MR. BRUNDAGE: Mr. Chairman, Members of the Committee, we appreciate the opportunity to talk to you today regarding negotiating objectives for agriculture in the next round of trade talks in the World Trade Organization. I'm here before you in strong support of U.S. agriculture being a significant force at the negotiating table in the next WTO round. I am here as the manual reports representing the Tennessee Farm Bureau as a member of the State Board of Directors. The Tennessee Farm Bureau represents 90 percent of the farm families in Tennessee.

As you know Tennessee is a very diverse state with three district regions. Tennessee farmers produce the traditional row crops including cotton, corn, wheat and soybeans and we are consistently within the five tobacco producing states in the nation. I noticed on one of your slides this morning tobacco is very prevalent in a bunch of our exports. With the pressure that it's under in the states that exporting will be important to our tobacco producers. In addition, we're a large producer of horticultural products and quality hardwood timber. In today's global economy we realize that the future of the growth of agriculture of Tennessee will depend greatly on a free and open trade to access customers around the world. Agriculture consistently runs the trade surplus with a positive balance of trade every ear since 1960. One of the few U.S. industries that does run a trade surplus. The ability of U.S. agriculture to gain and maintain a share of the global markets depends on many factors, obtaining strong trade agreements and making sure that they're properly enforced. Obviously, just going to talks and getting the agreements that we want to enforce in future years will take years and years to have some of those even though we have gained very little. Enhancing the administration's ability to negotiate increased market access for U.S. agriculture. Last spring I had the opportunity to be in Washington and visit some other countries to their embassies and one of the things they told us when we talked about trade is the fact that our President didn't have the ability for a fast track ability in our Congress. So they seem to say that if we don't have the confidence to put the ability in the hands of our leadership, why would they want to negotiate with us. So we have to take of some things right here at home before we can do anything on a worldwide basis.

Building necessary changes to the WTO dispute settlement process to ensure timely resolution of disputes. You know, we read time and time and again of a dispute being brought up and then taking years and years to settle and by then we have worked out some other way to go about the problem or price changes have changed and changed the importance of that matter. The agriculture community is certainly suffering from very low commodity prices. We've heard that from several speakers and to those people in this room it is a known fact. We have farmers that are facing devastation of prices that are lower than they were in the 1930's and 40's though no more obvious than the hog situation this winter.

It brings the point when we look at this from a common sense standpoint, this past winter I had the opportunity to be in Juarez, Mexico, with millions of our neighbors begging for food and at home, I am in the hog business, we were selling hogs for ten cents a pound.

It's hard to understand that those people can live in silent order and we can't get the food to them and I can't make a profit. We have some kind of breakdown in the trade negotiations when that's the situation. We must protect and strengthen agriculture's long-standing history of a balance of trade surplus. Working through the WTO is a means to ensure agriculture trade remains strong. The United States cannot afford to simply allow others to form new trade pacts and write future rules for trade. We must be involved. If we forfeit this opportunity, U.S. producers, and exporters will be severely disadvantaged in the competitive marketplace in the 21st Century.

If you would allow me to make a few common sense objectives for this next round. Obviously we need policies that promote revenue not just stabilize growth or stop the downtrend. We need to promote growth. We need to change some of the charts that we looked at this morning to a different direction. Everyone benefits from a higher standard of living including the countries that receive our exported products as some of us already mentioned with better food products and ability to buy and trade with us. Our agriculture negotiators must address head on issues of high tariffs, trade subsidies and other restrictive trade practices, much the same as the chart that you showed us with what the European countries are putting in their enhancement programs. We have an export enhancement program that's funded and we don't even use the full funds in the amount of money. It's somewhat like we're at war with people using different types of arms if they're spending that much money and we're not spending any of ours.

Many times personally I would feel that we could do more on that aspect in building relations and building the markets by using some of the money that we often refer to as bail out money, the money that's been put into farm programs to save our producers which is always a short term fix. Perhaps some of that money should be put into some market building opportunities that would make it last a lifetime rather than a few short months until next year's crop. Our market is the most (inaudible) market in the world. It seems as though we'll buy anything from anybody and we cannot allow competitors to trade openly in our market but deny us access to their markets on equal terms. That goes to the fact that sometimes we have seagoing vessels come to our country, bring us things and go home empty without the opportunity to put something on them to go home. We must ensure market access for biotechnology products produced from genetically modified organisms. Significant delays and lack of transparency in the regulatory approval process initiate a need to clearly establish that biotechnology products are covered by the science based provisions of the WTO agreement and to ensure that the approval is handled in a timely manner. Nothing can be more important to the farmers in the southeast than this portion of your negotiation. My small family farm alone this year's crop will include 60 percent of my bean crop ready beans. I have 70 percent of my corn and BT product. I also have 50 acres of newly released round of ready corn. And in relation to the man's comment this morning about the in Monarch butterflies, if you had Round Up ready corn and BT corn, the milkweed would be better and the larva would (inaudible) to begin with so we can solve that problem before we even start.

We need to facilitate to shorten the dispute resolution procedures and process. As I mentioned before this typically can take as long as three years to settle a dispute once it's started and even after it's settled as with the EU banana and beef cases sometimes even after there is a settlement, compliance is not always as should or timely. I understand that they are still needing some increase in time for some of those settlements. The negotiations must begin and conclude as early as possible. Put the Tennessee agriculture producers on a level playing field with the rest of the world. We have been trying to get on a level playing field as long as I have been dealing with agriculture. All negotiations for the next round should occur and conclude simultaneously. By doing so other countries will be prevented from having the difficult agricultural negotiations until the bitter end. A short time frame along with a single undertaking approach will prevent long drawn out negotiations that become too complicated to conclude punctually. This will avoid leaving agriculture to be a last minute undertaking. Agriculture trade is important. We can achieve a stronger agricultural trade with true reform of the current trading regime. We need fair trade for our producers. We have an opportunity to help shape the agenda at the next round of trade talks. We must seize this chance and demonstrate to the world that we are committed to opening new markets in U.S. agriculture.

This is the conclusion of my remarks that was prepared and present from the Tennessee Farm Bureau. I would like to add a personal comment or two if possible.

I am a producer and I left my combine parked in the field today with nobody there to run. I wouldn't have done that two or three years ago, but we're at a position and beginning to get to the point of a crisis in agriculture to the point that it was worthwhile for me to stop the day's work to come and try to give my views to you.

It also because I did leave at home a 20-year-old son that's trying to start in agriculture and without your success in this World Trade Organization next meetings that we start into, he probably won't have that opportunity. It appears that as though my ability to survives kind of depends on your ability to succeed when you go to these hearings this year and start negotiations.

When we signed on with the Frequent Farm Act it was a (inaudible) and I still believe it will work, but we did that with the promise of greater, stronger trade activity with the world. And as you can see with what you've presented us this morning from the time of the '96 Farm Bill we've gone the wrong way. We've gone done instead of up which makes people tired of that situation. We're the big producers in the market. The market today my county is two dollars for corn and 4.50 for beans and 2.25 for wheat. Just which one of those markets would you want to produce for. I can't find one that's going to work too well.

Dan, this morning talked about value added. The problem with value added is that it's increased all of the way the picture looks as the experts say because we are producing more dollars, but those value added dollars are not coming back to the producers. The producers of the raw product that start this process is sharing very little in the advantage whether it be potato chips or whatever we're seeing. So, you know, I hope that you take to heart the comments that you hear today. You're hearing them all the way from CEO's of big corporations to small independent producers. We all have a vested interest and we certainly appreciate the fact that you're going across the country listening before you start, but once you do, it's very important and I hope you carry that with you. Thank you, sir.