[House Hearing, 116 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
FARMING IN THE 21ST CENTURY: THE IMPACTS OF AGRICULTURE TECHNOLOGY IN
RURAL AMERICA
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HEARING
BEFORE THE
SUBCOMMITTEE ON INNOVATION AND WORKFORCE DEVELOPMENT
OF THE
COMMITTEE ON SMALL BUSINESS
UNITED STATES
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED SIXTEENTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
HEARING HELD
JANUARY 9, 2020
__________
[GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Small Business Committee Document Number 116-066
Available via the GPO Website: www.govinfo.gov
__________
U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
38-824 WASHINGTON : 2020
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HOUSE COMMITTEE ON SMALL BUSINESS
NYDIA VELAZQUEZ, New York, Chairwoman
ABBY FINKENAUER, Iowa
JARED GOLDEN, Maine
ANDY KIM, New Jersey
JASON CROW, Colorado
SHARICE DAVIDS, Kansas
JUDY CHU, California
MARC VEASEY, Texas
DWIGHT EVANS, Pennsylvania
BRAD SCHNEIDER, Illinois
ADRIANO ESPAILLAT, New York
ANTONIO DELGADO, New York
CHRISSY HOULAHAN, Pennsylvania
ANGIE CRAIG, Minnesota
STEVE CHABOT, Ohio, Ranking Member
AUMUA AMATA COLEMAN RADEWAGEN, American Samoa, Vice Ranking Member
TROY BALDERSON, Ohio
KEVIN HERN, Oklahoma
JIM HAGEDORN, Minnesota
PETE STAUBER, Minnesota
TIM BURCHETT, Tennessee
ROSS SPANO, Florida
JOHN JOYCE, Pennsylvania
DAN BISHOP, North Carolina
Melissa Jung, Majority Staff Director
Justin Pelletier, Majority Deputy Staff Director
Kevin Fitzpatrick, Staff Director
C O N T E N T S
OPENING STATEMENTS
Page
Hon. Jason Crow.................................................. 1
Hon. Troy Balderson.............................................. 3
WITNESSES
Mr. Kevin M. France, President and CEO, SWIIM System, Ltd.,
Denver, CO..................................................... 7
Dr. David Potere, Head of GeoInnovation, Indigo Agriculture,
Boston, MA..................................................... 9
Mr. Roberto Meza, Co-Founder and Farmer, Emerald Gardens,
Bennett, CO, testifying on behalf of the Rocky Mountain Farmers
Union.......................................................... 10
Dr. Douglas Jackson-Smith, Professor and Assistant Director,
School of Environment and Natural Resources, The Ohio State
University, Wooster, OH........................................ 12
APPENDIX
Prepared Statements:
Mr. Kevin M. France, President and CEO, SWIIM System, Ltd.,
Denver, CO................................................. 30
Dr. David Potere, Head of GeoInnovation, Indigo Agriculture,
Boston, MA................................................. 35
Mr. Roberto Meza, Co-Founder and Farmer, Emerald Gardens,
Bennett, CO, testifying on behalf of the Rocky Mountain
Farmers Union.............................................. 40
Dr. Douglas Jackson-Smith, Professor and Assistant Director,
School of Environment and Natural Resources, The Ohio State
University, Wooster, OH.................................... 45
Questions for the Record:
None.
Answers for the Record:
None.
Additional Material for the Record:
Statement of Paul Schlagel, Sugarbeet farmer, Longmont, CO,
Chairman, Biotech and Research Committee, American
Sugarbeet Growers Association, Washington, DC.............. 129
FARMING IN THE 21ST CENTURY: THE IMPACTS OF AGRICULTURE TECHNOLOGY IN
RURAL AMERICA
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THURSDAY, JANUARY 9, 2020
House of Representatives,
Committee on Small Business,
Subcommittee on Innovation and Workforce
Development,
Washington, DC.
The Subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 10:03 a.m., in
Room 2360, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Jason Crow
[chairman of the Subcommittee] presiding.
Present: Representatives Crow, Finkenauer, Kim, Davids,
Veasey, Houlahan, Balderson, Chabot, Hern, Burchett, and Joyce.
Also Present: Representative Panetta.
Chairman CROW. Good morning. The Committee will come to
order.
We thank everyone for joining us this morning to our first
Small Business Committee hearing of 2020. And I want to
especially thank the witnesses for taking the time to travel
from across the country and take time away from their
businesses in some instances to have this important discussion.
As is the case with these hearings, there will be members
coming and going. There are overlapping hearings on other
Committees, so you will see some folks come and go throughout
and ask questions, so we just ask for your patience in bearing
with that as well.
Farming and agriculture are at the heart of strong
economies around the country. Investing in agriculture is
crucial to ensure that our communities can thrive. Coming from
Colorado, I understand the importance that farming and
agriculture have on our state's way of life and economic well-
being.
Nearly half of Colorado's 66 million acres are dedicated to
over 30,000 farms and ranches, many of which are small, locally
owned operations. Colorado is a leading producer of cattle,
corn, wheat, and dairy, but Colorado's small farms are also
raising everything from bison to ostriches and growing
sunflowers, grapes, and mushrooms to name a few.
In the 21st century, technology and innovation are changing
everyday life, reshaping how consumers shop, and how business
is conducted. Modern farming is no different. Through
advancements in robotics, sensors, artificial intelligence, GPS
technology, and digital platforms, agriculture is undergoing a
revolution and transitioning from the industrial age to the
digital age. These innovations, commonly known as agriculture
technology, or ag-tech, provide an opportunity to help farmers
increase yields and profitability while reducing waste and
environmental impact.
Today's hearing will provide members with an opportunity to
hear from innovators, farmers, and researchers about how ag-
tech is helping farmers modernize their businesses and how
entrepreneurship and innovation in ag-tech is changing our food
and farming systems.
The increased use of ag-tech has the potential to address
challenges our country and the world will face over the next
century. Globally, the world's population is on track to exceed
9 billion in the next 30 years. According to the United
Nations, this means our agricultural production will need to
increase by 70 percent to meet the growing demand for food,
fiber, and biofuels.
Meeting this global demand for food will be even more
challenging in the face of climate change that is already
impacting our food systems, water, and land. Changing
temperatures reduce yields and increase pest pressures. Changes
in participation patterns increasingly cause crop failure and
production decline.
As a former Army Ranger, I have also seen how these
threats, including scarce water resources and poor food
security in other countries can have a profound impact on our
own national security, readiness, and resiliency.
But the full potential of ag-tech to meet global food
demands mitigate the negative impacts of climate change and
create jobs in our rural communities will not be fully realized
unless we fully support our farmers and innovators and the
research that supports them.
Ag-tech can spur innovation and growth in rural parts of
the country, but like many other sectors of the economy,
agriculture is struggling to find and retain a skilled and
stable workforce. To address this, I worked with my colleagues
on both sides of the aisle to pass the Farm Workforce
Modernization Act which will help create a reliable workforce
for American agriculture. This legislation will help provide
certainty for guest workers and for American farmers and
ranchers, an important step in solving the labor challenge
facing American farmers and ranchers.
There should also be robust funding of agriculture,
research, and development at the USDA to support farmers in
rural communities. I am proud that Colorado is a hub of ag-tech
and innovation. Growing tech centers in the Denver and Boulder
areas, funding opportunities through CoBank in my district, and
a pipeline of talent from outstanding universities like
Colorado State University and the University of Colorado
systems have helped make Colorado the second largest ag-tech
ecosystem in the country. As that pipeline develops the high-
tech skills in food science, environmental engineering and
precision agriculture, these specialists will lead the ag-tech
industry forward.
Finally, it is crucial to mention the need for greater
deployment of high-speed Internet in our rural communities.
Outside of its importance in healthcare, education, and legal
services, connectivity is the backbone of ag-tech. Broadband
makes it possible for farmers to aggregate and analyze data in
real-time while tracking commodity markets and operating
digital technologies. Small businesses and farms across
Colorado suffer daily from lack of access to high-speed
broadband services due in large part to lack of investment.
Reliable, affordable high-speed broadband is a necessity and
why Congress must work to coordinate Federal resources and make
investments in infrastructure projects.
Technology has become indispensable for all small
businesses, and farmers and ranchers are no different. Small
businesses play a vital role in providing products and services
supporting America's digital farming revolution.
I look forward to hearing from our expert witnesses today
on how farming is being impacted by technology and how R&D is
impacting small business growth and entrepreneurship so that
the U.S. can once again be the world leader in agricultural
research and innovation.
And I would now like to yield to the Ranking Member, Mr.
Balderson, for an opening statement.
Mr. BALDERSON. Good morning, everyone, and thank you, Mr.
Chairman, Chairman Crow. I appreciate it. Happy New Year. And I
look forward to a great 2020. I anticipate a great 2020 with
another year of bipartisan camaraderie and innovation on
Workforce Development Subcommittee.
Today's hearing will explore agricultural technology
innovations that are modernizing our farms and revitalizing
rural America. Having spent time working on a family farm
myself, I understand the impact farmers have on their community
and our Nation.
Agricultural technology, or ag-tech, is a broad term
describing a diverse range of technologies, including
bioscience, big data, analytics, automation and robotics,
supply chain and logistics, and alternative business models
such as hydroponics and meat alternatives. On farms, these
technologies can increase productivity, reduce waste, and boost
profits. On a larger scale, ag-tech entrepreneurship activities
boosting rural revitalizing efforts by attracting startups,
jobs, and investment dollars to agricultural regions. With the
diversity of technologies involved, ag-tech attracts
entrepreneurs and investors from various industries and
geographies.
