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Agriculture and Nutrition Act of 2018

Floor Speech

Date: May 16, 2018
Location: Washington, DC
Issues: Unemployed and Low-Income Entitlements and the Safety Net Agriculture and Food

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Mr. CRAWFORD. Mr. Chair, I thank the chairman for his leadership on this issue.

Let me start by saying that it is not very often that we talk about agriculture in the context of national security. I believe it is next week we are going to be taking up the NDAA reauthorization. While that is very important to our national security, I think it is equally important to consider how vital our agriculture producers are to our national security. A country that can't feed itself is a country that is not secure. It is inviting danger and peril. All you have to do is look around the globe and see those nations that are in that situation. Most notably in our hemisphere, Venezuela can't feed themselves. You can see the turmoil that has ensued as a result.

But there are other countries around the world. One of the big ones that we don't talk about very often and, quite frankly, we should, and that is China can't feed themselves. They have 1.4 billion people.

What we should be doing is taking every effort during this debate to thank farmers across the country for what they do and for the security they provide to this Nation, recognizing that, without them, the nutrition programs that we are fighting over couldn't exist.

Let's get a little different perspective, if we can, and recognize that, first and foremost, we have got to have the food produced, not only to provide a level of security in this Nation, but to be able to feed the 300 million-plus that call this country home.

Second, we have to be about trying to secure that food source and making sure that farmers are in a competitive marketplace that gives them equal opportunities to sell their commodities.

Certainly, the nutrition part of this is paramount. But I think most Americans across the country--and I think there are polls that bear this out--some 75 percent of Americans say, yes, we probably should encourage folks to work and/or get educated as a component of receiving nutrition benefits. That is all we are saying. We are not trying to compromise anyone's nutrition or threaten a single calorie.

One thing I think we need to clarify, too, is the Agriculture Committee has no jurisdiction over school nutrition programs.

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