Reps. Cheri Bustos and Austin Scott
Sep 27, 2021
WASHINGTON, DC -- Last week, USA Rice Farmers Chair Kirk Satterfield presented to the House Agriculture General Farm Commodities and Risk Management Subcommittee at the invitation of Subcommittee Chair Cheri Bustos (D-IL) and Ranking Member Austin Scott (R-GA).
Producers were invited to update and discuss the effectiveness of current Farm Bill commodity support and crop insurance as well as the economic and growing conditions on the ground.
In his remarks, Satterfield, a rice farmer from Benoit, Mississippi, focused on the importance of the Price Loss Coverage (PLC) program to rice farmers, and how weather events and loss in domestic and export markets make risk management programs more important than ever to rice. Combined with flat rice prices over the past several years, Satterfield questioned whether or not the current reference price will provide adequate support to rice producers as input costs continue to rise.
"While PLC has helped us survive some difficult years, we believe that at the current reference price level, rice farmers will soon be in the red," Satterfield said. "Therefore, when considering the next Farm Bill, we urge the committee to bolster this support to provide the level of certainty farmers need in today’s markets."