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America’s Natural Resources: Agriculture
We are the party of America’s growers,
producers, farmers, ranchers, foresters, miners,
commercial fishermen, and all those who bring
from the earth the crops, minerals, energy, and
the bounties of our seas that are the lifeblood
of our economy. Their labor and ingenuity, their
determination in bad times and love of the land at
all times, powers our economy, creates millions of
jobs, and feeds billions of people around the world.
Only a few years ago, a bipartisan consensus in
government valued the role of extractive industries
and rewarded their enterprise by minimizing its
interference with their work. That has radically
changed. We look in vain within the Democratic
Party for leaders who will speak for the people of
agriculture, energy and mineral production.
Abundant Harvests
Agricultural production and exports are
central to the Republican agenda for jobs, growth,
expanded trade, and prosperity. Because our
farmers and ranchers care for the land, the United
States does not depend on foreign imports for
sustenance. Americans spend a smaller percentage
of their income on food than any other nation. On
average, one American farm produces enough food
to feed 155 people. No other nation has been as
generous with food aid to the needy. We have good
reason to celebrate our domestic security in food.
We are the largest agricultural exporter in the
world, and our exports are vital for other sectors
of our economy. Those exports drive additional
economic growth as each dollar of agricultural
exports generates another $1.27 in business activity.
That is why we remain committed to expanding
trade opportunities and opening new markets for
agriculture. Under a Republican president, America’s
trade negotiators will insist that our global trading
partners adhere to science-based standards with regard to food and health regulations. We will not
tolerate the use of bogus science and scare tactics
to bar our products from foreign markets, nor will
we allow insufficient health and safety standards for
products imported for our consumption.
We must also ensure that domestic policies
do not compromise our global competitiveness
through overregulation and undue interference
in the marketplace. There is growing recognition
that federal dairy policies, crafted during the Great
Depression, are increasingly an impediment to the
ability of our dairy producers to meet the expected
doubling in global demand coming by 2030. We
oppose the policies pushed by special interest
groups seeking to stop or make more expensive
our current system of safe, efficient, and humane
production of meat. Congress has repeatedly had to
block the current Administration’s draconian rules
concerning the marketing of poultry and livestock.
This regulatory impulse must be curbed, not on a
case-by-case basis, but through a fundamental
restructuring of the regulatory process. In the
meantime, the intrusive and expensive federal
mandates on food options and menu labeling should
be ended as soon as possible by a Republican
Congress. We oppose the mandatory labeling of
genetically modified food, which has proven to be
safe, healthy, and a literal life-saver for millions in the
developing world.
The Democratic Administration’s sustained
support for additional regulation of agriculture has
directly resulted in higher costs of production for
those who produce the food we eat. This federal
regulatory overreach has resulted and will continue
to result in higher food prices for Americans. These
higher food costs are particularly challenging for
those Americans struggling to make ends meet.
Like the rest of the economy, agriculture has
suffered through eight years of the Democrats’ regulatory juggernaut, particularly from the
Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). States,
not Washington bureaucrats, are best equipped
to engage farmers and ranchers to develop
sound farm oversight policies. The EPA’s Waters
of the United States (WOTUS) rule, issued jointly
with the Army Corps of Engineers, is a travesty.
It extends the government’s jurisdiction over
navigable waters into the micro-management of
puddles and ditches on farms, ranches, and other
privately-held property. Ditches, dry creek beds,
stock ponds, prairie potholes, and other nonnavigable
wet areas are already regulated by the
states. WOTUS is now subject to judicial review and
must be invalidated, but that will not be sufficient.
Unelected bureaucrats must be stopped from
furthering the Democratic Party’s political agenda
through regulatory demands forced upon citizens
and businesses beyond that which is required by
law. We must never allow federal agencies to seize
control of state waters, watersheds, or groundwater.
State waters, watersheds, and groundwater must be
the purview of the sovereign states.
Farmers and ranchers are among this country’s
leading conservationists. Modern farm practices
and technologies, supported by programs from
the Department of Agriculture, have led to reduced
erosion, improved water and air quality, increased
wildlife habitat, all the while maintaining improved
agricultural yields. This stewardship of the land
benefits everyone, and we remain committed to
conservation policies based on the preservation,
not the restriction, of working lands. For this
reason, ranching on public lands must be fostered,
developed, and encouraged. This includes providing
for an abundant water supply for America’s farmers,
ranchers, and their communities.
Farming and ranching remain high-risk
endeavors, and they cannot be isolated from
market forces. No segment of agriculture can
expect treatment so favorable that it seriously
disadvantages workers in other trades. Federal
programs to assist farmers in managing risk must
be as cost-effective as they are functional, offering
tools that can improve producers’ ability to operate
when times are tough while remaining affordable to
the taxpayers. Even so, the expansion of agricultural
exports through the vigorous opening of new markets around the world is the surest path to farm
security.
While uncertainty about natural weather and
markets is a risk farmers and ranchers always face,
government should not add to their uncertainty by
inaction and delay. Thanks in large part to a lack
of leadership from the current Administration and
congressional Democrats, the last Farm Bill took
far too long to enact, creating instability about
farm policy for nearly two years. Republicans are
dedicated to leading this country forward, which
includes getting things done on time, including the
next Farm Bill.
The Democrats play politics with farm security.
Much of the Democrats’ delay had nothing to
do with the vital role of American agriculture. It
concerned their efforts to expand welfare through
the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program
(SNAP), which now comprises more than 70 percent
of all farm bill spending. During the last eight years
of a Democratic Administration, nearly all the work
requirements for able-bodied adults, instituted by
our landmark welfare reform of 1996, have been
removed. We will restore those provisions and,
to correct a mistake made when the Food Stamp
program was first created in 1964, separate the
administration of SNAP from the Department of
Agriculture.
Like all other sectors of our society, agriculture
is directly impacted by the constant advance in
technology. Agriculture now faces a revolution in the
generation of “Big Data” — information produced
not only through public oversight of regulations and
programs, but also from private business records of
farming and ranching operations. In the interest of
protecting the safety of our farmers and ranchers,
we will advance policies to protect the security,
privacy, and most of all, the private ownership of
individual farmers’ and ranchers’ data.
The U. S. Forest Service, within the Department
of Agriculture, controls around 200 million acres of
land with enormous natural resources, especially
timber, a renewable resource providing jobs for
thousands of workers that should be used to the
best economic potential for the nation. Many of
our national forests are in worsening health with
the threat of invasive species, insect mortality,
and the severe risk of wildfire. The increase in catastrophic wildfires has been needlessly killing
millions of animals and destroying homes and
watersheds for decades in the western states.
The expense to suppress wildfires related to failed
federal forest policies continues to increase. When
timber is managed properly, the renewable crops
will result in fewer wildfires and, at the same time,
produce jobs in the timber industry for countless
families. We believe in promoting active, sustainable
management of our forests and that states can best
manage our forests to improve forest health and
keep communities safe.[4]
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Pence on agriculture and food policy
