The House Agriculture Committee held another field hearing on the 2012 Farm Bill Tuesday—this one took place in Cheyenne, Wyoming.
In his testimony, Roggen, Colorado wheat producer Jerry Cooksey, who is also president of the Colorado Association of Wheat Growers, discussed the Farm Bill safety net, including direct payments and the ACRE program. Cooksey said direct payments are the most reliable safety net mechanism for wheat farmers.
“Twelve percent of the wheat base acres nationwide were enrolled in ACRE, while there was only one percent enrollment in Weld County where I live and farm,” Cooksey said. “This is a very complex program—farmers in eastern Colorado did not see the benefits of ACRE and chose the direct payments.”
And Cooksey pointed out that direct payments are also WTO-compliant, which prompted this response from House Ag Committee ranking member Frank Lucas of Oklahoma. “In a world where we’ve watched the cotton people be taken limb from limb over their program, being WTO-compliant is critically important,” Lucas said.
Farmpolicy.com contributed to this story.
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