Local cotton farmers are upset after Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsak said Wednesday that he does not have the legal authority to designate cotton seed as an oil seed despite the House Agriculture Committee saying he does.
“I’m very upset because Secretary Vilsak is supposed to be an advocate for agriculture he is supposed to be there to help agriculture,” manager of Meadow Farmers Co-op Dan Jackson said. “It’s his number one job and at the end of the day, he has the opportunity to do this with the stroke of a pen.”
Jackson said Secretary Tom Vilsak’s announcement Wednesday continues leaving cotton farmers in the dust.
“The climate has been very adversarial the last two or three years,” Jackson said. “We’ve been through a five year drought, but the last two or three years we went through the farm bill process have been pretty hard. When we came out of it, cotton has essentially been left out.”
Plains Cotton Growers asked Vilsak to make the designation under the 2014 Farm Bill last year.
The designation would’ve allowed cotton producers to buy and sell the seed, creating extra cash flow before planting season as a financial safety net in a struggling market.
“They could add those to their loan applications and try to make sure that they can cash-flow the loan they are trying to have made to cover the operating expenses,” Plains Cotton Growers Director of Policy Analysis Shawn Wade said.
Jackson said not designating cotton seed as an oil seed will hurt more than just the farmers.
