template

“I’m from the federal government and I’m here to help you.” Chuckles are expected when you hear that statement, and that is why it did not bother her when chuckles greeted Colleen Callahan, Illinois Director of USDA’s Rural Development Agency. She was addressing about 75 representatives of local governments, non-governmental organizations, and small rural business owners who gathered to learn about funding available from the U.S Department of Agriculture.

Most of the non-farm folks reading this have the perception that USDA stuffs farmers’ mailboxes full of checks everyday. Raise your hand if you think that. Ah, ha, just as I expected. We won’t go into the fact that 60% of the USDA budget is used for food stamps, school lunches, and other nutrition programs. While food and nutrition get the largest slice of the USDA budget and conservation is also high on the list, a significant amount of dollars are also allocated for rural development, which includes economic development opportunities, improving infrastructure, and raising the quality of life of residents of small towns across America.

USDA’s funding this fiscal year was bolstered by federal stimulus money designed to improve the economy beyond Wall Street and mortgage bankers. The presentation by Callahan’s staff laid out many of those programs, only 5% of which are grants, but the bulk are either direct loans or guaranteed loans through commercial lenders. Nationally, the Rural Development offices will have $1.5 billion to help stimulate the Main Street America economy, $45 million of which is earmarked for Illinois business and industry. Community facilities are another eligible category of Rural Development funds, and nearly $6.4 million have been awarded to date in Illinois. The third leg of the stool is water and waste treatment facilities, and $14 million has already come to Illinois.

At the meeting Ed Aukamp, city administrator of Macon introduced himself as a beneficiary of the Rural Development funding. Macon is in the process of obtaining a new water tower, and Aukamp’s calculations indicated that construction costs would inflate faster than the village could build up its savings to pay cash for the water tower. The Rural Development direct loan program means USDA funding will benefit everyone in Macon who turns on the faucet or flushes the toilet.

Some $110,000 USDA dollars have already been approved for the DeWitt County Development Council, whose principals Ruth Stauffer and Ken Bjelland were at the meeting and described how small businesses in DeWitt County to tap into a revolving fund comprised of the USDA money with the requirement that the loan would create additional employment at those businesses. Simple enough.

More complex is a project underway at Auburn, planned by a church in that community, to development land at the junction of Routes 4 and 104, potentially with the Rural Development funds. Being designed, according to financial consultant Larry Perkins of Forsyth, is a day care center, an assisted living senior care center, and what will be, Auburn’s only grocery store.

At the conclusion of the meeting, Callahan repeated her statement that “I’m from the federal government and I’m here to help,” but there were no chuckles in the room. Everyone there could envision the opportunity of obtaining either grants, low interest loans, or guaranteed loans to improve their community. Macon is getting its water tower, and Aukamp is also investigating similar funding for improved storm water drainage and a new fire house. DeWitt County is only awaiting receipt of the USDA funds to jumpstart its hiring program.

Funny, not a single dollar of that USDA money will find its way to a farmer’s mailbox. There is a bit of irony in the tone of those chuckles I hear.

Mother Nature welcomed farmers back to the fields this past week with an Indian Summer invitation to make some progress on harvesting corn and beans. However, with the October monsoons that left grain soaked, molded, and sprouted, corn and beans will require time to dry out. It is not profitable to spend an extra $100 per acre to dry corn that may be sold at barely breakeven prices initially.

Unfortunately the delays caused by the late maturing crop and the extra ten inches of rain are beginning to mount up. And those delays this fall will even create ripples that farmers will feel next spring. In addition to the unbudgeted drying expense, the crop is getting smaller and quality is deteriorating. The October USDA Crop Report forecast a corn crop that would exceed 13 billion bushels. When the November Crop Report is issued on Tuesday, watch for the size to fall below 13 billion bushels and continue to shrink into the final report in early January.

The delays in harvest have resulted in field losses of corn and beans where fungi have attacked the integrity of stalks and molds have expanded within ears of corn and soybean pods. Additionally, those fields that were not mature when cold temperatures brought that process to a halt will result in lower test weights. That means it will take more grain to make a bushel, subsequently, the number of bushels produced this year will decline. North Dakota is not a major corn growing state, but 60% of the crop was immature when the first freeze arrived, and only 2% of that state’s crop has been harvested. And winter is knocking on the Dakota door.

