Opening Statements

Remarks as prepared for delivery:

Thank you, Chairman Scott, and thank you to our panelists for testifying.

Recently, The New York Times wrote a series of stories and produced several videos denigrating rural Americans for providing the country with the safest, most abundant, and most affordable food supply in the history of the world. Let’s set the record straight. U.S. agriculture accounts for less than 10 percent of greenhouse gas emissions, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. Over the last 70 years, U.S. agriculture has tripled food and fiber production while usage of land, energy, fertilizer, and other inputs has remained steady.

I believe farmers are climate champions, but there is more to be done. In fact, nearly a year ago, several of my Republican colleagues on this Committee introduced a suite of climate friendly and farmer focused bills. So, if you have common sense solutions, I am here to work with you. But I will not fundamentally upend our commodity, conservation, and crop insurance programs to appease Washington think tanks. I will reject complicating our programs and making climate the focus of every title of the upcoming farm bill reauthorization.

We must ensure agriculture production remains viable in rural America to keep production from increasing in areas of the world with lower environmental standards, worse labor conditions, and fewer food safety considerations. That is why a robust safety net is critical to keeping farms and production here while lowering overall global GHG emissions.

I would be remiss not to mention the tone deafness of this hearing as our country and our farmers face enormous and immediate challenges including higher food prices, record inflation and input costs, attacks on our energy independence, crop protection tools, and dependable labor. These are the issues I hear about as I travel my district and the country. These are the issues we should be addressing. Our producers need action, not half-baked pilots and arbitrary mandates.

I hope at the end of the day, we recognize that our voluntary, locally-led, incentive-based conservation system is working as intended, and that we must not undermine its continued success in supporting the environment and producers. 

American agriculture is science. It’s technology. It’s innovation. The demands of a 21st century farm economy—and economically viable climate solutions—depend on tools and policies that continue to unleash and increase U.S. productivity.

I yield back my time.