fine except if 

you lose a crop. 

So we both believe that without an adequate safety net, many 

producers will struggle to secure their operating loans and lines of 

credit to cover input and equipment costs, always rising. We need 

those producers to stay in business if we are going to meet this 

global challenge. 

Folks, this is not only a challenge for us. It is a moral issue. We 

started this with Food for Peace in the Eisenhower administration, 

and if we are going to feed a troubled and hungry world and be 

able to do that, we must have the base from which we can operate. 

It is a national security issue. Show me a country that cannot sustain itself in regards to its food supply, I will show you a country 

that is wavering and having problems and probably getting into a 

little bit of terrorism, so it is a national security issue, as well. 

Unfortunately, our farm programs are not the only policies that 

affect production. I am looking forward to hearing from today’s witnesses about the impact of Federal regulations on their operations. 

The cost of regulations on an annual basis to American today with 

existing regulations and some that are now pouring out like a 

Katrina, it seems to be, in all phases of our economy is now over 

$1 trillion. That is incredible. Surely, we can do a better job on a 

cost-benefit basis, and we hope to get your input. 

Our Kansas producers continue to tell me that Federal actions 

from outside of the Department pose just as great a threat to their 

ability to feed a troubled and hungry world as anything else. At a 

time when the future of agriculture production so heavily impacts 

our national security, why would we do anything from the Federal 

Government’s standpoint to hinder their efforts? 

Madam Chairwoman, you have convened a diverse panel representing a wide range of issues under our committee’s jurisdiction. 

I look forward to hearing their testimony, tasting the fruits of their 

labors—bing cherries—while we are here in Michigan. Thank you 

so much. 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Thank you. 

6 

Senator ROBERTS. Thank you all for taking your time to come 

out. This is a wonderful group. This is a wonderful audience, wonderful turnout. Thank you so much. 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Thank you very much, Senator Roberts. 

Thank you very much. 

[Applause.] 

Chairwoman STABENOW. We will turn to our excellent hosts this 

morning, who will bring opening comments, of course, Michigan 

State University’s President, Dr. Lou Anna Simon, Vice President 

for Research and Graduate Studies, Dr. Ian Gray, and Director of 

MSU Extension, Dr. Thomas Coon. President Simon, we are so 

happy to be here. Good morning. 

STATEMENT OF LOU ANNA K. SIMON, PRESIDENT, MICHIGAN 

STATE UNIVERSITY, EAST LANSING, MICHIGAN 

Ms. SIMON. Good morning, and we are delighted to have you 

here, and welcome home. Senator Roberts, this is going to be your 

second home, particularly if you deliver that playbook in a way 

that helps us in October. 

But it is my distinct pleasure to welcome you to Michigan State 

University and to pause a moment and to reflect on your title, 

Chairwoman. It is an extraordinary honor for you, but also for 

Michigan State University and for the State of Michigan. You have 

been a tireless advocate for this University, but also for agriculture, from the very beginning of your career, and so this position 

and this opportunity to have an important role in shaping not simply next week but the future of this country for a very long time, 

we are so proud of the role that you will play. And Senator Roberts, 

your record is extraordinary and we could adopt you as a son of 

Michigan, if that is appropriate. 

[Laughter.] 

Ms. SIMON. Let me not go through the formal testimony- -you 

have it in front of you—but make about three observations, if I 

might, and turn it over to my colleagues. 

You reflected on the pioneering land grant university, and we are 

celebrating the Sesquicentennial of the Morrill Act in 2012 and it 

will be a time in Washington where there will be parties on the 

Mall and posters and a lot of discussion. But that was an extraordinary time in our history, when the Morrill Act was adopted, in 

a time of war, a time of great economic stress, and a time when 

our country needed to chart a future that was simply different than 

where we had been. 

Michigan State University was the prototype, being founded 

seven years before the Morrill Act as a way of thinking about how 

we could blend, as Senator Stabenow says, the making and the 

growing in a way that was not simply about making and growing. 

It was about economic independence and quality of life and a way 

in which the research that has occurred at this university could 

have profound impacts on the people of Michigan and, therefore, 

the people of the United States. This is a uniquely American institution. It is a bit muddled at times because we try to balance access, being good enough for the proudest and open to the poor, competing in international competition, at the same time being very locally connected. 

7 

When John Hannah returned from U.S. AID and a stint in World 

War II, he understood that this was going to become a global competition, a global society, and that places like Michigan State, with 

its values, should participate in that global dialogue, establishing 

the first Dean of International Studies Programs in 1956, well before the issues of internationalization or food were a part of the national security interest that you are talking about today. 

So Michigan State University has in its DNA this capacity to be 

internationally focused and locally relevant and connected, at the 

same time, trying to open its doors widely, but also expecting the 

best and to be able to compete with the best, whether it is on the 

football field or anyplace around the world. That spirit is what animated the Morrill Act and what we should be celebrating in 2012. 

Also, the Morrill Act understood that research had to underpin 

whatever we did, that true democracy was based on the capacity 

to have people across all walks of life have access to the best information, and that we could be both relevant today, but also forwardlooking for tomorrow. So the research agenda for the land grant 

university had to anticipate tomorrow’s problems, not simply address the day- to-day economic issues of difficulties of floods and 

droughts and all the things that might occur. That balanced portfolio was really important for the growth of America and the 

growth of Michigan agriculture. 

So as you think about the farm bill and its profound impact 

going forward, it has to have this proactive element so that it can 

anticipate the problems of tomorrow in this global context that you 

have described, Senator Roberts, and that Michigan and the United 

States can play an important role in solving those problems in 

ways that rebound positively to the prosperity for the people of 

Michigan and the people of the United States, and those two are 

not mutually exclusive. And that really is the 21st century land 

grant university and the role we can play in helping you and others 

both identify those issues as well as staking out an agenda that is 

long-term and short-term. 

We also must stay connected to the people, and that becomes 

more difficult, and sometimes as we are all sort of fascinated by 

our iPads and phones and testing. But Extension needs to be relevant for the 21st century, as well, and that requires some reorganization, and Tom will talk about the challenges that we are facing, but also how we think that technology as well as our connections with people in this room and many across the State can help 

us find the new rhythm for Extension for the 21st century that 

blends this technology, but also thinks about the role that Extension must play in bringing and making sure that we are monitoring 

what is happening around the world so we can learn from the best 

practices in the world and remain very, very competitive, and Extension needs to play a role in making sure that we are bringing 

those best practices, not simply from a part of the United States, 

but from around the world back to Michigan so that we can be 

competitive. 

We have all faced enormous budget challenges. Michigan has 

been no exception. Those challenges have frayed some of our trust 

and our relationships. They have put friends at odds with one anVerDate Nov 24 2008 00:52 Mar 27, 2012 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00011 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\71628.TXT MICHA
8 

other over priorities. And they have also, though, been an opportunity for us to reassess what we need to do for the future. 

We are very pleased that as a part of the ongoing discussions 

there will be an ag summit here in Michigan, I think now scheduled for August, as away of having the Department of Agriculture 

and Rural Development, the University, the State’s land grant university, and the various constituents be able to think together 

about how we can better frame the problems of today and for tomorrow. 

The farm bill as it stands now had CREATE–21. It was an opportunity to be able to fund the kind of work needed for work in the 

State and to really capitalize on the opportunities that are available. We really understand the difficulties that you will be facing 

but have trust that you will be able to rise above the political nitpicking of the day and be able to find that framework that will be 

a parallel to the celebration of the Morrill Act in the future. 

Ian? 

[The prepared statement of Ms. Simon can be found on page 152 

in the appendix.] 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Dr. Gray? 

STATEMENT OF J. IAN GRAY, VICE PRESIDENT FOR RESEARCH AND GRADUATE STUDIES, MICHIGAN STATE UNIVERSITY, EAST LANSING, MICHIGAN 

Mr. GRAY. Thank you, President Simon. Good morning, Chairwoman Stabenow, Senator Roberts. Welcome again. And I welcome 

the opportunity to make a few remarks about research and the 

need for research and the critical role that USDA- funded research 

plays in the long-term sustainability of the agricultural system in 

the United States. 

I will divide my remarks into three discrete areas: CREATE–21 

and its future and its impact on agricultural research, the MSU research programs and support of Michigan agriculture and natural 

resources industries, and the need for a balanced research portfolio 

within the National Institute of Food and Agriculture and in those 

universities which obtain research support from the USDA. 

CREATE–21, and I would like to express our deep appreciation 

to you, Chairwoman Stabenow, for your strong commitment and 

support of this initiative. This has been a major change in direction. It is really a need. And the growth of research funding in the 

United States has not paralleled the need that faces the agricultural industries. Research funding is almost static and has grown 

at an average annual rate of just 1.85 percent over the last four 

decades. CREATE–21 called for increasing competitive funding to 

just over $2 billion per year over a seven-year period with fundamental or basic research constituting 55 percent of the total and 

integrated programs the remaining 45 percent. And this would be 

a wonderful paradigm to follow and bring to completion because 

that is what is needed to support not only the universities, but the 

research programs for global and U.S. agriculture. 

Michigan agriculture contributes almost $70 billion annually to 

the State’s economy, making it the second largest industry. We 

have over 200 commodities, and that makes us second to California 

in terms of agricultural diversity. Michigan State research relies 

9 

heavily on USDA funding, State funding, particularly the Project 

GREEN, and also commodity funding. 

We face a myriad of challenges and, therefore, it is very, very 

critical that the research grows and the programs within the University grows at the same time to address those unique needs facing Michigan agriculture, and I would acknowledge the importance 

of the Specialty Crop Research Initiative that was established by 

NIFA to resolve critical industry issues through research and Extension activities, and Chairwoman Stabenow, I would like to particularly recognize your strong advocacy for this initiative, as it 

pertains directly to the needs of our specialty crops in Michigan 

and this is a unique change in how we do research. It was multiinstitutional, multi-disciplinary, multi- investigator activity coming 

together, the sharing, blending of disciplines to address critical, 

critical problems, and MSU has been successful in those initiatives. 

As a particular example, we received $14.4 million to lead a team 

of scientists from 11 U.S. institutions and six international partners to improve the quality of fruit in the globally important 

Rosaceae family, and that was very, very good. 

There is also a need for flexibility in USDA funding. We do not 

mind—in fact, we encourage competition. But Michigan, as many 

other States do, we face some critical problems. So, in other words, 

we need a pool of funds to address problems such as the 

marmorated stink bug in Michigan, which is a serious problem that 

was identified in Michigan, in two counties in Michigan, reported 

by the MDA in February of this year. Control of this pest and others, such as the spotted wing drosophila, is necessary to secure the 

viability of our plant industries in Michigan. 

The third point I would like to make is about the need for USDA 

to commit strongly to promoting and funding basic research, and 

basic research is the basis of the coming up with solutions. Basic 

research is the underpinning mechanism for problem solving in the 

State of Michigan. The report, ‘‘New Biology in the 21st Century: 

Ensuring the United States Leads the Coming Biology Revolution,’’ 

it was concluded that integrating knowledge from many disciplines 

will permit deeper understanding of biological systems which will 

both lead to biology-based solutions to societal problems and also 

feedback to enrich the individual scientific disciplines that contribute new insights. 

So we have been promoting this integrated research approach at 

Michigan State for many, many years, and I would like to provide 

a few brief examples. One, the genetics [sic] and improved potato 

breeding, a project that we get funded through the Specialty Crop 

Research Initiative. That is a program taking basic researchers and 

computational biologists to work together to come up with solutions. The Cold Tolerance Project for Arabidopsis with Dr. 

Tomascho [phonetic] in which we can actually insert cold tolerant 

genes into canola to allow greater growth of the canola crop in 

Michigan. The RosBREED project, I just mentioned. The swine production—many of our researchers are integrating genetic technologies to identify DNA markers. 

So those are some of the examples, and it is also important that 

I advocate for the concern of our basic research is for continuation 

10 

of basic research support. It is all about research, research, research, and we thank you for your appreciation. Thank you. 

Now, I will turn to my colleague. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Gray can be found on page 91 

in the appendix.] 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Thank you very much. 

Yes, Dr. Coon. 

STATEMENT OF THOMAS G. COON, DIRECTOR, MICHIGAN 

STATE UNIVERSITY EXTENSION, EAST LANSING, MICHIGAN 

Mr. COON. Thank you. Honorable Chairwoman Stabenow, Senator Roberts, thank you for the opportunity to share with you some 

of the important changes that are going on in Extension both here 

and across the country and the importance of the farm bill in support of Cooperative Extension. 

Michigan is a State that we think of ourselves as being a State 

of innovation and entrepreneurship, and that certainly is part of 

the spirit that we have brought to the redesign of MSU Extension. 

Our charge from President Simon was to create a Cooperative Extension System that Michigan needs for the 21st century. 

In order to accomplish that, we have had to step back, ask ourselves what is most important and what is really nice but perhaps 

not something we can afford to do any longer. In doing that, we 

have come to the realization there are four key program areas that 

we need to focus on. Agriculture and agri-business comes first. 

Health and nutrition is also just as important. Working with our 

youth and preparing them for tomorrow is also important. And 

then, finally, in our community development and environmental 

programs, which we call our Greening Michigan programs, because 

green is such an important color for us. Those are really our four 

key areas that we focused on, and they are certainly in line with 

the priorities in the farm bill. But we also feel we have priorities 

to share back with you in what we can be doing in the future. 

Some of the things that we have done in our redesign, in addition to focusing in these four areas, is we reduced our administrative layers and cut our administrative FTEs in half. We have accelerated our use of technology. I am sure you are aware and familiar 

with eXtension, the online presence of Cooperative Extension 

across the nation. We have made a very serious commitment to 

that with our own funds as well as our own people, and what we 

are finding is that by working together across the States, we have 

actually created something very new in the spirit of that innovation 

that I think is serving people in Michigan as well as across the 

country. 

Today, someone can go to eXtension, type in the ‘‘Ask an Expert’’ 

app, and ask a question about a problem they are having perhaps 

with their tomatoes or what have you and have an answer in 24 

hours, and it goes through—it is like FedEx. It goes through someplace—it is not Memphis, but someplace and comes to Michigan. 

We answer it here and it gets back to them and they have connected with their Cooperative Extension System in a new way. 

That is happening in every State. 

We have also streamlined our business strategies, trying to be as 

frugal and as efficient as we can be. If you think about it, we are 

11 

an institution that works with three different government levels— 

Federal, State, and county level. You can imagine the red tape we 

can find ourselves in at times, and we are really trying to simplify 

that as much as possible through some of the innovations that the 

President has led here with our own administrative services, and 

that is working very well and the counties are now signing on with 

our new cooperative agreement that really centralizes that a bit 

more. 

Finally, our focus is what is most important, and that is, as 

President Simon said, on Michigan’s economy—creating and retaining jobs, improving the health of individuals, communities, and the 

environment, and enhancing the quality of life for people in Michigan. 

I would like to just showcase a few of the things that we do with 

the Federal investment through the farm bill. Certainly, the SmithLever title and the Hatch title in the research—Hatch and SmithLever lines in the research title are fundamental for our support. 

For every dollar that Michigan State receives from Smith-Lever 

and Hatch, we leverage another $16 in State, local, foundation, and 

other grant funding. 

With that, we have also expanded into other areas that are 

touched by the farm bill, including the Specialty Crops Initiative 

that Dr. Gray mentioned, certainly with the USDA Rural Development. We now host the North Central Regional Center for Rural 

Development at Michigan State University. We are very pleased to 

provide leadership for that, and as part of that, we have joined 

forces with USDA Rural Development in the Stronger Economies 

Together program, the SET program. It began last year. The four 

Regional Centers for Rural Development have provided the lead for 

this for Cooperative Extension, in working with rural development. 

In the North Central Region last year, two States, Ohio and Missouri, were our pilot States, and multiple county regions came together in rural areas in those States, developed proposals for how 

they might work together to enhance economic development in 

their regions and have been successful in obtaining funds with this. 

In 2011, more States were brought on board, including Michigan 

and Ohio— or Michigan and Indiana, and we currently have two 

proposals, from Southwest Michigan and from Northeast Michigan, 

to take advantage of that and build on that regional approach to 

rural development. 

In our agriculture and agri-business programs, we are provided 

leadership by Dr. Wendy Powers, but her research in Extension 

program is really exemplary of the kind of things that we see ourselves doing, the kind of integration that Dr. Gray talked about. 

She works particularly in livestock management practices, evaluating them for the impact that they have on air quality and water 

quality and then providing translational work that helps producers 

understand what they can do to reduce the impact that their operations may have on the environment. 

