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Washington DC Office
555 Dirksen Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
Ph: 202.224.6342
Fax: 202.224.1100
North Carolina Offices
Raleigh Office:
310 New Bern Avenue
Suite 122
Raleigh, NC 27601
Ph: 919.856.4630
Fax: 919.856.4053
Salisbury Office:
225 North Main Street
Suite 304
Salisbury, NC 28144
Ph: 704.633.5011
Fax: 704.633.2937
Western Office:
401 North Main Street
Suite 200
Hendersonville, NC 28792
Ph: 828.698.3747
Fax: 828.698.1267
Eastern Office:
306 South Evans Street
Greenville, NC 27835
Ph: 252.329.1093
Fax: 252.329.1097
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Press Office - Floor Statements
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FLOOR STATEMENT ON TOBACCO QUOTA BUYOUT
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October 11th, 2004 - Mr. President, this is a truly historic day! The tobacco quota buyout is a monumental achievement – and I am absolutely delighted for our North Carolina farm families and rural communities and those in other tobacco producing states.
On their behalf, I am deeply grateful. Senator Mitch McConnell has been a stalwart ally, and his leadership was absolutely critical in the Senate. Sometimes it felt like David and Goliath! But persistence pays off!
And thank you to Senate Finance Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley. Chuck was kind enough to let me track him down at Reagan National Airport as he was getting on a plane to
Iowa – to stress the need for this long overdue legislation.
I want to thank my colleague from North Carolina, Congressman Richard Burr. He cleverly laid the ground work that got the buyout into the FSC/ETI bill. It was Richard Burr’s hard work that brought us to the point of success today.
Also, I appreciate so much the efforts of Congressman Mike McIntyre on getting this bill through the House. He has been a real statesman in taking care of the needs of our constituents. And Richard and Mike could not have done it without the blessing of Chairman Bill Thomas and the House Leadership. Let me express my warmest appreciation to all of them.
I also want to thank Senator Jesse Helms. Jesse worked so tirelessly for tobacco farmers and their families for 30 years during his tenure here in the Senate. He said then that achieving a tobacco buyout would be the hardest thing that he had ever tackled in his long career in the U.S. Senate. We are here today because he began laying the groundwork so many years ago.
For his last five years, Jesse’s right hand on tobacco issues was David Rouzer. And David has been my Senior Advisor as we have worked through this buyout. At a young age, David began working on his family’s tobacco farm in Johnston County, North Carolina. He understands the stress that tobacco farmers have been under and he has labored tirelessly to get us to this day.
I made the buyout a top priority when I arrived in the Senate, because our tobacco producing communities have suffered terribly in recent years. The rigid government program created in the 1930’s was not designed for the intense world competition of today. It was not designed to withstand the consequences of the Master Settlement Agreement. In past years, our farmers led the world in tobacco production. Now, they account for only 7% of flue cured tobacco sold worldwide. The time has come to end the last of the depression era farm programs. Our farmers want to operate in a free market!
As the United States market share in tobacco has slipped, the quota system with its price supports kept US producer costs artificially high. These high prices led to tobacco imports from lower cost countries like Brazil and China. Under the current tobacco program formula, the decline in demand for American tobacco produced a cut in quota - - the amount of tobacco a farmer can grow and sell. In just the last five years, tobacco quota has been cut almost 60 percent. That is equivalent to cutting your paycheck by 60 percent.
There isn’t a business in America that wouldn’t take a serious hit with a 60 percent cut in revenue. And according to agricultural economists, these farm families were about to get an additional 33 percent cut in quota for the 2005 crop year.
These cuts have had profound impacts on North Carolina’s tobacco communities. For almost seventy years, U.S. Government-issued tobacco quota was something you could take to the bank – literally. Under permanent law, they could expect a yearly return on investment. Farmers used it as collateral for loans in order to put the next year’s crop in the field. Families handed quota down from generation to generation, and paid the death tax on it, as part of keeping family farms alive. Widows used quota as an investment to supplement their Social
Security.
By buying out these quota holders, we give families the option of retiring with dignity. We give them the ability to pay off the bank for loans made against an ever shrinking collateral. By getting the buyout done before the next quota cut, literally thousands of families in rural North Carolina will be saved from bankruptcy. Rather than having to quit the farm, this buyout gives our farmers the ability to compete in the free market. And if farmers want to continue to grow leaf, they can compete worldwide without the artificial cost increase. Many will also use this opportunity to invest in new equipment and transition to other crops.
This tobacco buyout will help not only the farmers and their families, but their hard-pressed communities. It is the retailers, equipment dealers, chemical and fertilizer dealers and a whole array of small local businesses that will also benefit from the tobacco buyout. These are the very small businesses that create the majority of new jobs in tobacco producing states – jobs that are much needed.
Mr. President, with our action today, we come to the end-of-an-era in tobacco policy. We stop conceding tobacco production to countries like China and Brazil. We stop foreclosures to thousands of farmers. And we stop, the negative economic ripple effect throughout rural southeastern states. For that we can all be proud.
To those who have worked so hard on the tobacco quota buyout, on behalf of the thousands of farm families in North Carolina and throughout the southeast, a heartfelt thank you. What has been accomplished is a legislative miracle, and a monumental achievement. It has been a great privilege to work with you.
Mr. President, I yield the floor.
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| Elizabeth Dole |
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11th - current Floor Statement
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