Farm Bureau Press for April 6

In Farm Bureau Applications available for M*A*S*H Applications are now available to high school students for the summer M*A*S*H (Medical Applications of Science for Health) camps. These camps will be located at 34 medical facilities throughout Arkansas. The two-week M*A*S*H camps are designed to expose rising high-school juniors and seniors to healthcare-related vocations.

This year marks the 30th anniversary of the M*A*S*H program in Arkansas.

During those 30 years, close to 9,000 students have participated in the program.

“The M*A*S*H program gives students an inside look at various medical professions and is designed to spark students’ interest in the medical field,” said Jennifer Victory, Director of Rural Health for Arkansas Farm Bureau. “A large number of the camps are held at rural medical centers and attract local students with a rural background.

“The idea is that future medical students from a rural background are more

Arkansas Farm Bureau President Randy Veach, Vice President Rich Hillman and state board members Joe Christian, Terry Dabbs and Mike Freeze recently visited with Anne Idsal, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Region 6 Administrator in Fort Worth. The ArFB leaders, along with Farm Bureau leaders from other states talked about issues critical to the Region 6 area. Visit our Facebook page to hear a recap from President Veach. likely to return to their roots.”

Applications are available through school guidance counselors, by contacting the M*A*S*H director in your area or by visiting bit.ly/mashapps2018.

County Farm Bureau organizations and the M*A*S*H Partnership sponsor students so they may attend the camps at no cost. The partnership includes

Jace Ford was announced as the winner of the Jackson County Farm Bureau Distinguished Service Award Scholarship.

The scholarship is awarded annually to a deserving student enrolled in the Arkansas State UniversityNewport’s Education Agriculture Technology (EAT) program. Pictured are Ford (left) and Jackson County President Tommy Young.

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the University of Arkansas for Medical Science’s Regional Centers, Arkansas Blue Cross and Blue Shield, Arkansas Farm Bureau and Baptist Health.

More information on the M*A*S*H program can be obtained by contacting Amber Marshall with UAMS, 501-6866188, or Victory of Arkansas Farm Bureau, 501-228-1269.

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A Publication of Arkansas Farm Bureau Federation

April 28, 2017 • Vol. 20, No. 9

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Arkansas irrigation yield contest There is a new irrigation yield contest in Arkansas. The contest is designed to test

White County Farm Bureau Women’s Leadership Committee recently hosted a luncheon for local MSRs, Agents, Adjusters, and cooperative extension agents to express appreciation for their contributions in achieving the Arkansas Farm Bureau President’s Award, which is given to the state’s top county.

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Arkansas dairy foods contest The 61st Annual Arkansas Dairy Foods Contest will be May 30 in Little Rock.

This annual event is sponsored by Arkansas Farm Bureau and the Arkansas Dairy Cooperative Association.

The contest is divided into two categories: Main Dish and Party Ideas. Each county may enter one recipe in each of the two categories.

Students enrolled in 4-H aged 9-19 or in the 4th through 12th grades as of Jan. 1 and living in Arkansas may enter. Homeschooled students may also enter.

Entries must be approved by the county dairy committee or by the county Extension agent.

Each contestant must agree to participate in the state cook-off if his or her recipe is selected for the semifinals.

Local entries must be received for selection of state finalists by April 27.

For more information, visit bit.ly/ardairycontest2018.

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In Arkansas

Clay County Farm Bureau Vice President Mark Coleman (left) presented copies of the American Farm Bureau Foundation for Agriculture’s Book of the Year, “John Deere: That’s Who,” by Tracy Nelson Maurer, to Brenda McGrew of Corning’s Park Elementary School and to Chelsea Witworth of the Corning Public Library.

Ashley County Farm Bureau Women’s Committee members Amy Hartshorn (left) and Lonni Davis (right) presented a $400 donation March 29 on behalf of the county Farm Bureau to the Helping Hands Food Pantry in Hamburg.

Director Mary Williams accepted the check for Helping Hnads and said it would help feed people in need throughout the county.

the knowledge and ability of growers to produce the “Most Crop Per Drop.”

The University of Arkansas Division of Agriculture has been demonstrating Irrigation Water Management Practices on cooperator farms for five years. Experience has shown that when applied effecively water use can be reduced by 24 percent on average with no yield penalty. Reduction in water use of around 40 percent have been documented. The adoption rate of Computerized Hole Selection is over 40 percent, indicating that this is now a mainstream practice in Arkansas.

The first-place winner in rice will receive $10,000 seed tote credit sponsored

by Ricetec; the first-place winner in corn will receive $10,000 cash sponsored

by Arkansas corn and Grain Sorghum Promotion Board; and first-place winner in soybeans will also receive $10,000 cash sponsored by Arkansas Soybean Promotion Board.