We have also showcased some other efforts around the State. We 

are doing a concentrated effort in Saginaw and Genessee Counties. 

Those two counties have our highest rates of obesity of any counties in the State and we have a concentrated six-month campaign 

going on there right now called ‘‘I Know My Numbers,’’ helping 

12 

people change their eating habits and in the process improve their 

health, reduce their risk of becoming obese or reduce their obesity, 

and in the process reduce health care costs. 

We have also been innovating in community food systems. We 

see that Michigan has a great opportunity to become a global center for innovation in metropolitan food systems to help address that 

challenge of feeding the extra three billion people that we will acquire in the next few decades, most of whom will be concentrated 

in urban areas. 

And then, finally, we are helping to prepare the youth for tomorrow, particularly the sciences, improving science literacy for young 

people, enriching the experiences that they have in school with 

science educational opportunities that are really true to the 4–H 

model, that is, learning by doing. 

With these areas, we really see some tremendous opportunities 

for us to grow and expand Extension. It is ironic to be at a time 

where the Department of Health and Human Service and the Department of Energy are trying to figure out how to do something 

like Extension. We keep telling them, work with us. We will show 

you how to do things like Extension. 

Thank you for the opportunity to provide testimony—— 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Well, thank you. 

Mr. COON. —and thank you for your leadership. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Coon can be found on page 78 

in the appendix.] 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Thank you very much to all three of 

you. Let us give our panelists a round of applause. Thank you very 

much. 

[Applause.] 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Thank you so much. Again, we are so 

proud of all that you do and we will excuse you and invite our second panel to come and join us as we continue on with the hearing, 

so thank you very much. 

[Pause.] 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Well, good morning again and welcome. 

We are so pleased to have all of you with us. Let me introduce each 

of our witnesses on this panel and also remind people, we have 

asked for longer written testimony, but we will ask, because we 

have so many people that we want to hear from today, that you 

keep your comments, remarks, to five minutes, so that is the reason for the clock. So we will ask you to pay attention to that. And 

then, of course, we want to have follow-up with questions and have 

the opportunity to receive any other written information that you 

have for us this morning and deeply appreciate your time in being 

with us. 

Let me introduce all of our panelists. Our first panelist is Mr. 

Clark Gerstacker. He and his brother, Kirk, farm 1,500 acres, I understand, of corn, soybeans, sugar beets, and dry edible beans on 

a farm that has been in their family for 115 years and four generations. He went to school right here at Michigan State, is a member 

of the Corn Board of the National Corn Growers Association, has 

served on numerous positions with the Michigan Corn Growers Association, and we are so pleased to have you with us today. 

13 

Our next panelist is Ben LaCross. He is a cherry farmer from 

Cedar, Michigan, and a graduate of Central Michigan University. 

He farms on his family farm, where they grow 700 acres of tart 

cherries, sweet cherries, plums, and now apples, I understand. Ben 

was elected Chair of the Farm Bureau’s Young Farmers and 

Ranchers Committee this year and is focusing on helping the next 

generation of farmers become interested in the industry and make 

their voices heard with policy makers, so welcome. Good to have 

you. 

Ray Van Driessche is a third generation farmer from Bay City. 

He operates his farm in partnership with his brother, Gene. They 

grow sugar beets, corn, soybeans, and wheat. He is currently the 

Director of Community and Government Relations for the Michigan 

Sugar Company and is former President of the American Sugar 

Beet Growers Association. Good to have you with us. 

Julia Rothwell was raised on Baehre Orchards, where her family 

farmed over 400 acres of apples, cherries, peaches, and plums, and 

spent all of her growing up years working in the orchards and the 

packing shed. For 28 years, she was a partner of those Hersee 

Brothers [phonetic], a Michigan fruit growing, storage, packing, 

and shipping organization. Julia currently serves as the Chair of 

U.S. Apple as well as the Michigan Apple Association. Good to see 

you. 

Ken Nobis has been farming in the St. Johns area since 1968, 

after completing his college education at Western Michigan University and two years in the Army. He operates Nobis Dairy Farm, a 

950-cow dairy farm, with his brother, Larry. In addition, they farm 

3,000 acres. He is currently the President of the Michigan Milk 

Producers Association and has held national leadership positions 

with the Michigan Milk Producers, as well. He was awarded the 

Dairy Farmer of the Year from Michigan State University in 2006. 

Great to have you with us. 

Pete Blauwiekel and his wife, Brenda, own and operate Blue 

Wing Farm, a farrow to finish facility in Fowler, Michigan. In addition to being pork producers, they also are committed to educating 

and engaging young people by being active 4–H leaders. Pete is 

also involved in the Michigan Pork Producers Association. 

So we are so pleased to have each and every one of you with us 

today, and we are going to start our conversation and testimony 

this morning with Mr. Gerstacker. Welcome. 

STATEMENT OF CLARK GERSTACKER, CORN AND SOYBEAN 

PRODUCTION; MEMBER, MICHIGAN CORN GROWERS ASSOCIATION, MIDLAND, MICHIGAN 

Mr. GERSTACKER. Well, thank you. Thank you. Good morning. 

And first, I want to thank Chairwoman Stabenow and Ranking 

Member Roberts for your time today and for selecting Michigan as 

the site of the Senate Agriculture Committee’s first official field 

hearing. 

As the second leading industry in our State, Michigan’s $71.3 billion agricultural industry, as you know, has been a bright spot in 

our dim economy throughout the recession. We are very appreciative of the Senate Agriculture Committee’s consideration of how 

14 

our diverse yet strong agricultural sector will impact the upcoming 

farm bill. 

Today, I would like to testify before you not as a member of any 

organization but as a rural crop farmer who depends on the farm 

bill to protect my farming operation and to ensure that my centennial farm can be passed on to my children. 

Americans enjoy the cheapest food on the planet, as they spend 

only ten percent of their annual budget on food. In other countries, 

such as India, as much as 50 percent of one’s budget is spent on 

food. While farmers like me are eager to provide this safe, abundant, and inexpensive food supply, we face increasingly tumultuous 

markets that rise and fall with the wind. At the same time that 

we encounter ever-changing market opportunities, farmers also 

face higher input costs, such as feed, fertilizer, and fuel, all of 

which are necessary components of a year’s harvest. 

In addition to market volatility, farmers are also confronted with 

the constant uncertainty of weather. We wait for the thaw, the sun, 

the rain, the heat, all of which are conditions completely out of our 

control. Each of these can present a make-it-or-break-it factor for 

our crop. 

Due to these ever-present vagaries, farming operations like mine 

are forced to take on a considerable amount of risk each year we 

cultivate our land. The fact is, we are faced with the task of providing feed and fuel for a growing world population. We cannot 

simply sit out a planting season until farming becomes more profitable. It is no surprise to anyone in this room that a farmer’s entire 

year’s work can result in a loss with as little as a drop in prices, 

a spike in fuel costs, a drought, or an early frost. 

The increased cost of this amplified risk means that farmers and 

consumers need some stability to ensure a reliable and affordable 

food supply in our country. Farmers like me need to have access 

to affordable risk management tools to better mitigate the impact 

of significant crop losses and sharp price declines. This is why the 

upcoming farm bill is so important. It is not about providing income to less than two percent of the American population that 

farms. It is about ensuring that the same two percent can continue 

to provide affordable food for the other 98 percent of Americans 

who rely on them. 

At Gerstacker Farms, we have utilized a variety of farm bill programs over the years, such as crop insurance, the ACRE program, 

LDP, CRP, as well as EQIP and disaster assistance programs. 

Faced with the growing national debt and budget constraints 

across the board, I realize some of these programs may be changed 

in the next farm bill. Here in the agricultural industry, we want 

to do our part to improve the Federal deficit situation. We have already contributed substantially with savings from the Federal Crop 

Reinsurance as well as taking budget cuts in the areas of rural development, conservation, and research. 

I do feel the risk management programs, such as ACRE and crop 

insurance, are absolutely vital and cannot be lost in the new farm 

bill. The ACRE program, as an example, can be made more efficient and useful to farmers by increasing the timeliness of payments and bringing program triggers closer to the farm. In States 

such as Michigan, the average yield differs vastly throughout our 

15 

State’s various corn regions as a result of diverse soil and weather 

variations. By adjusting program triggers so they are tied more 

closely to the individual farm, gaps in the current farm bill programs will be bridged to help protect farmers from shallow repetitive crop losses. I also feel the crop insurance premiums should be 

adjusted to reflect today’s yield trends and Michigan’s average indemnity payment ratio of less than 70 percent. 

Additionally, programs in the next farm bill should strive to be 

producer-based as opposed to land owner-based. This will ensure 

that programs assist the farmers who grow the crops and assume 

the risk. By improving these risk management tools, we can provide the best possible safety net for America’s farmers and for the 

American food supply. 

As you look to the future of Michigan agriculture, our industry 

continues to be a beacon of promise and I am proud to be a part 

of this sector. Michigan’s farmers and ranchers provide a bounty of 

fruit, grain, vegetables, and protein which is enjoyed by people 

across the globe. Crops such as those grown on my farm are utilized as feed, fuel, food, and fiber, and these important resources 

will continue to play a vital role in our economy throughout the 

next farm bill and the next century. 

Thank you for your time and consideration, and I look forward 

to your questions and comments. Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Gerstacker can be found on page 

88 in the appendix.] 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Thanks very much. 

Mr. LaCross, welcome. 

STATEMENT OF BEN LACROSS, CHERRY PRODUCTION; CHAIR, 

YOUNG FARMERS AND RANCHERS COMMITTEE, AMERICAN 

FARM BUREAU, CEDAR, MICHIGAN 

Mr. LACROSS. Thank you, Chairwoman Stabenow. Senator Roberts, welcome. I had the opportunity to visit your State of Kansas 

this last winter for a Young Farmers and Ranchers conference and 

you definitely have a great group of young, vibrant, optimistic 

young farmers in your State. 

Before I begin today, I want to take a moment and thank you, 

Senator Stabenow, for your leadership on the last farm bill. Today, 

we have a specialty crop title in the farm bill, which is a result of 

your hard work and determination these past few years. Specialty 

crop farmers have benefitted from your vision and leadership. 

I am here today as a young farmer from Cedar, Michigan. My 

wife and I farm with my parents, Glen and Judy LaCross, and we 

grow tart and sweet cherries, plums, and apples. I am currently 

the Chairman of the American Farm Bureau Federation’s Young 

Farmer and Rancher Committee. 

Strong agricultural markets, increasing demand for niche products, and a general public that is showing an increasing awareness 

of agriculture make today an exciting time to be a farmer or rancher. Young farmers and ranchers face many of the same challenges 

that have plagued our industries for years—access to credit, limited 

abilities to transfer ownership from one generation to the next, and 

marketing limitations, to name a few. 

16 

We have a great tradition of family farmers in our country. We 

measure the longevity of our operations not in years, but in generations. Young farmers and ranchers need your committee to show 

strong leadership to ensure that the challenges of farming and the 

risks we undertake as farmers do not eclipse the rewards that family farmers reap every day by working the land. Young farmers 

need a stable farm bill that consists of research, usable support 

mechanisms, rural development, conservation, and market access. 

Research and conservation are pillars of farm policy whose payday is not measured in return on investment but on the sustainability of farmers and ranchers nationwide. Safety nets are crucial 

for farmers to be confident that the future of their farms will not 

be devastated by market or weather fluctuations. Most farm families are able to sustain the ebbs and flows of farm income by supporting themselves through off-farm income. Rural development is 

a jobs initiative, compounded with the benefits it gives farm families and the rural communities that are vital to our nation. Market 

access provides our crops stay competitive in a global marketplace. 

Michigan is second only to California in crop diversity. Michigan 

farmers produce some of the finest specialty crops in the world. 

Fresh and processed fruits and vegetables are vital to Americans’ 

diets, and increased consumption of fruits and vegetables has 

shown to lower the instances of obesity. This is an area of the farm 

bill we should be celebrating, America’s farmers growing nutritious 

food while the nutrition title gives consumers access to these foods. 

What harmony. 

As a specialty crop grower whose fruit goes mainly into the processing market, it is very important for my crop to be recognized as 

a healthy snack alternative. I was dismayed that dried cherries, a 

ready-to-eat form of our perishable crop, were excluded from the 

snack program. Value-added agriculture is a significant driver of 

our State’s and our nation’s economy, and canned, frozen, juiced, 

and dried fruits can be easily added to healthy menus. 

I have two examples of Michigan’s value-added processing industry, dried apples and single-serving applesauce. In our on-the-go 

lifestyles, ready-to-eat processed fruits give consumers the convenience they want while the farmer’s fruit gives them the nutrition 

they need. While fresh fruits and vegetables have their place on 

the nation’s collective plate, so do processed fruits and vegetables, 

and I urge your Senate committee to restore processed fruits and 

vegetables back into the snack program. 

As a farmer, I understand firsthand the need to spend money 

wisely. I also understand how to make the difficult decisions to cut 

expenses when my income comes up short. Chairwoman Stabenow, 

Senator Roberts, you are both placed in the unenviable position of 

having to write a farm bill during challenging economic times. I appreciate Chairwoman Stabenow’s characteristic of the farm bill as 

a jobs bill. Agriculture is economic development. It is also crucially 

important to the well-being of our nation. This farm bill must 

maintain the vital areas of research, usable support mechanisms, 

rural development, conservation, and market access. 

Young farmers and ranchers are optimistic about their role in 

American agriculture. I urge your committee to give them the stability they need from their government to continue to produce the 

17 

safest, most abundant, most affordable supply of food, fuel, and 

fiber the world has ever known. 

Senator Stabenow and Senator Roberts, I appreciate the opportunity to testify before you today. I would be happy to take any 

questions you might have. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. LaCross can be found on page 

122 in the appendix.] 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Thank you very much. Ben, you are 

making me hungry as you are holding up that food. 

[Laughter.] 

Mr. LACROSS. They are right here. We can pass them over. 

Chairwoman STABENOW. We should be passing it out. 

All right. Mr. Van Driessche, welcome. Good to have you here. 

STATEMENT OF RAY VAN DRIESSCHE, SUGAR BEET PRODUCTION AND CONSERVATION; DIRECTOR OF COMMUNITY AND 

GOVERNMENT RELATIONS, MICHIGAN SUGAR COMPANY, 

BAY CITY, MICHIGAN 

Mr. Van Driessche. Thank you. Thank you, Chairwoman Stabenow and Senator Roberts, for bringing the hearing to East Lansing 

here. I appreciate the opportunity to speak on behalf of the more 

than 1,000 Michigan sugar beet growers regarding the 2012 farm 

bill. Sugar beets have been grown in Michigan for over 114 years. 

Family farms have been passed down through several generations 

because of the stability this industry has provided to us and to our 

bankers. 

In 2004, 1,300 growers of the Michigan and Monitor Sugar Companies merged to form Michigan Sugar Company Grower Cooperative, which is based in Bay City. Our four factories produce about 

12 percent of the sugar beet production in the United States. Our 

farmers took on substantial debt, with many of them mortgaging 

their farms, to purchase the two companies and save the industry 

here in Michigan. The significance of that kind of commitment exemplifies why we need a strong farm policy to ensure that we have 

a viable industry to pass on to the next generation. 

Today, the Michigan sugar beet industry generates $1.2 billion in 

economic activity and supports over 10,000 farm and factory jobs. 

We are essential suppliers of the State’s diverse food industries, 

and as the only sugar beet producer east of the Mississippi River, 

we are also strategically important suppliers to customers in other 

Midwestern States that do not have their own sugar production, 

primarily Indiana, Ohio, Illinois, and Pennsylvania. 

We need to maintain a strong domestic sugar industry and an effective no-cost U.S. sugar policy for the following reasons. Dependence on unreliable and unstable foreign suppliers is a threat to our 

food security, which is why a strong, diversified, and reliable domestic industry has long been recognized as important to the nation. Sugar is an essential ingredient to our nation’s food supply, 

and as an all-natural sweetener, bulking agent, and preservative, 

it plays an important role in about 70 percent of processed food 

products. The U.S. sugar beet and sugar cane industries in 18 

States generate more than 146,000 jobs and over $10 billion per 

year in economic activity. 

18 

Despite our efficiencies, we are an industry that has been under 

enormous stress, and from 1985 until 2009, the price support level 

did not increase, causing a long period of very low prices. As a result, from 1985 to 2009, 54 of America’s 102 cane mills, beet factories, and cane sugar refineries shut down and will never reopen. 

The United States is the world’s fifth largest sugar producer, the 

fifth largest sugar consumer, and the world’s second largest snack 

importer. We are among the lowest cost producers in the world. 

