Glickman Disputes Combest's Criticisms of USDA

August 24, 1999

Agriculture Secretary Dan Glickman disputes House Agriculture Committee Chairman Larry Combest's claim that the department has not made effective use of the non-insured crop disaster assistance program (NAP). "That simply is not the case," Glickman says in a letter to the Texas Republican.

In his letter to Glickman, Combest referred to an Aug. 9 television appearance during which Glickman expressed the need to provide ad hoc disaster assistance to producers of non-insurable crops. "What is less clear is why (USDA) is not effectively using the current...program...designed by your own administration to meet these very needs,"Combest wrote. "In fact, producers whose non-insured crops have been damaged by drought should be able to apply right now and receive immediate assistance under NAP."

Since the program's inception, Glickman replied, USDA has approved 1,432 areas for assistance, paying out more than $100 million to farmers who otherwise would have received no compensation for natural disaster losses.

So far this year, says Glickman, 600 areas have been approved. The administration proposed that Congress include changes in crop insurance reform legislation to make NAP more responsive to farmers' needs by "making it easier for me to designate an area eligible for the program and raising coverage levels."

The House Agriculture Committee should have included that proposal in its crop insurance reform bill, says Glickman, "and hope you will revisit that issues in that bill or some other legislation before the House completes action on its legislative agenda this year."