Throughout the Cornbelt, only 35% of the soybeans were harvested at the outset of the week, and that means delays in getting wheat planted. If a field is still full of beans, wheat cannot be planted, and last Monday only 35% of the expected 2010 wheat crop had been planted.

According to federal crop insurance policy regulations, 2010 crop year wheat should already have been planted to qualify for coverage. And just this week, the USDA clarified its regulations for 2009 insurance coverage for corn and soybean crops. The insurance policy coverage terminates on December 10 and many farmers are expected to still be harvesting beyond that date. USDA indicated the coverage will end on December 10, but farmers should alert their agent about the delays in harvest, and instead of filing a claim, continue to harvest as much grain as possible to determine if any indemnity checks would have to be paid.

One of the major headaches for area farmers whose harvest season is just beginning is the fact that the fall fertilizer season should have already begun, and hasn’t. To save time in the spring, many fields that will be planted to corn next year would get a partial application of nitrogen in the form of anhydrous ammonia. That application and some light tillage would prepare fields for spring planting. However, that won’t happen on most farms this year, if soils freeze before crops are out of the field.

Even with the harvest delays, University of Illinois soil fertility specialist Fabian Fernandez is recommending against the application of anhydrous ammonia because of the unusually wet soils. He says the furrow behind the applicator tines will not close properly to capture the pressurized gas, and the soil is so wet that the ammonia will quickly bond with it and not properly disperse through the soil. That means areas of concentrated nitrogen and other areas without any.

The weather delays will also have a major impact on the health of farmers. The need to finish harvest and any possible fieldwork will create major psychological and physiological stress on individuals. Workdays of eighteen or more hours for the next several weeks will take heavy tolls on the health of farmers and their families. And both weariness and unfinished farm business will also mean smaller than usual crowds at the Nov. 24th Illinois Commodity Conference and Illinois Farm Bureau annual meeting in early December.

For a farm family, weather makes all the difference, and crop insurance is not always a cure-all.

“This is ugly,” says David Brown who farms several thousand acres northwest of Decatur, and has much more crop in the field than in the bin. Of course, Brown is no different from thousands of other Central Illinois farmers who are spending more time in the office and machine shed than in combine cabs.

November first is here and the vast majority of the Illinois and Cornbelt crop is still in the field, held captive by mud, ponds, and grain moisture levels that have made harvest impossible.

Today’s farmers are asking their dads and granddads if they can remember such problems as are being faced today. October, usually a month with 2-3 inches of rainfall, has brought nearly 9 inches (as of Thursday). Except for a dozen counties in northwestern Illinois which have received 150 to 200% of normal rainfall for October, the remainder of Illinois has received between 200% and 400% of normal October rainfall. And 2009 has already recorded a 50% increase in precipitation over average years.

For a few hours at midweek, some farmers ventured to the fields to harvest as much as possible, but combine tires were full of mud and corn stover. Moisture levels are still well above 20% and corn needs to be dried to 15% moisture for preservation purposes. That means spending unbudgeted money on propane to dry grain loaded into on-farm storage or paying the elevator for the necessary drying.

And many farm grain dryers have not been used for several years, due to normal growing seasons and a benevolent Mother Nature who took care of all of the dry down obligations. At GSI at Assumption, staff members say every grain dryer that comes off the assembly line already has a buyer and it has become difficult to keep up with the demand.

The drying costs for corn at 25% moisture, plus the lost bushels from the 1.4% shrink factor imposed by elevators will cost farmers about $100 per acre says Extension farm management specialist Gary Schnitkey at the University of Illinois. He normally recommends budgeting $35 per acre for drying costs, and the high cost this year caught him by surprise, and he’s not sure how many farmers really realize the additional cost for producing the 2009 crop.

Those drying costs will eat further into profitability, and Schnitkey had already predicted a loss on growing corn this year because of high nitrogen costs and cash rents pushed up by high commodity prices the past two years.
While Schnitkey’s estimates of negative returns on 2009 corn production were made prior to the recent market price increases, he says those price increases will essentially be consumed by the drying and shrink expense.

