A move to monitor and regulate China and other countries that buy farmland in the U.S. continues to pick up steam as a provision to grant USDA more oversight could be attached to the next farm bill.
Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, announced Tuesday plans to address a common concern she said she often hears from farmers.
"Iowa farmers know well, food security is national security," Ernst said during a press call.
"The increasing foreign investment in American farmland represents a grave threat to our national security. I've been traveling from river to river (in Iowa) as I do every year and I consistently hear from our farmers and agriculture leaders have their serious concerns with this issue. But it's not just our farmers who are sounding the alarm."
Along with Sen. Debbie Stabenow, D-Mich., chairwoman of the Senate Agriculture Committee, Ernst said she hopes the next farm bill will include an "overhaul" of the system that has "allowed U.S. national security risks to go on for far too long."
Ernst and Stabenow want to give USDA more oversight authority through the Agricultural Foreign Investment Disclosure Act to be able to investigate foreign investment in U.S. agriculture, by allowing the agency to "upgrade the tools available to them" to "combat nefarious interests" in American farmland.
That would include creating a public database of ag land owned by foreign interests and an audit of such ownership. Ernst said she also wants to prohibit foreign nationals from participating in Farm Service Agency programs.
"And as you all know right now in the ag committee we're working through the 2023 farm bill," Ernst said.
"So, it is my hope that we can bring this issue out of the shadows and in[to] this year's farm bill, so we have a clearer picture of what foreign interests there are in our valuable farmland."
Taking steps to clamp down on foreign ownership of U.S. farmland is seeing growing bipartisan support.
Ernst said both Democrats and Republicans increasingly agree something needs to be done.
Last summer, a Chinese company purchased 300 acres of good farm ground north of Grand Forks, North Dakota -- near the Grand Forks Air Force Base that houses sensitive military drone technology.
Earlier this month, the House Appropriations Committee voted in an annual funding bill to direct USDA to write a rule prohibiting people or companies tied to Iran, China, Russia or North Korea from buying U.S. farmland.
Source: dtnpf.com
Categories: Iowa, Government & Policy