U. S. Congresswoman Terri Sewell, 7th Congressional District, meets with local farmers.

 

Congresswoman Terri Sewell addresses concerns presented by farmers across the 7th Congressional District

 

Special to the Democrat

By John Zippert, Co-Publisher

Last Friday, October 28, 2011, Congresswomen Terri Sewell conducted a day long farm tour crisscrossing her Alabama Black Belt counties to meet with farmers to get their views on the upcoming 2012 Farm Bill legislation.

Sewell is a member of the House Agriculture Committee which is holding hearings now on the content of the 2012 Farm Bill. At all of the stops, Congresswomen Sewell announced that the House Agriculture Committee has been asked by the Congressional Budget Super Committee to reduce expenditures by $23 Billion over the coming five year period of the Farm Bill.

Sewell said, “As a member of the Agriculture Committee, I will be asked to vote on program cuts and changes for nutrition; farmer production, conservation and marketing programs; risk management, disasters and a safety net for farmers; rural development for rural towns and communities and other sections of the bill. I have come to listen and get your opinions and feelings so I will know what to support and how to vote to best help farmers and rural people in the 7th District.”

The first stop on the tour was the conference room of the Dallas County Farmers Cooperative in Selma, where a group of 50 Black farmers were assembled to meet with her to discuss their concerns.

Sewell had assembled a panel of farm specialists with her to help explain and answer questions which included: Doug O’Brien, USDA Undersecretary for Rural Development; John McMillan, Alabama Commissioner of Agriculture; Ron Sparks, Alabama Rural Development Director; Ronnie Davis, State Director of USDA Rural Development; Daniel Robinson, State FSA Director; William Puckett, State NRCS Director; Daniel Robinson, State FSA Director; Dr. Walter Hill, Dean of Agriculture at Tuskegee and John Zippert of the Federation of Southern Cooperatives.

The farmers raised concerns about the availability of funding support for agricultural credit, conservation, irrigation and outreach programs to serve smaller size and minority farmers. Several farmers voiced concerns about assisting young people and other beginning farmers to get into business in a successful and entrepreneurial way.

Dr. Walter Hill and John Zippert mentioned the Black Belt Fruit and Vegetable Marketing and Innovation Center to be built soon near Selma which will open new production and marketing opportunities for family size farmers in the Black Belt area.

Several Black farmers expressed concerns about the long delayed settlement of the Pigford II class action lawsuit by Black farmers claiming  discrimination in lending and farm programs by USDA. Senator Hank Sanders, one of the lead class counsels in the case announced that the Federal judge had just approved the settlement in the case (see story in Newswire section) and that the 180 day claims period would begin on November 14, 2011.

Next stop on the trip was a visit to the Pearce Catfish Farm in Marion Junction. While at the farm the group was able to view a demonstration of raising catfish in cages which increases production and feed conversion. Since the fish are raised in a more confined area, the wastes produced are conducted to indoor pens where talapia are being raised and the waste water from the talapia is being used to raise lettuce and tomatoes in adjoining greenhouses before the water is returned to the catfish ponds. The farm also has over 400 acres of conventional catfish ponds.

From the farm, the group went to the Alabama Catfish Feed Mill in Uniontown for a luncheon of fried and broiled catfish and a listening session with catfish farmers. These farmers were concerned about ethanol subsidies which have pushed up feed costs, the withdrawal of farmland into the USDA Conservation Reserve Program, labor availability due to the new Alabama immigration law and the unfair competition from foreign fish imports. These farmers were also concerned about programs to pass their farms to a succeeding generation of younger people. Sewell listened carefully to the farmers and ways to improve the Farm Bill to serve them.

The tour concluded with a visit to George Hall’s Farm in Greene County where he was making syrup from cane sugar. Hall an African-American farmer, who was a named plaintiff in the original Pigford lawsuit and used the proceeds from the settlement to develop his syrup mill and other enterprises. Sewell addressed the farmers about the Farm Bill issues and agricultural policy. She also listened to more comments from the Greene and Sumter county farmers at the Hall farm.

Congresswoman Sewell and her staff invited farmers to write or e-mail her with more comments and suggestions on the Farm Bill at her Washington, D. C. or district offices.