Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2015

Floor Speech

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Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. Mr. Chairman, I rise today in support of this bill. This is the fifth of the twelve 2015 appropriations cycle bills. It provides $20.9 billion in discretionary funding for important agriculture, rural development, and FDA programs.

With this legislation, we ensure America's farmers and ranchers--who contribute billions to our economy, as well as create jobs and put food on our tables--have the resources they need to continue to remain successful.

We have provided responsible funding for programs that work to stop crop, plant, and animal disease that can cripple U.S. producers and entire industries. Funding is also directed to programs that help conserve and protect farmland, and improve water quality and food safety.

In addition, this bill also provides funding for infrastructure development, housing loans and rental assistance, and economic opportunities for America's rural communities. These vital loans and programs help foster an environment for economic growth and will help rural America thrive.

The committee also prioritized the safety of our Nation's food and drug supply, targeting increases to FDA food and drug safety activities.

The funding in this bill will maintain 8,000 inspection personnel for meat, poultry, and egg products and facilities across the Nation.

I am also pleased that we have included language that forces the FDA to develop more robust guidelines for abuse-deterrent opioid pill formulations. We withhold $20 million from the Commissioner's office until these long-overdue regulations are finalized, because the drugs on the market that are not abuse-deterrent result in opioid addictions, overdoses, and deaths. They need to be corrected.

Prescription drug abuse is a scourge on this Nation, and FDA can and should be doing more to battle this epidemic.

Beyond funding these critical USDA and FDA programs, the bill also includes funding for a variety of nutrition programs, making sure our most vulnerable, including our children and elderly, don't go hungry.

The discretionary funding level in this bill is about the same as last year,
which is a testament to the hard work of this subcommittee to find savings wherever possible to make that possible. Each and every program within this bill has been closely examined to help make the best decisions about where to direct tax dollars and where to trim funding.

The bill also makes strides to make these programs more efficient, more effective, and more useful for the American people and strengthens congressional oversight, particularly where it comes to mandatory spending on important nutrition programs.

For example, within SNAP, formerly called food stamps, we have required the enforcement of a ban on certain outreach with foreign governments and implemented protocols to help weed out waste, fraud, and abuse.

Mr. Chairman, the bill before us today is a commonsense bill that makes every step to adequately fund important agricultural programs, to support our most vulnerable citizens, and to act with fiscal restraint.

I want to thank Chairman Aderholt, Ranking Member Farr, the subcommittee members, and their staffs for all they did to achieve this very good bill. It was not easy because the allocation they had was not perfect, but they made do with it, and they made do well. I want to thank them for their hard work and congratulate them on a good bill. I urge unanimous support for the bill.

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