House building on capitol hill where shortly agriculture secretary sonny perdue is set to testify. Hell update members on the state of the Rural Economy. Actually, governor perdue, seen on your screen right there, live coverage here expected to get underway momentarily on cspan 3. Many which we dont even know. On this occasion, we ask a special blessing on our agriculture industry, and that your blessings come upon our new secretary of agriculture, sonny perdue. Dear heavenly father, finally we thank you for your holy spirit. For oftentimes we know not what we should pray for as we ought, but your holy spirit intercedes for us with groanings that cannot be uttered. We thank you for that. And we ask your holy spirit to enter this room today. These and other blessings we ask in your son, christ jesus name, amen. David, thank you. Mr. Secretary, welcome. You and i have had several conversations before this morning. Let me officially congratulate you on becoming our nations 31st secretary offing agricult. We cant be happy. Were eager to work with you. We know you have great heart and concern for americas farmers and ranchers. We know you have both the policy and political acumen to get a lot of things done. I dont think theres a better man for the job of secretary of agriculture in these challenging times. It took time to get you confirmed. I want to commend you for landing on your feet. I appreciate you weighing in with the administration on the vital importance of trade to our nations farmers and ranchers particularly regarding nafta. Put in place a new rule that respects private property rights, federalism and no fewer than three Supreme Court rulings is critical to helping dismantle this attempt at federal land grab. Your successful support of the issuance of an executive order by the president to revisit the myriad of regulations affecting american agriculture could not be more appreciated. And again, thank you for taking on these challenges. Restoring common sense at the School Lunch Program and putting the halt on regulations and would force organic producers to comply with Animal Protection welfare practices are welcome actions. As you begin the work of implementing these i hope you exercise the same kind of prudent judgment. Thank you for your role and helping to insure the United States if forces trade laws including those of mexicos Illegal Dumping of sugar into the u. S. Market. I want to underscore the importance of your leadership to continue building the case against chinas Domestic Support and tro administration trq administration for corn, rice and wheat. If we are to regain americas confidence in trade, we must hold our trading partners accountable for their commitments. On the topic of the importance of trade you nounced this week youre embarking on a reorganization of the department of agriculture. I look forward to hearing more about your ideas and how to make the department more effective. Even if it does so within the confines of tighter budgets. I think its important to point out our current bill is expected to save 23 billion over ten years but the most recent cbo protection show 2014 farm bill is targeted to reduce spending by 104 billion. Nearly four times that anticipated. This achievement is made possible of the hard work and determination of the members of this committee and our counterparts in the senate. I hope youll make sure the president will know this as he makes tough decisions. Farmers and ranchers have seen their net incomes cut in half. Times are difficult on the farms and ranches across the country these days. And if those who are paid to make forecasts about these things are correct, Economic Times in the farm and ranch industry will not be any better over the next several years. Its my experience that a bad farm economy can adversely impact the entire economy. A good farm economy can boost the nations economy. Its my experience that strong u. S. Foreign policy sees our farmers and ranchers through hard times but impacts jobs. Weve had a safety net in place that is working as intended with exceptions of cotton and dairy. Cotton farmers have rallied a way to mend their safety net to make it more effective. We believe that you have the Legal Authority to effectuate this policy. Congress would have done this a couple weeks ago, but for a recklessness of a couple folks in the other chamber it doesnt happy. Well continue to state that over and over, it was reckless and inappropriate. While the dairy industry continues working on a unified approach to mending its safety net i believe theres ample opportunity for you to help them as well as did your predecessor. Well be in a much better decision to deliver on the president s promise of a strong farm bill. Ill recognize my Ranking Member for any comments he has. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Im very pleased to welcome secretary perdue to the agriculture committee. It took a while for you to get here, its nice to see youve hit the ground running. Now youre at usda i think i speak for all of us when i say were ready to work with you. The administration has been in need of someone that understands farm programs and their impact on Rural America. Hopefully now that youre there youll get them to reconsider some of the proposed 4. 