Forty countries have duty-free access to our market for over 1.4 

million tons of sugar each year, or about 15 percent of our domestic 

consumption, as required under the trade laws. Trade agreements 

have given more and more of the American sugar market to foreign 

producers, even if the foreign producers are highly subsidized and 

inefficient. In addition, Mexico enjoys unlimited access to our market. 

Finally, American food manufacturers, consumers, and taxpayers 

continue to benefit from a reliable supply of sugar that is reasonably priced, high in quality, and safe to consume. Sugar is the only 

major commodity program that operates at no cost to taxpayers, 

and government projections through 2021 feel it will remain at no 

cost over all those years. 

In summary, the U.S. sugar industry has endured a wrenching 

restructuring over the past two decades. American sugar farmers 

who remain are grateful to Congress for crafting a sugar policy 

that balances supply and demand, ensures that consumers have a 

dependable, high-quality supply of a vital food ingredient, and in 

improving the market conditions. The policy achieves all of these 

goals at zero cost to American taxpayers. We strongly urge the continuation of this successful no-cost policy in the next farm bill. 

I would like to add a couple other comments very quickly. Agriculture research is one of the most important investments this government can make in the future of American agriculture. Year 

after year, the USDA ARS has supported leading-edge sugar beet 

research at the Sugar Beet and Bean Research Unit right here in 

East Lansing. Unfortunately, the lack of funding and inflation has 

threatened sustained research and the unit has not received any 

additional funding since 1994, resulting in reduced staffing. No 

other public agency or entity in the United States has responsibility for sugar beet genetic improvements to address the challenges that confront our industry nationwide. 

My final point. USDA conservation policy is tied very tightly to 

the improvement and sustainability of sugar production and Michigan agriculture as a whole. For example, on our harm, we participate in the crop program with seven CP–21 contracts totaling 26 

acres of filter strips that border miles of drainage ditches to control 

soil and water erosion. We also have two CP–23 wetland restoration contracts with 23.7 acres under the program. We have established autumn olive windbreaks to control soil erosion from wind 

on highly erodible soils, and we are gradually increasing the 

amount of no till factors on our farm each year. 

Jean and I believe that incorporating conservation practices into 

our operation has not only improved production, but it also allows 

us to maintain sound environmental stewardship in conjunction 

19 

with protecting the water quality of the Saginaw Bay Watershed 

District. 

Thank you again, Chairwoman Stabenow, Senator Roberts, for 

holding this important hearing and for all that you and the committee do for American agriculture. We look forward to working 

with you on the farm. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Van Driessche can be found on 

page 155 in the appendix.] 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Thanks so much. 

Ms. Rothwell, welcome. Good to have you. 

STATEMENT OF JULIA BAEHRE ROTHWELL, APPLE PRODUCTION; CHAIR, U.S. APPLE ASSOCIATION, BELDING, MICHIGAN 

Ms. ROTHWELL. Thank you. Chairwoman Stabenow and Ranking 

Member Roberts, thank you for allowing me the opportunity to testify today. 

Senator Stabenow, I want to personally thank you for your 

strong leadership during the last farm bill. At that time, the programs that were included in the specialty crop titles were just concepts. Today, they are fully implemented and yielding significant 

results for the apple industry and for other specialty crops. We note 

this is directly attributed to your efforts on our behalf and we 

thank you. 

Senator Roberts, thank you for your strong leadership on behalf 

of agriculture. I also want to thank you for your military service 

to our country and your continued support of our troops. My son 

is a Captain in the Army, based out of Fort Bragg, and he was just 

redeployed on May 17 to Iraq, so thank you for your support, as 

well. 

My name is Julia Baehre Rothwell, and my family farm, Baehre 

Orchards, has been growing apples and cherries for generations in 

the heart of Michigan’s fruit ridge. I am married to Michael 

Rothwell, who is the President of Belding Fruit Storage and 

BelleHarvest Sales. They handle apples for approximately 120 

growers throughout the State of Michigan and they are one of the 

largest apple shippers east of the Mississippi. 

As Chair of the U.S. Apple Association, I represent all segments 

of the apple industry—growers, packers, marketers, processors, and 

exporters. I have been a member of and an advocate of the apple 

industry my entire life. 

There are several farm bill programs I would like to highlight. 

Exports are extremely important for the apple industry, with about 

25 percent of crop sold overseas. Apple growers utilize the MAP 

and TASC programs, which promote American apple consumption 

around the world. 

A foreign pest or disease can easily devastate our orchards. Now, 

we are dealing with the brown marmorated stink bug. It is in over 

30 States, spreading, has over 300 hosts, including apples, cherries, 

peaches, grapes, tomatoes, corn, and soybeans. Today, our worst 

fears are being realized as the stink bug activity is rapidly increasing at least two months ahead of where it was last year. Researchers and U.S. Apple staff were in an orchard in Maryland last week 

just at the time that the stink bug was exploding in activity, the 

reported damage levels ranging from four to seven percent to the 

20 

peach and apple crops already. Last year, the level of damage was 

not observed until July. 

So we have a critical need for research funding to combat this 

serious invasive pest. Over 50 researchers have submitted SCRI 

grant initiative proposals to the USDA to develop methods of controlling this monster. If this rate of damage were to occur nationally, the losses would be measured in the billions of dollars. We are 

asking for approximately $10 million over the next five years to 

save billions in agricultural production. The brown marmorated 

stink bug represents a real threat to the U.S. food supply and I believe it is the greatest pest threat to agriculture in a generation. 

Chairwoman STABENOW. I know you are aware China has requested access to our market for their fresh apples. This fall, the 

USDA moved closer to granting that request when they completed 

work on the pest list. There are over 60 quarantined pests and diseases on that list that China has and we do not. Each one of them 

could be the next emerald ash borer, spotted winged drosophila, or 

stink bug. Funds for pests and diseases in the SCRI initiative are 

very important to us. These programs are underfunded now and we 

are worried they will be cut. 

I know that immigration issues do not fall under your jurisdiction. However, I must comment on immigration reform and specialty crop agriculture. We strongly favor securing our borders, but 

if we do not have a workable guest worker program in place and 

if e-Verify becomes mandatory, the time spent here will be for 

naught because we will absolutely cease to exist. The lack of workers to harvest our crops and the threat of the brown marmorated 

stink bug are, in my opinion, the greatest immediate threats to my 

family’s farm and to the whole specialty crop sector. 

Our industry believes that our agriculture and food policy should 

better reflect the dietary guidelines for Americans, and Ben reflected on that very strongly. We support the continuation and expansion of the fresh fruits and vegetables program and a direction 

to the USDA to buy more fruits and vegetables in all forms for Federal nutrition programs. 

The Specialty Crop Block Grant Program focuses on regional and 

local priorities for specialty crop producers. This has been utilized 

in Michigan in many ways and much credit needs to be given to 

the Michigan Department of Agriculture for successfully implementing this program. 

There are many other programs in the farm bill that are just as 

important as the ones I have mentioned today and they are included in my written testimony. We need these programs to grow 

demand and build long-term competitiveness, and we strongly support the expansion and continuation of all of them. Without, we 

could see U.S. specialty crop production, apple production, relocate 

to foreign growing areas. The outsourcing of our food supply would 

not only be economically devastating to our production areas, but 

pose a serious threat to our national security. 

Thank you for allowing me the opportunity to testify today, and 

we look forward to working with you in the development of the 

next farm bill. Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Ms. Rothwell can be found on page 

133 in the appendix.] 

21 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Thank you so much. 

Mr. Nobis, welcome. 

STATEMENT OF KEN NOBIS, DAIRY PRODUCTION; PRESIDENT, 

MICHIGAN MILK PRODUCERS ASSOCIATION, ST. JOHNS, 

MICHIGAN 

Mr. NOBIS. Thank you, Senator. Thank you, Senator Roberts. We 

appreciate you holding this first official farm bill hearing in the 

State of Michigan. We greatly appreciate that. And I appreciate the 

opportunity to testify on dairy policy this morning. 

As was mentioned by Senator Stabenow in her introduction, I am 

President of Michigan Milk Producers Association. We are a cooperative with 2,100 owners, farmer members, are primarily located in 

Michigan, but also Wisconsin, Indiana, and Ohio. 

I would like to add that dairy is the largest commodity group in the State of Michigan. We contribute about $6 billion to the Michigan economy. We are also the eighth largest dairy State, which 

many people do not realize, and we are growing very rapidly in 

both production capacity and processing capacity. The production 

level in Michigan has increased over 40 percent in the last ten 

years. 

My testimony today is greater and reaches far beyond the Michigan borders. I would like to testify representing the national dairy 

industry. The dynamic dairy industry of the United States has 

been marked by continuous change, but dairy policy has remained 

remarkably constant for the past several decades. Until recently, 

almost all the milk produced in this country was marketed in this 

country. World trade in dairy products had been relatively small 

and conducted at prices below those prevailing in the U.S. domestic 

marketplace. Until recently, feed grain prices were relatively low, 

and for the most part were stable. Major changes in world supply 

and demand conditions together with our nation’s need to seek alternative energy sources have made grain prices much more volatile and driven them to levels that put dairy farmers’ cost of production far below the support levels fixed in the current farm bill. 

Portions of our current dairy policy date back to the late 1940s. 

It was designed for an industry that has changed dramatically. 

Current dairy policy cannot serve the needs of dairy farmers, and 

in some ways is now actually harmful to them. Growing world demand for dairy products has boosted world dairy market prices and 

rapidly turned the U.S. dairy industry into a commercial exporter. 

U.S. dairy exports have shot up from the equivalent of less than 

six percent of U.S. milk production in 2003 to almost 13 percent 

in 2010. Further growth in dairy exports is expected as world population grows, and more significantly for the dairy industry is the 

growth in the number of middle-class consumers around the world. 

The U.S. dairy industry faced a crisis in 2009. The United States 

lost a substantial share of the growing world markets during 2008 

and the resulting loss of commercial sales volume built up as large 

unsold inventories here in our domestic market. U.S. dairy exports 

had reached the equivalent of 11 percent of domestic milk production in 2008. Then, with resistance to high milk prices built up, 

credit was tight and import buyers with full product type lines held 

off further purchases when prices showed signs of weakening. 

22 

World prices then plummeted, taking U.S. prices down with them. 

However, the U.S.’s major export competitors, with a more flexible 

marketing mechanism, were better able to maintain their export 

volumes when world demand soon picked up, albeit at lower prices, 

in 2009. U.S. exports dropped off and did not return for almost two 

years. 

During the last half of 2008, total U.S. dairy exports plunged by 

over five percent of U.S. milk production. The loss resulted in a 

build-up of commercial inventories of cheese and governmentowned inventories of non-fat dry milk that kept milk prices depressed, even though about a quarter-of-a-million dairy cows were 

removed through the Cooperatives Working Together Program, 

which was an industry-funded program. 

The current price support program also encourages non- fat dry 

milk and other basic dairy products to be produced to government 

standards. These standards were developed to ensure long 

storability and do not reflect the products that dairy importers 

want to buy in today’s global dairy marketplace, where individual 

end user specifications rule the day. Furthermore, the price support program has increasingly become a price support program for 

the world, benefitting dairy farmers in other countries, such as 

New Zealand, more than it does U.S. dairy farmers. 

The Milk Income Loss Program, which makes direct payments to 

dairy farmers when milk prices are low, actually falls short of 

being an adequate safety net, even with the addition of the feed 

cost adjustor. 

With this as background, it is clear that current dairy policy is 

no longer serving the needs of U.S. dairy farmers and is in need 

of a major overhaul. Over the last two years, dairy producers and 

cooperatives representatives have been meeting through the National Milk Producers Federation Strategic Planning Task Force, 

which developed a Foundation for the Future, a comprehensive 

package of dairy policy programs that would bring much-needed 

change. The Foundation for the Future is designed to help reduce 

price volatility and protect milk producer income by focusing on 

producer margins rather than on milk prices alone. Revenue supports are meaningless when the cost to produce exceeds the revenue received. 

Any questions we had about the adequacy of our current dairy 

policy were answered in 2009. If we were to experience another 

2009 in the near future, the U.S. dairy industry would be decimated. There is little equity left to borrow our way through another 2009. 

The components of Foundation for the Future include, one, replacing the existing Federal dairy support programs; two, introducing a new margin protection program to protect producer equity; three, implementing a market stabilization program to address market imbalances; and four, reforming milk pricing regulations set by the Federal Milk Marketing Order System. Including 

revisions of the Federal Milk Marketing Order Program in the proposal is important to address some basic concerns that both producers and processors have with the current pricing system. This 

multifaceted approach dramatically improves dairy policy and proVerDate Nov 24 2008 00:52 Mar 27, 2012 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00026 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\71628.TXT MICHA
23 

vides for a more economically viable and secure future for dairy 

producers in the 21st century’s global economy. 

Thank you. I look forward to answering your questions today and 

working with you for the completion of a successful dairy policy in 

the 2012 farm bill. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Nobis can be found on page 124 

in the appendix.] 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Thank you very much. 

Mr. Blauwiekel, it is wonderful to have you. 

STATEMENT OF PETER B. BLAUWIEKEL, PORK PRODUCTION; 

MEMBER, MICHIGAN PORK PRODUCERS COUNCIL, FOWLER, 

MICHIGAN 

Mr. BLAUWIEKEL. Thank you. Good morning, Chairwoman Stabenow, Ranking Member Roberts, and committee staff. I also want to 

compliment Senator Stabenow and her staff, back when the looming government shutdown was going on, your staff did an excellent 

job of keeping me abreast of the situation and I—you have an excellent staff, so thank you for that. 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Thank you. 

Mr. BLAUWIEKEL. My name is Pete Blauwiekel. My wife, Brenda, 

and I own a 150-sow farrow to finish operation near Fowler. I have 

a daughter who is a technical service provider for a local agriculture supply company and I have a son who next week, probably 

about this time, will be returning from Afghanistan as an ensign 

in the SeaBees, so Memorial Day comes next week for us. 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Absolutely, and thank him for his service, and, Julia, your son, as well. 

Mr. BLAUWIEKEL. I appreciate the opportunity to appear before 

you today to testify on behalf of the Michigan Pork Producers Association and the National Pork Producers Council. 

The U.S. pork industry represents a significant value added activity in the economy. America’s 67,000 pork producers generate 

more than $34 billion of Gross National Product and help support 

more than 550,000 mostly rural jobs. Pork producers have a keen 

interest in the next farm bill, and NPPC has a Farm Bill Policy 

Task Force to gather input from producers. NPPC is committed to 

working with Congress on the 2012 farm bill. 

As this committee and the Congress begin to write the next farm 

bill, pork producers like me hope you will maintain, strengthen, 

and defend the competitiveness of the U.S. pork industry by opposing unwarranted and costly provisions and mandates. In our written testimony, which we have submitted for the record, we lay out 

how the farm bill can maintain, strengthen, and protect the competitiveness of the U.S. pork industry. Let me discuss several 

issues. 

In the 2008 farm bill, Congress asked USDA to address five specific issues related to the buying and selling of livestock and poultry. Unfortunately, the agency’s proposed GIPSA rule goes well beyond those five issues. According to a study by Informer Economics, 

the rule would cost the pork industry alone nearly $400 million annually. It would create legal uncertainty, raise production cost, lead 

to more vertical integration in the industry, and could force producers like me out of business. NPPC wants USDA to scrap the 

24 

proposed GIPSA rule and write a regulation that sticks to the five 

mandates Congress gave us. 

Another concern we have is the availability of feed for our animals. Last year was the third highest corn harvest on record. Despite that, USDA estimates we only have about two weeks of corn 

stocks. If we have a drought in the corn belt or if China, for example, makes a major corn purchase, we could see regional feed shortages. To address those, NPPC would like the productive lands now 

in the Conservation Reserve Program released without penalty so 

that they can be planted to feed grains. We also would like a mechanism that ensures producers can feed their animals if there is a 

corn shortage. This may mean a change in U.S. biofuels policy. 

To strengthen our competitiveness and grow our industry, we need to increase our exports, which last year added $56 to the price 

of each hog I sold. The best way to do that is through Free Trade 

Agreements. Currently, the U.S. has pending agreements with Colombia, Panama, and South Korea. When fully implemented, those 

trade agreements will increase live hog prices by $11.35 and create 

more than 10,000 pork industry jobs. NPPC urges the Obama administration to send the implementing legislation for those Free 

Trade Agreements to Congress soon and urges Congress to approve 

them before its August recess. 

