AUDIO: Wayne Fredericks, American Soybean Association
An American Soybean Association director reflects on 2017 and looks ahead to 2018.
Wayne Frederick, of Osage, Iowa, serves as an American Soybean Association (ASA) director. Frederick says the Association allocated a lot of its time to the 2018 Farm Bill this past year.
?One of the overriding thoughts is ?Do No Harm? to a Farm Bill that is working well for corn and soybean farmers, particularly,? Frederick said. ?We realize dairy and cotton producers have some issues, (and) hopefully we can find some fixes for that prior to writing the Farm Bill.?
Frederick says the Association would like to see changes made to the Agriculture Risk Coverage (ARC) and Price Loss Coverage (PLC) programs in the upcoming Farm Bill.
?We would like to see some freedom of choice, again, between the ARC and PLC payments,? Frederick said. ?We understand there have been some issues with ARC payments on county lines. (We are) advocating to change from the use of NASS yields to RMA yields, as we feel they are more reflective and accurate.?
Frederick say freedom of choice becomes more important as prices decline.
?We want farmers to have a choice between ARC and PLC payments,? Frederick said. ?Moving forward, many will choose PLC. ARC is based on rolling five-year values, and those values are going down because our prices have dropped. It doesn?t look too attractive moving forward. We, at least, want to give producers the opportunity to change.?
Additionally, the Association would also like to see maintained funding for conservation, marketing and research programs.