As we observe the astounding growth and impact of ag-tech
ventures, we cannot lose focus on the primary stakeholders, our
farmers. With uncertain markets and narrowing profit margins,
farmers may be hesitant to take on additional risk that comes
with new technologies. For example, an investment in precision
agricultural systems include equipment purchases, installation
charges, and precise precious time spent learning how to use
and maintain these technologies. To be fully taken advantage
of, the system must be compatible with preexisting machinery,
Internet connectivity, and business model. To be worth farmers'
investments, technologies must have a tangible impact on
productivity and profit. As options rapidly increase, how do
farmers determine what will work best for their specific
business needs?
I would like to thank our witnesses for being here today
and to talk about these experiences from ag-technologies and
what resources are available to minimize the risk and maximize
the benefits of investment. Thank you for being here today to
represent this promising industry.
I yield back, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman CROW. Thank you, Mr. Balderson. And I agree with
you on looking forward to 2020. We had some exciting wins and
collaborations in 2019 and I look forward to continuing that in
the next year.
The gentleman yields back.
And if Committee members have an opening statement
prepared, we would ask that they be submitted for the record.
I would like to just take a minute to explain the timing
rule. Each witness gets 5 minutes to testify and each member
get 5 minutes for questioning. There is a lighting system in
front of you to assist you. The green light will be on when you
begin, and the yellow light will come on when you have 1 minute
remaining. The red light will come on when you are out of time,
and we ask that you stay within that timeframe to the best of
your ability.
I would now like to introduce our witnesses. But before
doing so, I am going to ask unanimous consent to allow
Congressman Jimmy Panetta, who serves on the House Agriculture
Committee to join this Subcommittee hearing.
Without objection, so ordered.
Welcome, Mr. Panetta.
Mr. PANETTA. Thank you.
Chairman CROW. Thank you for joining us today.
And I will actually yield to you to introduce our first
witness.
Mr. PANETTA. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate this
opportunity to be here to speak about a very, very important
issue. And thank you, Ranking Member Balderson. I appreciate
both of your opening statements and agree with absolutely
everything that both of you had to say. So thank you.
It is an absolute honor to be here. It is actually quite
far away from where I come, not just in the Cannon Building but
in California. I come from the Central Coast of California. And
it is otherwise known as ``the Salad Bowl of the World.'' Trust
me, my fellow members on the Ag Committee get sick and tired of
me saying that and they have heard me say it over and over. And
now you get to hear me say it. But I say it with a lot of proud
because there on the Central Coast of California, you name it,
we grow it. We have hundreds and hundreds of specialty crops.
There is a reason why we are not only ``the Salad Bowl of the
World,'' but we have ``the Garlic Capital of the World.'' We
have ``the Artichoke Capital of the World.'' We have ``the
Berry Bowl of the world.'' We have specialty crops.
But as many of you know, specialty crops can be very
difficult to harvest, especially crops take that human
discernment when it comes to soft fruits and vegetables as to
figuring out what is safe, what is ripe, what is ready to be
picked, what is aesthetically pleasing to the consumer. Because
as you know, most of the time those products, once they are
picked, they go right into the cartons. Those cartons go right
onto the shelves of the stores. And those cartons then go home
with us and then those products go right into the mouths of our
sons and daughters. And so it does take at this point a very
skilled--you have to be very skilled in order to harvest this
product.
Now, for a long time we have relied on humans to do that,
especially on the Central Coast of California. That is why
Jason, I completely agree with you, the Farmworker
Modernization Act was a very, very important bill that I am
proud to say has not only passed in a bipartisan basis in the
House; it must be passed in the Senate and signed into law.
But in the meantime, the other avenue that we must go down
is ag-tech, as you mentioned. But this type of technology for
these types of crops, we are behind it. We are lagging. Now, do
not get me wrong; I have been out in our fields there in
Watsonville, and I have seen some pretty interesting things
from some companies right over the hill from Silicon Valley,
where I have seen machines take more pictures of a strawberry
plant in one afternoon than all of the previous human history
of taking photos of a strawberry plant. It is that type of
technology that is needed. But more needs to be invested in
this technology to do it.
And I think is why it is so, so important that we are
having this type of conversation here in Washington, D.C., so
that those types of investments in the fields, not just on the
Central Coast but throughout this country, can benefit from the
investment that is needed when it comes to ag-tech.
And so it is an absolute honor that I am here today with
you, but also have the opportunity to introduce Mr. Kevin
France. Kevin France is the chief executive officer of SWIIM
Systems, a small business that provides on-farm agriculture
water accounting. SWIIM has a satellite office in my district
there on the Central Coast, and it partners with the Western
Growers Association, which has one of its main offices in my
district as well.
Now, under Mr. France's leadership, SWIIM has been
recognized as a Top 25 Ag-Tech Company by Forbes Magazine. Mr.
France, I thank you for being here, for your preparation, for
your time, and all of us look forward to hearing what you have
to say in regard to the investment that is needed and what has
been done and what needs to be done when it comes to ag-tech.
Thank you.
Thank you, Ranking Chairman, Ranking Member, Chairman, I
yield back.
Chairman CROW. Thank you for being here, Mr. France, and
Jimmy, you might have a lot of agricultural capitals of the
world but I do not think you can claim the mushroom capital of
the world because that distinction belongs to Ms. Houlahan
sitting next to you. So I just wanted to be clear for the
record.
Our second witness is Dr. David Potere. Dr. Potere is the
head of GeoInnovation at Indigo Agriculture. He is a technology
leader focused on building integrated applied science platforms
using geospatial technology to tackle complex business
challenges. For the past several years, he has focused on
building a living map of the world's food supply. Using
reliable maps, data, and metrics can help farmers grow crops
that are more profitable and sustainable. Prior to joining
Indigo, Dr. Potere was cofounder and CEO of Tellis Labs, which
provided action agricultural intelligence across the food value
chain using machine learning, remote sensing, and geospatial
analysis. Dr. Potere has a Ph.D. in geodemography from
Princeton University and served the country as a surface
warfare officer in the U.S. Navy. Thank you for your service,
Dr. Potere, to the country and for being here today.
Our third witness is Mr. Roberto Meza, a beginner farmer
and cofounder of Emerald Gardens located in Bennett, Colorado.
While a grad student at MIT in the Art, Culture, and Technology
program, Roberto was inspired by student projects addressing
food production in urban landscapes. His career quickly
transitioned from the arts to agriculture with a focus on food
access. After a hiatus working on farms and observing problems
in our food systems, Roberto moved to Colorado with a childhood
friend and started their own farm in 2017. Emerald Gardens
grows, harvests, and distributes microgreens to restaurants,
grocery stores, food pantries, and smaller retailers in
Colorado's metro areas. They operate sustainably using
geothermal and passive solar energy. Roberto is also the Chair
of Membership and Outreach for Mile-High Farmers, the local
chapter of the National Young Farmers Coalition and the Rocky
Mountain Farmers Union. He is also a board member of the High
Plains Food Co-op and is developing a model for Last Mile
Distribution to help food co-ops and local producers gain
access to markets. Thank you for taking time away from your
business to be here today, Mr. Meza, and it is always good to
see a fellow Coloradan in Washington, D.C.
I would now like to yield to our Ranking Member, Mr.
Balderson, to introduce our final witness.
Mr. BALDERSON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I do want to
acknowledge the Ranking Member of the Small Business Committee
has joined us also, Ranking Member Chabot. Mr. Chabot, thank
you for being here this morning.
I am sure a lot of you are looking and you see the witness
list. Dr. Jackson-Smith and I have made an agreement. We are
not going to do the O-h-i-o stuff. But we do want to
acknowledge that though Ohio State is not in the National
Championship, Joe Burrow is. That is where he got all his
training, so Ohio State is still represented in the
championship game coming up Monday evening. So I just want to
make sure that everybody is well aware of that, and he lives
from the southern portion of Ohio. So we are well represented.
Mr. CHABOT. Will the gentleman yield?
Mr. BALDERSON. Yes.
Mr. CHABOT. You mentioned Mr. Burrow. He may soon be a
Cincinnati Bengal, too, which I happen to represent. We shall
see.
Mr. BALDERSON. We shall see.
Our next witness--sorry, Doctor--Dr. Douglas Jackson-Smith,
professor and assistant director of Ohio State University
School of Environment and National Resources. He is here today
as a representative of the university's initiative for food and
agricultural transformation. Before joining Ohio State in 2016,
Dr. Jackson-Smith served 15 years as a faculty member of the
Department of Sociology, Social Work, and Anthropology at Utah
State University. He has a bachelor's and master's degree in
rural sociology, a master's degree in agricultural economics,
and a Ph.D. in sociology. Trained as a rural sociologist, his
research explores the dynamics of technology and structural
change in agricultural and natural resource systems. He has
helped lead $25 million worth of interdisciplinary science
grant funding from USDA, NSF, and DOE. Dr. Jackson-Smith, we
thank you for your research in this field and appreciate you
taking the time away from your work to be here with us today.
Thank you.
I yield back, Chairman.
Chairman CROW. Thank you, Mr. Balderson.
In all due respect to the Ranking Member, Mr. Balderson,
Dr. Jackson-Smith received his academic training from
University of Wisconsin. So, go Badgers. Not to be outdone.
Thank you very much.
Mr. France, you are now recognized for 5 minutes.