Corn has to be dried to prevent mold growth, but it is apparently too late for Johnson Grain at Auburn, which used its website this week to lament its challenges. President Jay Johnson reported, “We have 3 million bushels of very high damage currently stacked up at our facility. We are hopeful that we can sell some of this damage so we can keep our doors open for the remainder of harvest and not fill our facility completely with high damage corn.” And he added, “Since harvest began we have loaded five trains and have met grade specifications on only one of them. We met grade on the most recent train, but had to off- load 37 cars and reload some cars three times.” As you can imagine, that is not the type of news you want to publicly reveal. It is “ugly.”

There are dozens, maybe hundreds, of low, mid, and high level government staffers in Washington who are pounding their heads on the walls right now. Collectively, they spent thousands of hours creating the Average Crop Revenue Election (ACRE) program as part of the 2008 Farm Bill. It was a major chore. There had to be balance among commodities, among geographic regions, and it had to be politically acceptable, within budget, and not inflame the international community. It was finally rolled out earlier this year and farmers were given until August 14 to sign up for the program.

Eight percent signed-up. Ooooops!

Only 13% of eligible program crop acreage was enrolled into ACRE. Oooooops!

ACRE was supposed to be the high tech version of farm programs to help farm owners and operators manage their revenue risk, without being encouraged to increase production and reduce world grain prices. After all, ACRE payments were not guaranteed, and to receive a payment from the ACRE program, yields had to be lower than a threshold average of historical farm yields and revenues had to be lower than a threshold level of revenue calculated for your state.

Was complexity one of the barricades to sign-up? Open the back of Granddad’s pocket watch, and it may be simpler to understand the mechanism than to figure out the ACRE program. By far and away, ACRE has been the most complex farm program to originate in Washington in the history of farm bills. Actually, it may be easier to explain the Dairy program than ACRE.

Despite the complexity, many ag economists and farm management specialists at Land Grant Universities did their best to help sell the program to farmers. They made presentations, they published fact sheets, and they created web-based decision aids that would project ACRE payments, which were estimated at $65 to $70 per acre in Illinois for corn enrolled in the program. And many of those specialists who own farmland went out on the limb to say they had enrolled their own farms into the ACRE program. That just did not do the trick.

Was the four year commitment one of the barricades to sign-up? After all, once a farm was enrolled in the ACRE program it had to remain there for the length of the Farm Bill, and a switch to the alternative program was not allowed.

Was the easy money from revenue crop insurance a barricade to sign-up? Many farmers have learned the various revenue programs will almost always pay out, even if you are in Illinois which perennially subsidizes the big insurance indemnity payments for Texas farmers.

Was the problem of getting buy-in from land owners a barricade to sign-up? With the farm enrolled for four years in the ACRE program, future tenants would have less flexibility and may not agree to high cash rents if the ACRE program was not beneficial. ACRE was a serious problem for farm operators who had to sell the concept to farm owners who were not familiar with the concept.

Was the problem due to the yield records required by USDA for ACRE enrollment that became a barricade to acceptance? After all, ACRE required third party proof of yields that even went beyond what USDA’s Risk Management Agency requires for crop insurance.

Was the problem due to the year long delay before an ACRE payment would be received, since anything earned from the 2009 crop would not be paid until October of 2010?

If there is any consolation, Illinois was one of the states with the greatest enrollment in ACRE, with 22% of acreage, surpassed only by Nebraska and South Dakota.

As Washington does a post mortem on the ACRE program enrollment, it will be interesting to watch the dynamics in the Senate Agriculture Committee, which did almost all of the creation of ACRE’s details. That committee is now chaired by Sen. Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas, where only 2 farms out of more than 25,000 eligible signed up. What does that mean for the future of ACRE?

Mother Nature brought an end to the growing season for corn and soybean crops, and as farmers sit idle waiting for a chance to return to the field, many feel like wallflowers at the local homecoming dance waiting to be invited to the dance floor. Unfortunately there is not much rug cutting going on right now with saturated soils. Even if combines could get into the fields without too much soil compaction the grain would be too wet to harvest.

But there is still a lot of activity on the dance floor. Commercial grain users and processors are trying to obtain enough grain to fill their needs at the most economical price. They really don’t care who they dance with, just so the grain supply exists and delivery can be scheduled. One dance partner with a seed cap is just as good as another, and they don’t really care who they came to the dance with in the first place.

