Remarks as prepared for delivery: The ban on crude oil exports was a 1970s effort to protect the U.S. economy and U.S. consumers, but over the past 40 years it has achieved the opposite result. While it may have been well-intentioned at the time of enactment, the ban on crude oil exports is an antiquated relic and it is disrupting global energy markets, reducing domestic employment, and slowing ec... Read more »
Washington, D.C. - In advance of today’s Senate hearing on U.S. country of origin labeling, Mexican and Canadian officials sent separate letters to Senator Pat Roberts (R-KS) and Senator Debbie Stabenow (D-MI), Chairman and ranking member of the Senate Agriculture Committee, stating that a full repeal of COOL is the only option. “For Canada, legislative repeal of COOL is the only approach that wil... Read more »
Washington, D.C. - Today, Rep. Rodney Davis (IL-13), Chairman of the House Agriculture Committee Subcommittee on Biotechnology, Horticulture, and Research, held a public hearing to review the United States Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) marketing programs. Dr. Craig Morris, Deputy Administrator of the USDA Agriculture Marketing Service (AMS) Livestock and Seed Program provided an overview of A... Read more »
Remarks as prepared: Today the subcommittee examined the tools and capabilities of USDA’s Agricultural Marketing Service to assist food producers market their products. As we look more closely at the types of products consumers are demanding, we need to have the programs in place to ensure that the claims made on product labels are truthful and not misleading. Farmers want and need to provide cons... Read more »
Remarks as prepared: Good afternoon. I would like to welcome everyone to the Subcommittee on Biotechnology, Horticulture and Research. For the past several months, the Committee has evaluated aspects of agricultural marketing. As we have observed, consumers, ourselves included, are becoming increasingly savvy. As the number of choices available to us have increased, so has our desire to locate and... Read more »
Today, the House Agriculture Nutrition Subcommittee held a joint hearing with the House Committee on Ways and Means Human Resources Subcommittee addressing how certain welfare programs and related benefits can discourage work as a result of the high effective marginal tax rates they impose on certain populations. Read more »
Remarks as prepared for delivery: Thank you to Chairman Ryan and his Committee for hosting the first joint hearing between our two committees as we explore how our welfare system can discourage work. It’s surprising that our Committees have not engaged formally before given the overlap in our recipient populations. According to the most recent SNAP characteristics report: • 20 percent of SNAP reci... Read more »
Remarks as prepared for delivery: Thank you to Chairman Ryan and Subcommittee Chairman Boustany for hosting this historic joint hearing between our two committees as we better explore how our welfare system can discourage work. As the chair of the Nutrition Subcommittee, we have spent the past five months exploring the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, also known as food stamps. Our revie... Read more »
Washington, D.C. - Today, House Agriculture Committee Chairman K. Michael Conaway issued the following statement in response to new Senate legislation that contradicts the House-passed bill (H.R. 2393) which repeals mandatory country of origin labeling (COOL) for beef, pork, and chicken. Introduced by Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-MI), the Senate legislation leaves in place several of these burdensome m... Read more »
Washington, D.C. - Today, the House Agriculture Committee began a full-scale review of U.S. international food aid programs with a hearing focused on the nation’s international efforts to alleviate hunger and malnutrition and to enhance food security. The U.S. government provides international food aid through a variety of programs administered by either the U.S. Agency for International Developme... Read more »