STATEMENTS OF KEVIN M. FRANCE, PRESIDENT AND CEO, SWIIM SYSTEM,
LTD.; DR. DAVID POTERE, HEAD OF GEOINNOVATION, INDIGO
AGRICULTURE; ROBERTO MEZA, CO-FOUNDER AND FARMER, EMERALD
GARDENS; DR. DOUGLAS JACKSON-SMITH, PROFESSOR AND ASSISTANT
DIRECTOR, SCHOOL OF ENVIRONMENT AND NATURAL RESOURCES, THE OHIO
STATE UNIVERSITY
STATEMENT OF KEVIN M. FRANCE
Mr. FRANCE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Congressman, thank you
very much, and other members of this Committee. I appreciate
the opportunity to speak with you today on the impact of
agricultural technology in rural America. And I appreciate this
opportunity to share some of my experiences.
My name is Kevin France, and I am Chief Executive Officer
of SWIIM System. My graduate and undergraduate degrees are in
business administration, and my professional experience
includes developing technologies through public partnerships
that can be integrated into the private sector.
Prior to the ``Internet of Things'', also known as the IoT
revolution, sensors were not generally connected to the
Internet and as a result, data was gathered manually, normally
by a grower, when time permitted in between growing. Now,
sensors are being connected to the Internet and data is being
made available in near-real-time. Growers need better access to
this game-changing technology in order to sustain our
agricultural economy in the face of ever-increasing water
shortages.
SWIIM is an on-farm agricultural water accountant, twice
recognized as a top 25 ag-tech company by Forbes Magazine, and
we maintain a distribution agreement with Western Growers
Association, one of the largest agricultural trade
organizations in the Nation. Our clients are made up of growers
of all sizes and shapes. We provide complete water use
reporting, including applied and consumed water resources on a
real-time basis by field and by crop.
Similar to the way your CPA provides a detailed statement
of financial accounts--money in, money out, and from what
source--we enable growers to quantify and protect their water
allocations well into the future.
Our initial research was originally funded by private
investment and underpinned by state water conservation grants.
The technology was then developed over a 5-year period through
an agreement with the USDA, Colorado State, and Utah State
Universities. Our first issued patent was actually co-developed
with the help directly alongside the USDA.
Depending on their location, a grower may have access to
river water, access to groundwater. Some have access to both.
Unlike other farming inputs, however, water is the only
component to a farming operation that has no alternative
source, and if not available, could put the farmer completely
out of business.
By way of example, take the Colorado River--a prime surface
water source for seven western states is over-appropriated by
as much as 40 percent, leaving some farmers without water to
grow the crops on which our Nation severely depends upon. Years
of drought exacerbates this situation.
As another example, take California's recent passing of the
Sustainable Groundwater Management Act to manage over-pumping
of its aquifers. With these upcoming restrictions, at least
500,000 acres of farmland in the Central Valley of California
will be without water most likely, which means no crops will be
grown on those acres.
Our clients tell us they fear for their livelihoods and the
legacy of their operations, many of which have been in their
families for generations. Growers need access to updated
technologies to fight the consequences of drought and lack of
water availability that is widespread throughout the U.S.
The equipment we most often see in the field fails to
provide the accurate water accounting needed today. We see
roughly about one in five flow meters in the field are
producing data that is off by as much as 25 percent and old-
fashioned open canal measurements where they still use
yardsticks to measure water levels being off by as much as 40
percent.
Consider what this means. Our experience shows us that many
of the current funding sources available are geared toward
research. These contributions are valuable, but the net sum
result of many of these projects simply leads to more research
without much private sector engagement, unfortunately. The
USDA-NRCS has programs that are designed to help famers and
irrigation districts implement technologies. They include EQIP
and RCPP funding sources. These programs, although well-
intentioned, are tough to plan around, as funding cycles do not
track with grower needs and the application process is
difficult to complete. Funds for these programs are managed and
distributed generally on a regional basis making larger, more
scalable projects that can benefit multiple regions more
challenging to implement. We have seen this first-hand.
One promising example relates to a project that we are
currently finalizing along the Colorado River in Arizona, with
support from the Federal Government. The client is working with
the Bureau of Indian Affairs and the Bureau of Reclamation
(BuRec) to co-fund a SWIIM deployment in an area that will
benefit significantly from this type of water use data. If this
funding project could be expanded through a partnership with
BIA and BuRec to multiple users along the Colorado River, then
more meaningful scaling could be achieved.
To provide paradigm-shifting technologies and to facilitate
the embracing of these types of technologies on a wider scale,
funding sources must be flexible, and allow for approval on a
project-wide basis across different regions, opposed to a
region-by region basis as it is currently done.
Thank you for the opportunity to share this story with you
today, and I look forward to answering your questions.
Chairman CROW. Thank you, Mr. France, for that testimony.
And I would be remiss if I did not recognize that you are
bringing your family here as well and it is my understanding it
is at least your youngest daughter's first time in Washington.
So welcome to our Nation's capital to the France family as
well.
Mr. FRANCE. Youngest and oldest. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman CROW. Right. Thank you.
Dr. Potere, you are now recognized for 5 minutes.
STATEMENT OF DAVID POTERE
Mr. POTERE. Thank you, Chairman Crow, other members of the
Subcommittee. Thank you for the opportunity to testify in
today's hearing.
You know, fundamentally, growing food has always been a
venture of small businesses, and that is true here in the
United States. Despite all that we hear about consolidation of
farms, today in the U.S., no sector has a higher percentage of
small business ventures than agriculture. And that is not only
the farmers who are growing our food but the shippers and
carriers that bring our food to market, the accountants and
CPA, and agronomists and mechanics that help bring that crop
out in the world. And, of course, small business is
challenging. And no small business is more challenging than
agriculture.
I come to you today as a technologist. I build
technologies. I am not a farmer but I have been serving farmers
for the last 5 years, building out a better system of
agricultural intelligence using satellite and weather
technology that is the result of hundreds of millions of
dollars of government investment over the last many decades.
And I am now proud to be a member of Indigo Agriculture, Inc.,
which is a company whose mission is to use technology to help
farmers sustainably feed the planet.
There are many challenges that the farmers face today; we
have seen 49 percent reduction in the profitability of farms
since 2013. We are looking at a 400 percent increase in input
costs for farmers over the last 40 years, most of that in the
last 15. If you think about where that increase in input cost
is going, it is not going to small businesses. Think about how
challenging it is to market that grain out in the world. As an
asset class, commodities futures is one of the most volatile
asset classes on the planet, and farmers ever year have to
figure out when and how to market their crop out into the
world. It is hard to be small in the food system, and at
Indigo, we believe that technology is a part of the solution to
making farming a more valuable profession and by extension,
making small business a more viable sector.
The two aspects of our business that I want to share most
with you today are around bringing that crop out into the world
via Indigo Marketplace, and learning how to grow a new kind of
crop. Learning how to become a carbon farmer. We think this is
one of the most hopeful things that we have heard of when it
comes to the climate change story. Bringing farmers into the
solution. It is true that farming represents 25 percent of
carbon emissions but at Indigo, we believe that farming can be
a definitive part of the solution for climate change because of
the potential for agricultural soils to absorb carbon. It is
really an old technology. It is called regenerative farming,
and it basically means planting cover crops and letting what we
all learned in eighth grade science take over. When it comes to
photosynthesis, plants are really good at turning atmospheric
carbon dioxide into soil carbon. We should let them do that and
let them do that year-round by helping farmers move to a system
where they plant crops during the winter, cover crops, that
actually make the soil healthier, make the food healthier for
human consumption, and actually create resilience for those
farmers to better resist the changes of climate change, which
if unmitigated look like they could create a 20 percent
headwind when it comes to agricultural production in the
country.
That carbon solution, it requires a marketplace, and Indigo
Marketplace technology is designed to match buyers and sellers.
And that is a real tough problem. I have sat at the farm gate
with many, many farmers in my time at Indigo around harvest
time trying to make that decision of where and when to sell
their grain. They are not armed with the same technologies as
the Big Ag companies that they are selling into. And we work to
democratize the kind of market insights and intelligence that
it takes to make smart, rational decisions at that key moment,
including learning how to sell carbon.
One of the things that we wanted to make sure to mention
today as we speak with all of you is an opportunity to support
farmers in that chance to sell carbon. The thing we would like
to observe is that for a decade now, due to changes in the Tax
Code, oil and gas companies have had the opportunity to
sequester atmospheric carbon as part of enhanced extraction.
And the question we have for the Committee is if it makes sense
at $50 a ton for the government to subsidize oil and gas to put
carbon dioxide back into the ground, would it not make sense to
allow farmers to do the same thing and to allow farmers to do
that at lower cost per ton and do that in every rural community
in America and allow them to become a part of the same solution
that we know is so urgent for the planet?
So I will kind of leave you with that question. I look
forward to answering your further questions.
Chairman CROW. Thank you, Dr. Potere.
Mr. Meza, you are recognized for 5 minutes.
STATEMENT OF ROBERTO MEZA
Mr. MEZA. Chairman Crow, Ranking Member Balderson, and
members of the Subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity to
testify today.
My name is Roberto Meza. I am a first-generation farmer and
co-founder of Emerald Gardens, a farm located 15 miles east of
Denver on 35 acres in Bennett, Colorado. My business partner
and I operate a controlled environment, passive-solar
greenhouse in which we cultivate herbs, edible flowers, and
over 20 varieties of microgreens. Every week, we harvest more
than 300 pounds of microgreens destined for restaurants,
grocery stores, food pantries, public schools, farmers markets,
and for direct delivery to consumers.
