Peterson holds press conference to address President’s budget cuts to agriculture

Washington, DC - Flanked by 17 of his colleagues, Congressman Collin Peterson (D-MN), the House Agriculture Committee’s new Ranking Democrat, held a press conference in the U.S. Capitol Building to address the cuts facing U.S. production agriculture in the President’s recently released budget for fiscal year 2006.

“The President’s budget priorities just don’t make a lot of sense,” Peterson said. “He should have given us an honest budget plan that addresses our nation’s fiscal crisis and supports successful programs like our farm bill.

All 21 Democrats on the House Agriculture Committee signed on to a “Contract with Agriculture,” that reaffirmed Congress’ support of the 2002 Farm Bill and pledged opposition to the President’s proposed cuts to agriculture.

“In the 2002 Farm bill, we made a commitment to restore the farm safety net and ensure that producers and their bankers would know what to expect from the government for the next 5 years,” Peterson said. “This “counter-cyclical” safety net has worked, delivering payments to producers only whenever the price for a commodity is less than the target price. The 2002 Farm Bill is working and we have spent $15 billion less than what we allocated when the farm bill passed.

“The President knows that farm program spending accounts for less than one-half of one percent of the federal budget and that even if these programs were eliminated completely the savings would not put even a small dent in the deficit budget. But even though he knows that, the President is proposing cuts could directly hurt our farmers and send a damaging ripple effect through rural economies.”

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