Finally, it is important to adequately fund USDA programs that 

deal with foreign animal disease and disease surveillance, which 

not only protect our animals, but our export markets. Also, we 

must address the country’s feral hog situation, which now is a 

problem even here in Michigan. Feral hogs often carry diseases 

that put our swine herds at risk and our operations. 

Thank you for inviting me to testify. I would be happy to answer 

any questions. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Blauwiekel can be found on page 

63 in the appendix.] 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Well, thank you very much, and thank 

you to all of you. 

We would like now to open it up to some questions, and let me 

start with Mr. LaCross. As we look to the next farm bill, we are 

obviously looking to the next generation. The average farmer today 

is 55 years of age or older and we are looking to you. We are looking to the next generation of how we can continue to keep the family farm and to be able to have new farmers as well as those passing down from generation to generation. 

But I wonder if you might speak a little bit more about the kinds 

of things you are involved in to engage young farmers as well as 

obstacles that you see in finding credit or technical assistance. And 

as you do that, I want to also mention, we engaged with my regional managers around the State. We asked others that were not 

able to be here to ask questions today, the kinds of questions they 

would want us to ask of all of you, and what came up over and over 

again was what can be done for beginning farmers. We have heard 

a lot about that, you know, how can we help farmers get started 

and so on. 

So on behalf of folks who submitted questions to us as well as 

my own interest, I know that there is a great deal of interest from 

people around Michigan in how we can support your efforts, the beVerDate Nov 24 2008 00:52 Mar 27, 2012 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00028 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\71628.TXT MICHA
25 

ginning farmers’ efforts. What should we be doing? What are you 

doing right now? And what are the biggest obstacles, from your 

perspective? 

Mr. LACROSS. Well, one of the exciting things that my nationwide Farm Bureau committee did this last year, along with Farm 

Bureau, is we partnered with the USDA to begin a program called 

Start to Farm. You can find it at starttofarm.gov. And we started 

the first ever beginning farmers and ranchers conference. That was 

held in conjunction with our Farm Bureau annual Young Farmer 

and Rancher Leadership Conference. That brought in a whole new 

host of new farmers who are looking to get into agriculture but do 

not know where to begin, do not know where to start with technical 

assistance, and this showed them some of the avenues that they 

can utilize through USDA resources to begin farming. I think, by 

all accounts, that was a rousing success. 

Some of the great challenges that I outlined that young farmers 

and ranchers do have are a lot of the things that have plagued our 

agricultural industry for years—access to credit, generational 

transfer of farmland. And I think a lot of young farmers are being 

creative in how they do that. They are partnering with retiring 

farmers so that they can build up a sweat equity in the retiring 

farmer’s operation so that when that farmer is ready to retire, they 

can take over. I think a lot of States are very successful at utilizing 

a program such as that called Farm Link, where they link retiring 

farmers to beginning farmers. 

I think in our State, we have seen great success in the Farm and 

Ranch Land Protection Program. That has protected a lot of desirable land for development and that has been able to keep that in 

agriculture, and so that has been another avenue where young 

farmers can defer some of those high asset costs and be able to do 

what they want to do, which is grow food. 

So I think young farmers, in general, are very excited. I think 

a lot of young farmers have been able to utilize niche agricultural 

markets to be able to get their foot in the door. Sometimes the capital investments are less intensive and the cash flow is a little bit 

easier to handle than some of the traditional markets. 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Great. 

Mr. LACROSS. So young farmers are—— 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Well, no, thank you. We all have a 

great stake in our next generation of farmers being successful and 

young people being excited about agriculture as a future, as a profession. So I very much appreciate all that you are doing. 

Ms. Rothwell, if you would talk for a minute—you have talked 

about pests, incredibly important, the challenges that we have on 

research. I mean, I have heard that from each of you on the panel, 

talking about the importance of research, and this really needs to 

be a focus for us. Senator Roberts and I have talked about that as 

one of the major issues for us going forward. 

But could you also talk about the challenges that relate to what 

has happened on natural disasters. I think about last year, where 

our grape growers lost about 50 percent of their production in 

Michigan and what happens in terms of weather. I mean, we have 

been more fortunate than others this year, but when we look at improving crop insurance or disaster response for specialty crop proVerDate Nov 24 2008 00:52 Mar 27, 2012 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00029 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\71628.TXT MICHA
26 

ducers, if you could talk a little bit about what has worked and 

what do we need to do in that area for specialty crops. 

Ms. ROTHWELL. Well, the Tree Assistance Program, and thank 

you very much for your role in that because that was a great asset, 

a great help to the growers in Southwest Michigan who suffered 

from fire blade [phonetic], but that funding was made mandatory, 

so we appreciate that. That has been working well. I think if there 

are concerns with that, it has to do with the thresholds of loss or 

the death of the trees and right now that is at 15 percent. 

And if you have 1,000 trees to an acre, you would have to lose 

150 trees, obviously. But several of the growers that sustained 

damage from the windstorm a year or two ago and lost, you know, 

maybe they only lost 12 percent or ten percent, so they did not 

qualify to be under—to receive assistance from that program. So I 

think that would probably be very helpful, is to have the threshold 

lowered so that more—you know, because even a ten percent loss 

is—— 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Right. 

Ms. ROTHWELL. —I do not want to say even—it is disastrous. It 

is disastrous for that grower, and sometimes it can ruin a whole 

orchard block to have just a few trees that are—I say just a few, 

100 trees that are not right. 

As far as crop insurance, the U.S. Apple Risk Management Task 

Force has worked with RMA for probably ten years in trying to improve that program, and it is still a work in progress. It has been— 

the new rules have been in place, and I think the difference for the 

apple growers that we truly appreciated was that instead of having 

to declare units of processed and—or we can now declare or ask for 

coverage for units of processed or fresh apples as opposed to having 

to ask for all one or the other. 

I know there are some concerns with the appraisal of the fruit 

that has been damaged and the grade standards that are applied 

to that, that maybe they are not necessarily applicable in today’s 

marketplace. 

Another concern is about the salvage and how the salvage can 

be utilized. So, for instance, if you have a loss and you are paid 

for that loss, but then the salvage you want to be able to run 

through a fresh packing line, you cannot do that and you are penalized for that. 

I understand that Congress has given a directive to the RMA to 

be actuarially sound and that may be the issue there, but those are 

the concerns that the growers are still feeling about the crop insurance program, and—— 

Chairwoman STABENOW. So what are you doing with the salvage? 

Ms. ROTHWELL. I am sorry? 

Chairwoman STABENOW. You are saying—what happens, then, 

with the salvage? 

Ms. ROTHWELL. With the salvage? 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Yes. 

Ms. ROTHWELL. They cannot utilize it—they cannot run it over 

a fresh line. They have to—it has to go for processing—— 

Senator ROBERTS. Why? 

Ms. ROTHWELL. That is the question they are asking. 

27 

Chairwoman STABENOW. That is the question. 

[Laughter.] 

Chairwoman STABENOW. That is a very good question. 

Ms. ROTHWELL. Thank you. 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Evidently, that is the question we need 

to answer—— 

Ms. ROTHWELL. You know, because a lot of the growers feel—— 

Senator ROBERTS. Okay. You say it is the RMA? 

Ms. ROTHWELL. I am sorry? 

Senator ROBERTS. You say it is the RMA folks? 

Ms. ROTHWELL. Yes. 

Senator ROBERTS. Bless their hearts. 

[Laughter.] 

Chairwoman STABENOW. I am going to write that one down. 

Okay. Thank you. 

I am going to turn it over to Senator Roberts for a couple of questions, and then I have a couple more. 

Senator ROBERTS. Clark, thank you for being here. You mentioned that you signed up for the ACRE program. How is that 

working out for you? 

Mr. GERSTACKER. As of this point, it has been there as the backstop, have not utilized it. 

Senator ROBERTS. Now, you are one of six percent of Michigan 

farmers who signed up for that. We had two percent in Kansas. 

Not a very big turnout. You said it would be a better program if 

it were administered at the county level, but I have talked to a lot 

of producers in Kansas who did sign up. It is hard to find them, 

but at any rate, they tell me that even with the county trigger, 

they would not necessarily receive a payment when they have a 

loss, and so because of this difficulty with ACRE, our producers 

opted instead to buy up on crop insurance. 

My question to you is, does crop insurance help you on your farm 

to cover the same type of risk that the ACRE program covers? Do 

you use crop insurance to cover yield and price risk just like you 

use, or try to use with the ACRE program? I know you are in it, 

and if you are in it, you are in it for three years. 

Mr. GERSTACKER. Correct. 

Senator ROBERTS. It is like the Marine Corps. You sign up and— 

or Airborne. At any rate, I am sort of giving you a curveball question here. And then there were 23 steps, as I recall, that you had 

to go through to sign up for the program. 

Mr. GERSTACKER. That—— 

Senator ROBERTS. My Lord, if we cannot offer a program with 

two steps or one as opposed to 23, it would just seem to me that 

that was not a very good way to start off with the program. Your 

comments? 

Mr. GERSTACKER. I think a couple issues with the ACRE program moving forward from the last farm bill was the timing and 

the complexity. I think it was very difficult for growers and our 

field service teams to really understand it and be able to sell it—— 

Senator ROBERTS. It was very difficult for the committee. 

Mr. GERSTACKER. Agreed. So I think that was a very difficult position for growers to be in, along with our field staffs trying to help 

us. It is a three-year commitment, so the decision you made at that 

28 

time based on the market parameters you were given, I think it is 

a very viable program and it was one that I was very comfortable 

with. 

The crop insurance additional to it, it is a yearly basis. You 

know, I may or may not enroll in different crop insurance programs 

that year. However, I have the ACRE program as the backstop and 

our decision to choose a particular crop insurance program is really—that decision is made in March based on the parameters and 

the tables and risk assessment that we can look at for that year 

moving forward, so—— 

Senator ROBERTS. And you would sign up for it again? 

Mr. GERSTACKER. Yes. 

Senator ROBERTS. You would not opt out, you would sign up, 

even if we—mission impossible—improve the crop insurance program? So you like ACRE? 

Mr. GERSTACKER. I do like ACRE. I think it has some very good 

pieces behind it. You know, one of the other issues with it is getting the, I apologize for the term, but, you know, the rate. You had 

to get your landowners and everybody else to buy in for a long period of time. I mean, three years is a long period of time if you are 

looking at arraying out your land and tying it up in someone else’s 

farm unit and so forth. 

Senator ROBERTS. Okay. I appreciate that very much. You are 

sort of a Braveheart here in regards to ACRE. 

Mr. LaCross, when you talk to your lender and you go in, of 

course, given your status and your leadership, I think it would not 

make too much difference, but what does your banker tell you 

when you come in to apply for a loan? Do they place any requirements on you they might not place on more established farmers? 

Mr. LACROSS. Well, Senator Roberts, I am lucky in that I farm 

with a family unit, and so I have that established farm and the 

reputation of my parents when I walk into the banker—— 

Senator ROBERTS. Okay. Speak for the people who do what I cannot do, and that is to go on the Internet and look up 

starttofarm.com. I could probably do that, with help, but anyway—— 

[Laughter.] 

Senator ROBERTS. They took away my typewriter some years ago. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator ROBERTS. At any rate, speak for them. 

Mr. LACROSS. Yes. Well, I have heard a lot of negative stories 

from young producers who claim that when they walk into a lender 

to get access to credit to put a crop in the ground in the spring, 

they cannot meet the collateral needs of the bank. They do not 

have that beginning up-front capital to be able to collateralize that 

loan, and so they do not have the opportunity to expand their business in the spring. You know, our farms are so cash-flow intensive 

that we have to put all of our money up front and cross our fingers 

and hope in the long run that we get a payment, and a lot of times 

that is hard when you walk into a banker and try to explain that 

story to them. So I have heard a lot of horror stories from young 

farmers who have not been able to expand into different areas of 

agriculture that they wanted—— 

29 

Senator ROBERTS. Of course, your community banks now are 

under the gun, too, in regards to Dodd-Frank, the bill that is coming down the road, and also FDIC, who sweeps in and says, let us 

take a look at your books and the mark-to- market situation. It is 

just a very difficult situation. But when you said access to credit, 

I think that is probably one of the biggest hurdles you have. 

Mr. LACROSS. Absolutely. 

Senator ROBERTS. Okay. My time has run out, Madam Chairman, or do you want me to keep on firing? There is a red light 

blinking here. 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Oh, well—— 

[Laughter.] 

Senator ROBERTS. You usually gavel me down when I am in 

Washington. 

Chairwoman STABENOW. I usually do. I am being polite today. 

[Laughter.] 

Chairwoman STABENOW. We have a lot of guests here. I am being 

polite. 

[Laughter.] 

Chairwoman STABENOW. If you would like to ask one more, that 

would be fine. 

Senator ROBERTS. Okay. Let me go to Mr. Van Driessche. You 

announced the partial deregulation of round- up-ready sugar beets 

if producers undertake certain conditions associated with planting. 

I was pleased that the Department could reach this decision, but 

I remain concerned about the uncertainty for producers from the 

repeated lawsuits filed against the Department of Agriculture approving biotech crops. If we could just rename things a little bit, 

instead of talking about genetically modified organisms—— 

Mr. Van Driessche. Right. 

Senator ROBERTS. I mean, who wants to put—that is like something that you put on your breakfast food or something, and who 

would want that? We ought to say ‘‘scientifically improved’’ products or something like that. 

I changed an acronym once when I was Chairman in the House, 

the Market Promotion Program to the Market Access Program. You 

change an acronym in Washington, that is big time, so I hope we 

can do that. 

At any rate, biotech is, as you know, a critical component of our 

ability to feed what we are talking about here, and we have the 

science-based regulatory system. How important is this technology 

for our sugar beet producers? 

Mr. Van Driessche. Well, you know, it is a great question and it 

is extremely important, not only for sugar beets, but for corn, 

wheat, and soybeans and other crops that are now developing that 

kind of technology. What it has allowed us to do in the sugar beet 

industry is essentially go from using three or four different crop 

protection products. Now, it is down to one. We are making as 

many as five and six passes across the field to try and control 

weeds when I can do that in either one or two passes, which means 

we are burning a lot less fuel. 

When we were using each one of these products in spring multiple times, we were setting our crop back each time that we 

sprayed them, injuring them a little bit. Now, with the Department 

30 

that we have there currently, we are not injuring that beet. We are 

not setting back our crop. Like I say, we are burning less fuel, 

using less chemicals. Environmentally, it could not be a better 

thing to do. 

And it allows us to—and it has increased our production. We 

have essentially gone up in the last few years from an average of 

about 23 ton to the acre just a few years ago to—well, it was in 

2008, we hit 28.9 ton as an average across the State of Michigan, 

which is just unbelievable. So this new technology is extremely important when you look at being able to feed the numbers we are 

talking about here in the future. 

And my concern is that if we start to restrict the ability to use 

new biotechnologies, you are not going to only hurt sugar beets, 

you are going to hurt a lot of other crops that go along with it. 

Senator ROBERTS. Madam Chairwoman, I have had questions for 

three. I am going to turn it back to you, and then I am going to 

save Ms. Rothwell for the last dance. 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Okay. Thank you. 

Okay. Well, let me ask Mr. Nobis, you have talked about the volatility in the dairy industry. We all know what happened in 2009. 

I have heard really devastating stories from our dairy farmers and 

we certainly do not want to go through that again, there is no 

question about it. 

But we also know that our industry in Michigan has grown consistently across the last few years. You talked about that, as well. 

Have we fared better than other parts of the country, and if so, 

why is it? Or is that true? 

Mr. NOBIS. We have. It is because we are smarter. 

[Laughter.] 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Well, I figured that. I figured that 

much, so—— 

Senator ROBERTS. Is that a softball or what? 

[Laughter.] 

Chairwoman STABENOW. So share what it is that we are doing 

that is better than other places. 

Senator ROBERTS. I am going to write this down. 

Mr. NOBIS. Well, I think—I do not think, I know in Michigan it 

is the dairy industry that we are very, very proud of. I have the 

opportunity to travel around the country a lot in my position with 

National Milk Producers and I am always really happy to come 

home, because I know I do not have to go to California or Arizona 

or New Mexico or Idaho to learn the latest and the best in the 

dairy industry. I can just look at my neighbors. 

We have a super infrastructure here. We have the good fortune 

to be born, most of us, in Michigan, which is an ideal climate for 

dairy cattle. We have adequate water, which dairy cattle really 

love. We have a temperate climate. We do have some heat stress 

issues in the summertime, but they do not go on and on like they 

do in Florida, for six months at a time. It is more like six days at 

a time here. 