I am a member of Rocky Mountain Farmers Union (RMFU), which
represents approximately 20,000 family farmers, ranchers and
rural members across Colorado, New Mexico and Wyoming. I am
also the Chair of Membership and Outreach of Mile-High Farmers,
a co-chapter of Rocky Mountain Farmers Union and the National
Young Farmers Coalition (NYFC).
My business partner and I are proud to be building our
small farm with a focus on environmental stewardship,
technology, innovation, and community engagement.
Microgreens are the primary crop of our farm and our labor
of love. They have low input needs, have a quick turnaround
time, can be grown year-round, and have a high nutrient
density. It is through growing and incorporating microgreens
into my diet that I experienced healing and renewal when I was
struggling with personal health issues. Furthermore, they
exhibit beautiful colors, have distinct flavor profiles, which
make them highly sought after by chefs in restaurants and
discerning consumers.
On our farm, we use innovative technologies that help us
reduce our costs and be strong environmental stewards. Our
greenhouse uses a passive-solar design that is both energy
efficient, economically sensible, and environmentally friendly.
It works by using clear polycarbonate material on the south
side to let the light through, and insulated metal panels on
the sides and the north wall to trap that heat. This allows us
to charge our Ground to Air Heat Transfer System (GAHT), a
design refined by Ceres Greenhouse Solutions, that is based on
the principles of a climate battery. This allows us to channel
that heat in the greenhouse through a series of tubes that run
below the structure's foundation and allows us to reduce our
reliance on auxiliary heating and cooling implements.
We grow vertically to maximize the use of our 3,000 square
foot and use supplementary LED lighting to be energy efficient
and cost-effective. Over the next few weeks, we will be
installing 40 solar panels to power the lights and the fans in
the greenhouse.
Also, as Coloradoans know very well, the state closely
monitors water supply and use because of the arid climate. We
use an automated recirculating water system to supply the roots
only what they need while reducing evaporation.
Many people are still unfamiliar with microgreens. Social
media is a critical tool we use to raise awareness about their
nutritional benefits, as well as the important role they play
in local food systems. By posting videos that show our farm
practices and the technology we use in our production systems,
it builds trust, transparency, and a deeper connection for
consumers and their food source.
A major puzzle we have been working to solve is optimal
distribution of our product. Emerald Gardens is a boot-strapped
business, so unsurprising we have relied on some relatively low
tech methods of distribution such as attending farmers markets.
But we also have an online farm stand so customers can place
orders from their smartphone.
For broader distribution, we have partnered with an
innovative local grocery delivery startup, Bondadosa. Bondadosa
allows us to deliver to all of our wholesale and retail markets
through a single weekly pick-up. We also looked to partner with
Bondadosa to share data that helps us optimize their delivery
routes. As technology advances, including agricultural
technology, it is becoming increasingly important for today's
farmers to have a college education. Indeed, it has become an
asset on many farms as well as our own. A college education is
out of reach financially for many and student loans are
essential.
Unfortunately, student loan debt is one of several key
factors preventing young and beginning farmers from getting or
staying involved in agriculture. As a first generation and
beginning farmer with my own student loan debt, I believe a
Federal student loan debt forgiveness program is essential.
Looking ahead, we are excited by the opportunity to partner
next year with a technology startup that will pilot new sensors
in our facility. These sensors will generate data that will
help us understand the microclimate in our greenhouse to
increase the precision of our production methods. Support for
technologies such as these, which can improve environmental and
economic efficiencies are increasingly important within the
context of our changing climate.
I want to close by saying that innovation is borne of
struggle. While we face a myriad of challenges as small farmers
and small business owners, we remain committed to a mission of
feeding our communities, improving our farm and food systems,
and remaining careful stewards of Colorado's natural
environment. Technologies, both high-tech and low-tech, as well
as grit and determination, are helping us get there.
Thank you for the opportunity to testify, and I look
forward to your questions.
Chairman CROW. Thank you, Mr. Meza. And I know tomorrow is
your distribution day. So I especially appreciate you flying
out to do this today. It is always good to see you at the
Stanley Marketplace.
Mr. MEZA. Thank you.
Chairman CROW. Dr. Jackson-Smith, you are now recognized
for 5 minutes.
STATEMENT OF DOUGLAS JACKSON-SMITH
Mr. JACKSON-SMITH. Thank you. And I want to begin by
thanking the Subcommittee for the opportunity to speak to this
important issue. As your introduction pointed out, I am a
professor of rural sociology and water security at the Ohio
State University, and I have spent my career studying both the
drivers and the implications of technological change for
farmers, with a particular focus on small and mid-size farms in
rural communities.
My comments today also reflect the contributions of a
colleague, Dr. Casey Hoy, who is the Kellogg Endowed Chair of
Agri-Ecosystem Management and the director of the initiative
for Food and Agricultural Transformation (InFACT) that I can
speak more about later, at Ohio State.
Many of the challenges faced by small businesses stem from
structural disadvantages that they face when competing against
large-scale specialized businesses that serve global commodity
markets and benefit from economies of scale. With that said,
there is reason for optimism for the future of small and
medium-size farms, agribusinesses, and food companies. Changes
in consumer preferences, expanding markets for food products
that offer social, economic, environmental, and health
benefits, supportive public policies, and--most importantly for
today's hearing--a whole raft of cutting-edge technological
innovations provide a foundation for reinvigorating small
businesses in rural America.
Specifically over the last 20 years, a rise in consumer
interest and awareness of how their food is produced has
contributed to the rapid growth of new markets, and in response
we are witnessing the resurgence of diversified farm and food
supply chains in the U.S. This certainly includes farmers who
incorporate cover crops and diverse crop rotations, reliance
more on agro-ecosystem processes instead of synthetic inputs,
and those who produce niche or specialty products.
It also includes small food supply chain businesses that
are more nimble and better able to meet these emerging
specialized needs of different types of customers. In our
written testimony my colleague and I list many examples of
innovations that could help support these diversified farm and
food businesses, and for the sake of time I am just going to
highlight a few in my oral comments.
First, there are innovations that improve the performance
of diversified farms which we see as a foundation for this
frontier. The diversified farming systems of the 21st century
are not your grandfather's farm but rather improvements in
scientific knowledge have opened new windows into the dynamics
of agro-ecosystems and how diversification can be leveraged to
improve farming. Some promising areas for innovation include
support for farmer innovation. There are literally tens of
thousands of farmers currently working to diversify their crop
and livestock systems, and these farmers represent a reservoir
of practical knowledge that you should start with and be a
foundation for future discovery and innovation.
There are breeding and genetic engineering tools, both
traditional and cutting-edge, that could be used to develop new
crop and livestock varieties optimized for small scale and
diversified production systems. And the use of sensors and
precision farming data to help farmers use inputs more
efficiently and adapt to conditions in real-time.
A second cluster of innovations might improve linkages
between diversified farms and these emerging markets, and that
would include tools to track the performance of diversified
farms, innovations like the environmental sensors and tracking
systems the previous speakers spoke to. Third, improving
traceability. New data information systems, in particular block
chain technology, could be harnessed to track products
throughout a food supply chain without placing burdens on
producers, processors, and retailers. And increased
opportunities for direct marketing. In the digital age,
connecting with consumers requires access and a reliable
presence on the Internet, and the comments made earlier about
the importance of rural broadband Internet, I think go no
further mention.
Finally, there are innovations that expand opportunities
for non-farm businesses throughout this diversified system that
we see. These might include innovative farm machinery
companies, food processing technologies designed specifically
to support diversified production and small scale producers. It
also includes food safety monitoring technology that could
address potential threats to the food supply associated with a
more distributed and diversified supply chain, including new
sensors and automated sampling technologies that are less
labor-intensive and more accurate than many current systems.
So big picture. While technological innovation can help
small and medium-sized businesses thrive in a more diversified
farm and food system, we are not working in a vacuum. For
decades, the dominant thrust of technological change in the
U.S. farm and food sector has focused successfully on large-
scale specialized commodity production. I think without
conscious public leadership in this space we are concerned that
the future of technology may not generate the opportunities for
small businesses and rural economic development that all of us
desire. Fortunately, I think emerging markets, good public
policy, and targeted investments in research and innovation and
small business development can help energize the technologies
we have talked about today and stimulate economic opportunities
in areas where Federal leadership in stimulating research and
innovation around diversified farm and food systems could have
a significant impact.
And I thank you for the opportunity to address the
Committee, and I look forward to your questions.
Chairman CROW. Thank you, Dr. Jackson-Smith.
I have appreciated everything that all four of you have
shared with us today.
I will begin by recognizing myself for 5 minutes and start
with Mr. Meza.
Mr. Meza, you have done something that not a lot of people
are able to successfully able to do, and that is from kind of
no background and experience in this area to jump in and start
a small farming operation and to be able to survive your first
few years. That is a very challenging statistically thing to
do, and I would love for you to just share with us for a minute
what advice you would share with other young folks that are
looking at entering into the profession and doing this and your
lessons learned, very briefly.
Mr. MEZA. Thank you, Mr. Crow.
My experience has definitely been challenging as you
mentioned. I think one of the reasons why we have been
successful is our involvement in our community, in our farmers
union, working with extension offices, and also identifying
appropriate technology and crops that are sought after in our
community.
As you know, Denver is a blossoming culinary world but it
also has an underdeveloped food system. So with those two
factors in mind, we have targeted microgreens as a perfect crop
to really address a lot of those factors. For us, it has been
an opportunity to explore and research different models for how
to create a niche for ourselves and how to create a viable
business. With the support of our community and the solidarity
with other farmers, it has allowed us to get to where we are
today. I would say the backbone of our farm aside from
technology is also the relationships and partnerships that we
have established. So I would definitely advise beginning
farmers to collaborate, especially with their local community.
