Inouye slips $25 million into farm bill
By Susan Roth
Advertiser Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON — The Senate version of the farm bill includes $25 million in new agricultural programs for Hawai'i, but it's uncertain whether they will survive the coming contentious House-Senate conference on the 10-year measure.
Senior Hawai'i Sen. Dan Inouye got two amendments added to the $73.5 billion bill last week. One would authorize the U.S. Department of Agriculture to pay as much as $3 million a year for agriculture inspections at Neighbor Island airports from fiscal 2002 to 2006.
The money would relieve the state from its payments of about $2.5 million a year for the federally mandated inspections.
The other amendment authorizes a $10 million technical assistance program for "geographically disadvantaged farmers and ranchers," to provide grants to local groups offering "business ownership education and services" to farmers and ranchers. The provision would also generate a study to identify barriers to efficient transportation of farm products for such farmers and ranchers.
Both amendments would require companion legislation to allow the spending, as the farm bill, officially known as the Agriculture, Conservation and Rural Enhancement Act, only authorizes the programs. Inouye is not a member of the Senate Agriculture Committee, but he is a top member of the Senate Appropriations Committee, which allocates money.
As usual, the carefully written language for the technical assistance program never mentions the state of Hawai'i although the senator acknowledges that he specifically intended it to help farmers and ranchers in Hawai'i, as well as Alaska and the Pacific and Caribbean territories.
These producers "operate at a competitive disadvantage because they are located long distances from markets, and they tend to have fewer transportation alternatives than producers in the contiguous 48 states," Inouye said in a statement.
"With the recent disruption of transportation networks (due to the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks), many of these producers face even further reductions in air freight space availability, longer delays during intensified security inspections and higher shipping rates," the senator said.
He noted that the cost of shipping cattle via ocean freight from Hawai'i to Oakland, Calif., is nearly 29 cents a pound, while trucking cattle the same distance on land costs about 7 cents a pound.
The provision did not escape the notice of Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., who called it "particularly egregious" during a Senate floor debate. Criticizing the process of approving the massive bill, McCain also attacked more than 100 other amendments that he said were added at the last minute.
"How could we ever operate as a Senate if every line, every paragraph, every little item in every bill had to be fully debated and discussed?" responded Iowa Democrat Tom Harkin, chairman of the Senate Agriculture Committee.
Harkin said he had made sure that committee Republicans had no objections to any of the amendments included in the bill.
But the provision flew under the radar of GOP Agriculture Committee staffers, who thought it referred to "very poor farmers who are in most cases minorities or subsistence farmers," according to spokesman Andy Fisher.
"My guess is that it has absolutely no controversy if it's trying to help subsistence farmers," Fisher said. "But if it's really for Hawai'i sugarcane farmers, it wouldn't stand a chance in conference."
Bill Burton, a spokesman for Harkin, said neither Inouye amendment was controversial in the Senate, but he could not predict what would happen in the conference, which is expected to be rocky.
The House and Senate bills are vastly different in emphasis, with the Senate version focusing more on land and energy conservation and rural development. The House bill focuses more on agricultural subsidies, especially for cotton and rice.
The Senate bill would spend $46 billion in the first five years of the 10-year authorization period, while the House version would spend $36 billion.