And we think that we have a very cooperative marketing group 

here in Michigan, that Michigan Milk, for example, works with the 

other cooperatives in the State to the advantage of all dairy proVerDate Nov 24 2008 00:52 Mar 27, 2012 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00034 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\71628.TXT MICHA
31 

ducers in this area, and I keep saying Michigan, but it expands beyond the Michigan borders. 

We have a very good working relationship with the State regulators and we have had a very good working relationship with our 

legislators in the State of Michigan. I think we should take a great 

deal of pride in the cooperative that all levels of the production agriculture has in the State of Michigan, and I look forward to continue. 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Great. All right. Well, thank you very 

much. 

Mr. Blauwiekel, let us talk for a minute about livestock producers, and I know that there are parts of the farm bill that are 

not utilized by our livestock producers, but there are others that 

are, that are very important, and I wonder if you might speak a 

little more about how you feel as a producer about areas like EQIP 

and CFP or permanent disaster assistance. I mean, talk from your 

perspective about what are the most important parts of the farm 

bill for you. 

Mr. BLAUWIEKEL. I think we personally have used the EQIP program and we have some—we went through some of the CRP program initially when it was by watershed. So the CFP program now 

is quite a bit different from what it was when I signed up. But the 

EQIP program is a really valuable program for us livestock producers to help us to be more responsive to our environmental impact and to try to design structures and facilities that will minimize any environmental impact we have. 

Our CSP program, or contract, also has a component in there 

that, you know, has a recordkeeping component that makes us 

aware of where our manure is going, if we have a CNMP, which 

our farm does. Those types of things help us to be a responsible 

neighbor environmentally. 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Great. Thanks. 

I wanted to throw open one question, too, that came again from 

folks as we reached out across the State saying, what would you 

like to ask a distinguished panel like this, and we heard—and I am 

not sure who to direct this to, but I will just throw out it out because it is something we have heard a number of times, and this 

relates to new opportunities for existing farmers and looking at the 

farm bill as a jobs bill. Agriculture, of course, is jobs. But specifically, we had a number of people ask about what should be considered to help develop and sustain local food systems as well as helping start or sustain new value-added products from our farms, 

fields, such as bio-based products. What can we be doing for new 

kinds of value-added products, if anybody would want to comment 

about that. 

Mr. Van Driessche. Well, I would make a couple of comments, if 

I could, and that is that in the State of Michigan, as you know, we 

have a lot of production, and we are so fortunate to have over 200 

commodities represented in Michigan. What I think we are lacking 

here in the State is processing, and we have tremendous opportunities to increase our processing, and along with that increase the 

value-added product opportunities. 

And so any type of USDA funding that would help advance this 

processing would be a very big benefit. You look at the amount of 

32 

livestock we have here in the State of Michigan and most of the 

meat processing is done outside of the State. And whether it is livestock or whether it is vegetables or whatever it is. 

And one commodity ties in with the others many times, and if 

I think about all the different processing that uses sugar, if we had 

more processing, whether it is a confectioner or an ice cream 

maker, whoever it is, the more of the opportunity for processing, 

the more of the opportunity to use the other commodities from the 

State of Michigan. So any type of funding for increased processing 

would be helpful. 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Great. Well, I know this is something I 

have talked with the Governor about, and I think I saw our Director Keith Creagh here from the Michigan Department of Agriculture. Good to have you here, Keith. This is something that we 

have talked about, as well, that this is a real opportunity for us 

to leverage and expand what we are doing in Michigan as we look 

at food processing. So it is certainly a priority for me. 

Does anybody else—yes? 

Mr. GERSTACKER. Yes, Senator. Research is obviously part of 

that, coming from the governmental side, but on the buy bio products and the government buy bio programs and so forth, and I forget the acronym, but it was BEES—— 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Right. 

Mr. GERSTACKER. —B–E-E–S—it is very difficult to get comparative products favorable stature in the marketplace because of some 

of the constraints that they have to go through to be looked at, 

whether it is marketing support or promotion or so forth. We have 

viable alternatives. It is generating the public buy-in, is one of 

those things I think the agricultural sector needs support with. 

Chairwoman STABENOW. And talk a little bit more about that in 

terms of the public buy-in. 

Mr. GERSTACKER. Well, if it is a plastic replacement, if it is a biodegradable plastic and so forth, you know, as a parent going to the 

grocery store, do I want a milk jug that will go to a landfill or will 

need to be recycled or do I want one that can be composted and 

just go back to the soil through microbial growth? Which is better 

for the—I would believe it would be better for the environment. 

But to get that push and that push from our side and the pull from 

the consumer that they will actually want that, may pay a little 

premium or something and so forth, but to have that drive. There 

is just some disconnect there. 

Chairwoman STABENOW. There are some real opportunities for 

us. It is very exciting, and, of course, a lot of work being done by 

so many people here at Michigan State and related efforts around 

bio-based alternatives. I think there are great opportunities that 

meet environmental needs that address a number of concerns that 

people have today, and it is a matter of getting the word out and 

continuing the research and making sure that we are bringing that 

together. 

Actually, we have a long history of that in Michigan, I will just 

say to my distinguished Ranking Member, back to the origins of 

the automobile industry when Henry Ford was looking for a way 

to help farmers back in the Great Depression and started looking— 

and ended up looking at soybeans as a way to be able to bring in 

33 

bio-based products for automobiles, and to this day now, we actually—in the new Ford Focus and Chevy Volt, there are soybeans 

in the seats. So if you get hungry and you are driving a car, you 

can—— 

[Laughter.] 

Chairwoman STABENOW. But there is a great coming together, I 

think, and some very exciting opportunities to really expand on 

that in a way that really creates jobs for us. 

Senator Roberts, do you have any other questions? 

Senator ROBERTS. Yes, ma’am, for the last three, if I could—— 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Please. 

Senator ROBERTS. —and I will try to make them real quick. 

Pete, thank you for your comments on the GIPSA rule. We have 

heard a lot of fears and frustrations over that proposal from pork 

producers all across the country, and I really hope that the Department will offer the public an opportunity to comment on the economic analysis of this. It is terribly important, and any changes to 

the proposal, because substantial changes are necessary to ensure 

our markets are innovative and able to meet the consumer demand. This is one of those where I think they went outside what 

we told them not to do in the farm bill, which is one of our problems. People might be somewhat amazed at that, but that is something that we have to deal with. 

Now, what is the greatest regulatory challenge you face in your 

operation? Which program in the farm bill is the most important 

to you in addressing that particular challenge, and how can we improve it to be even more effective? 

Mr. BLAUWIEKEL. Well, those are excellent questions. I think 

when you look at the farm bill and pork production, I think, basically, there are not really specific titles, other than some of the environmental things, that will affect us as pork producers. We kind 

of want to make sure we do not get hit by the wagging tail of something, some other part of the program. You know, for instance, if 

you look at some of the biofuel fallacies, I am scared to death going 

into this fall. I do not know how I am going to access my corn. 

But that being said, the GIPSA thing, some of the things that 

appear to be a little bit government overreach, I guess I would call 

them, some of the innovation that has occurred in the industry 

with regards to contracting arrangements that were entered in 

freely between producers and packers are kind of threatened. 

Those kinds of things probably concern me more than—I guess specifically on the farm bill, until I actually see what is going to be 

in it, I really cannot comment on that. 

Senator ROBERTS. We will save you and have you come in in a 

covert room and you can say what you really think. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator ROBERTS. Thank you for your son’s Navy service in Afghanistan. Which deployment is he on now, his first, second, third, 

what? 

Mr. BLAUWIEKEL. This is his first deployment. 

Senator ROBERTS. First deployment. Well, you tell him 

for us that I am now the last Marine in the U.S. Senate, which 

is sort of a novel thing, but at any rate, we want to thank him so 

much for his service. 

34 

Let me move real quickly. We have not done dairy yet. I do not 

do dairy anymore. As Chairman way back in 1996, and my staff 

member will hit me here for bringing that up, but at any rate, the 

last thing, Madam Chairwoman, that we always have to deal with 

is dairy, in any farm bill, 11th hour, 59th minute, here they come. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator ROBERTS. You know, we had two Senators in particular 

and we could not even get out of session and it was just really a 

problem. So I remember when the Leader asked me to come over. 

He said, ‘‘You are Mr. Agriculture,’’ and I said, ‘‘No, I am not.’’ And 

he said, ‘‘What do we do about dairy?’’ I said, ‘‘Punt.’’ 

[Laughter.] 

Senator ROBERTS. But are we considering a reliable dairy supplier to the world marketplace? Could we resolve part of this if we 

produced more whole milk powder for export and less non-fat dry 

milk? What do you think? 

Mr. NOBIS. I am not sure it is whole milk powder. That is one 

of the products. But just the current policy of the court of last resort is to sell it to the government, and it is only in that form of 

non-fat dry milk, and that was done for storability reasons, and 

that is not a product that is in high demand in the export market. 

Of greater concern to us, though, what happened to us in 2009, 

the dairy industry, was that we had that underpinning of approximately 990 support price for milk, a little higher than that. It depends on how you calculate it. But it was still higher than what 

the world price was at that point in time. So the co-ops, in particular, were buying that milk, making it into skim milk powder, 

selling it to the government because it was guaranteed money. 

Senator ROBERTS. Right. 

Mr. NOBIS. If that had not existed, we would have been forced 

to sell it, probably at cheaper prices than what the government was 

buying it for at that point in time, but it would have caused a rebound in the prices in this country much, much sooner than what 

we experienced. It was almost two years before we saw a rebound 

here. But we had frozen ourselves—we take ourselves out of the 

international market because we choose to sell it to the government. Again, that is a sure thing. When we do that, then we are 

no longer a reliable seller to that international buyer, and they are 

going to go back to their buyer of first choice who has been dealing 

with them for many years. We get away from that. 

That is why we are asking for a change in dairy policy. The most 

important part of that is to get rid of the support price so that we 

can be a—it will force us to be a consistent supplier to the international market, but at the same time, we want that money that 

is being used, what is left of it, for support in MILC so that we can 

still have a safety net, because when we run into that situation, 

that actual pay price on the farm, it will be a shorter period of 

time, but it is going to get really bloody and we need that safety 

net for those periods of time. 

Senator ROBERTS. I appreciate that so much. 

Ms. Rothwell, thank you so much for your comments. There are 

a lot of us—I think all of us in the Senate and the House want to 

thank those in uniform who are protecting our freedoms. I notice 

35 

you mentioned he was in the Army, but he is a member of the Airborne Division—— 

Ms. ROTHWELL. Right. 

Senator ROBERTS. —so he is right up there in the front lines. 

What deployment is he on? Is this his first, second—— 

Ms. ROTHWELL. Third deployment, his first deployment—— 

Senator ROBERTS. Third deployment. 

Ms. ROTHWELL. Well, first deployment was to Iraq. Second—and 

he was with the 101st Airborne at the time. The second deployment, he was with the 82nd. He went to Haiti. 

Senator ROBERTS. Is he married and have a family? 

Ms. ROTHWELL. No, he would like to have, and I would like for 

him to have one. 

[Laughter.] 

Ms. ROTHWELL. I have to rely on communication from his 

girlfriend to know what is going on. 

Senator ROBERTS. I will give her a call. 

Ms. ROTHWELL. Okay. 

[Laughter.] 

Ms. ROTHWELL. We will tell her that. 

Senator ROBERTS. It is so tough when you have third, fourth, 

fifth, sixth deployment, and more especially with people with families—— 

Ms. ROTHWELL. Oh, definitely. 

Senator ROBERTS. We are wearing a lot of people out and I really 

worry about that, but this is not a defense hearing. 

Would you list the top—I have three, I will put two— the top two 

programs authorized in the 2008 farm bill that are most valuable 

to you and your produce operation, and just tell me what that is? 

Ms. ROTHWELL. I had a feeling you were going to ask me that 

question. I thought it was either going to be that or ag—— 

Senator ROBERTS. Well, we leaked it to you, so I thought it 

was—— 

Ms. ROTHWELL. Okay. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator ROBERTS. No, we did not. I just said that. 

Ms. ROTHWELL. I am going to have to go the way of my friend 

down here at the end of the table. You know, they are all very important. I think they all contribute and help the specialty crop industry in their own unique way. 

I think the comments that I made this morning may tell you 

what is the most urgent at this point in time. I think the research 

component and the things that are going on with pests and diseases, I think is incredibly important, but I do not want to negate 

the importance of the others because they all play a significant role 

in us being productive and staying in business and being able to 

feed everybody. 

Senator ROBERTS. Well, that is the—— 

Ms. ROTHWELL. You will have to get me alone. 

Senator ROBERTS. Right. We will work on that. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator ROBERTS. You know, Madam Chairwoman, that is really 

reflective of what our responsibilities are as we deal with a tremendously difficult budget situation and people basically playing the 

36 

numbers game and saying, we have to reach this number, and we 

are making a determined effort to try to discuss with them that 

number to begin with—— 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Right. 

Senator ROBERTS. and secondly, to let us do that work, let the 

authorizing committee, the people that at least we think we know 

something about agriculture to make these cuts. They may be very, 

very, very painful, but at least let us do that job. 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Right. 

Senator ROBERTS. And so what you are telling me is, okay, I 

have got probably three or four or five things I would like to talk 

about, very difficult to say this is a priority and this is not, and 

that is our problem, as well, because it is going to be a very difficult task for us to try to settle this out. But we are more than 

willing to do it. We do not want other people to do it for us. 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Absolutely. 

Senator ROBERTS. Thank you. 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Well, thank you so much. Please join 

me in thanking our great panel. 

[Applause.] 

Chairwoman STABENOW. We will ask our next panel to come forward, and we thank you so much. 

[Pause.] 

Chairwoman STABENOW. I call the meeting back to order. We 

have got a lot of great energy in the room and we are appreciative 

of that. 

We are going to continue now with our third panel, and we are 

very excited because there are so many parts of the farm bill. One 

of our challenges is that—I have always said, every page of the 

farm bill affects us in Michigan. I am always envious of my colleagues who only have to care about one or two sections. We have 

everything, and every part of the farm bill matters to us. We are 

involved in it, and our third panel reflects a number of different 

issues that are very important to us. 

And so let me start with Karen Serfass, who is a lifelong Michigander. She and her husband, Richard, are semi-retired from the 

family business, a pet store in Waterford, Michigan, which they 

have owned and operated since 1983. They have been acquiring 

forestland in the U.P. since the 1990s. They own two properties, 

one in Chippewa County that is a former hay farm, and the other 

in Mackinac County. Karen is the Past President of the Michigan 

Forest Association and is currently serving as the Treasurer of the 

Michigan Tree Farm Operating Committee, so welcome. It is so 

good to have you. 

Kristen Holt is the President of Quality Assurance International 

and Senior Vice President of the NSF International Global Food 

Safety Division. Quality Assurance International provides USDA 

certification for organic products. Ms. Holt has more than 15 years 

of food industry experience. In 2010, she was elected to the Board 

of Directors of the Organic Trade Association as its Treasurer 

Elect. She now serves on the Board of Directors for United Way of 

Washinaw County and is also a licensed CPA. We are going to need 

your help as we put this together here in the farm bill. 

37 

Eric Davis is the Director of the Food Initiative at the United 

Way for Southeastern Michigan—so pleased to have you here— 

where he is dedicated to promoting food security for the people of 

Michigan. Eric has been involved in public policy ever since graduating from Michigan State and served as Chief of Staff for two 

State Representatives as well as Deputy Director for Legislative Affairs for our former Governor Granholm. Welcome. 

Dennis West—it is great to see you, Dennis—who is President of 

the Northern Initiatives since 1997. I appreciate your being with 

me last week in D.C. for a different session on rural development. 

Northern Initiatives provides rural small businesses in Michigan 

and Northeast Wisconsin with access to capital, information, and 

markets. Mr. West is active on several boards, including the YMCA 

of Marquette County, so it is great to have you with us. 

Jim Reid, welcome. Jim and his wife, Pam, have been farming 

in Jeddo, Michigan, for more than 30 years. Their son, who I am 

happy to say is also in MSU’s dairy and management program, also 

farms with them. They milk 170 cows in addition to growing 

wheat, corn, and soybeans on 1,000 acres. Jim was recently recognized by the Michigan Farm Bill for ecology leadership, and his 

farm is certified by the Michigan Agriculture Environment Assurance Program, so congratulations. 