Chairman CROW. And I know the last time we had a roundtable
together at the Rocky Mountain Farmers Union there was some
discussion about what you mentioned on the burgeoning
restaurant market. You know, we have added almost 50 percent
population, almost 2 million more Coloradoans than the last 2
decades, which has led to a boom in the restaurant industry.
But one of the biggest challenges is getting fresh produce to
those restaurants in a timely way without them sitting on the
shelf and having the spoilage. And I know some folks in the
union are experimenting with online platforms to do that where
a restaurant can order something up in real-time and get it
within hours. Have you had experience with that, and are those
platforms you think valuable?
Mr. MEZA. Definitely. These platforms allow us to have a
really strong relationship and communication avenues with our
markets and our buyers. Growing microgreens allow us to
generate enough product every week to cover the immediate needs
of chefs in restaurants. So we have been able to capitalize on
the benefits of microgreens in order to satisfy the needs of
our blossoming culinary enterprises.
Chairman CROW. And is there a role in your view for this
Committee in helping young folks with the startup costs or the
barriers on those platforms? Because, I mean, one of the things
I love about this is you cannot outsource fresh produce; right?
I mean, it has to be grown locally and produced locally and
sent to local restaurants. So I think it is at great
opportunity for us. But what are those barriers that you think
folks like us sitting up here could help reduce?
Mr. MEZA. Absolutely. I think, you know, one of the
challenges was accessing capital. When my business partner and
I decided to start a farm in Colorado, we did not exactly know
how to approach it. We did not know what products to grow, and
we also wanted to be mindful of food waste. So for us it was an
opportunity to research what the local menu is in our context.
Microgreens became that crop that we focused on. And because of
their ease of production and low input needs, we were able to
bootstrap our operation in a very small, 150 square foot
greenhouse that was adjacent to my initial property that I was
renting in Colorado. And through that it allowed us to really
connect with the markets that were emerging, especially through
farmers markets.
Now that we have scaled to our commercial phase, we have
realized that much more infrastructure and input needs have
been required by our business model to be viable. So access to
capital has been quite a challenge but we are bootstrapping it
as we go along. This allows us to really understand the scale
that is needed to address a lot of these factors and make our
business viable.
Like I had mentioned before, student loans have been a
factor in our ability to address the infrastructure needs of
our business but we are optimistic and we are determined to
innovate new models for helping younger farmers, especially
since a lot of our aging farming population is experiencing
this moment of transition. So we are trying to engage, inspire,
and motivate the next generation of agriculturalists.
Chairman CROW. Thank you, Mr. Meza.
And I do have some questions for the other witnesses but I
do want to spread it around a little bit before I loop back to
all of you for a second round.
So my time has expired, and Mr. Balderson is now recognized
for 5 minutes.
Mr. BALDERSON. Thank you, Chairman Crow.
I will start off with Dr. Jackson-Smith.
Doctor, according to a recent article in the Minnesota
Times--excuse me, Minnesota Star Tribune--tractors built in
1980 or earlier are in high demand because the price to buy and
maintain them is significantly lower than new high-tech
tractors. Can you give us a brief interpretation of this trend?
Mr. JACKSON-SMITH. Certainly. And I can say I just retired
my 1985 Toyota Corolla, which rusted out before the engine ever
went, so I bond with those farmers. I farmed for 25 years, and
when I farmed I understood the value of this kind of tier of
technology.
My explanation for that ties into the fact that farmers at
this small and mid-size tier have limited resources and a lot
of cutting edge technology, especially when it first rolls out
is beyond their reach or designed for scales that initially
might exceed their capacity to take advantage of it, whereas
technology from the `70s and `80s, certainly tractor
technology, can do the job without having to be very expensive
and difficult to acquire and maintain.
Farmers also farm for more than economic reasons. The
quality of the labor experience, their ability to achieve
independence is critical to farmers that I work with. And being
able to work on your own tractor was why I kept that Toyota
Corolla. I could fix a car that had a carburetor. I cannot fix
my Toyota Prius. In fact, I am scared to touch the Toyota Prius
engine.
So it is a very interesting observation but it does
reflect, I think, both the lack of development of appropriate
technology perhaps in the mainstream machinery industry
historically and therefore, old tractors having a niche, but
also an opportunity for manufacturers to get into that space
and find ways to produce technology that is really targeted and
suited to that kind of clientele. And there are manufacturers I
think who are wising up to that.
Mr. BALDERSON. Yes, I agree. Thank you very much.
This next question I have is for the whole panel and you
all can jump in however you may.
According to the Innovate Ohio statewide broadband
strategy, 300,000 households in Ohio, representing
approximately 1 million Ohioans lack broadband Internet access.
As a member of the Small Business and Transportation
Infrastructure Committees, I advocate for rural communities,
including those in my district that suffer from crumbling
infrastructure and inadequate Internet access. How does
broadband access impact technology adoption for rural farmers?
Mr. POTERE. Ranking Member Balderson, I can make a comment
from the prospective of Indigo Ag. We have had to build mobile
technologies for farmers to validate the work they are doing on
farm in order for buyers to pay a premium. We are trying to
decommoditize grain agriculture. And that means we have to send
agronomists and farmers themselves into the field to take notes
on what is happening. The lack of broadband access has required
us as a technology company to build all of our apps resilient
to a lack of Internet connectivity. The development costs of
that and the missed opportunity around a two-way street of data
flows for the farmer are just really mindboggling.
It is really interesting from a software developer
perspective, we bring developers from all over the world to
Indigo. They were shocked to deal with that engineering
challenge because they are so trained on solving urban
problems, it was a real moment to realize that the lack of
bandwidth was going to mean developing against total blackout
from a bandwidth perspective.
Mr. BALDERSON. Thank you. That is a good answer.
Sir?
Mr. FRANCE. If I may, I would like to second that. Our
entire network has been developed based upon a cellular and
satellite uplink because of the fact that in many of the
regions we are in, there is not sustainable broadband. So we do
use broadband where we can because there is a cost benefit to
doing so. But it is a secondary backup. I mean, some of these
areas, they are in the middle of the desert. You know, we are
in areas where it gets to 130 degrees as a high, and then, of
course, in areas of Colorado it is below zero. So that shift in
climate over the year puts you in a position where not only do
you have to have solid equipment that can sustain itself but
also the connectivity to get to the web is still not there.
Mr. BALDERSON. Okay.
Mr. Meza?
Mr. MEZA. We have been lucky in our context in rural
Bennett that we have incredible fiber-optic connections. It is
an essential part of our business model because we are able to
create a niche for ourselves and a market for ourselves through
the use of communication of platforms by educating consumers
about our product and connecting them with their food source.
That is pretty much how we have been able to create this
business for ourselves. And we also need this technology to
utilize the sensor technology that we are using to mitigate any
energy waste that we may encounter in our production methods.
Mr. BALDERSON. Thank you very much.
Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
Chairman CROW. Thank you, Mr. Balderson. The gentleman
yields back.
The gentlelady from Kansas is now recognized for 5 minutes.
Ms. DAVIDS. Thank you, Chairman. And thank you for holding
this hearing. Thank you to all the folks who came out here to
testify on what I think is a really amazing opportunity for us
on the Small Business Committee to be talking about issues that
really touch on rural, urban, and suburban points of contact
here.
I represent the 3rd District in Kanas, which is home to
Garmin. So we have got a lot of the precision agriculture
technology. You know, it is very important to the district I
represent, but also, in my state there is really, I would
consider there to be a big push toward the sustainable
agriculture that you all have been talking about today. Johns
County Community College has a sustainable agriculture program
that I had the opportunity to go and visit. And one of the
things they brought up is how hard it can be for people to get
into some of the types of farming that you have been talking
about, the smaller farms, getting into some of the crops that
people are less familiar with.
So I guess the question for anyone on the panel who wants
to help enlighten us is how can we as the Small Business
Committee or Congress help support that pipeline? And also, the
technologies that I think--I am particularly excited about the
carbon sequestration piece, but I would love to hear from you
about how we can really impellent or make the programs that we
have existing better for you all.
Mr. POTERE. Congresswoman Davids, I appreciate the
question, and I will maybe address in particular the carbon
opportunity.
Something we wrestle with is if this is such a win-win, you
know, coming to a regenerative system means you can use less
inputs, farm more profitably, make more healthy food and be
paid for it, why have we not seen the transition; right? I
mean, farmers are entrepreneurs. If it was that compelling, why
are we seeing only 2 and 3 and 4 percent of all American
farmers doing those things? And we think the barrier in large
part is risk and know-how. So it is risky to change the model.
And the model of conventional farming is well understood. And
so anything that stretches conventional farming introduces
risk. And so I would suggest that anything that Congress can do
to create incentives around overcoming that first barrier is a
game changer; once folks have been doing this for 2 and 3
years, it is actually a more profitable farm. But it is
overcoming that initiation obstacle that seems to be a big part
of the blocker.
Mr. FRANCE. If I may add to that. So SWIIM, we are in three
states, and we have a staff of 30-something. So we are a small
business as well. We have applied for state and Federal
funding. Been successful in some cases. Failed in others. We
find ourselves helping our growers may be 30 percent of the
time use some funding mechanism to help integrate this type of
technology, whether it is SWIIM-based technology or otherwise,
some level of technology.