And even if prices work their way higher, commercial grain traders will pass off their price risk onto the checkbook of the speculators, who are happy just to be in the dance and will pay about any price for the chance to buy a ticket. The speculators have been watching the snow depth in Nebraska and the Dakotas, the immaturity of the crop in Illinois and the Great Lakes States, and are willing to pay higher prices just for the chance of a dance and a big score before the party is over.

Market analysts have said farmers are entering harvest with only one third of the grain priced that they had sold at this time last year. They spent the summer in the market doldrums, where prices went sideways and did not offer any marketing opportunities. The market just did not seem concerned about late planting and the lack of crop maturity. Farmers just did not want to engage the market dance because they needed a price that would cover the $1,000 nitrogen they booked last fall, and so far there has not been much of a chance at recovering that cost.

But when corn prices approached the $4 mark recently, that was music to the ears of many would-be dancers and farmers began to accept the invitations of the grain processors. Some just will not sell and are getting anxiety about not being able to harvest. Many of the commercial grain companies are keeping the basis as an invitation to the dance, and are raising and lowering cash prices in an effort to pry early corn out of storage and offer incentives to sell later corn as it crosses the scales.

Currently, some farmers have realized it pays to store corn at home and they are going to sit out the dance until later in the evening. After all, being paid about 4¢ per bushel per month from December to July is good money, since it only costs about 2.5¢ per month for storage costs. There is no point in storing beans, either on the farm or at home, since spring and summer delivery prices are equal to or less than they are now.

Of course, there may be other dance partners, like speculators, who speed up the beat of the music with such issues as weather and the falling value of the dollar. They like the weather music because it decreases supply and they also like the song of the dollar since it increases demand.

But once crops are harvested, everyone will be on the dance floor. Swing your partner and doh-see-doh.

Ah, the bucolic visions of a fall harvest! Right out of a Norman Rockwell painting there are shocks of corn stalks, pumpkins, pheasants, and sky colors at dusk that only exist on God’s paint palette. But, ooops! That certainly does not describe 2009, the year that is only found in a Stephen King novel.

Just as harvest is getting underway flood watches abound and Central Illinois ponded corn and soybean fields more closely resemble Arkansas rice plantations. And on top of that, a band of snow is forecast from Kansas to Michigan that may leave several inches of snow where combines now fear to tread.

While mature crops will be harvestable when the ground dries out and combines can return to the fields, the freezer door that will be left open the next couple mornings will signal an end to the growing season for millions of Cornbelt acres of corn and soybeans. Ironically on Friday USDA issued its latest crop forecast, and basing it on normal weather predicted a corn crop just under 13 billion bushels and soybeans at three and a quarter billion bushels. But because USDA’s crop forecast protocol requires that normal growing weather be assumed, it could not adjust the statistics collected about Oct 1 to reflect the freight train full of problems that are besetting Cornbelt crops.

Although most corn and soybean fields in Central Illinois are mature, or nearly so, there are many acres that will not survive the low temperatures forecast for Monday morning. Commodity Weather Group estimates that 60% of North Dakota’s corn will still be immature and vulnerable. The same is true for 50% of Wisconsin’s corn, 40% of Minnesota and Michigan corn, 35% of Illinois corn, 30% of Indiana and Ohio corn, 20% of the corn in South Dakota and Nebraska and 10 % of the corn in Iowa and Missouri. The late planting and the cool summer just did not give crops enough time to grow, and now the price is being paid.

While 60% of North Dakota corn will be affected, that is not a big amount. However, the Cornbelt totals were computed by Iowa commodity brokerage R. J. O’Brien, which reports a potential for 232 million bushels of corn to be lost because of immaturity out of the 13 billion bushel crop. That represents 10% of the national crop due to the 2.3 billion bushels at risk in the northern sector of the Midwest where the cold air will kill immature plants.

In Illinois only 42% of the corn crop would have been at the mature stage by this weekend, versus 84% for Iowa. And yes, there are farmers reading this today whose crops will be killed by the cold air, halting the maturation process. The National Corn Production Handbook published by university agronomists. It says the key factors include the length of time the plant is exposed to the cold air and how mature the plant may be. There are very few fields which are still in the milk stage, but those would only be good as chopped silage after a freeze. Corn in the dough stage will suffer a 50% yield loss, and corn in the dent stage will also have a yield loss after field dry down. Mature corn will not be hurt, but husks will loosen and that will enhance field drying.