7 billion in cuts to usda that was outlined in the march budget. I know you werent part of that and i just dont think in the white house understood what hes cuts would mean to Rural America. This hearing is focused on the Rural Economy. And as youre well aware and everybody is, the Rural Economy is trending downward. We had a pretty good year last year, relatively high yields that kept things afloat in spite of the fact that the prices arent what they should be. I worry we can find ourselves in real trouble if we have an ordinary year or somewhat of a down year this summer. So this is why its so important that the farm bill safety net be set right. So ill be looking forward to your thoughts on what you think needs to be done on the next farm bill and what your roll, what you anticipate the role of the administration is going to be in that process. The farm bill one of the many topics i expect us to cover today. I know our members are looking forward to hearing from the secretary, so with that, mr. Chairman, ill yield back. Thank you, the chair request other members submit their Opening Statements for the record so our witness may begin his testimony and insure theres ample time for questions. With that id like to welcome to our witness table the honorable sonny perdue. Mr. Secretary, the floor is yours. Thank you, chairman conway and thank you Ranking Member peterson. Its a delight to be with you this morning. I look up there on the podium and i see my good friend mr. Scott who showed out at my confirmation hearing if yall are not familiar with that. Thank you for those very kind remarks, and i see some other georgia homeboys with you today as well. My staff was a little concerned since this was our first date and i hadnt had a chance to meet you. They had 15 pages of prepared remarks, but im going to not do that to yall. You can read my remarks in the written record. I want to share a few things with you. Youve indicated correctly that 2017, 2018 is a different Economic Situation for our farm and Rural Communities across this land than it was when the 14 bill was promulgated. Im excited about being at the department, what i found is a cod codre of hardworking people out there. Theyre passionate about american agriculture how we can make it better. My goal and i stated internally and externally is to make you as the committee on agriculture nat house proud of the way the usda is run. My goal is to make it the most effective, most efficient, the best managed, the best value agency in the United States government. We had an opportunity in georgia to do some of that. Weve begun already in looking at that and i know some of your questions will hear about my ideas for reorg, i call it realignment today. I look forward to hearing those and answering those. But the challenges we face now, you know that our farm economy is down about 50 drop in net income from where it was in 2013 as you all were working and contemplating the 14 farm bill. Weve got several members, particularly younger farmers have levered up in the situation where the revenue is not supporting their debt structure and theyre in some dire straits that way. The safety net you all referred to and had worked very well, that you said without maybe a couple of situations that we can improve on. Has been a safety net. Our Crop Insurance combined with the a. R. C. And p. L. C. Programs i think have worked very well generally. Were in some dire straits out there. And the government payments total almost 13 billion in 2016. And based on those great yields that chairman or Ranking Member peterson talked about that we cant continue to depend on, its going to be less than that in 2017. So the Crop Insurance, again, has been a good support, but the other thing is Rural Development has been a wonderful program. What ive learned about usda, how vast, how broad, how helpful it can be in Rural America overall. Thats why i was glad to see and glad to participate with the president in his signing of the executive order interAgency Working together determining what are those barriers to american agriculture and how can we eliminate those and mitigate those for the prosperity of Rural America. Its not just the producers, you know if farms arent doing well in our Rural Communities, those Rural Communities dont do well. Were looking at how we can help those thrive as well. I look forward to explaining my vision for Rural Development upon your questions. So you also know that usda provided approximately 243,000 loans to 35. 2 billion to farmers and ranchers, that led to a full utilization for the Program Level for fiscal year 16 and with record loan levels at 6. 3 billion. Those are the kinds of things we help will help the safety net out here. I look forward to engaging with you personally here today, but also in your offices and your phone calls about the issues that per tatain to your constituents in the ag communities so we can resolve their fears and anxieties over where the future of agriculture goes and address those in a way that makes sense for the shareholders, the taxpayers of the United States of america. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Mr. Secretary, thank you very much. The chair members will be recognized for questions in order of seniority for members who were here at the start of the hearing. After that members will be recognized in order of arrival. I recognize myself for five minutes. Thanks for being here. Were looking forward to looking with you across this myriad of issues we have Going Forward. As i mentioned in my opening comments i represent a lot of cotton farmers, i believe we had a very elegant fix to the issue with respect to cotton in the program that didnt work. It should have been in the omnibus bill but our colleagues, particularly two of them in the senate refused to see the wisdom of that. And for their own purposes and own benefit, didnt let that happen. So now were left with the same wreck in cotton. I hope i can count in working with you across whatever tools that we have, obviously, we think that cotton seed could go under the title i program. There will be challenges about making that happen and i look forward to working with you on that and other issues with respect to getting help to offset what china and india has done to the market that doesnt allow our producers to compete properly. Id like to turn to the undersecretary youve done, obviously, authorized in the 14 farm bill. Thank you very much