The other thing that we find as a barrier is the fact that
these growers tell us over and over that they just want to
grow. They are not in a position where they want to fill out
paperwork. They are not in a position where they want to wait
for funding. Many of the programs, at least the ones that we
are involved in that are available create a disincentive to
pre-deploy these types of technologies. Again, whether it is
SWIIM or any other technology where one could apply for
funding, the grower wants to get in on it now. If they do pre-
fund, the available funding packages will not allow them to be
reimbursed. So they cannot. And I am speaking specifically to
EQIP. I am sure there are others. We have had growers just say
flat out, I am tired of waiting. I want to get this water
conservation technology in place. To heck with it, I am just
going to deploy it myself. Over and over. We have actually
helped our clients apply multiple times. And almost every
single one of them have just moved forward and done it
themselves. So a revamp of the process, maybe thinking outside
of the box. You know, we have had growers say if we could just
do one master application for all of our fields in this one
region we would do it in about 5 seconds. But one form for
every single field? It is the same reason they do not want to
monitor their water. They want to leave that to a professional.
The same reason that we found pushback on these types of
programs.
Thank you.
Ms. DAVIDS. Thank you. And my time is coming to an end
here. I appreciate the tangible suggestions that you have. And
I will reach out to the folks who did not get to answer this
question to see what you have to say about it.
Thank you so much, and I yield back.
Chairman CROW. Thank you. The gentlelady yields back.
The gentleman from Tennessee, Mr. Burchett is recognized
for 5 minutes.
Mr. BURCHETT. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate the
opportunity to be here, and I appreciate you all being here.
I have been involved in I guess an organic business. I have
had a little composting, mulching business for a long time and
I know, I guess, the learning curve I had to experience but
also with regulations, they just make them up as they go. And
so I am excited to see you all doing what you are doing.
I have a couple of questions. This is for the full panel.
How do American consumers affect ag-tech industry dynamics?
And are they driving the expansion of this industry or are they
continuing to learn how it works?
Mr. MEZA. Thank you, Mr. Burchett.
Mr. BURCHETT. You can call me Tim. We are good. I would
appreciate it.
Mr. MEZA. In Colorado there is a really strong local food
movement, and consumers are increasingly demanding products
that are available locally, not only to receive the freshest
and most high-quality ingredients, but also to limit the food
miles that food has to travel to get to their plates. So we
have been able to address that by the kind of crop that we
grow. And not only that, but I think there is also this greater
awareness of the participation we all have in establishing a
sustainable local food system. It is really the ecosystem that
we all partake in. Farmers, consumers, everybody that is
involved in food. So it really is a driving force because we
grow for the consumer. That is our primary goal. And for me it
is really important to not only think of it in terms of a
transaction but a reciprocal relationship; right? We see it as
we take care of the plants so that they can take care of us,
and then we can take care of the community. And that
relationship has been the, I would say, intangible
infrastructure that supports our entire business.
Mr. BURCHETT. I was glad to hear you say that. I am an
organic gardener and I grow tomatoes and squash and green
beans. And we have got blueberries and blackberries and
raspberries. And it is all sort of conglomerated. And I
remember when I started in my backyard it was covered in all
kinds of stuff. And my neighbor, oddly enough, who was not in
my political party, but told me I needed to spray it down with
some chemicals. You know? And I hesitated. I was mayor of the
county but I lived in the city, kind of confusing, but I
adopted two goats and they were wonderful. Even the neighbors
ended up liking them, so I always thought I was going to get in
trouble with the goat police if there were any but they were
awesome. A lot of fond memories. They were Ray and Lucy. I
named them after some friends of mine. I appreciate that. It is
true. You can look it up. You can look it up. Neighborhood kids
would come by. They would say, ``Mayor, can we get a picture
made with your goats?'' And I would say, ``Sure. Come on
back.''
They are great, man. They were just like a member of the
family. I remember one time we were eating breakfast, my little
girl Isabelle, I heard this chomping in the background. And I
looked over and me and her mama saw that daggone goat had eaten
the screen. And they do eat anything. I mean, anything. That is
no lie. Had eaten that screen and she was feeding it Cinnamon
Life through the kitchen window. But, you know, I love my girl
so it could have come right in the kitchen for all I care. Mama
would not have liked that but it was all right with me.
But anyway, back to my questions. That is good for ratings
on C-SPAN by the way. They love that stuff.
What motivates or discourages small family farmers when
they are considering new technologies? You know, when I was in
my deal, I mean, I was strict on the environmental issues and
it seemed like our universities, they did not like the organic
aspect. And I found out later that a lot of the funding comes
from some of the big boys who I taunt regularly on my Twitter
page about, you kwon, my organic berries and stuff. And which I
am sure it brings them to their knees. But the truth is that
they get a lot of funding, these universities do from that, and
so they sort of discourage the environmental thing. I know one
of you all said you grew microgreens and other things, so I was
kind of curious how that all played in.
You all just kind of jump in wherever you want to. Or just
shake your head in disbelief.
Mr. JACKSON-SMITH. Since you pointed out universities, let
me just jump in on this one. And I think the world has changed.
Compared to 30 years ago, unversities are now very much
focused, as is agriculture, on this sort of emerging, consumer-
driven market. There was skepticism when I started my career
about whether organics was the real deal and whether there is
real science behind organic farming. It is now a $50-60 billion
industry. And so that has woken up a lot of researchers to the
possibilities of being in that space and helping to optimize
those systems in the same way we have optimized conventional
agricultural systems.
And I think for farmers, the area of diversification and
regenerative agriculture is going to be the next frontier. It
is complex. It is going to require a lot of support and
targeted work but I think if I were to be self-serving,
universities are going to play a role in helping solve and
figure out some of those fundamental science dynamics of those
systems that entrepreneurs and innovators will be able to
develop into new technologies that can help farmers adopt.
Mr. BURCHETT. All right. I see I have run over my time once
again but I really appreciate you all being here. Thank you in
all sincerity. I dig entrepreneurs and we have got to encourage
that. We have got to encourage the university and through all
these emerging new markets it is very encouraging.
Sorry, Mr. Chairman, I yield back none of my time.
Chairman CROW. Thank you, Mr. Burchett. I think everyone is
disappointed that your time is expired, including me. Always
one of my favorite----
Mr. BURCHETT. I know the viewers are.
Chairman CROW.--some of my favorite 5 minutes of all the
Committee hearings. So I appreciate it very much. But I am sure
you will go viral so, you know, we can watch it later.
The gentleman's time has expired.
The gentleman from Oklahoma, Mr. Hern, is recognized for 5
minutes.
Mr. HERN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I have no goat stories,
but I did grow up on farms.
I thank the Ranking Member as well, and thank you all for
being here today.
As a small business owner for almost 35 years now and job
creator and all kinds of farming and ranching over the years,
but I am also an engineer so I really appreciate technology and
what it does to make our lives better, or confuse us, one or
the other a lot of times. It has allowed for a lot of increased
deficiencies and you have related to that in your testimony.
And it is also, I am very familiar with IOT and what it has
done for changing America, the legacy equipment we have out
there.
You know, because small businesses start as numerous
innovations and agricultural technologies to help aid American
farmers, specifically these innovations have helped farmers to
identify problematic factors impacting their crop productions,
how to become more efficient, and you know, there has been a
lot of conversation about more sustainable food production, the
creation of a stronger resistance to environmental factors
which is huge, to create more yield. To continue this success
it is essential that we as elected officials are fostering
growth for startups and small businesses rather than creating
more barriers. One of the things, if you know the history of
this Committee, it is a really bipartisan Committee that really
works on trying to cut through all the politics of what is out
there to really get things into the hands, ideas, and remove
barriers for our entrepreneurs to go out and create a lot of
jobs.
Unfortunately, a lot of times when we try, the government
tries to get in the way, and I know a lot of times when you
come here you are asking for the government to get involved,
and we can also be the worst nightmare because everybody has a
wonderful idea that tends to stifle growth and innovation. And
one of these examples of the barriers stems from a 2011 study
you may be familiar with which found that due to regulations,
bringing a new plant biotech variety to market costs an average
of $136 million and more than 13 years to complete. In an
effort to reduce these burdens, both Obama and Trump
administrations have called for reforming our agricultural
biotech rules to reduce cost, improve efficiency, and reflect
decades of safe use. That said, there is more that we can do to
improve our regulatory environment. This is something I would
like to ask each of you about.
So the question is in our 2-1/2 minutes, and we will just
start right here and just kind of move down if you do not mind,
do you all have thoughts and recommendations, specific or
general, on ways we can improve the regulatory climate, remove
unnecessary market barriers, or allow for better small business
participation in this critical sector?
Mr. FRANCE. Sir, I would write a book on that if I could
figure that out. It would probably be a best seller would be my
guess.
But in all seriousness, as far as regulation goes, we have
spent a lot of time in our particular area looking for ways to
take already established programs and make them work for our
clientele. So we are talking EQIP, RCPP funding through a
third-party source, directly going to BuRec or BIA. I struggle
with asking the government to come up with another program. I
would suggest looking at the programs we have and giving more
leeway to those that already have the ability to kind of look
outside the box. For example, a lot of the USDA funding that is
issued on a regional basis, you know, it is issued to regional
offices if you will and they place it. If, for example, you
found a project that spanned regions giving one person
authority to fund all of those under the same terms and
conditions, maybe flexing within the system that is in place
would be my advice because I am not sure you would necessarily
want to go in and try to create a brand new program. That is
just my view.