Dave Armstrong has over 30 years of experience with Farm 

Credit Services in Michigan. He is also a proud Spartan—that 

seems to be a theme here—having earned his Bachelor’s degree 

here in animal sciences. After graduate school in Wisconsin, he 

came back to work for the Production Credit Association of Southeastern Michigan. That company merged with three others in 1999 

to form Greenstone Farm Credit Services, where he now serves as 

President and CEO. Dave is also active in several boards, including 

Michigan SFA Foundation, Chicago Federal Reserve Bank’s Advisory 

Committee on Agriculture, Small Business, and Labor, and the 

Michigan Livestock Expo. 

So we welcome all of you. We thank you so much for your time 

this morning. We will start with Ms. Serfass. Welcome. 

STATEMENT OF KAREN SERFASS, FORESTRY PRODUCTION; 

PAST PRESIDENT, MICHIGAN FOREST ASSOCIATION, 

DAFTER, MICHIGAN 

Ms. SERFASS. Thank you. Good morning. Chairman Stabenow 

and Senator Roberts, thank you for the opportunity to testify this 

morning. I am here today as a tree farmer from Dafter, Michigan, 

certified by the American Tree Farm System, a program of the 

American Forest Foundation. My remarks reflect the views of the 

Foundation and the 95,000 tree farmers like me that the Foundation works with every day. 

Most Americans do not realize that much of the clean water we 

drink and the clean air we breathe, the wood products we use everyday, the wildlife we hunt and fish for, comes from forests owned 

by families like mine. More than ten million American own large 

segments of our nation’s forests, and here in Michigan, more than 

438,000 families own more than half of our State’s forests. 

38 

Forests in America are the ultimate public-private partnership. 

Families like mine invest in and make improvements in our nation’s forests and keep these forests productive and all Americans 

benefit. This is why the farm bill conservation programs and the 

USDA Forest Service Private Forest Programs are so important to 

family forests and to the public. 

My husband, Rich, and I purchased 205 acres of mixed forest in 

the Eastern U.P. in 1988. This has provided us a place to hike, observe wildlife, cross-country ski, and hunt safely. When we purchased the land, we had no idea how to manage it. With the help 

of a Michigan Department of Natural Resource Service forester and 

a private consulting forester, we found very little had been done to 

manage it, to mimic the natural disasters, and create the diversity 

needed for wildlife habitat. Our forester explained all this to us 

and helped us plan out what we could do to improve the habitat 

by using a Forest Stewardship Plan, which is funded in part by the 

USDA Forest Service. 

The plan recommended diversifying the age of our forest so that 

wildlife had both younger forests and areas to forage as well as 

older forests for dens and nests. We also had stands of aspen, 

which is a good wildlife species, which was aging and not regenerating. We needed to help these stands come back and thrive. 

To create this diverse forest habitat for the wildlife, in 1995, we 

harvested timber on 45 acres to create openings and help our aspen 

stands regenerate. We do this every ten years or so, moving the 

harvest to different parts of the forest to keep the forest healthy 

and keep the wildlife habitat. 

The income we earn from these harvests, we invest it in more 

food plots for wildlife, planting other tree species that are good food 

sources, such as black cherry and oak, and improving our roads 

and trails, which help with water quality. 

In addition to this woodland, in the mid-1990s, we purchased an 

old hay farm with 160 acres, which is where we now live. We again 

put together a Forest Stewardship Plan for this property, even 

though there were only a few acres of woods and a small stream 

running through that we wanted to enhance for wildlife value. 

Since this property is open with heavy winds, we decided we needed a windbreak around the property to keep the soils intact and 

help to reduce the cost and conserve energy to heat our home in 

the winter. To improve the wildlife habitat, we also decided to put 

in wildlife corridors to enable the wildlife to make their way from 

forage to nesting sites. 

We are currently implementing an EQIP contract, which is 

leveraging our own investment to plant 6,000 trees and shrubs as 

windbreaks and travel corridors. While we probably could have 

paid for this project on our own, it would have taken us several 

years to put together the funds needed for this project. Because of 

the EQIP cost share, we will get the energy savings for our home 

much sooner and see the wildlife habitat in our lifetime, since the 

trees are growing now. 

Unfortunately, too many forest owners are not familiar with the 

benefits of forest management. In Michigan, only 13,000, just three 

percent, of forest owners who own 1.1 million acres have Forest 

Management Plans. Nationally, we see similar trends, where less 

39 

than four percent of forest owners have management plans. This 

is a good barometer for how active they are in their forest management. 

The farm bill Conservation Program, combined with the Private 

Forest Owner Program, supported by the USDA Federal Reserve, 

are an incredibly valuable tool for families like mine, leveraging 

our investment to make improvements to the land that benefit all 

Americans. In 2008, Congress made a number of improvements to 

the farm bill Conservation Program, without which I probably 

would not be here today. 

The American Forest Foundation is working with a coalition to 

develop specific recommendations for the 2012 farm bill. I am sure 

they would be happy to share them once they are complete. 

I think I speak for most family forest owners when I suggest a 

focus on two key areas for the 2012 farm bill, especially given the 

budget climate. First, I think it is important to maintain and improve these conservation and forest programs, ensuring family forest owners are on level ground with agriculture producers. 

Second is the issue of technical assistance. As I mentioned, my 

husband and I would not be here today and have a well-managed 

forest if it were not for the USDA Forest Stewardship Program 

that supported the assistance from our DNR Service forester and 

our consulting forester. I hope in the farm bill Congress can find 

ways to improve the availability of forestry technical assistance, 

perhaps with more private-public partnerships. 

Chairwoman STABENOW. thank you for your leadership on this 

important issue and for inviting me to share the story of my family 

forest. I welcome you and any other members of the committee who 

would like to see an actively managed forest to come and visit us. 

[The prepared statement of Ms. Serfass can be found on page 144 

in the appendix.] 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Thank you so much. 

Ms. Holt, welcome. 

STATEMENT OF KRISTEN HOLT, PRESIDENT, QUALITY ASSURANCE INTERNATIONAL (QAI), AND SENIOR VICE PRESIDENT, 

FOOD SAFETY AND QUALITY, NSF INTERNATIONAL, ANN 

ARBOR, MICHIGAN 

Ms. HOLT. Thank you, and thank you for the invitation to speak 

with you today. Chairwoman Stabenow, Ranking Member Roberts, 

and Senate Agriculture Committee staff, my name is Kristen Holt 

and I am President of Quality Assurance International and Senior 

Vice President of the Global Food Division at NSF International, 

based in Ann Arbor. Today, I am testifying on behalf of the more 

than 6,500 Certified Organic Operations represented by the Organic Trade Association, where I serve as Treasurer Elect on the 

OTA Board of Directors. 

NSF International is an independent, not-for-profit organization 

that develops standards, certifies products, and provides testing, 

auditing, and training services for public health. NSF employs over 

1,000 people, and almost 500 are in the State of Michigan. 

NSF acquired QAI, a pioneer in organic certification, in 2004. 

QAI is an accredited USDA National Organic Program certifier and 

40 

is one of the leading U.S. certifiers. QAI certifies 1,700 organic operations and 60,000 organic products. 

Organic agriculture is the fastest growing segment of the food industry, growing at 18 percent per year from 1997 through 2008. 

Organic was a $29 billion industry in 2010, and even in 2010, the 

sector grew by eight percent compared to less than one percent 

growth for the food industry as a whole. Organic is responsible for 

growing jobs, businesses, and revenues that especially benefit rural 

and small businesses. 

Michigan ranks 11th in organic annual output and has 460 Cer- tified Organic Operations, producing over $71 million—I wish it 

was billion, I have heard that a few times today—in farmgate revenue. The organic sector plays a contributing role in revitalizing 

Michigan’s and America’s rural economy through diversity in agriculture. 

The 2008 farm bill contained several funding provisions that 

have proven vital to the organic industry’s growth, including, one, 

resources for the National Organic Program, NOP, to promulgate 

and enforce certification rules; two, certification cost share support 

for new organic farmers; three, the Environmental Quality Incentive Program, or EQIP, to assist in the conversion to organic farming; four, providing more organic production and market data; and 

five, providing funding for more organic production research. These measures, totaling $125 million since the passage of the 

bill, have contributed to the growth of the organic sector and have 

served as a modest downpayment on future innovations in agriculture that have demonstrated an impressive 40-to-one return on 

investment. 

I will focus my comments on the top three provisions. Protecting 

the integrity of the USDA Organic Label is the highest policy priority for the organic sector. There is still significant work to be 

done to institute a regulatory framework appropriate to a $29 billion a year industry. The NOP performs regulatory oversight of the 

Organic Label and ensures that consumers are getting what they 

expect when they buy organic. These functions are essential for the 

growth of the organic sector. 

Regardless of where food is produced, all foods labeled and sold 

as organic in the U.S. must be certified to the NOP in a consistent 

manner. Maintaining a level playing field in this global regulatory 

program, such as the NOP, requires adequate resources for oversight of foreign certifiers. Otherwise, U.S. organic producers will be 

disadvantaged. 

The 2008 farm bill funding has enabled the NOP to better address organic labeling violations and has improved the consistency 

of accredited certifiers worldwide. Continuing funding here is critical to ensure market stability, ongoing capital investment, and 

continued sector growth. 

The 2008 farm bill also expanded the National Organic Certification Cost-Share Program, providing organic operations with 75 

percent of the cost of annual inspections, up to $750 per certification. This low level of annual assistance reduces the cost burden 

of certification, especially for small farmers, and helps eliminate a 

barrier for new organic farmers. Currently, 25 percent of Michigan’s Certified Organic Operations participate in the Cost-Share 

41 

Program. Eliminating this program in 2012 would result in fewer 

organic farmers in Michigan and in the U.S. 

The 2008 farm bill also recognized that conservation programs 

should work hand in hand with the organic sector, because by definition, organic farming improves the health of the farmland. A new 

provision, known as the Environmental Quality Incentive Program, 

or EQIP, was established to provide assistance to producers for 

conservation practices related to organic production as long as they 

are pursuing or meeting the requirements for organic certification. 

This is the only program designed to assist farmers in the transition to organic production practices and needs to be continued. 

Looking to 2012, the new farm bill should optimize these programs and provide the tools necessary for more farmers to take advantage of organic opportunities so that U.S. farmers can remain 

globally competitive. It is understood that no part of the farm bill 

is safe from cuts in this fiscal environment. However, the prospect 

of funding cuts to organic programs will result in uncertainty and 

instability in the organic sector which can jeopardize this growing 

$29 billion per year industry. Government investment in a highgrowth 40-to-one ROI in industry should continue because the investment is modest and the benefits to the U.S. economy and to the 

environment are significant. 

Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Ms. Holt can be found on page 96 in 

the appendix.] 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Thank you very much. 

Mr. Davis, welcome. 

STATEMENT OF ERIC DAVIS, DIRECTOR, FOOD INITIATIVE, 

UNITED WAY FOR SOUTHEASTERN MICHIGAN, DETROIT, 

MICHIGAN 

Mr. DAVIS. Good morning, and thank you, Chairwoman Stabenow and Ranking Member Roberts, for the opportunity to talk with 

you today about hunger and the critical importance of nutrition assistance in Michigan. My name is Eric Davis and I am the Director 

of the United Way for Southeastern Michigan’s Food Initiative. 

Today, I would like to share with you about how the problem of 

hunger is affecting people in Southeast Michigan and what the 

United Way and our partners are doing about it and how innovative, community- based efforts that promote access to nutrition assistance are critical in closing the gap. 

Hunger is all too common in Southeastern Michigan. Too many 

people and families in our region cannot afford enough food, and 

so they face difficult choices: Gas or dinner, winter coats or groceries, school supplies or breakfast, medications or meals. While 

families in Southeastern Michigan are struggling to keep a family 

home or find a job, they too often face the additional burden of 

hunger. Even for those that are employed, hunger can have a negative impact on their productivity, as they often skip meals to ensure their children have enough to eat. 

Today, 18.5 percent of people in the Detroit Metro Area struggle 

with hunger. More than 700,000 residents of Southeastern Michigan depend on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program for 

food each month. Over 300,000 of these are children. 

42 

Since 2004, the number of Michiganders counting on Food 

Stamps to feed their families increased by 66 percent, from just 

over one million to almost 1.7 million people. We expect unprecedented amounts of people that continue to rely on Food Stamps 

until unemployment rate have decreased significantly. 

Families with children are the hardest hit by hunger. While this 

is a crisis itself, it becomes more troubling when you consider that 

children experiencing hunger have lower math scores and are more 

likely to repeat a grade. They are more likely to be absent and 

tardy and to have behavioral issues and attention problems. Teens 

experiencing hunger are more likely to be suspended from school 

and have difficulty getting along with their classmates. These proven effects of hunger are also known predictors of negative life outcomes, including high school dropout, low IQ, and lower lifetime 

earnings. 

The United Way for Southeastern Michigan is proud to be a part 

of a committed, dynamic, and inclusive community of advocates for 

food security, fresh food, nutrition education, and a sustainable 

food economy. I would like to share with you just a few of the innovative initiatives designed to create better outcomes for our region 

by leveraging local assets in combination with Federal Nutrition 

Assistance Programs. 

United Way for Southeastern Michigan is one of the many proud 

supporters of the Fair Food Network’s Double Up Food Bucks Program, which doubles the buying power of SNAP dollars when they 

are used to buy Michigan-grown produce at farmers’ markets. In 

partnership with Gleaners Community Food Bank, United Way is 

committed to establishing more client choice food pantries in Metro 

Detroit. Another initiative, Detroit FRESH, is a project of a Wayne 

State University group known as SEED Wayne, in collaboration 

with the Capuchin Soup Kitchen and works to supply corner stores 

with local, fresh, and affordable produce. 

The final project I would like to highlight is the Michigan Benefits Act Initiative, or MBAI, a community-based outreach initiative 

that utilizes web-based technology to register individuals for available government benefits. As United Way strives to build stronger 

and healthier communities, one of the lessons we have learned is 

that greater access to benefits positively impacts all of us. Michigan loses almost $1 billion annually in unutilized Federal benefits. 

Increasing SNAP participation would bring those funds to Michigan, where they would provide a valuable boost to the economy as 

they flow to local businesses. 

It is with this in mind that the United Way for Southeastern 

Michigan is actively participating in the MBAI, along with more 

than 50 partners Statewide, including State and Federal Government agencies, businesses, and nonprofits. The MBAI will use an 

online tool developed and operated by the Michigan Department of 

Human Services called MiBridges to streamline multiple benefit 

applications. Currently, MiBridges allows applicants to apply for 

SNAP and LIHEAP, or utility benefits, using one integrated application. It is currently being expanded to integrate other benefit applications, as well. This model is a one-stop method for connecting 

families to benefits and is coupled with an outreach program that 

utilizes the resources of community organizations around the State. 

43 

The outreach portion is an essential component of the MBAI, designed to help the MiBridges tool meet people where they are 

through a dedicated network of community-based organizations 

whose staff will be trained to assist those eligible within their communities in successfully applying for benefits. Families that are 

struggling with hunger for the first time due to recent economic 

crisis often lack familiarity with assistance programs. Therefore, 

using established community organizations and modern technology 

are crucial to successfully reaching these and other populations. 

We at the United Way for Southeastern Michigan encourage the 

committee to maintain SNAP to meet the needs of Southeastern 

Michigan, Michigan as a whole, and the United States. We also appreciate the opportunity to voice our support for innovative programs that leverage community resources to help all families access benefits for which they are eligible. And finally, to ask the 

Federal Government to focus on strengthening the safety net in 

local communities by supporting cross-sector efforts to modernize 

and streamline access, such as the Michigan Benefit Access Initiative. 

Chairwoman STABENOW. I would like to thank you for your 

strong record of advocacy on behalf of the children of our State and 

issues like poverty and hunger that impact our families and our 

economy. I urge you and your fellow Senators of this committee to 

protect funding for SNAP and to support hungry children and families in accessing available benefits as you focus on the upcoming reauthorization of the farm bill. Thank you very much. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Davis can be found on page 84 

in the appendix.] 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Thank you very much for your testimony. 

Mr. West, welcome. 

STATEMENT OF DENNIS WEST, PRESIDENT, NORTHERN 

INITIATIVES, MARQUETTE, MICHIGAN 

Mr. WEST. Good morning. Thank you, Senator Stabenow, Senator 

Roberts, for this opportunity to provide testimony. Northern Initiatives is a nonprofit community development financial institution 

and micro lending intermediary. We work in 46 rural Michigan 

counties, everything north of Claire in Michigan, and five border 

counties of Wisconsin. We are based on the campus of Northern 

Michigan University that founded us back in 1991. 

USDA programs have been critical for Northern Initiatives and 

they have helped us to make close to 600 loans, ranging in size 

from $4,000 to $1.8 million. Those programs that we have used 

have also supported the ability to offer technical assistance, and so 

half of our loans have been to start-ups and 40 percent of our loans 

have been to women-owned businesses. 

