House Agriculture Committee Chairman Bob Smith (R-OR) today announced that Egypt and Spain have both made large purchases of U.S. grain on the heels of the Committee's August trade mission to Egypt and Spain. Continuing the Agriculture Committee's efforts to open up foreign markets for U.S. farmers and ranchers, Smith led an agricultural trade delegation, consisting of 6 Members of Congress, to Eg... Read more »
House Agriculture Committee Chairman Bob Smith (R-OR) today announced that U.S. corn growers will have an opportunity to sell up to 200,000 tons of corn to the European Union (EU) in a tender which follows on the heels of a committee's August trade mission to Spain. Continuing the Agriculture Committee's efforts to open up foreign markets for U.S. farmers and ranchers, Smith led an agricultural tr... Read more »
As world agriculture trade talks approach in 1999 and with agriculture constituting the largest positive item in the United States' Balance of Trade, the House Committee on Agriculture, led by Chairman Bob Smith (R-OR), pressed for reductions of tariff and non-tariff trade barriers while securing additional purchases of U.S. wheat in talks with officials in Egypt and laying the foundation for addi... Read more »
Chairman of the House Committee on Agriculture, Bob Smith (R-OR), announced today that Canada has enacted a series of regulatory changes that ease restrictions of the Northwest Cattle Pilot Project (NWCPP). Since leading an Agriculture Committee trade mission to Canada in March 1997, Smith has been working on the NWCCP with Canadian and U.S. officials to streamline import and inspection requiremen... Read more »
Making only technical changes, the House Committee on Agriculture today passed by voice vote Chairman Bob Smith's (R-OR) Forest Service Cost Reduction and Fiscal Accountability Act of 1998 (H.R. 4149), legislation bringing financial and performance reforms to the U.S. Forest Service (USFS). A General Accounting Office (GAO) study found that overhead charges to five off-budget fund have increased 8... Read more »
Chairman of the House Agriculture Committee Bob Smith (R-OR) today announced that France has formally approved the sale of genetically modified corn to the European Union (EU) safegaurding a $200 million-plus market for American corn growers. In letters to United States Trade Representative Charlene Barshefsky and Secretary of Agriculture Dan Glickman, Smith and six other Members of Congress urged... Read more »
With adverse weather conditions and disease devastating farms in the Upper Midwest and the Great Plains, Agriculture Committee Chairman Bob Smith (R-OR) and a bi-partisan group of four committee members from the affected region wrote to Agriculture Secretary Dan Glickman today urging him to use the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) to help alleviate the economic impact of these disasters. "Produc... Read more »
With proposals of regulatory changes threatening to destabiIize the over-the-counter derivatives market and send it overseas, Agriculture Committee Chairman Bob Smith (R-OR) today introduced legislation to temporarily halt Commodity Futures Trading Commission authority to regulate certain hybrid instruments and swap agreements until Congress resolves the dispute during reauthorization next year. "... Read more »
With the General Accounting Office (GAO) reporting continued abuse in the food stamp program, Representative Bob Goodlatte (R-VA), Chairman of the House Agriculture Subcommittee on Department Operations, Nutrition, and Foreign Agriculture, held a hearing today on his bill to put an end to food stamp payments to deceased persons by requiring increased coordination between the federal government and... Read more »
With American farmers and ranchers struggling with adverse weather conditions and low crop prices, the House of Representatives today passed the Emergency Farm Financial Relief Act (S. 2344) by voice vote, the Senate version of a bill introduced by Agriculture Committee Chairman Bob Smith (R-OR). "This bill is a sound step that we can take today that will reassure producers and their bankers that ... Read more »
