Andrew Grobmyer
Andrew Grobmyer has served as executive vice president of the Agricultural Council of Arkansas since 2011, continuing the agency’s advocacy and educational efforts. A native of Arkansas and 2002 graduate of Southern Methodist University, Grobmyer has worked as legislative assistant to both Arkansas Sen. Mark Pryor and Rep. Marion Berry. He is also a board member with the Arkansas Foundation for Agriculture and the University of Arkansas’ Agriculture Development Council. Grobmyer also serves as a policy advisor to the American Cotton Producers arm of the National Cotton Council and as an advisor to the Arkansas Agricultural Workers Compensation Self Insurance Fund’s board of directors.
He recently spent an hour discussing issues facing the state’s agriculture industry, from the 2014 Farm Bill to how immigration reform is important to the state’s farmers.
One year into the five-year farm bill, how has it begun to affect agriculture in Arkansas?
The policy definitely shifted from a direct payment safety net toward something more directly tied to risk. Right now, farmers are in the process of making decisions as to which programs they want to participate in and to what level. … What the farm bill did was shift more risk to the farmer from the government, and that is going to be a challenge for some people who aren’t well capitalized. They will have to adapt, or some of them might not be able to carry on their operations as they knew it.
Components of the legislation allow farmers to participate in “insurance” programs that provide payments for either yield losses or low market prices, but farmers have to choose one program or the other. How much of a challenge is that decision?
Farmers are updating their base acres and yields for those programs and will have to elect which ones they participate in for the next five years, going back to the 2014 crop. The struggle for some people will be waiting for program payments, waiting until after this crop year for the 2014 safety net payment. That is going to be a challenge.
Aside from the end of direct payments to farmers, is there another significant challenge facing Arkansas producers?
Payment limits and means testing for income may disqualify a lot of farms in Arkansas that may have substantial acres or substantial revenue, historically.
Was this the perfect bill? No. Was it a far departure from what we had? Yes. We think there are some aspects that will be beneficial, such as tax incentives and other federal programs that benefit agriculture. We feel like we fared pretty well under the circumstances, given the cards that we were dealt.
For many years, Arkansas producers, especially those growing rice and raising chickens, have looked southward toward the untapped market of Cuba. With the United States normalizing relations with that island nation, it appears Arkansas commodities may soon find their way there. How significant can the Cuban market be?
The agriculture industry in the state looks at it with an optimistic view. We are not very far, from the transportation side of things, to get to that market. We know the market is there from what is in their diet. We want to benefit from that market. It is still a very complex issue that is one that has a lot of hurdles to overcome at the federal level, but we think the times have changed. The policy of the past 50 years is a little bit outdated. With leadership changing there, there may be some opportunities to introduce capitalism and commercial activities to them in a way that could benefit the U.S. economy and benefit their economy and hopefully benefit their people at the same time.
Row crop producers in the Delta have been working toward saving water for many years, but those efforts are gaining steam. What are the next steps?
The Ag Council, along with Farm Bureau, along with the University of Arkansas Division of Agriculture, along with the Natural Resources Commission, along with the counterparts in all those areas in neighboring states are encouraging “Pipe Planner.” It was developed by Delta Plastics and has great potential. The H2O initiative has the desired goal of reducing water consumption by 20 percent by the year 2020. We think that is a very attainable goal.
How do these projects, involving plastic piping rolled out across fields, aim to save water?
“Pipe Planner” is cloud-based software that is easily usable and allows a farmer to introduce data, based on the Faucet Program, which is a mathematical formula for selecting pipe hole size for each furrow. It’s very exciting. The irrigation savings are anywhere from 20-50 percent. That’s applicable not only to furrow irrigation for cotton and corn and soybeans, but it is also now available for rice, which is exciting because rice is the biggest water user.
These programs seem to be universally popular among industry groups. Why did everyone get on board?
This shows that industry can take a proactive approach and adopt this type of technology, save the water, without having a government solution that is mandated. This is an industry-driven solution, created by an Arkansas-based company, that has its priorities in line.
Immigration reform has been a hot topic at the federal level for some time. How important is that issue to the state’s agriculture industry?
It is important and has been important for decades. Our major commodities don’t require as much manual labor as speciality crops, but we still do require a lot of labor, and sometimes the labor force isn’t there in the state. It’s not accessible. So, sometimes we do rely on migrant labor. We believe Congress and the President, whoever it is or will be, needs to take this issue up and be serious about it and make the reforms that would allow for long-term stability, address all the issues that exist, from border security to dealing with the existing individuals and families that are here, trying to set up a way for these workers to come to the United States and work and hopefully stay here for a while if they find a good place to work.
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