For the contest rules and more information, visit bit.ly/aryieldirrigation or email contest@uark.edu.

rebate approved recently by the Arkansas Agriculture Department’s State Plant Board (ASPB). Cotton farmers should expect payments by the end of April.

The ABWEF borrowed millions of dollars over the years from the USDA Farm Service Agency (FSA), as did other southern states and programs, to finance the boll weevil eradication program that began in 1997. In 2006, the devastating boll weevil pest was eradicated from Arkansas. In 2015, the ABWEF successfully paid off the loan amount three years early. Last year, the ABWEF lowered assessments from $4 per acre to $3 per acre, saving cotton producers thousands of dollars.

“We are very excited for our cotton producers. This rebate is unlike anything offered before by the program,” says Arkansas Boll Weevil Eradication Foundation Executive Director Regina Coleman. “Our program has remained dedicated to the best interests of Arkansas cotton growers. Even after lowering assessments last year, our finances are allowing us to keep a two-year reserve in place to ensure the sustainability of the program and offer a rebate to our cotton farmers.”

For more information and questions about the boll weevil rebate, contact Regina Coleman at 870-692-6368 or rcoleman@abwep.org.

Boll Weevil Eradication Foundation For the first time in the history of the program, the Arkansas Boll Weevil Eradication Foundation (ABWEF) is providing a cash rebate to Arkansas cotton farmers, for cotton acreage reported in 2017. Just over $318,000 will be given back to farmers, to fulfill the $.75 per acre

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Improved Dairy Safety Net Tool U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Sonny Perdue is encouraging dairy producers to consider enrolling in the new and improved Margin Protection Program for Dairy (MPP-Dairy), which will provide better protections for dairy producers from shifting milk and feed prices. With changes authorized under the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2018, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Farm Service Agency (FSA) has set the enrollment period to run from April 9 to June 1.

“We recognize the financial hardships many of our nation’s dairy producers are experiencing right now. Folks are losing their contracts and they are getting anxious about getting their bills paid while they watch their milk check come in lower and lower each month. The Bipartisan Budget Act provided some much-needed incentives for dairy producers to make cost-effective decisions to strengthen their farms, mitigate risk, and conserve their natural resources,” said Secretary Perdue. “This includes our support of America’s dairy farms. We encourage dairy producers to review the provisions of the updated program, which Congress shaped with their feedback. Those changes are

Lori Dabbs (right) of Stuttgart was recognized today as Arkansas County’s first Woman of the Year in Agriculture, an award bestowed cooperatively by the Farm Service Agency, Extension Service, Arkansas County Soil Conservation District, NRCS and Farm Bureau Women’s Committee.

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Elsewhere

Zack Graham, the owner of Zack’s Flying Service in Tuckerman, recently hosted the first class of the Education Agriculture Technology program. This program was launched in the fall of 2017 as a result of several farmers in the area needing a more skilled labor force. The administration and staff of ASU Newport worked to create a curriculum of 60 accredited hours of study that was approved by the State Board of Higher Education. This course will provide an Associate degree in Agriculture Technology. now in effect, and I’d ask any producers who are interested to contact their local USDA service centers.”

The program protects dairy producers by paying them when the difference between the national all-milk price and the national average feed cost (the margin) falls below a certain dollar amount elected by the producer.

Changes include: • Calculations of the margin period is monthly rather than bi-monthly.

• Covered production is increased to 5 million pounds on the Tier 1 premium schedule, and premium rates for Tier 1 are substantially lowered.

• An exemption from paying an administrative fee for limited resource, beginning, veteran, and disadvantaged producers. Dairy operators enrolled in the previous 2018 enrollment period that qualify for this exemption under the new provisions may request a refund.

Dairy operations must make a new coverage election for 2018, even if enrolled during the previous 2018 signup period.

Coverage elections made for 2018 will be retroactive to January 1, 2018. All dairy operations desiring coverage must sign up during the enrollment period and submit an appropriate form (CCC-782) and dairy operations may still “opt out” by not submitting a form. All outstanding balances for 2017 and prior years must be paid in full before 2018 coverage is

approved.

Dairy producers can participate in FSA’s MPP-Dairy or the Risk Management Agency’s Livestock Gross Margin Insurance Plan for Dairy Cattle (LGMDairy), but not both. During the 2018 enrollment period, only producers with an active LGM-Dairy policy who have targeted marketings insured in 2018 months will be allowed to enroll in MPP-Dairy by June 1; however, their coverage will start only after active target marketings conclude under LGM-Dairy.