We are in the process of scaling our ability to make more loans. 

We now have an online loan application that is for all loans under 

$50,000, which gives a consumer or customer a credit response in 

24 to 48 hours, and later this year, we will move that application 

up to $100,000. So it gives us the ability to scale capital and to 

serve a large geographic area efficiently. 

44 

The third area of our work is regional strategies to support natural and cultural tourism and to help parts of the Upper Peninsula 

grow as regional and national tourist destinations. 

I am here to testify on the importance of rural development programs for entrepreneurship and strengthening community capacity. 

On the entrepreneurship side, rural development programs are providing credit for rural businesses complemented by TA, and specifically, the programs vital to Michigan are the Intermediary Lending 

Program, the Rural Micro Entrepreneur Assistance Program, Business and Industry Loan Guarantee Program, the Rural Business 

Enterprise Grants, the RBEG, and the Rural Business Opportunity 

Grants, the RBOC. The community capacity programs of importance are the Rural Community Development Initiative and the 

Water, Sewer, and Community Facilities Programs. 

Let me say a few words about entrepreneurship. In the last decade, things were simply horrific for Michigan and much of rural 

Michigan, yet 45 of the 46 counties in which we work saw growth 

and that growth was in small businesses employing one to nine 

people. So consistently through the period, there was something 

growing and it was small businesses, which is a great sign of innovation and new ideas taking place throughout our State. 

Some examples of where we have used IRP and helped small 

businesses get started and grow, Dan Torres in Marquette, Michigan, has started a fresh Mexican concept 14 years ago, now has 

three locations, 100 employees with benefits. 

Mike Zacharias has started a small business in Wakefield which 

is in the mold making business, what would otherwise be considered a dying industry in America, but his speed of delivery and 

commitment to his customers has resulted in a global company 

with three locations and over 50 employees. 

Alternative loan product has helped Bob Jacquart and Jacquart 

Fabric Products in Ironwood, Michigan, to take an industry that we 

would not expect to succeed in America, the cut and sew business, 

and now to be able to use speed of delivery and technology and employ 150 people in Ironwood, Michigan. 

So these are examples of where this money has been used to 

start up and produce results with technical assistance and growth, 

and nationally, the IRP program has made over $700 million in 

capital available to intermediaries like Northern Initiative. In the 

history of the program, it has never had a default or a delinquency 

while providing capital to 8,000 businesses. With some seasoning, 

I am sure the Rural Micro Assistance Program will get to the same 

point. 

While these rural development programs appear to be categorical, they very much interrelate and support one another. Capital 

investments in broadband bring about high- speed access. The capital and technical assistance help individual rural businesses overcome distance, isolation, and seasonality using e-commerce to sell 

regionally and even globally. 

And these rural development programs leverage private support, 

local dollars, and bring about increased taxes for the State and localities and the Federal Government while lessening the use of the 

social safety net. Just as importantly, they are building bridges to 

long-term private capital and private service providers, as our borVerDate Nov 24 2008 00:52 Mar 27, 2012 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00048 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\71628.TXT MICHA
45 

rowers are typically going into a commercial bank within three to 

five years. 

So thank you for this opportunity to testify today and I look forward to questions. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. West can be found on page 161 

in the appendix.] 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Thank you. Terrific. Thank you. 

Mr. Reid, welcome. 

STATEMENT OF JAMES REID, REID DAIRY FARM, GRANT 

TOWNSHIP, MICHIGAN 

Mr. REID. Welcome, and good morning, Senator Stabenow, Senator Roberts. 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Good morning. 

Mr. REID. Thank you for holding this first official field hearing 

on the upcoming reauthorization of the farm bill. I appreciate the 

opportunity to provide testimony regarding the reallocation of the 

Rural Energy for America program to the Rural Development Department of USDA. 

You already know my name. My farm is located in St. Clair 

County. I am just four miles from the Lake Huron shoreline. I was 

born and raised on a dairy farm in St. Clair County, worked alongside of my dad through my school years and into college. After 

graduation from Michigan State, I pursued a teaching career for 

five years and my wife and I, Pam, decided to purchase an operating dairy farm just in our neighborhood from a retiring couple in 

1978. We combined the two herds, ended up with a 50-cow herd. 

As years went on, we gradually grew the dairy and cash crop farm 

to a 1,000-acre 90-cow herd by 2007. 

The same year, we began planting and implementing a project 

that would bring us at today’s level, a little bit revised from what 

you stated, Senator Stabenow, we are at 225 cows—— 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Oh, great. 

Mr. REID. —1,100 acres. My son, Jeff, is currently enrolled in 

Michigan State University’s Dairy Management Program. He is 

doing his internship this summer at another farm. I really miss 

him, but hopefully, his education will contribute to our farm. 

I recently had an opportunity to use the REAP Grant Program 

to install a solar power system on our 225-cow dairy operation in 

the thumb of Michigan. After exploring several renewable energy 

alternatives, including wind power, we chose solar as a way to provide energy on our farm. We installed 96 205-watt Evergreen solar 

photovoltaic panels on the roof of our freestall barn. These panels 

will generate roughly 27,000 kilowatts per year, or about a third 

of our energy needs. 

While use of solar power is beneficial to us in the reduction of 

energy costs on the farm, the cost of the solar panels and installation would have been cost prohibitive without the assistance of 

REAP and other incentives through Detroit Edison, in our case. 

Total investment costs for installing the solar panels was over 

$140,000. Our reduction in energy costs is expected to be approximately $5,000 a year. As you can see, without any financial assistance, the return on investment would have taken over 28 years. 

46 

With the REAP Grants and other incentives, our investment is now 

going to be recouped in about four years. 

Aside from the financial gain of using solar energy, the implementation of renewable energy fits well with our overall farm strategy and priorities. Over the past several years, we have worked to 

make our farm as environmentally friendly as possible. Working 

through the Michigan Agriculture Environmental Assurance Program, we have implemented new management strategies to protect 

the livestock and the land on our farm. We are certified in all three 

MAEAP programs, Farmstead, Livestock, and Cropping. This past 

winter, our efforts to be good stewards of the resources earned us 

the selection of Ag Ecologist of the Year from Michigan Farm Bureau. 

Many of the changes we have made around the farm, including 

renovating buildings, were made to help make way for the next 

generation, my son, to continue working on the farm. 

Programs like REAP help farms implement new areas of energy 

efficiency and conservation on the farm. While we used the program to install a renewable energy program on our farm, other 

farms have used the program to make relatively small changes on 

the farm that result in large savings of energy consumption. Farmers by their personal nature want to conserve and protect our natural resources as much as possible. The REAP Program makes it 

financially feasible for us to explore new energy sources on our 

farm. 

Supporting efforts like the REAP is one more step in our nation’s 

move towards less dependency on foreign energy sources. President 

Obama has called for ten percent of our nation’s energy to come 

from renewable sources, like wind and solar, by 2012, and 25 percent by 2025. We are proud to have done our part in the effort to 

gain energy independence. We encourage you to continue the REAP 

Program and to allow other farmers the chance to bring renewable 

energy and energy conservation to their operations. Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Reid can be found on page 130 

in the appendix.] 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Thank you so much. 

Mr. Armstrong, welcome. 

STATEMENT OF DAVID ARMSTRONG, PRESIDENT AND CHIEF 

EXECUTIVE OFFICER, GREENSTONE FARM CREDIT SERVICES, EAST LANSING, MICHIGAN 

Mr. ARMSTRONG. Thank you. Last but not least, right? 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Absolutely, not least. 

Mr. ARMSTRONG. Good morning, Madam Chairman, Ranking 

Member Roberts. Thank you for the opportunity to participate in 

today’s hearing and allowing me to share some of the great things 

going on at Greenstone Farm Credit Services that we are doing for 

our farmers and rural residents. I would also like to provide you 

with a brief overview of the credit conditions in our local service 

area and then touch on a couple of areas that are important to the 

Farm Credit System to carry out its mission nationwide. 

Greenstone Farm Credit Services is the largest agricultural lender throughout the State of Michigan and Northeast Wisconsin. We 

are a financial service cooperative, which means our stockholders 

47 

are the more than 21,000 farmers and rural residents that do business with us. In fact, Greenstone distributed 20 percent of its 2010 

earnings to its members in patronage refunds, bringing our fiveyear total to just over $85 million. 

Greenstone is part of the National Farm Credit System, which 

was established by Congress in 1916 as a means to provide farmers 

and ranchers with a stable and secure source of credit. Some 95 

years later, Greenstone is a $5.6 billion financial institution, placing it seventh in the nation in terms of asset size among the 86 

Farm Credit Associations, with a market share of 65 percent of the 

agricultural debt when compared to selected commercial banks active in agricultural lending within our territory. We are 

headquartered right here in East Lansing, Michigan, and have 

more than 450 employees working out of 37 locations throughout 

our service area. 

Turning to credit conditions, the growing season in our territory 

was good to excellent in 2010 for row crops and below average for 

the apple and cherry industries, which were adversely impacted by 

an early frost, which contributed reduced yields of approximately 

50 percent over the 2009 levels. Crop insurance minimized the financial impact for the apple industry. However, the cherry industry did not fare as well, as it continues to work with excess inventory carryover that is keeping prices low. 

Grain commodity prices started the year at moderate levels. Favorable growing conditions deteriorated in the Midwest during July 

with excess levels of moisture in the Corn Belt, similar probably a 

little bit what we are experiencing this year. There was also an increase in export levels due to the drought in Eastern Europe later 

in the year. The industry went from expectations of losing money 

to near record profits as expectations of ending stock levels shrank. 

As a result, grain prices have risen steadily. 

Input costs for seed, fuel, fertilizer have also increased significantly and we are seeing an upward pressure on land rents as a 

result of the current price environment. Even with these increases 

in input prices, the opportunity for solid profit margins still exist 

in 2011 for grain and crop producers in general, and again, that is 

assuming that we are still able to get average yields despite this 

very late start in planting. 

Turning to dairies, Midwest dairies returned to profitable levels 

in 2010 after losing money in 2009. The run-up in feed prices that 

started in August of last year will place significant pressure on 

margins in 2011. This increase in costs should first be felt in the 

Western U.S., where the majority of operations purchase their feed. 

Dairies in Michigan enjoyed a good to record feed harvest in 2010. 

Most operations have large high-quality forage inventories to work 

with in 2011, and improved milk prices and relatively lower feed 

costs in 2010 provided the opportunity for many of our operations 

to recover most of their 2009 operating losses. 

The slow recovery of the general economy continues to negatively 

impact timber, greenhouse and nursery operations. Several timber 

and greenhouse assets in our portfolio were downgraded to an adverse asset classification during the year and are not expected to 

improve significantly until the housing sector also improves. 

48 

The 2011 outlook for the protein sector is for reduced earnings. 

Feed costs will likely eat into available margins and have the potential to send several industries into the negative earnings range. 

Current 2011 CME Class 3 milk prices are above 2010 levels, 

which should hopefully allow our Midwest dairies to maintain 

break-even or better margins. 

Interest rates continue to be at or near record low levels, which, 

when coupled with relatively high margins for most feed grains, 

can, and it is, leading to rapidly increasing farm land values in several parts of the country. Fortunately, we have experienced only 

moderate land value increases in Michigan to date, which should 

help mitigate our impact of any significant decline in crop prices 

on our customers’ ability to service their debt. As an agricultural 

lender, we are very sensitive to escalating land values and continue 

to follow sound underwriting standards when extending credit to 

the industry. 

Some of the farm bill issues I wanted to touch on, at Farm Credit, we continue to utilize our available authority and program resources that permit us to make credit available to the broadest 

group of producers. The Guaranteed Loan Programs of the Farm 

Services Agency help us work with farmers that may not be as 

sound financially or that present a greater risk than for some other 

reason compared to other customers. We urge you to review these 

programs to ensure that they reflect the needs of today’s farmers. 

It is essential that the caps on loan size be allowed to increase 

to reflect continued inflation of land values and the cost of production. Farmers must be able to obtain sufficient financing for them 

to have a viable sized farm operation. 

And before I conclude my testimony, I would also like to bring 

to your attention an issue that will have an impact on small rural 

financial institutions that make up the Farm Credit System and 

our ability to continue helping agriculture and rural development 

grow. As you know, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission 

is proposing a rule requiring the mandatory clearing of swaps. 

While appropriate for large commercial banks, this rule will have 

an unintended negative impact on small rural lenders. We have relayed our concerns to CFTC Commissioner Gary Gensler and would 

like to briefly state our main arguments for requesting exemption 

from mandatory clearing of swaps. 

First, the Farm Credit financial institutions like Greenstone 

have a proven record of being competitive, dependable, and responsible sources of credit for Michigan agricultural producers. The 

Farm Credit System is not interconnected to the banking industry. 

It has not had nor is it at risk of a credit crisis. Farm Credit banks 

within the Farm Credit System serve as a pass-through for their 

member associations, which individually have assets less than $10 

billion, meaning they should be given the same exemptions as 

many other small financial institutions and commercial end users. 

Madam Chairman and Ranking Member Roberts, I want to 

thank you again for inviting me to participate in today’s hearing 

and look forward to assisting you and your staff in any way we can 

as Congress begins the process of rewriting the 2008 farm bill. 

Thank you. 

49 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Armstrong can be found on page 

58 in the appendix.] 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Thank you very much. 

I should mention that we will be holding our second oversight 

hearing of the CFTC in June. We continue to raise a number of 

questions and bring the issues that you are talking about and others to the CFTC, and we will continue to be actively involved with 

them, both the committee and the staff, as well, so thank you. 

In our last few minutes, I am going to quickly move through 

some things, see how much we can cover. But let me ask, Mr. Armstrong, as we look at cropland values increasing, and increasing 

significantly, and then we think back to the previous panel with 

Ben LaCross talking about beginning farmers and our young people getting into—or older people getting into farming for the first 

time, what is your experience in lending to beginning farmers? 

Have you set any goals for attracting young farmers into agriculture? And of the benchmarks that you have used in that area, 

what is the most difficult to meet as we look at making sure that 

there is credit available? 

Mr. ARMSTRONG. Well, as you know, Senator, being a member of 

the National Farm Credit System, we are mandated to make sure 

that we have programs in place to finance young beginning and 

small farmers, and Greenstone, I am very pleased to report, is in 

full compliance with those standards and, in fact, we exceed many 

of our peers around the country in terms of the percentage of 

small, young, and beginning farmers that we do serve. 

We have a number of different programs that we can use for particularly young farmers who want to get started, where we will use 

reduced underwriting standards in some cases with some offsetting 

risk mitigators, like a USDA guarantee. We may require some crop 

insurance. There are some areas where we would want them to 

have a well proven financial recordkeeping system, a marketing 

plan. 

And unfortunately, sometimes, most—many—I should not say 

most—many young producers want to get out there and farm. That 

part of the business, they do not really enjoy and would like to 

defer. And so it is sometimes a challenge in getting them to work 

through those pieces of their plan before they just jump on the 

tractor and farm, and that is probably one of the biggest challenges 

for us. 

The other one is probably just upright having equity, having 

enough equity that they are not financing 100 percent of their entire operation. 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Great. Thanks very much. 

I want to ask Ms. Serfass and Mr. Reid both questions in terms 

of conservation and managing risk. When we look at managing 

whatever the risk it is, whether input costs, pests, diseases, and so 

on, could both of you talk about the conservation programs and 

how they assist you as it relates to managing risk and remaining 

competitive? Ms. Serfass? 

Ms. SERFASS. Oh, remaining competitive—our Forest Stewardship Program really helps tremendously. If we did not have that 

plan—which my husband and I had no clue how to manage our 

property when we first bought it. We just thought we just wanted 

50 

a nice place to get away from retail and people and traffic and had 

no clue at all what we were getting into. We just—so with my husband’s curiosity—he is always, if you get into anything, he is question, question, question, which is fantastic, really—he contacted the 

DNR and they helped us get started. He told us we should have 

the Forest Stewardship Plan. He told us about the Forest Association and tree farms and all the different programs that were out 

there to help us manage this property. 

If it was not for this contact—at that time, we had seven Service 

foresters throughout the State, and Michigan is a pretty darn big 

State. Now, we only have three, and most of the conservation districts have lost their foresters, and these people help beginning 

wood lot owners and other even agriculture owners—it is not just 

forestry— on how to take care of their property and the best way 

to handle it. 

