Rep. Delgado Urges House Agriculture Committee to Support Small Farmers in Federal Policy

Chairman Peterson and ranking member Conway for the opportunity to join you this morning. I'm pleased to be here on behalf of the nearly 5000 small farms in over eight thousand farm operators in my district 90 - six percent of which are family farms. We do not have big corporate farms back home in upstate New York which makes things challenging given how much our federal policy is geared towards supporting the large Indeed, Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue has opined that the demise of the small family farm is quote inevitable end quote. I disagree It's a choice. The choice is exactly why I sit with you today this past weekend. I joined the Sahara County Farm Bureau at August Acres Farm where I met with several dairy farm operating farmers operating across the County and they represent generations of family farms and we cannot and will. Choose to leave these folks behind when crafting federal policy supporting our family farmers starts with pushing back against a group thinking supporting economies of scale rather than economies of cooperation economies of cooperation to guide our work to create inclusive policy that helps every farmer get ahead. That means giving small family farmers. the tools to access increase market share supporting the next generation of farmers equipping our farmers to respond to a changing and challenging climb. And crafting legislation to specifically combats monolithic agricultural policy that drowns out the voices of Family-owned farms. a first step to addressing these headwinds facing small farmers includes giving our farmers to increase flexibility to reorganize their finances. To that end. I worked with Chairman Peterson on legislation that will help farmers through this challenging time for agriculture. The Family Farm Relief Act lifts the eligibility cat from Three million to 10 million for Chapter 12 bankruptcy filing. Which allows small farmers to flexibility to reorganize restructure and repay their debt. It passed the House and the Senate earlier this year and was signed by the President in August. This law is not a panacea, but it is certainly one that helps our farmers well. it's important for our farmers to have increased flexibility. I urge the Committee to better tailor our federal policy to support Family-owned farms. This includes removing barriers to success for the next generation of young farmers. I've introduced the bipartisan Young Farmers Success Act, which adds farmers in. To the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program this legislation, which is currently moving as part of the College Affordability Act, will be voted on by the full House soon as we think about the future generations of farmers, we must also consider the significant risk posed by climate change as farmers face unpredictable growing patterns, threats to long-term soil health and more severe extreme weather events. I urge the Committee to support tax credits and incentives for climate friendly practices, including carbon sequestration, Additionally as a Committee. It is our duty to acknowledge the significant headwinds facing dairy producers today, including low prices and increase market consolidation and continue to fight for interests of our small dairy farmers to protect their ability to stay in business. I'm proud to support the bipartisan whole milk for Healthy Kids Act of 2019, which allows schools in the school lunch program to buy flavored unflavored a whole milk for students and the Daily Pride Act, which combats the mislabeling nondairy products are important incremental steps. Bolster support for our small dairy farms, I will continue to push to bring more product from our local farmers into our public schools, hospitals and other more localized institutions as we consider future legislation to support our farmers and specifically considered the plight of small farms. The policies pursued by this Committee should not foster market consolidation, but rather serve as a check against it. Our small farms are also feeling disproportionate impacts from the President's scattershot trade policies now. Is now paying more to help our farmers deal with tariffs. then we did to bail out the auto industry during the Great Recession. more than double the Administration's own attempts to combat these tariffs continue to Advantage Big Act. For example, the environmental working group found that in the administration's first round of trade aid for farmers, more than half of total payments went to the top 10 percent of farmers. In other words, the largest and wealthiest farms in the country. Our policies must be tailored to address urgent needs for small family-owned farmers During this down farm economy, I will close this morning. Once again, highlighting my experiences this weekend with dairy farmers in Scary County, these are the folks we must look out for those who have maintained family farm land for generations. This time on our tradition is crucial to our upstate way of life and we will not allow them just go away. I thank you all again for opportunity to testify and look forward to continuing to working alongside the community support our small farms I yield back.