NFO 164 (AV10662) Marketing Agency in Common

[music] the national farmers organization the organization that awoke America and represents the leadership of agriculture presents us farm report a public information program brought you in the interest of Agriculture's grow business and the well-being of our nation by members of the national farmers organization in this area and others interested in having farmers received costs of product plus a reasonable profit the American farmers are building a brighter future for agriculture through the National Farmers Organization u.s. farm report numbers since marketing agency in common with special guests Walter Goeppinger president of the National Corn Growers Association from Boone Iowa mr. Goeppinger is a graduate of the Iowa State University and has been engaged in farming for 36 years his also formation chairman of the United States feed and grain Council and is in the tenth year as president of the National Corn Growers Association and Gordon Shafer chief negotiator of the national farmers organization from Kingsville Missouri and now US farm reports mr. Goeppinger we are indeed delighted to have you as our special guest on this u.s. farm report I understand that you're president of the National farm Growers Association I hear that you were also the first president of the feed grain Council would you care to make some remarks about your affiliation with these groups our National Corn Growers Association is now in its twelfth year and as a part of the work of the National Corn Growers Association we formed the US Feed Grains Council in 1960 the US Feed Grains Council is the market development arm working in 17 foreign countries through eight international offices scattered throughout the world and as such we are interested very basically in marketing the products of agriculture the same as NFO is well you are a farmer would you care to comment a little bit on your farming operation more or less as it's getting getting acquainted here with our audience well I can say that my entire well being economically is tied to farming I'm as you mentioned in my 36th year of a Midwest corn farmer we've also been keenly interested in the production of beef cattle through the years and my father ahead of me and my grandfather headed me out in central Iowa now I had my son my older son with me in business and I hope when my younger son gets through his military responsibilities which he's just in the middle of now that he can come back home and be part of the farming scene to eventually fine I understand that a few months ago you joined the National Farmers Organization I might also mention that our national president Oren Lee Staley is a member of the National Corn Growers Association would you care to comment on why you decided to join the National Farmers Organization the NFO well I believe that the support of all farmers belongs with the National general farm organizations that truly represent the farmer and I want to see to it that he gets a fair income for his investment in labor and I not only belonged to NFO but I also belong to other two other general farm organizations which I feel are striving valiantly along with new people to get what is right for the corn and u.s. farmer furthermore I think typically as relates to NFO that your organization has a close dichotomy with our organization in that we're both seeking to improve the marketing methods and stressing that we we in the action field creating and seeking out new markets and expanding him and you people working on the price side to attempt to get a better price for the farmer yes well that's fine we too believe that it's necessary for farm groups to work together we believe that even though a farmer may belong to one or perhaps several other farm organizations that really there's no basic conflict and no reason why all farmers should not join hands and join with the National Farmers organization in attempting to band together and sell together to get a better price for farm commodities and we're glad to see that other farm groups are taking the same view that we've held for a long time and we're sure glad to have you as a member and we're here to welcome all other groups and to let everyone know that just because they belong to some of the farm organization it doesn't mean that they can't be good members of the National Farmers Organization and work with all the rest of us in trying to bring together enough of their total production so that we can bargain for cost of production plus reasonable profit prices for any and all farm commodities not only the corn which you represent but also all other commodities which farmers produce in the United States we don't ask any farmer to desert any other organization to become a member of the National Farmers Organization we welcome you and all other farmers to come and work with us in this common objective you mentioned in our remarks just prior to the time we started the program that you had recently come back from the world trip where you were investigating the possibilities of the corn market and some other things that you interested in would you care to tell us a little bit about your trip and and what you observed as you traveled around well I'd like to mention that the trip had two basic goals one was to assist the fine officers and staff that we have overseas in the US feed grains council offices in the work of expanding markets and observing things which would help them to expand markets for US corn and the other was to go into some countries that were competitors of ours and our competitors of ours and raising corn for the world market to see what the real situation was there in the eyes of a farmer like myself and to try to analyze what the probable future of their continued production expansion of production and the penetration of world markets by these countries would be the first place that we went to was in Japan in the course of that level we were working with our very best corn customer of the US the necessity of finding a new means