Grotberg Challeges Conrad's Approach To Disaster Legislation And Energy Policy

Dwight Grotberg, Republican Senate candidate, held press conferences Tuesday in Bismarck and Fargo calling for a stronger 2007 farm bill that brings energy and agriculture together. Grotberg also challenged Senator Conrad's method of tying supplemental disaster legislation to other pending legislation saying, "While I encouraged the president to support the legislation, farmers need a new approach for securing aid for future disasters."

"We need to bring energy and agriculture together to secure a better demand base for energy commodities such as corn, soybeans and canola," stated Grotberg. "Farmers are now growing energy in addition to food, and we can no longer look at these two vital aspects of our economy as separate issues. Securing greater demand for energy commodities by bringing together the next farm bill and a national security initiative for energy will free up farm bill dollars for stronger crop insurance and disaster funding."

Grotberg also challenged the senator's BOLD initiative, citing that Conrad encouraged the president to pressure OPEC to increase oil production and at the same time discourages domestic production of petroleum in many areas of the country.

"In order to secure our bio-fuel future and to ensure that consumers have a stable abundant energy supply," said Grotberg, "America needs to expand incentives for our bio-fuel production while at the same time developing a better domestic petroleum production infrastructure. We must also have the freedom to open up our nation's energy reserves in places like ANWR. It is now a matter of national security."

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