USDA has a web tool to help producers determine the level of coverage under the MPP-Dairy that will provide them with the strongest safety net under a variety of conditions. The online resource, which will be updated and available by April 9 at www.fsa.usda.gov/mpptool, allows dairy farmers to quickly and easily combine unique operation data and other key variables to calculate their coverage needs based on price projections. Producers can also review historical data or estimate future coverage based on data projections.

The secure site can be accessed via computer, smartphone, tablet or any other platform.

USDA is mailing postcards advising dairy producers of the changes. For more information, visit www.fsa.usda.gov/dairy or contact your local USDA service center.

Editor Maddison Stewart

maddison.stewart@arfb.com

In the Market As of April 5, 2017 Omnibus bill changes 199A In an effort to address the 199A snafu in the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act that allowed farmers selling to cooperative to deduct up to 20 percent of total sales made to co-ops, Congress included an estimated $2.7 billion in additional tax measures in the omnibus spending bill. Changing the 199A provision back to the old system is estimated to generate $108 million over the next decade. In order to get the provision changed Congress included a tax subsidy for affordable housing at a cost of $2.8 billion. Under the new tax rules passed in December, farmers will receive a 20 percent deduction on the net of products sold. The new 199A provision reverts the cooperative deduction back to the old system. Cooperatives will again have a deduction of the lesser of 9 percent of adjusted gross income or 50 percent of W-2 wages and have the option of retaining their deduction or passing some of their deduction to their patrons. Therefore, the business deduction the farmer who sells to the cooperative receives will range between 11 percent and 29 percent of net income from sales, depending on both his operation’s W2 wages and the size of the deduction passed through to him by his cooperative. As a result of the changes, a farmer who operates a pass-through business and sells product to a cooperative will not know the full value of their deduction until it is decided what share of the cooperative’s deduction will be retained or passed back to patrons.

U.S. pushes to get NAFTA 2.0 U.S. trade negotiators are pushing to finish North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) talks with Canada and Mexico as quickly as possible, a White House spokeswoman said Monday, but the official declined to comment on a Bloomberg report that Trump wants a deal in principle by the Summit of Americas meeting that begins April 13. “Negotiations are continuing on a daily basis with the goal of a successful and rapid conclusion, and the NAFTA countries will announce

plans as warranted,” the White House spokeswoman said. “As Ambassador Lighthizer said in March, time is running very short to complete a new NAFTA agreement.”

China responds to trade announcement China’s Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM) and Ministry of Finance (MOF) separately announced a proposal April 4 to levy retaliatory tariffs of 25 percent, impacting approximately $16.5 billion in Chinese imports of agricultural and food products from the United States.

The announcement is in response to the recent announcement of proposed U.S. tariffs on Chinese imports as a result of the U.S. 301 Investigation into the forced transfer of U.S. technology and intellectual property. China’s proposed tariff increases in response to the U.S. 301 Trade Action target U.S. soybeans, corn and corn products, wheat, sorghum, cotton, beef and beef products, cranberries, orange juice and tobacco and tobacco products.

The announcement did not include a comment period and does not indicate a date of implementation.

Chinese tariffs could impact U.S. soybeans Chinese imports of U.S. soybeans could drop by as much as 71 percent if Beijing moves to invoke tariffs on crops in retaliation to U.S. duties and investment curbs, according to a new study from Purdue University. The analysis, commissioned by the U.S. Soybean Export Council, modeled the effects of Chinese tariffs ranging from 10 percent to 30 percent. “The annual loss in U.S. economic well-being would range between $1.7 billion and $3.3 billion,” Wally Tyner, one of the Purdue agricultural economists in charge of the study, said in a statement.

“Chinese economic well-being also falls if they impose a tariff, in some cases as much or more than for the U.S.” But as detailed in recent newsletters, we would expect lost business in China to be diverted to other countries, blunting the impact.

Gene-edited crops free of regulation Last week, the USDA issued a statement saying it won’t regulate certain new crops that are the products of gene editing.

The statement said USDA does not now regulate — and has no plans to regulate — crops where the genetic modifications

could have been achieved through conventional breeding methods. It didn’t take long for the National Grain and Feed Association (NGFA) to press USDA to work with foreign countries to make sure they will accept all U.S. exports of genetically engineered commodities. The group urged developers of gene-edited crops to “communicate proactively with consumers about the safety and benefits of the new plant breeding techniques.”

Japan’s tariff on U.S. beef reverts Japan’s duty on U.S. frozen beef reverted to 38.5 percent as the special safeguard system reset for the new Japanese fiscal year. Japan had increased the duty to 50 percent in August 2017 after imports of frozen beef exceeded established trigger volumes. Under the terms of its free trade agreement with Japan, Australia was not subject to the safeguard duty as beef tariffs continue to fall as scheduled in the agreement.

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Matt King 501-228-1297, matt.king@arfb.com