I am not sure if I answered your question completely—— 

Chairwoman STABENOW. And just one quick follow-up to that, because, I mean, you were curious. You reached out. And you were 

saying in your testimony, only about three percent of our family 

forest owners are actually engaged and actually have a Forest 

Management Plan. What can we do to do better outreach so that 

there are more folks that are coming into the programs? 

Ms. SERFASS. I kind of always thought, if we could get the real 

estate people who sell these blocks of land to let people know that 

there are programs out there and organizations out there to help 

them learn how to manage their property so that it stays healthy. 

If you do sustainable management, you have the healthier forests, 

you are going to help the environment much better. You take out 

the trees that are in poor condition and susceptible to disease and 

make room for the stronger trees to have a better forest for the 

wildlife and for the environment. 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Great. Well, thank you very much. 

And Mr. Reid, if you could talk more about managing risk and 

being competitive. You are obviously an example of someone who 

has been very involved in focusing on environmental protection. I 

am sure it is not easy to be certified in all three areas of the Michigan Agriculture Environmental Assurance Program, and congratulations on receiving the recognitions that you have. But speak 

about conservation programs a little bit more. 

Mr. REID. Well, the MAEAP program goes a long way as far as 

keeping your risk at a minimum. In order to achieve MAEAP 

verification, EQIP plays an important role in that. EQIP will allow 

the farmers to help finance those practices that help take control 

of those risks. A livestock farmer, such as myself, creating or building a manure storage facility, for example, is very expensive. The 

other practices that go along with it, collecting the dirty water, as 

we call it, and making sure it does not impact the environment, collecting it into the storage facility and then using those nutrients 

in place of commercial fertilizer, for example, it is a big savings to 

us. I think those two programs coupled together do a lot to minimize our risk. 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Great. Thank you. 

And then finally, and then I will turn it over to Senator Roberts, 

Ms. Holt, could you talk more about the challenges and opportuniVerDate Nov 24 2008 00:52 Mar 27, 2012 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00054 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\71628.TXT MICHA
51 

ties of farmers who are converting to organic production and what 

sort of tools are most valuable to them in converting? What are the 

obstacles to our farmers that wish to convert to organic farming? 

Ms. HOLT. Well, I think the most important thing is maintaining 

the integrity of the USDA Organic Label. It is a pretty small funding amount for the NOP program, but it is critical to make sure 

that there is going to be an ongoing market for the organic products. They are going through a lot of work. They have to be certified organic, unlike anyone else who is selling their products. And 

so if they are going through all of that, that label needs to mean 

something to the U.S. consumer. So that is the most important 

thing. 

Then just from a funding standpoint, the Cost-Share Program has really helped to offset costs. It is only giving $750 per farmer, 

but that is something and it does make a difference to help offset 

that certification cost that another farmer does not need to go 

through. 

And then EQIP, we have talked a lot about that, but those programs, as well, will help with the conversion by providing some 

funding to help that farmer make that conversion, and it does take 

three years to convert the land over to organic production, and so 

during that time, they are doing the work and basically farming organic, but they are not able to sell the product as organic, so it does 

help offset some of those costs. 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Great. Thanks very much. 

Senator ROBERTS. Senator ROBERTS. I will try it in reverse order. Mr. Armstrong, 

did you ever hear back from Gary Gensler about your recommendations on CFTC and the rulemaking? 

Mr. ARMSTRONG. No, sir, not to my knowledge. 

Senator ROBERTS. Remind me again, this was not just your letter, but it was a consortium kind of letter in response to the rulemaking that CFTC has proposed, is that correct? 

Mr. ARMSTRONG. Correct. 

Senator ROBERTS. When did you send it in? 

Mr. ARMSTRONG. There were letters that were sent in earlier this 

spring on behalf of the National Farm Credit Council—— 

Senator ROBERTS. What happened to those letters? Do you know? 

Mr. ARMSTRONG. Well, I assume that Mr. Gensler received those 

letters as well as others on the CFTC Board, and to my knowledge, 

we have not heard a formal response yet. 

Senator ROBERTS. I mean, have they even acknowledged that 

they received them? 

Mr. ARMSTRONG. I would have to check with our national office. 

Senator ROBERTS. Well, I had an interesting talk with Gary 

Gensler. I made a speech on the floor where I mispronounced his 

name and—— 

Chairwoman STABENOW. That did not help. 

Senator ROBERTS. No, it did not help at all. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator ROBERTS. He expressed his desire that it was a crucial 

need that CFTC needs somewhere between 200 to 300 more lawyers—— 

[Laughter.] 

52 

Senator ROBERTS. and that did not go down very well. At any 

rate—with parking spaces. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator ROBERTS. That means they stay there. That is the problem. 

All right. On page three, you are talking about a moderate increase in land values. Tom Hoenig used to be our Kansas City Fed 

Chairman, the only guy who testified before the Fed to quit using 

the Fed’s money to try to keep pace with the economy, a lone dissenter. He is a little worried that we might see a repeat of the 

1980s, and Lord knows you went through that. A lot of that depends on the weather, just all sorts of things, all of the variables. 

What do you see out there? You say it is moderate. Where are we 

going? 

Mr. ARMSTRONG. In Michigan, and this is not to be an evasive 

answer, but talking to one of our chief appraisers recently, I asked 

him the same question about values in the State, and he said, 

‘‘Dave, it is zero to 25 percent in Michigan.’’ We have areas of this 

State where we have less productive soils. We have areas that are 

closer to the urban populations of this State, where development 

pressures have all but evaporated. So poor soil, smaller size parcels, and those parcels close to urban areas, we have seen very little in terms of escalating land values. In the very strong ag areas 

of this State where we have highly productive soils, large tracts, 

highly competitive neighborhoods, that is where we are seeing 

some of the 25 percent increases. 

And so when you kind of average that out across Michigan because of the diversity that we have, in general, we would say land 

values overall are more moderate. If we were in the middle of your 

Fed district, they probably would be north of moderate, certainly. 

Senator ROBERTS. Mr. Reid, you installed those solar panels and 

figured out that without the REAP program, that they would have 

paid off in 28 years, $5,000 a year, I think, as I recall. But with 

the REAP program, you were able to make that work in four years’ 

time, is that correct? 

Mr. REID. That is correct. 

Senator ROBERTS. All right. Do you think we will ever see a day 

when the solar energy program can stand on its own two feet? Do 

not misunderstand me, I am not criticizing the program. I hear 

that a lot. 

Mr. REID. Well, I think the cost of these panels will probably go 

down as more of them are produced. 

Senator ROBERTS. Sure. 

Mr. REID. I would assume that is going to happen. And I think 

the cost of electricity that you and I pay for every month is probably going to increase. So between those two factors, we will probably see some improvement in the cost, in the initial cost of that 

program. Other than that, I cannot give you a foreseeable answer—— 

Senator ROBERTS. Well, it is a hard thing to figure—— 

Mr. REID. Yes. 

Senator ROBERTS. —and I am not asking you to do that. But 

down the road, that would be the hope, of course—— 

Mr. REID. Yes. 

53 

Senator ROBERTS. —if, in fact, that would take off. The same 

thing with wind power. The President says we can do this in 2012, 

upwards of ten percent. Do you think we can make that? 

Mr. REID. It is going to be tough. I actually think that maybe on 

a more residential usage of this, I think that is where you are 

going to see the growth. These panels can be put on, they can be 

mounted on roofs of houses, for example. They have to be on a 

north-south orientation, I guess, or they can be ground mounted. 

There are several alternatives. But they can—I think they can—I 

think I see more use in the residential field, at least on a widespread basis. 

Senator ROBERTS. I appreciate that. Thank you very much. 

Mr. West, welcome to Garden City, as in August when you have 

the family reunion. That is in Kansas, by the way, folks. His wife 

is from Kansas, and so he grabbed one of our sunflowers and 

brought her up here. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator ROBERTS. You mentioned the five Cs in regards to capital resources investment, or whether you are talking to your 

friendly hometown banker or whatever lending institution, and the 

one that really stood out, you indicated, was character, especially, 

and we talked about young farmers and the Chairwoman talked 

about that. How does a banker evaluate character, especially what 

we have been through in regards to who got loans and who was 

able to pay them back and et cetera, et cetera, with Freddie and 

Fannie and so on and so forth? And what is your experience with 

that? I mean, how did—— 

Mr. WEST. Well, as an alternative lender, character matters a 

great deal to us. So partially, what we will do, since we are doing 

so many start-ups, is we will go through a series of asking a business person to do more research to help us understand where they 

are trying to go. And as they go and perform more research, it is 

a great indicator of their commitment, and largely that is what we 

are investing on, is their character and their commitment. 

Senator ROBERTS. So it is what Mr. Armstrong indicated when 

a farmer wants to hop on the tractor and go farm as opposed to 

sitting down and saying, okay, what is your plan? What is your financial plan? Where are you in five years, et cetera, et cetera? 

Mr. WEST. Well, we look at all the same things. 

Senator ROBERTS. Right. 

Mr. WEST. It is just that as an alternative lender, we are going 

to do the loans the banks cannot do, should not do, or will not do. 

Senator ROBERTS. All right. 

Mr. WEST. And as such, that means that almost anything we are 

going to get into has either had a credit blemish— often, those 

credit blemishes were because of health issues, they have had a collateral challenge that they cannot overcome with respect to the 

bank, or there is not enough equity initially to get started. So those 

are the gaps that we try to fill. So it is incumbent upon us to really 

understand character and really get focused on—— 

Senator ROBERTS. Well, thank you for your efforts. I know that 

is a difficult job. 

54 

Mr. Davis, what can we do to get more folks in the private sector 

to invest in the Double Up Food Bucks Program in regards to 

SNAP folks? 

Mr. DAVIS. Well, I would say that it can be seen as an economic 

generator. If we are able to convince businesses that by providing 

more buying power, spending power, by some of our citizens that 

have less resources, then that would really create an economic impact—— 

Senator ROBERTS. Do you have an outreach program with Chambers of Commerce and other business groups or other civic groups, 

et cetera, et cetera, to step up to this? 

Mr. DAVIS. Well, the United Way does not per se. We were a contributor to the Double Up Food Bucks. That was really being driven by the Fair Food Network, and I know that Oran Hesterman, 

the Chair of the Fair Food Network, has done a really good job of 

encouraging buy-in from local businesses and other advocates 

around—— 

Senator ROBERTS. The SNAP Program is going to have to stretch 

that dollar a little bit more. We had the same program in Kansas 

with the farmers’ markets. So I wish you well and I hope that you 

can get a good outreach program to have more success. 

Mr. DAVIS. Thank you. 

Senator ROBERTS. Flipping very quickly here, Ms. Holt, Secretary 

Vilsack just last week, I think, testifying before our committee, 

cautioned against us being too prescriptive with programs, more especially with organic, and said perhaps there are other programs 

available at the Department, particularly in the area of research 

and conservation, for which organic growers can utilize in similar 

fashion. That is just a statement by the Secretary. Do you have any 

comments? 

Ms. HOLT. I just—that because of the regulatory oversight that 

exists with the organic program, it is necessary to make sure that 

that funding is there so that they can do the job that they need 

to do. So that is a specific program. Certainly, organic can take advantage of some of the other programs within the farm bill, but the 

National Organic Program does need its own funding—— 

Senator ROBERTS. I sure would like to have a nice visit with you, 

because I went through that controversy on what is organic and 

what is not. Dan Glickman from Kansas was Secretary. He says it 

is one of the worst times he ever had, trying to figure out from organic producers what is organic, what is not, and the label and all 

of that, and I know that is always a chore for you, but just let me 

indicate my interest in that and the Chairwoman in that. 

Let me see, here. How are you getting along with those wolves 

out there, Ms. Serfass? 

Ms. SERFASS. Directly on our property, we have not had too 

many wolves. I did see one, oh, within a mile of our property, but 

we just had a nice little stare-down and he went his way and I 

went my way. And I was in the car, thank heavens. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator ROBERTS. Right. So you are not in the wolf- raising business—— 

Ms. SERFASS. No. 

55 

Senator ROBERTS. All right. Okay. EPA regulatory action as it relates to clean water permits—since the 1970s, EPA regulations 

have interpreted the Clean Water Act to define most forest management activities as non-point sources, therefore not requiring 

NPDES permits, long permit. If EPA advances this regulatory action, this is proposed and will no longer consider forest management as a non-point source. How would this new permit requirement affect the way you and other private forest land owners manage your land? What costs would be associated? What challenges 

will you face in the future, none of which are good? 

Ms. SERFASS. I am not exactly sure what that whole permit is 

all about—— 

Senator ROBERTS. That is the point. 

[Laughter.] 

Ms. SERFASS. I do not know—— 

Senator ROBERTS. Welcome to the world of Washington regulatory nonsense. I mean, you are going to wake up to it on a Thursday morning, when all of a sudden you are going to get something 

in the mail. 

Ms. SERFASS. I do know that the last time we had a logging, they 

were talking about that each time they are going to a different 

property, they are to make sure that their equipment has been totally cleaned down, because we have been having problems with 

garlic mustard being spread very easily—— 

Senator ROBERTS. Right. 

Ms. SERFASS. —and other invasives—— 

Senator ROBERTS. I am not sure that is EPA, as opposed to the 

State—— 

Ms. SERFASS. I am not sure of this, either—— 

Senator ROBERTS. —but this permit, I want to get at this permit. 

I want you to get educated and I want you to get involved with 

whatever associations you have to weigh in on this because that is 

another thing we do not need, big time. And I appreciate your saving your aspens. I love aspens. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator ROBERTS. You must have a beautiful place. 

Ms. SERFASS. Thank you. 

Senator ROBERTS. You went on that property to make a home, 

and you not only made a home, but you contacted your forester and 

so on and so forth. I was a little struck that only 13 percent of the 

people that have forest ground are into that program, know anything about it, really, in Michigan. I do not know what it is nationwide. But thank you, and thank you for your example. I think it 

is wonderful. 

Ms. SERFASS. Thank you. 

Senator ROBERTS. I appreciate it, Madam Chairwoman. 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Thank you very much. 

Well, we have come to the end of our time for the hearing. I am 

going to ask each of you to follow up—I will not ask you the question today, but as we look at various programs, various efforts, one 

question I have is how can we do a better job or help you do a better job working across the lines or reducing the lines between various parts of the farm bill. I know there are areas where definitions 

are different as to what is rural. I mean, how do we streamline 

56 

those things? How can we create more flexibility so that you have 

the opportunity to meet your goals and do the best job that you 

can, and that is part of what we are going to be doing in this farm 

bill, is focusing on how to streamline, how to take away the paperwork that Senator Roberts is talking about, how to streamline, how 

to be able to create more flexibility when it is appropriate and be 

able to work across lines so that we are growing those fruits and 

vegetables and making those available, Mr. Davis, and being able 

to do the kinds of things that we can do by working with all parts 

of agriculture. So we are going to ask for your input as we go along 

to be able to do that. 

We have had a really terrific opportunity today. I want to thank 

all of your for your input. And I want to thank not only Michigan 

State, as always, but I want to thank our staff, as well, who have 

done a terrific job. A lot of work goes into putting this together, 

and Chris O’Donnell [phonetic], my Director of our staff, and Mike 

Seaford [phonetic], who is on Senator Roberts’ staff, as well, I know 

you join me in thanking both of them. 

For purposes of everyone in Michigan, I just want to make sure 

that you know on our staff who is here. Jonathan Coppis [phonetic] 

is here, who has done a lot of our work on Title 1, the commodities, 

and all the budget. It is your fault, Jonathan and Chris, on the 

budget here, making this all add up. Joe Schultz [phonetic]—where 

is Joe—also working on those issues, as well. Tina May [phonetic], 

who is working on conservation and a number of other issues. Jacqueline Snyder [phonetic], who is our specialty crop person, as well 

as nutrition and so on. And Kelly Fox [phonetic] from our Michigan 

local regional manager. I do not know if Mary is here, as well. We 

have got our other regional folks here, as well. So we want to 

thank everyone that is involved in putting this together. It takes 

a lot of hard work to put together a field hearing like this and we 

appreciate all the staff’s response. 

This is field hearing one. We have more to do. We are in a process that will take the rest of the year and into next year as we go 

through, both in D.C. and around the country, and for me, around 

Michigan. We will be doing a number of sessions, continuing to sit 

down with community leaders and local growers and so on around 

the State. But this all adds up to giving us the information we 

need and the input we need so that as we sit down next year to 

put together the farm bill, we have got the very best input possible 

and the very best ideas. 

So thank you very much for coming. Thank you to our wonderful 

panel here. 

[Applause.] 

Chairwoman STABENOW. Thank you. We are officially adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 12:12 p.m., the committee was adjourned.] 

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