Mr. HERN. Dr. Potere?
Mr. POTERE. We certainly feel the effects that you are
describing. It is one of the reasons why we have pursued
microbial technology, naturally occurring microbes that are in
nature, amplifying those is one way. One of the reasons that is
an attractive avenue for yield improvements is because of the
barriers that you were talking about. So this is an example of
the private sector reacting to those barriers.
And I would say also that the system of conventional
farming is something that needs to change. And that is also not
a regulatory-constrained avenue. So in our case, I think while
we do face some of the constraints of regulatory approval for
those microbes that we are developing, we found two promising
ways kind of around that. So certainly verifying what you are
saying around the challenges that it creates.
Mr. HERN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield back.
Chairman CROW. I will extend 2 minutes. I would actually
like to hear the other two witnesses answer your question.
Mr. HERN. Thank you.
Chairman CROW. Yep.
Mr. HERN. Mr. Meza?
Mr. MEZA. Yeah, I think, you know, the first thing we need
to do is go to farming communities and ask them what ideas they
have. I think too often we as experts think that we have a
program that is complete and that will remove and allow further
development. But, you know, contexts are different everywhere.
And so the only one that can really speak to those contexts are
the farmers themselves. I think it is really important to take
into account the specificities of each farmer and what they
need and how they see the whole matrix of things working.
Another thing that I think would help is, you know, we all
know that Big Ag has been subsidized. So we should be able to
channel some of the funding into regenerative agriculture, new
innovative models for producing food. And hopefully, we can
come up with a nice brainstorming session that will yield some
innovative models.
Mr. HERN. Thank you.
Mr. JACKSON-SMITH. It is a fantastic question. You stumbled
into an area about which I know too much so I will be talking
for the next 45 minutes, like any good professor.
No, actually, I have worked for quite a while on ag-
technology. I started out when Bovine somatatropin (or bovine
growth hormone) was a cutting-edge technology in the dairy
industry in Wisconsin. And it was and still is a controversial
and contested technology. And it was the opening salvo in an
ongoing saga of genetic engineering being a political football
or at least a very contested issue. And I think our regulatory
system reflects that. I do not know anyone who thinks our
current regulatory system on genetic engineering makes any
sense. It is kind of like no one really likes our immigration
system. But to find our way forward with genetic engineering
regulation requires finding some middle ground, finding some
balance, and coming up with a system that incentivizes careful
scrutiny in places where it is necessary and recognizes that
many of the barriers that have been put in place right now are
preventing us from deploying technology for purposes that I
think all of us would celebrate.
There are plenty of examples. We talk some about it in our
longer written testimony, for example, innovations in cover
crops that allow cover crops to succeed. They are a great idea
but I know most farmers try them and find that it is more
complicated than they were told. And that is because we have
not had the ability to engineer and develop and breed cover
crops that suite the diversity of climates and production
systems farmers use. Biotechnology and genetic engineering
could be a tool if we were able to confidently deploy that as
part of our portfolio.
But I recognize, and I am sympathetic that the ways in
which it has been deployed to date have not always percolated
down into benefits for consumers or small businesses. And so
the skepticism and concerns about biotechnology are real. But I
think you are touching on an area where there is a bottleneck
and a bottleneck that somehow we are going to have to see our
way through in the future.
Mr. HERN. Thank you.
Mr. Chairman, thank you.
Chairman CROW. Thank you, Mr. Hern. The gentleman yields
back.
The gentleman from Pennsylvania, Dr. Joyce, is recognized
for 5 minutes.
Mr. JOYCE. I thank the Chairman for yielding and for the
opportunity to discuss the opportunities that ag technology can
bring to rural America.
First, I would like to take a moment to highlight a farm in
my congressional district which has been incredibly successful
in utilizing technology to improve their operations. Jan and
Dan Turner own and operate Ewe Lamb Right Farm, an 80-acre farm
in Shippensburg, Pennsylvania, where they primarily raise hair
sheep and lambs. Several years ago, Dan and Jan entirely relied
on a system of spreadsheets and post-it notes to record the
growth and any medication, vaccination, trimmings, other
details relevant to managing their flock. The process to
collect this data was tedious and it required them to access
the sheep one by one, flip through pages of spreadsheets to
find the corresponding records, and then input the updated
relevant information into the spreadsheets.
To improve this process, the very innovative Turners joined
the National Sheep Improvement Program and purchased a system
which consisted of ear tags with an RFID chip and a handheld
chip reader, as well as a Bluetooth enabled scale that works
with the chip reader. This technology has allowed them to
collect more data and do it in a fraction of the time. They
have seen a remarkable 4-to-1 time reduction in the barn and a
stunning 12-to-1 reduction in labor on data entry. More
importantly, the Turners not only save time but the additional
data enables them to improve quality of care to the flock and
decreases the stress on the animals and the shepherds. In the
words of the Turners, and I quote, ``It is like having a
farmhand who has X-ray vision and almost perfect memory.'' We
can all agree that technology of this magnitude can be
revolutionary for small and medium operations.
However, as noted by your testimony here today, major
hurdles continue to develop and impede the deploying of those
technologies. And this technology relies in a large part to
broadband access. One of my top priorities since coming to
Congress has been to increase and expand rural broadband
deployment.
Dr. Jackson-Smith, you certainly have a broad expertise in
this. Can you further elaborate on how a lack of reliable
broadband limits opportunities available to small and medium
farms that are looking to diversify, to modernize, and to
improve their operations?
Mr. JACKSON-SMITH. I can. And I can speak about the goats
that I used to raise. Not really. But the fact is that I used
to live on a farm where we did raise goats and sheep, and we
had dial-up Internet. And it sensitized me to the realities of
what life in rural American is like for farming and being able
to access cutting-edge technology.
For most developers of technology these days, they have
very little exposure to agriculture, very little personal
experience with the realities of what the working environment
is like, the complexities of juggling all the demands of that
task. Many come from urban areas. And so some of the comments
made earlier about how surprised people are who have been
working in tech development for 20 years, when they take on a
rural project or an ag project, the realities of what Internet
access is like. It is a huge issue. It is a tremendous barrier
to being able to deploy things.
One of the strategies I think that we should explore more
is to be able to get more entrepreneurs and innovators, and
this speaks to workforce development, out on farms, out in
rural communities before technology is hardened and developed
to get an appreciation for what the clientele are like and
where they have needs and where there are opportunities. I
think it is a vastly under resourced place for us to spend
resources and effort that would lead to things we could not
imagine. We need a designed system. I raise sheep. A designed
system for a small scale sheep producer that fits with my
budget, makes my life easier, and allows me to be more
successful is exactly where we ought to be at.
Mr. JOYCE. Thank you, sir.
Thank you, Mr. Chair, and I yield back.
Chairman CROW. Thank you, Dr. Joyce. The gentleman yields
back.
The gentleman from Texas, Mr. Veasey is recognized for 5
minutes.
Mr. VEASEY. Thank you very much.
I wanted to ask some questions for Mr. Jackson-Smith. I
know that information that can help farmers make these
decisions surrounding input and best management practices are
very critical, obviously, to be able to maximize yields. As the
digital technology and tools become more available, how do you
think this is going to change farmers' behaviors as it relates
to conservation?
Mr. JACKSON-SMITH. I think conservation is where we are
going to see some of the major opportunities in terms of
technology-driven, data-driven, information-driven decision-
making. It requires the emergence of markets and incentives for
conservation that allow farmers to get returns for those kinds
of investments which often benefit society a lot more than they
will benefit the individual operator. I think my comment
earlier speaks to the fact that if not appropriately tailored
to the needs of rural and small and medium-size operations, a
lot of technology might not give us the benefits that we would
like to think they can achieve. And so I think that is where
there is a role for all innovation is going to come from the
private sector. There is a critical role for small, and all
businesses to innovate. But for the Federal Government or
governments in general to build the infrastructure that creates
the template in the 21st century for success, and rural
broadband Internet is one of those key infrastructure
investments that will never make sense to a Verizon Wireless
company because there are not enough customers per mile but
make tremendous sense in terms of us being prepared to be a key
player and small and rural communities being a key player in
the future.
But also, trying to train and develop a workforce that is
capable of being sensitive to the needs of agriculture. I spoke
in my oral comments about getting farmers more involved in
research. And I went by it quickly, but I have come to the
opinion that conservation innovation is going to go a whole lot
faster if farmers are there at the very beginning of the
process to help design solutions than if we work from the
outside and innovate and then try to sell things to farmers.
And so I think supporting programs that embed farmers with
universities, I do that every day in my work, but also embed
entrepreneurs in businesses to a greater extent in farming and
rural communities will be some of the hidden ways we can really
accelerate innovation in that space.
Mr. JOYCE. Do you think that innovation of the space is
embraced by people in agriculture, or is it something that has
to be sort of gradually, you know, sold to them? Or is it
something that people are very open to? Or is it more of a hard
sale?
Mr. JACKSON-SMITH. So I am a social scientist. I get the
phone call from my technology-oriented colleagues who say we
have invented something. Farmers do not use it. You come along,
wave your magic sociology wand, and tell us how we can better
get people to do that.
I have learned to turn that question back and say, well, I
have always found that things that work are pretty easy to
convince people to use. If you have designed something that
really solves a farmer's problems or fits with the kind of
context they are making decisions, it is a whole lot easier to
get to that adoption.
It is simple think that farmers do or do not want to do
conservation but it is actually a lot more complicated. I have
rarely met farmers who do not want to do conservation.
