The rural route (East Tennessee) mailman stopped for my signature last
week, delivering a certified letter ($1.67) from the local USDA Farm
Service Agency. I thought you might benefit from seeing how helpful
and caring government can be. They've never sent me a certified letter
before, but earlier this year in regular mailings they announced new
strict enforcement of a lease-it-or-lose-it rule, and wanted to make
sure I knew.
Also, you may be interested in seeing how a smoothly-regulated market
works at the grower level when the crop is so popular and profitable
that the farmers WANT this sort of regulation. They know that without
a quota system limiting how much tobacco each farmer can sell, they
would all be growing nothing but tobacco "fencerow-to-fencerow" (and
the price would drop.)
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                           W A R N I N G !
                             A C T  N O W
                 OR YOU WILL LOSE YOUR TOBACCO QUOTA!
                    S A V E  Y O U R  Q U O T A !
    Burley tobacco quotas will be dropped on farms that have not:
                              _Planted_
                               _Leased_
                                  or
                             _Sold_Quota_
                      in 2 of the last 3 years!
A "ZERO NOTICE" will be sent to you on the 3rd year.
IF YOU DO NOT ACT NOW TO PROTECT YOUR QUOTA, IT WILL BE LOST FOREVER!
If you have any questions, or we may assist you in any way, please
call your local FSA Office ...
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and the back:
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                    IF YOU ARE GROWING YOUR QUOTA
                       PLEASE NOTIFY OUR OFFICE
                               REMEMBER
                   LEASES MUST BE COMPLETED BY BOTH
                      TRANSFERRING AND RECEIVING
              FARMS AND BE ON FILE IN THE COUNTY OFFICE
                          BY JULY 1ST, 1997
          YOU CAN LEASE AS LITTLE AS 5 POUNDS OF YOUR QUOTA
                  AND STILL RECEIVE PLANTED HISTORY
                           OTHER DEADLINES
              JUNE 30 -- FINAL PLANTING DATE FOR TOBACCO
                  TO RECEIVE FULL COVERAGE BENEFITS
                  UNDER CATASTROPHIC CROP INSURANCE
          JULY 15 -- FINAL DAY TO PAY 1997 CAT INSURANCE FEE
                      AND REPORT PLANTED ACREAGE
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Actually I have never grown that "CATASTROPHIC CROP" :-) and I don't
even know what "CAT INSURANCE" is, but I do understand the importance
of "PLANTED HISTORY". They were telling me I had to get a record on
file of planting or leasing this year, or I would be excommunicated.
I bought land that used to be part of a farm. I don't know how much
tobacco that farm grew 50 years ago or whenever the quota was
established, but I learned after I bought the land that a share of the
quota came to me with the land. I just had to tell the USDA office my
address, and they started sending me regular mailings. These would
have been helpful if I were actually a farmer -- advice on mold
outbreaks, new fertilizers and pesticides, how to insure that rented
land was not being used to grow marijuana, announcing workshops on
crops and techniques, etc.
There is typically only one local place to sell tobacco to the serious
buyers. Each farmer can not sell more tobacco than the quota assigned
to his land, plus any quota he has leased from others who had more
quota than tobacco. Every year everybody with a tobacco quota gets a
ballot for a vote by mail, asking roughly ~Do you want to continue the
quota system?~ I've always abstained, but I think the vote has never
been even close.
I am notified annually of what my quota is -- 756 pounds this year,
the largest ever I think, because I didn't lease any last year. I
think maybe some years (when I HAVE leased the previous year) my quota
may have been as small as 180 pounds. Everybody's quota gets adjusted
up and down by the same proportion, I think, based on the amount of
tobacco that has already been produced and is in storage. The quotas
are set early enough for farmers to decide how much land to plant. If
there's a county-wide drought or blue mold attack, a farmer may not
have as much tobacco as his quota. In other years with good growing
conditions the farmers with lots of tobacco will need to lease quota
from somebody else.
A quota is carried forward to the next year if it isn't leased or
grown. I think it is not carried forward more than one year. I may
have occasionally not leased 2 years in a row, losing the rent I could
have gotten that year on a few hundred pounds. But usually by the
second year my 700 pounds is useful enough to some tobacco farmer that
he'll call me (having gotten my number from the helpful FSA bulletin
board) and ask what I want for it. In the last few years I think $.05
to $.15 per pound is typical as a quota rental, while the price of
tobacco is around $1.80 per pound.
Tobacco harvests are celebrated here for their economic contribution.
I think I worked out a statistic once, that farmers earn about $8000
per tobacco death. There is tremendous respect here for law
enforcement, a million dollar addition to the jail, and enthusiasm for
collecting rent from the state for jailing prisoners from other
counties. Helicopters search my land. Neighbors in both directions are
in prison, their children in foster homes, because a lying government
employee tricked them into helping him buy 1 pound of pot.
Many people realize the damage done by tobacco and alcohol and use
that to urge enforcement of laws against marijuana on the grounds that
they don't want the problem to get worse!
... "These are not escapes from but enlargements, burgeonings of reality."
--- PPoint 2.00
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