of beef production in Japan is critical at the present time and our work centered on that and some other things but of great interest to us was Thailand which now is penetrating the Japanese market for two reasons number one they are finding new means to clear the jungles of Thailand and are putting out corn and cotton and some other crops field crops but basically they're raising corn there and shipping in Japan and Japan likes this because they found a new customer that they can trade their manufactured products for so we wanted to see what was happening in Thailand and what would be the future for their expansion of corn production I think that we could just sum up by saying that Thailand's cost of production on corn is much lower than ours in some respects because the fact that their people are used to about $15 a month income and if the wife works she gets about seven dollars and fifty cents a month and we have to compare this to the farmers of the United States are expected to live in a country with the highest standard of living of the world and compete against these people at the same price level now the farmers of Thailand are getting a dollar a bushel for corn and we're getting about that same price here in the United States and yet one is a very close to subsistence level and the other is on one of the highest standards of living by contrast the next country that I went to was in India and the course there it's a matter of looking at what this country that's struggling to meet the needs of its people from a food standpoint is able to accomplish in the raising of corn India raises about as much corn acreage wise as the state of Illinois or the state of Iowa annually and still their average yield is only about 17 bushels per acre are there a lot of reasons for this that I won't go into now but they're struggling to to bring their their yields up and they're doing some making some progress but then going on did stop in Iran and I won't comment on that but I did go on to France which is our third largest world exporter today Thailand is the fourth largest France is the third largest exporter of feed grains on to the world market now this may be a surprise to some people but she's next in line to Argentina and then we come first so as a real competitor and coming up fast with total bushels and increasing every year I wanted to see what was causing this and I traveled with the representative of the US Feed Grains Council in France from the Spanish border up to almost to the English Channel and saw the modern methods which are used for the production of corn in France and I think that the most important point is that the French government has recognized the fact that French farmers with the standard of living almost as high as ours cannot afford to take a dollar a bushel for corn and they have protected them to the point that corn brings the farmer in France about 2 dollars and 20 cents a bushel now wouldn't it be great if we could have even a dollar and a half a bushel for our corn sure would but they'd getting 2.20 and so enable to in order to be able to export on to the world market the French government pays a what they call a restitution on every bushel of corn of about 70 cents that lets that price down from 220 down to about the world level over in Europe of a dollar and a half in other words it takes a dollar a bushel for our corn at the farm level plus the transportation and other costs added on to make a price of a dollar and a half for France's competition to us in Spain and in Germany and in Great Britain will be about equal to ours so there we have a country that is competing against us with the help of their government and retaining protection for the farmers in the country now maybe you want to make some comments on this before I say what I my conclusion would be of what I am aware that yes I would I just like to say that this appears to put us in a rather awkward position in a on a rather difficult position so far as world trade is concerned as long as we tried to buy and sell at the world trade level without any protection as you see France for example is giving her farmers it appears to me that they from what you've said and of course from what I've read in other places that the world situation in the commodity which you represent corn is gradually becoming more and more competitive and as these are the nations which you have mentioned here in particular India and Thailand and and some of the others begin to apply modern techniques to corn raising we are be going we are going to be a even less favorable position to compete at a world price then we have been up to now as the world produces more and more corn and particularly as we produce more and more corn now this past year for example our farmers in this country were encouraged to try to more or less pull out the stops and produce more feed grains corn and other feed grains as well as sweet seems that we responded well to this request and now as a result we find ourselves on a down market with receiving less price than we were even last year the goal of the NFO of course is to try to get this corn price up to at least a dollar and a half a bushel along with soybeans at $3 and wheat at 2 it seems to me that in order to accomplish some of the objectives which we are setting for ourselves and to get on a plane where we can have a satisfactory standard of living for ourselves farmers in this nation we're going to have to consider the position of farmers and other nations as well so I'm glad that you brought this up I know that you have some suggestions where we've been trying to trade pretty much on a free and open market all over the world it appears to me that with our production capabilities we're headed for maybe more trouble in this field what do you think well I think that the fact that last bushel of corn that's sold or the last few bushels of corn that's sold from any crop determines the price for practically all of it in other words if we have a certain amount of corn to be sold most of which is utilized