Ubiquitously, people are very sensitive about their
environmental footprint. They want to be good stewards. They
want to leave the land in better shape than they found it. That
is what agriculturalists are like.
When farmers are not doing conservation, it is usually for
reasons that make sense. There are costs that exceed anything
they can afford without returns that compensate for that. Or
technologies that sound better than they might actually
operate, like in the cover crop arena. We need to do a lot more
to make cover crops be something. And when we design solutions
I think in partnership with farmers, we are going to find that
the end of convincing people, of telling people and educating
them is no longer going to be the barrier. It is really
something that tends to unfold on its own.
Mr. JOYCE. Thank you.
I yield back.
Chairman CROW. Thank you. The gentleman yields back.
The gentlelady from Iowa, Ms. Finkenauer, is recognized for
5 minutes.
Ms. FINKENAUER. Thank you, Mr. Chair. And thank you guys
all so much for being here today. I know some of you have
traveled pretty far to be here and it means a lot. And as the
Chair said, I am a congresswoman from Iowa. I represent Iowa's
1st Congressional District. It is 20 counties in northeast
Iowa. We touch Illinois, Wisconsin, up to Minnesota, and
innovation and agriculture is huge for us. And doing it right
and making sure that our folks in Iowa and to have access to
the innovation is one of our top priorities, but also something
that we struggle with because of our lack of access to
broadband, which I know you guys have touched on quite a bit
today. But I think it is just important to keep hammering this
home why this is so important.
You see, in my district, it was about 3 months or so ago, I
had FCC Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel, or Rosenworcel up to
Iowa One. We went to a farm in Dyersville, showed her some of
the new equipment that was out there in regard to precision ag.
But then also as we were sitting there and, you know, she was
talking to some of the young farmers in the area as well. One
of the guys came with his dad who I think he just got out of
ISU and he is trying to show her on his iPad the operation they
have. They are pork producers. For their feeding operation. And
as he is pulling out the iPad to show her, the thing will not
load. And it was just a perfect example about why we have an
issue when it comes to folks having access to the innovation
that is already here. But also what that means in the long run
as well about what we are going to be missing out on if we do
not get this right sooner than later when it comes to broadband
and making sure that our farmers have reliable connectivity and
fast connectivity.
And I know, Mr. Potere, I know you spoke about this, you
know, doing some innovative work on trying to create apps or
different things that would make it so that if you had low
connectivity it would still work. And I think that is great.
But what I would like to know is what are we missing out on
right now because we do not have the high-speed connectivity
reliably throughout the country? And what would that actually
mean for innovation if we had that so you could focus your work
on apps and other things that could do even more versus on
trying to bring them down to where they work on low
connectivity?
Mr. POTERE. Congressman Finkenauer, I think I am going to
highlight three examples of the things we are missing out on.
What we have today is essentially a one-way street where we
build apps that are resilient so we can log a bunch of data,
and then once you get to a broadband area, dump it back out
into Indigo servers. And so that means it is a one-way street.
And so we are not able to provide agronomic decision support to
the farmer the way we could so that they are getting drone
imagery in near-real time of critical moments in that crop's
lifecycle. So there is a disadvantage around the farmer
decision-making. They are missing out on intelligence they
should have.
There are also consumers who are missing out. Consumer
preferences are such that, as Dr. Jackson was saying, they are
changing. And consumers are increasingly ready to pay for
decommoditized agriculture. At Indigo, we have done deals with
companies like Anheuser-Busch, sourcing sustainably grown, low
water, rice, but you have to verify that the farmers are doing
what they are saying. And if there is no connectivity, if you
are in a black zone, you cannot do that.
And I would say the last example is those experiments that
Dr. Jackson-Smith was talking about involving farmers. Every
day, there are millions of experiments as farmers decide what
to plant and when to plant it. If we are not watching, we
cannot allow them to participate in this experiment. In Indigo,
we fight that by trying to instrument as many of those fields
as possible and watching them from space. But that is a half
measure. You know, the reality of prevalent broadband would be
that all three of those things I think get a lot better and
just accelerate us.
Ms. FINKENAUER. Well, thank you so much. And again, I
appreciate you all taking the time to be here today. This is
such an important topic.
And thank you, Mr. Chair, for holding this hearing.
And with that I yield back.
Chairman CROW. Thank you. The gentlelady yields back.
I would now like to recognize the gentleman from New
Jersey, Mr. Kim, who is also the Chairman of the Subcommittee
on Economic Growth, Tax, and Capital Access, a relevant
Subcommittee for this discussion as well, for 5 minutes.
Mr. KIM. Thanks, Chairman.
I just wanted to dive into a few things. You know, this is
critically important to my district. We have nearly 1,000 farms
in the New Jersey 3rd Congressional District. You know, making
farming more efficient and profitable in industries, something
I care deeply about, the technological advances that you join
us to speak about certainly sound really promising here. And I
am trying to think about how best this can be implemented.
I guess my question is, you know, Dr. Potere, I would like
to start with you. I guess my initial questions are, what can
be done to help farmers successfully transition into more
technologically driven farming practices? And as we know that
with the advent of technology into different industries that we
have seen in other sectors, you know, sometimes that transition
is difficult both in terms of taking on the resources, being
trained up, things of that nature. So what can we do to
decrease the burden upon farmers to integrate this type of
technology into their lives and their work?
Mr. POTERE. Congressman Kim, I appreciate the question.
You know, we should realize that we are incenting farmer
behavior with billions of dollars of tax and other kinds of
subsidy. And the question is how could we direct some of what
is already out in play towards more of these sustainable
beneficial ag practices?
I mentioned just one example I will spend a moment with you
on which is this carbon tax concept. For us, the question is we
have decided a decade ago that it makes sense to incent oil and
gas companies to sequester carbon dioxide as part of enhanced
extraction techniques. It costs of $50 a ton to do that. We
think that for a fraction of that cost, farmers can put the
same amount of carbon dioxide into the living, agricultural
soil.
So the question is, would it not make sense, should we
really care where those carbon that is being pulled out of the
atmosphere is going? We have done some math and it is why we
have created what is called the Terraton Initiative. It is a
challenge to sequester a trillion tons of carbon dioxide
equivalent into agricultural soils all over the world. That is
all of the carbon dioxide that has been emitted net since the
beginning of the Industrial Revolution. So literally, farming
has the potential to be a solution to the climate problem.
We have farmers on all of that land and, you know, Dr.
Jackson-Smith is right. Cover crops and regenerative
agriculture, it is not easy. It is going to take technology to
help those farmers understand a new sort of a digital playbook
of how to do this well. But the reward, if the government can
help incentivize that kind of behavior, is really hopeful. It
is putting the farmer as the hero in the climate challenge. And
we think it is time to start to put incentives in place to make
that happen.
Mr. KIM. I appreciate your answer there.
Dr. Jackson-Smith, I just have a question for you.
I really enjoyed in your presentation just kind of the
breakdown of how to look at this in terms of what technology
can do on this front. And I would like to just delve in a
little deeper. In my district, you know, our district got
crushed by Superstorm Sand. In New Jersey we have a lot of
temperature flux as we see the challenges that are arising with
climate change and extreme weather. This is a real problem for
farming in our district. We know cranberries and blueberries
are particularly sensitive to that kind of change in
temperatures, and flooding is something that is just getting
worse and worse. It is not just about when storms come. It is
really a daily occurrence in many places.
So I guess my question to you is, how can technology help
lessen some of these harmful effects, the impacts of such
events, as well as increase the resiliency of when we were
looking at farming?
Mr. JACKSON-SMITH. So I think one, easy, big picture answer
lies in the concept of diversifying our production systems. So
to the extent that we look more towards agroecosystem based
solutions, we are going to need farmers and farming systems
that produce a wider range of crops, that have soil building
practices that give them resilience in the face of extreme
weather events that we know is possible. And we are going to
have to develop the technologies in the markets that allow that
to be a viable and expanding and exciting opportunity. And so I
think it is that combination of putting the package together to
take us to that next generation of agriculture that is going to
show up as a more robust and resilient agricultural community
in your district. To the extent that we can help those farmers
make that transition in ways that make sense to them we will
succeed.
Mr. KIM. Yeah, well, look, these are all things that we
will have to work together to do.
Chairman, I yield back.
Chairman CROW. The gentleman yields back. Thank you very
much.
We want to thank all the witnesses for taking time out of
their schedules to be with us today on this really important
topic, and there was really fantastic testimony on the issues
that we all look forward to working on and trying to find ways
to help the industry.
As we have heard today, small businesses are at the
forefront of the ag-tech revolution as both producers of
exciting new technology and as farmer and rancher users become
more efficient and sustainable over time helping that
transition to occur.
In the 20th century, the United States public investment in
agriculture, research, and development was a driving force
behind innovation and increased efficiency. Yet, U.S. public
investment in agriculture, research, and development has
decreased steadily since 2002, being surpassed by China
actually in 2008.
So I am going to thank our witnesses for being here today
to share the challenges and opportunities to help reverse that
trend and make really smart and wise investments. I think we
all view our role here and there is great collaboration. And
this Committee is trying to find ways to reduce barriers and to
help spur innovation in the private sector, the public sector,
and at research institutions and universities as well. There is
tremendous work going on. I think we all recognize that and we
want to be helpful in reducing the hurdles and barriers so that
that can continue.
So I would like to ask unanimous consent that members have
5 legislative days to submit statements and supporting
materials for the record.
Without objection, so ordered.
And if there is no further business to come before the
Committee, we are adjourned. Thank you.
[Whereupon, at 11:36 a.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]
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