Childers Visits With Farmers During Crop Tour
Water Valley farmer John Ingram talks with Congressman Travis Childers during a meeting Monday afternoon. Childers was touring the First District, making three stops across the state to address crop loss from excessive rain this year. – Photo by Billy Davis
By David Howell
Editor
BATESVILLE – Congressman Travis Childers visited with Mississippi farmers Monday, making three stops in the First District including one at the Batesville Civic Center.
The meeting was well attended by farmers from North Mississippi, including Yalobusha County, as Childers reported that bills have been introduced in the House and Senate to provide financial assistance to the farmers hit hard by the excessive rains this fall.
“Producers throughout North Mississippi are suffering enormous profit losses and local economies are struggling to stay afloat due to heavy rains that have left farmers unable to harvest up to 50 percent of their crops,” Childers reported in a press release prior to the meeting.
With Childers at the meeting was U.S. Department of Agriculture Deputy Undersec-retary Michael Scuse.
“In order to ensure our hard-hit counties receive the relief they need, it’s critical that the USDA, the organization responsible for providing disaster assistance, has a first-hand understanding of the severity of our farmers’ losses,” Childers said, thanking Deputy Under Secretary Scuse for taking the time to tour our district for this very important purpose.
“The participation was really good from Yalobusha County,” MSU Extension Service director for Yalobusha County Steve Cummings reported of the meeting. “We had 10 people present at the Batesville meeting, representing most of the farming operations in the county,” Cummings added.
Last week, Congressman Childers joined Arkansas Representative Marion Berry in introducing legislation to provide timely disaster assistance. The legislation includes direct payment assistance to program crops, $650 million in state grants to assist specialty crop producers, and $150 million in assistance for livestock producers. Arkansas Senator Blanche Lincoln, Chairman of the United States Senate Committee on Agriculture and Senator Thad Cochran introduced companion legislation.
“The biggest hurdle that all farmers go through is trying to find financing for their next crop,” Water Valley farmer John Ingram told the Herald after the meeting.
“That is basically what is being addressed in these two pieces of legislation,” Ingram added.
Yalobusha supervisors passed a resolution in November, declaring the county a disaster for farmers. Preliminary estimates put crop losses in the county near $5 million dollars. The multi-million dollar estimate came during a meeting of the USDA Emergency Board in November at the Farm Service Agency in Coffeeville.
“I don’t want to mislead anybody,” Childers said at Monday’s meeting. “We’re at the end of the year and we’re trying very hard, but we’ve got to find an avenue to get this assistance in and I honestly don’t know that we can. I promise you we’re working hard on it.”
