Thad Cochran: “This is an amendment relating to economic and disaster assistance. To refresh the memory of Senators, this is an…”

“This is an amendment relating to economic and disaster assistance. To refresh the memory of Senators, this is an amendment that seeks to give the Secretary of Agriculture authority and funds with which to deal with the economic crisis that exists in production agriculture today. This is funding for the fiscal year that begins next October 1, so it is not an endeavor to deal with all of the existing problems in agriculture in the current fiscal year, but it is an effort to deal with economic problems during the harvesting and marketing of the 1999 crop throughout the country. There is already in place a $6 billion disaster program that was approved last year that has been administered by the Department.”