While most soybeans have begun to drop their leaves and dry out, they will not be hurt by temperature, but a prolonged period of wet fields that delay harvest will allow pods to shatter and soybeans to be lost. The latest report on crop conditions indicated 10% of Illinois soybeans had not begun to drop their leaves, and any of those in the northern quarter of the state will turn black from the freezing temperatures and their growing season will be terminated on Monday. That will lead to high price discounts when they are sold because of immaturity.

2009 has brought one nightmare after another. But didn’t Stephen King write something about a cornfield?

When it rains, it pours, as the adage goes. And the troubles of farmers in 2009 seem to continue unabated. The cost of crop inputs has been at record levels. And with commodity prices 50% to 60% of what they were last year, farm management specialists at the University of Illinois say the cost-price squeeze will result in an $8 loss per acre for corn and a $15 loss per acre for soybeans on highly productive rented farmland in Central Illinois.

Combined with the late planting that is pushing the late maturing crop toward frost damage, what more could happen? Well, there is more.

Farmers who have begun harvesting corn have been hauling grain to the elevator that is fluffy. It is not supposed to be fluffy. But it is, because kernels are shriveled, light in weight, and are coated with a mold called diplodia. Diplodia is one of those fungi that hang around cornfields every year, but rarely cause any problems. The cool, wet, and cloudy conditions of the growing season allowed the diplodia spores to declare “Showtime!” And without regard to all of the other issues challenging the Cornbelt farmer, diplodia marched on stage.

However, its appearance came without much forewarning. Unlike other diseases and fungal problems that discolor corn leaves and stalks, the diplodia remained hidden under the husks on the ear, and did not see the light of day until the husks were pulled back for yield checks, or the corn was harvested and the diplodia began to show up in grain tanks on combines, in grain carts, and trucks stopping on scales at the grain elevator.

“It is here, and in all of it, from very small amounts to very deplorable,” says Jerry Rowe, General Manager of Heritage Grain Co. at Dalton City. He says some loads of corn have as much as 25% damage from the diplodia fungus. At Stonington Cooperative Grain Co. General Manager Tom Johnson describes the situation similarly.

Most of the corn grown locally comes to either ADM or Tate & Lyle in Decatur, where diplodia damage exceeding 5% is discounted. Johnson says cornfields currently being harvested in his area all have diplodia, but he thinks the damage will be under the 5% threshold throughout the area from which he draws corn. Every truckload crossing the scale at Stonington will be tested, but Johnson says a composite sample will be made from all of the loads in an individual field and any discount imposed will be on the field not on an individual truckload.

That may benefit some farmers who are delivering corn that seem to have more diplodia fungus on end rows and less in the middle of the field. Denny Hill who manages the Top Flight Grain Co. facility at Maroa has tried to figure out the cause for the damage. He says early samples of corn showed 10% to 20% damage from diplodia, but with later planting, the level of damage has diminished. He says some seed representatives are blaming competing hybrids for being less resistant to the fungus, but he’s also found there is more on continuous corn, instead of in fields rotated with soybeans. Assumption Co-op General Manager Tom Bressner agrees the problem generally is with early planted corn, where one sample had 43% damage.

There are many reasons for the problem in the mind of Wyatt Muse at Clarkson Grain at Cerro Gordo, who also says new hybrids that are toxic to insects have reduced the food for birds, and birds pecking at ear tips earlier in the year allowed fungal spores to enter the husks. But he also thinks stronger stalks that are slow to deteriorate harbor the diplodia spores from year to year. That will cause some farmers to wonder if high plant populations, hybrids with good stalk strength, and minimum tillage practices are really beneficial, when elevators impose discounts for fungus damage, and they have to spend more on drying costs to ensure the fungus does not spread in the bin.

For many farmers the headache of fluffy corn will only be solved by a fluffy pillow.

