Date: 1989-05-03
Speaker: DE LA GARZA (democrat)
Chamber: H

Mr. Chairman. I rise to discuss briefly the impact of the budget on agriculture and the Jurisdiction that we have in our committee. First. let me say that we commend the gentleman from California and the gentleman from Minnesota and the members of the committee. I know there are arguments pro and con here. but I am satisfied that they did their best within the availability of the resources that they have. within the rules. and for that they are to be commended. and I most sincerely do SO. First. let me say that we were somewhat dissatisfied with a kinder. gentler administration that targeted Its budget cuts to an already overburdened agriculture. The percentage of agriculture spending. my dear friends. in the total trillion dollar budget is slightly over 4 percent. But yet we were initially burdened with 16 percent of the cuts. I have some budget charts that I would like to share with you. This. my dear friends. the top part is the budget and the little tiny part at the bottom is all that is spent for agriculture. Now let me say that in the past 8 years we have reduced spending in the agricultural sector for farm supports. et cetera. about $30 billion. We have been responsible. Led by the distinguished chairman of the Budget Committee. the gentleman from California . who has worked with us and continues to work with us as a member of the Agriculture Committee. we have met our part of the reduction in the budget. over $30 billion since 1981. Now whether it was real cuts or whether it was paper reductions. I do not know. We did not set up the accounting system. We did not set up the rules. but we met the number that they allocated to us. Now. $2.4 billion is what was allocated to us here in this budget which includes accounting changes in the food stamp program. $1.9 billion of that come out of traditional agriculture programs under the Jurisdiction that we deal with. $850 million is because of transfer of deficiency payments from 1 fiscal year to another fiscal year. $420 million is the socalled Bumpers- amendment that we will recoup by repealing that amendment. And then $600 million is left for us to go find and make the reductions. I might add. though. that under the $5.7 billion of Federal asset sales. agriculture will have a share of that. And on receipts from user fees. agriculture will also have a share of that. I am here to tell you that we will do the utmost that we can to try to meet that $600 million. I do not know if we can or not. but we will do the best we can. I commit myself and our committee to that. But again. let me remind my colleagues that we are the best fed people in the world. and for the least amount of disposable income per family of the major Industrialized countries of the world. Here you see the blue lines that are the major budget functions. At the end here. you see you have already spent 94 percent of the Federal budget when you get to the agriculture function. That is us at the very end. There is this misconception. or perhaps ignorance. that we read in the editorials in many of the prominent periodicals. of the high cost and impact agriculture has on the budget. My friends. here it is. The total trillion dollar budget. For farm supports. can you see the little line at the bottom? That is what we spent. That is 1.15 percent. That is what we have spent on agriculture out of the trillion dollar budget. They stumble over more money than that in 1 week at the Pentagon. That is what we spend. So hopefully. you see we are not happy with what the administration recommended. We do compliment the committee for doing the best that they could. As we have done for the past 8 years. agriculture will be there to do its part to meet our budget reduction goals. We will be responsible. I do not know if we can get your $600 million target. I will say to the gentleman from California . we are going to try our darndest.