Adrian Smith: “Thank you. I appreciate the opportunity to be here, and certainly I appreciate my colleague from California talking…”

“Thank you. I appreciate the opportunity to be here, and certainly I appreciate my colleague from California talking about agriculture. And it certainly speaks to the diversity of American agriculture when he listed so many products, and I don't think a single one of those that you listed is actually grown in Nebraska, and obviously we produce a lot of agriculture products in Nebraska, and we know what it's like to even produce more than we consume in our State alone. California might be slightly different, but we know that we've got efficient production all across America. So I want to take just a moment to discuss the impact and benefits of trade agreements to Nebraska and certainly the national economy. As our economy continues to struggle, we should obviously be exploring every avenue to create businesses and create new jobs. Markets around the world present tremendous opportunity because of their size, scope, and rate of growth. And we've heard a lot of numbers tossed around this evening, but we know that beyond the U.S. lies 73 percent of the world's purchasing power, 87 percent of its economic growth, and 95 percent of the world's consumers. While the national economic impact of trade is very important, the increased marketing opportunity for Nebraska is obviously tremendous as well. For Nebraska, this means the three trade agreements will increase exports by more than $123 million per year. That's every year.…”