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President Bush was wrong to recently veto the new farm bill, and I am pleased Congress voted to override that veto.  This bill - a product three years in the making that also passed by unprecedented margins - is extremely important to both rural and urban areas of Georgia.

 

In crafting the bill, members of both the Senate and House Agriculture committees traveled the country hosting forums to hear from Americans who are affected by this legislation, ranging from farmers to food stamp recipients to food bank programs, on how to make agriculture programs better.

 

Our goal was to take the most successful components of the 2002 farm bill and incorporate input we received to improve current law, and we did just that. The new farm bill strengthens our nation's food security, protects the livelihood of our producers and provides investments in nutrition assistance programs, conservation and renewable energy.

 

Every Georgian knows how important the agriculture industry is to our economy, with one in six jobs in Georgia agriculture related, and provisions in this new farm bill will allow us to grow even more. In 2006, the food and fiber industry generated a total economic impact of $55.2 billion for the state of Georgia. This farm bill, which I co-authored, will invest nearly $286 billion in programs that will greatly benefit people all across the state.

 

The new farm bill provides an additional $10.3 billion in nutrition assistance programs that will channel additional federal resources into the Georgia economy. For example, Georgia is among the top 10 states for issuance of federal food stamp benefits and over $1.12 billion was pumped into our state's economy last year. In addition, every five dollars of federal food stamp benefits generates $9.20 in local economic activity, benefiting low-income families, farmers, grocers and small businesses.

 

Critics will be hard-pressed to claim that this farm bill does not contain real reforms in payments to farmers - because it does. We are not guaranteeing farmers any kind of profit. We developed a very market-oriented process so that our farmers and ranchers can achieve their income stream from the marketplace and not from Washington. That is what they want, and that is what we as policymakers want.

 

The majority of the bill includes programs to feed the hungry and improve the nutrition of Americans. The bill is mostly about non-farming issues such as reforming the Endangered Species Act, providing tax credits to preserve rural lands, and support for our nation's school lunch programs. There is no question we crafted a bipartisan and fiscally responsible farm bill that moves in the direction of what the Bush administration requested.

 

At the very core, the farm bill provides a strong safety net for our producers, improves our nutrition assistance programs, encourages good land stewardship and provides incentives for renewable energy and research. It is a good bill for Georgia, and Congress was right to override the president's veto.