in the United States by either the livestock industry or the commercial industry the rest of it out here that has to go on to the world mark and meet the world market price is the one that determines the price on the internally sold corn and this internally sold corn is the corn price that determines what we're going to get for hogs and for cattle and for chickens and eggs and milk in the United States so it has the world price has a tremendous bearing upon our internal u.s. price and to me I cannot see that we can compete against South Africa Argentina Thailand Indonesia and France at the present methods of operation and the kind of standards of living that most of these countries have now in the case of France they have a standard of living on the French farms that I visit is about equal to what the Midwest corn farmer has but in South Africa and in Thailand and Indonesia and also to some extent in Argentina which is another major competitor the standards of living and the demands upon the farmer are not as great from a dollars and cents standpoint they don't educate their children to a high school graduation or college level they don't have the taxes to have to pay out to support all these things they are operating in a different type of world of economy so therefore it is apparent to me that a solution that we must look to is one which will create a decent price for the products of the corn farmer or the in Polish that corn creates in the United States and then get this extra corn sold out on the world market which the US needs for foreign exchange and the farmers need for a market for more acres of their land now I think that I told you at one time when we were conversing that there were four alternatives and three of these have some merit one of them I don't think has any merit at all but of the for alternatives one of which is to just go along on the status call and let these other countries keep on increasing their production and we having as the only world corn producer continually shrinking our acres in our production in order to make room for them in the world market this isn't good so we got to I think in terms of something else now we could have perhaps a world a green agreement whereby the countries of the world that are the producers get together and say we're going to divide this market up equally among among each other or along a pattern of the past and then say that the price is going to be such-and-such this doesn't seem to work too well for us in the past on no other commodities not where we tried it in international wheat agreement we got the dirty end of the stick each time so we've learned by practicality that this doesn't lend itself to a reasonable solution now the other two solutions are fairly helpful if they work with each other one is an intensified world market development program for corn but as we do this we help the other countries to and the first solution which I think is probably the one that we will have to come to at some time or another if we're going to stay in this world market and that is a subsidized export for US corn now we didn't have this in the early 1960s in the form of the payment in kind whereby we paid out as the expression goes the Baker's dozen when we sold a dozen bushels of corn why we gave a little more corn to the buyer without charging him for it and this was taken out of US government CCC stocks now we still have about a hundred and fifty million bushels in CCC ownership stocks I guess it'd be in the last month it was one hundred and forty million bushels this is amply sufficient to carry on a payment and kind program for some time or there could be a subsidy applied at the rate of X number of cents per bushel let's take for instance we'll say 15 cents a bushel well if we would let our corn compete in the world market at the market level of today we could buy that means raise our own internal price 15 cents a bushel and get 15 cents a bushel on approximately four billion bushels this is a terrific amount because this is the amount that we consume internally each year and in the US and 15 cents a bushel on that would be 600 million more bushels and 600 million more dollars in the pocket of the US corn farmer and also in the beef cattle and hog and poultry and dairymen well of course then what you're suggesting is really a 2 price system system whereby we can get a fair price for our products that we use here at home in our country and then another price which we would use to export the needed what are we need to in order to get rid of the extra production which we come up with and really be very competitive to in the world market yeah and of course I believe that you will probably agree that there's no question but what we hear in this country without some sort of a program being worked out will be for at least quite a long time able to produce more corn than we have a use for here in our own nation now what you're actually saying seems to me is about the same as what the national farmers organization has been recommending when we have told our people that what we thought we needed to do was to get together the producers of in this case corn but you could use the same example for any commodity get together enough of the total producers so that we can establish by a bargaining process a fair price cost of production plus a reasonable profit price for corn for that portion of the supply which is going to be used in this country and then we'll have to assess ourselves so that we can export at a cheaper price now of course in the past the only export subsidy that has been available is to the government and we and NFO believe that we should all support any government program which would tend to put money into the pockets of farmers but we do believe that in the final analysis to keep programs from changing from one administration to another and it will be up to farmers to bring themselves together so that we can ourselves eventually handle this problem of exporting at a cheaper price it appears to us for example that we would be