Kent Conrad: “I'm pleased to be a cosponsor of the amendment offered by the Senator from Montana to provide disaster assistance to…”

“I'm pleased to be a cosponsor of the amendment offered by the Senator from Montana to provide disaster assistance to those farmers and ranchers who suffered crop or livestock-related losses in calendar year 2001. American agriculture is beginning its fifth straight year of rock bottom prices. For those farmers lucky enough to raise a decent crop, the only thing that's been keeping them in business is the supplemental relief that Congress has provided in each of the past four years. Last month, the Department of Agriculture confirmed that net farm income will fall by 20 percent this year, to $40.6 billion, unless Congress responds with improved farm policy. As bad as this situation is, however, the blow is doubly hard for producers whose crops have been ravaged by drought, excess moisture, or some other natural calamity. These producers have little to fall back on, they cannot hope to make up in volume what they are losing under Depression-era prices. In North Dakota, the brutal reality of today's farm economics leaves little margin for either error or misfortune, and for many of those producers suffering natural disaster losses, their luck has run out. That is why Congress must respond.”