“It’s OK to use all your fingers to wave at a farmer.” That is the message that “John” wanted me to pass on to all of the readers of this column. And with that accomplished, I am still a bit curious why someone would wave to “John” with less than all fingers. He said within a 20 minute period on September 10th, when he was moving farm machinery down the road, there were 14 motorists who “waved” at him in some curious manner. Were they giving a “thumbs up” sign and conveying an “Attaboy!” Were they using a forefinger and pointing out that he had a flat tire? Or could it have been something else? “John” and his son “Andy” think it may have been the latter.

If they are correct, those folks who were of the notion to “wave” may get a bit tired in the coming weeks because rural roads are going to be dominated by combines, large tractors pulling grain carts, and slow moving semi-trailer trucks loaded with corn and soybeans. This is the harvest season and this past week happened to be National Farm Safety Week, which is certainly not coincidental.

Farm Safety Week is always a reminder to farm families that the press of harvest can be tiring and stressful, and all precautions should be taken to practice safe farming activities and prevent accidents that could result in injury or death.

However, it seems the “John” and “Andy” story indicates that the non-farm, motoring public needs to be taken to the woodshed and given a country lesson in farm safety. There are many people behind the wheel of their car who think they are totally immune to the laws of physics; particularly the law that says a small mass (car) is going to lose in a collision with a large mass (combine.)

If you don’t believe that ask the drivers in 190 accidents in Illinois last year who ran into farm equipment on rural roads. Or ask the 55 people who were injured in Illinois last year whose car ran into farm equipment on rural roads. Or ask the families of 3 people who were killed in Illinois last year whose car ran into farm equipment on rural roads. Their hypothesis was disproven by their physics experiment.

Across the western part of the Cornbelt in 2008 there were 21 fatalities, 9 of them were on farm equipment and 12 were in cars. Of the 499 non-fatal accidents last year in those same Midwestern states, there were 4 people injured in cars to every one person injured on a piece of farm machinery when the two collided. In other words, the odds are stacked against the driver and passengers in a car when it hits a combine, tractor, or other piece of farm equipment. Apparently, that high school physics lesson was forgotten; or maybe the driver just lost control of his vehicle when he took one hand off the steering wheel to “wave” at the operator of the farm equipment.

Taking a parochial viewpoint, farmers have to protect themselves as well, with all of the required flashers, reflective tape, and slow moving vehicle symbols, despite the fact that they are going to be ignored by the non-farm motorists. While tractor roll-overs are the top killer of farmers, those roadway collisions cause the second highest number of farm fatalities. They claimed 24% of farm lives lost in Illinois in 2008 according to Country Financial, which insures the largest segment of Illinois agriculture.

If you are hit from the rear, the fault is not going to be on the driver in front, but will lie with the driver who threw caution to the wind and did not slow down in time. As the harvest season slowly shifts into gear, prepare for the inevitable combine, truck, and tractor-grain cart combination on rural roads. Farmers will pull over to allow you to pass. When you do, wave, and use all of your fingers. Your next meal may be originating in that combine! (End of Stu’s Sunday Sermon.)

If Norman Borlaug was the only agriculturalist to win the Nobel Prize, that would be a fitting tribute to such an individual as he was. Borlaug passed away Saturday, and was one of those individuals who left the world better than he found it.

Some will connect him with the “Green Revolution” which brought hybrid seeds to the Asian subcontinent to feed the millions who were starving. His efforts resulted in the 1970 Nobel Peace Prize. Norman Borlaug was a wheat breeder and research director for the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center, where he began helping Mexican farmers feed their country in the early 1950’s.

His high yielding wheat varieties and improved farming practices next helped South Asian farmers in the following decade. Currently, his varieties are produced on 200 million acres around the world. That was made possible by the establishment of 15 international research stations which applied his technology and helped teach local farmers about production improvements.

Borlaug was most recently in the news when he received the Presidential Medal of Freedom, and earlier had received the Congressional Gold Medal, the highest US recognition for a civilian. But he helped establish the World Food Prize in 1986, which has become the Nobel Prize for agriculture. To date, 25 eminent researchers have received the award for their contributions to increasing the quantity, quality, and availability of world food supplies.

