Mark Dayton: “this summer farmers in my State of Minnesota suffered one of the worst droughts in the State's history. Throughout the…”

“this summer farmers in my State of Minnesota suffered one of the worst droughts in the State's history. Throughout the critical months of July and August, Minnesota received no rain whatsoever. Those cloudless blue skies with lots of warm sunshine which are considered good summer weather become deadly when it becomes relentless. Ninety-five percent of Minnesota's crop acres suffered some loss as a result, and 62 of our 87 counties were declared by the Secretary of Agriculture to be disaster area counties. Yields, moisture content, and overall quality of crops were all adversely affected by this drought. To add misery to injury, insect infestation attacked thousands of soybean acres in southern Minnesota, further destroying plants, lowering yields, and forcing already hard-pressed growers to spend $10,000, $20,000, or even more to spray their fields in order to fight off total devastation. In total, Minnesota farmers lost more than $1.1 billion in expected crop revenues. That is over 30 percent of our State's total crop revenue. Yet, tragically, another disaster afflicts those unfortunate farmers and thousands of other farmers who suffered similar losses in other States this year. That disaster is that there is no disaster aid funding in the current farm law which was enacted last year. The Senate bill that we passed here provided disaster aid. The House bill did not.”