44 



The payment factor or percentage for crop losses in the disaster 

 assistance program should be equitable in all cases. Why should 

 a farmer in one part of the country be eligible for 100 percent 

 of his/her losses and a farmer somewhere else only 50 percent? 



Flexibility should be allowed, so that excess funds from other 

 agriculture disaster programs like the Emergency Conservation 

 Program or the Tree Assistance Program could be used for crop 

 disaster assistance, if it better suits the needs of the 

 community. 



Mr. Chairman, we need strong legislation to assure fair and 

 equitable treatment of specialty crop farmers in the event of a 

 disaster. We can no longer rely on departmental policies that 

 may or may not recognize the needs of specialty crop producers. 

 : hope that we can work together on this initiative. And again 

 I thank the Chair and the Ranking Minority member for their 

 leadership on this issue. 