Borlaug was the consummate Extension agent, not only researching but teaching. He taught agronomic technology to the impoverished to better feed their families and their neighbors, and he taught elite researchers about the need for their efforts to be applied at ground level. Since his work was in more than 100 nations around the world, he is well known in many of those countries as a hunger fighter. In his Nobel acceptance speech, Norman Borlaug said, “It is true that the tide of the battle against hunger has changed for the better…but ebb tide could soon set in, if we become complacent…”

Borlaug lit a spark in millions of people around the world, not just in helping indigenous farmers feed those nearby villagers in India or Africa, but ignited the desires of many others to carry on his work in places we will never visit, nor ever hear of. Many of their comments on a special website are moving tributes to an individual they once met, but that was all it took to launch their careers toward helping feed a hungry world.

At the Norman Borlaug Institute for International Agriculture at Texas A & M University, Borlaug recently noted, “We all eat at least three times a day in privileged nations, and yet we take food for granted. There has been great progress, and food is more equitably distributed. But hunger is commonplace, and famine appears all too often.”
Borlaug was an Iowa farm boy who attended the University of Minnesota and received graduate degrees in plant pathology. After World War II he became an agricultural researcher for the Cooperative Wheat Research and Production Program, which later evolved into the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center and he began training interns to work in agricultural research, who migrated around the world to carry his spark and message. As a result, Pakistan and India, despite their large populations, today are self-sufficient in food.

The loss of Norman Borlaug leaves some big shoes to fill in a world that is growing with hungry mouths to feed.

There are a lot of old jokes about “the farmer’s daughter,” but none of them will probably be heard around the US Capitol out of respect for the new Chair of the Senate Agriculture Committee, Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas. For the first time ever, agricultural interests from apricots to zoonotic diseases will begin their Capitol Hill testimony with the words “Madame Chairman.”

While there have not been all that many women to serve in the US Senate, it should not be a surprise that few have served as committee chairs, and the Agriculture Committee has been one of those with few female members in the past. Sen. Lincoln’s selection came this week after former Chair Tom Harkin of Iowa was appointed to preside over the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee following the death of Sen. Edward Kennedy. Sen. Lincoln was not the next in line for seniority, but more senior senators wanted to keep their chairmanships of other committees, and the gavel fell into her hands.

The Cornbelt will quickly notice where Sen. Lincoln’s allegiance points, since she is from one of the larger producing areas of rice and cotton, two of the main commodities that receive farm program supports. And with rice and cotton prices being quite low for several years, they have been getting the larger share of funds distributed by the USDA. And with Sen. Lincoln at the helm, that will not change. And since predictability is important in federal farm policy, at least everyone knows what to expect.

However, the unexpected is what will shape the personality of the Senate Agriculture Committee during the leadership of Sen. Lincoln, and this past week pointed to climate change as one issue that main remain a flashpoint. Following the House approval of a major legislative initiative to control carbon emissions, the Senate will take up the issue this fall. And the accession of Sen. Lincoln to the helm of the Agriculture Committee may result in the Senate’s divergence from House policies in the way agriculture was integrated into the climate change implementation.

Under the House plan, farmers would pay much higher costs for inputs that are petroleum based and would have a limited opportunity to sell their tillage practices that retain carbon in the soil to industries that release carbon into the air. That is the so-called “Cap and Trade” legislation, which would benefit corn and soybean producers more than cotton and rice producers, whose agronomic practices would not benefit from Cap and Trade. Hence, the position of Sen. Lincoln on casting doubt on the future of climate change legislation, because “it picks winners and losers,” as she said in her news conference. Cotton and rice producers would be some of the losers, and Sen. Lincoln may draw the proverbial “line in the sand.”

On another issue, Cornbelt agriculture would certainly benefit from the priorities of Sen. Lincoln, which include a completion of the global trade rule negotiations. Cotton and rice are both significant issues in international trade, since much of the developing world consumes more rice than other starch grains, and the US has had many minor conflicts with the Orient over the years about cotton and textiles. Any effort pushed by Sen. Lincoln to jumpstart the current stalemate in global trade discussions will be welcomed by farmers from Ohio to Omaha, who are depending on a resurgent export economy to raise commodity prices.

With Senator Blanche Lincoln in the Chair, the personality of the Senate Agriculture Committee may change considerably, but don’t expect any Members or lobbyists to crack any jokes about that farmer’s daughter.