for seeing the wisdom of that. Can you talk to us a little bit about how you see your undersecretary working with the other array of trade entities whether its the usdr, whoever that might be and the role that undersecretary would play, not only in making sure the negotiations go the correct way, but also making sure that the administration keeps a close look on enforcement of the various trade things we have out there. So could you walk us through your vision in that . Certainly, id be happy to. Mr. Chairman, before i get into the answer to that question you and i have had conversations i was pleased that the National Cotton council came up with a very innovative and creative budget neutral idea and its disappointing we were not able to get that done. But we can look at the resolution in the 18 farm bill as you indicated. As i went around visiting, i visited with really 75 of your members on the other side of the house, and i think trade was on all of their minds, really, because were fortunate to live in a nation where we can grow more than we can consume. Thats the essence of trade, doing what we do well, and also a noble endeavor to feed the world. Our new motto for usda is do right and feed everyone. Thats what we want to do. We want to feed the hungry here in the United States and around the world. And our producers and ranchers have demonstrated the capacity to share and to do that. Thats what trades all about. I think in the 14 farm bill you all recognized that. And suggested very strongly in the undersecretary for trade, happened to agree with you. It was not an easy thing to do. There were several components that had to come together and were working through those details right now. We felt it was important because trade was almost number one on everyones mind that i spoke with internally, externally in the senate and for those of you who commented as well. Weve got to sell our way out of this supply demand situation and the depressing prices in the u. S. Now. Thats what we hope to do. Youve seen weve seen early successes of that and will continue. The fact is, my opinion is that people do business with people. And i wanted someone every day that woke up with that on their mind, where can i go to sell United States agriculture products around the world. Who is hungry, who will buy how can we do the deal. My role is to provide the expertise, the content to the secretary of commerce, secretary ross, and to our new trade representative, mr. Lighthouser in order to be triumph in sales. The secretary has a broader port foliar th folio than we do. So ive been impressed with secretary ross and his sinking his teeth into ag issue and ag products there. Were pleased with the progress weve made so far. We believe the secretary of trade will be on everyones front door as often as can be. This guy is going to be a million mile flyer around the world to be there in person. Because we know that foreign interests love to see you in person. Its an honor for them for us to come to their doorstep and call on them and say, heres my card, we want to do the deal. And thats important. We can do conference calls, we can do videos, but the pres nsz is important. That person could not do that when they were charged with the Foreign Service agency of having all these multiple offices around the country dealing with those customer facing issues every day. So i felt very strongly that the segregation of that, having a undersecretary for trade, was vitally important to get the job done of selling these bountiful products. Again, thank you, mr. Secretary for being here. I look forward to working with you. I recognize Ranking Member for five minutes. Thank you, mr. Chairman secretary i want to let you know i support the cotton injury and finding a fix for them. And whatever you can do to help, i will be there to help as well. The Rural Development issue has caused some consternation here and there. I take you at your world that youre getting oing to continuee that a priority. Youre the secretary, you decide how the department should be run. The only thing id say is were going to watch to make sure that Rural Development gets the same kind of emphasize it has always. You said that and i expect that will happen. Another issue that i hope you and secretary ross and i think you will, keep the mexicans feet to fire on the sugar issue and try to get that resolved. So far youve been doing a great job with that. So one of the things i went through here recently, we had a high path outbreak in my district. The department did a great job responding to it. And i had firsthand look at this, and its clear that the time to start a conversation with our trade partners regarding the use of vaccines to minimize the impacts of high path, doesnt need to happen during the course of the outbreak. You know, it seems like its you know, what we do. I think it needs to happen at a different time. You know, thats when the [ inaudible ] such as a stamp out procedure should begin now, rather than when we get into the next i think its, wise, obviously, sometimes i guess the saying we have in georgia when the mules out of the gate its too late to close the gate. You dont get that opportunity after an outbreak has occurred. I think youre wise in considering a vax eeccinevaccin. I will comment on the fact that while the 15 outbreak we were slow to respond at the state and federal level. The outbreak we had in tennessee and north alabama this year, i was very, very impressed with the process there. The biosanitary process and protocols our producers have learned. The speed in which usda moved over the indemnification issues. There was no confusion there. To their credit that was confined, very very tight. And thats the best kind of insurance we can have. I think this committee and congress is very wise to consider a foot and mouth disease bank, maybe avian has we