much better off to sell corn at a dollar in half a bushel what we could sell in this country for dollar and a half and then maybe only get a dollar for that portion that we had to export but we would get a blend price of say a $1.30, $1.35, or forty cents a bushel for our corn and of course we frankly don't think a dollar and a half a bushel is enough for corn either and I don't suppose you do it you were comparing it here to the price that the French received with 2.20 cents a bushel but we believe that we should not corn alone but all commodities we should be enough for the total together so that we will be able to get a good price across the production plus a reasonable profit price at least on the corn that we use here in this country and then have a two price system so that we can dispose of whatever the overproduction may be I think you've made a real good summary of the thinking that is basic to this problem I do want to say one or two things here taking ourselves back to an early portion of our discussion and that is the fact that we do need to have a control of the total production each year so we don't come up with the sort of a situation we have right now where we produce a little too much and as a result our position as farmers is weakened as far as a selling price is concerned now to me the proper way of operating our agricultural system in the u.s. is number one to control the production and number two to sell on a market where we dictate the price today we do have the tool for market control or production control I should say we have the tool for production control in the voluntary feed grain program so far as corn and grain sorghum is concerned probably would be better if it was a mandatory situation because all farmers would be then sharing in the load of producing within the realm of what was the probability of what we needed in the way of total production but be that as it may we have this voluntary feed grain program which enables farmers generate to adjust each year to about what the need is going to be the second thing that we need then is to be able to save what we think the price should be at the time that is marketed so we have so we have one tool at hand and we should be following that out as strongly as possible and National Corn Growers Association has the policy of urging every farmer this coming year to participate in the Feed Grain program in order to tighten up this supply situation which is too great at the present time and we need to create this this situation of bringing production in line and you people are working on the sale side that you see you're working on the marketing side too to get the say so developed eventually so that you can name and we can name together the price that this product should bring at a reasonable level for for agriculture and I'm glad to say that we are making progress we're working as you say in an effort to raise the price of these products we are very gratified in the last few weeks at the type of farmers that have that are being attracted shall I say to our proposals and to our program farmers such as yourself that have large operations and that our influential farmers more and more seem to be attracted toward what we're trying to propose just last week mr. Stoddard who's the public relations director for the farm quarterly magazine has a large farming operation in Wyoming some twenty four thousand acres he was in our office last week and signed a membership application became a member the national farmers organization just last week for example down in the state of Kansas what is reported to be the second largest farmer in the state joined the National Farmers Organization as one of our organizational meetings and this is going on all around over the nation it seems that we are attracting many many farmers because of the fact that there is such a tremendous interest in NFO at this time we have decided to well shall I say make it easier for farmers to become members of the National Farmers Organization ah just recently we have decided that what we should do is appeal to the farmers that have been interested in our program but we haven't been able to get out and contact directly to write and send their membership direct to our national office or to the radio station to which they're listening at this program so at this stage I would like to appeal to all of you farmers that are listening to this program tonight to fill out your check to the National Farmers Organization or just plain NFO\ in the amount of $25 right over in the corner first year membership dues sign your check and either mail it to this station or address you your envelope to membership NFO Corning Iowa and come on and join the effort so that you may actually become a part of what we're trying to accomplish again I'd like to say Mr. Goeppinger that we are very happy to have had you on our program this evening and I'm sure that you will be a big help to the National Farmers Organization in the months ahead and of course we say to you as we say to every member who joins we welcome you we appreciate your support anything that you can do to assist in convincing other farmers your neighbors back home anyone that you contact we would appreciate any help that we can get in bringing together enough farmers to accomplish this objective well I think our two organizations are well coordinated for the job thank you yes farm report has presented marketing agency in common with Gordon Shafer negotiator of the national farmers organization and Walter Goeppinger president of the National Corn Growers Association members of the national farmers organization invites you to tune in again next week at the same time for more information on agricultural and rural America which is a gear wheel in our economy that produces a majority of our nation's new wealth a national farmers organization pioneer of collective bargaining and the organization is voting it's time efforts and resources for the preservation of the family farm structured and private enterprise in America [music]