CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas — Small farmers are in trouble and need help: So say some South Texas farmers as the 88th Texas Legislative session gets underway.
In a recently published op-ed piece, Texas Agriculture commissioner Sid Miller covered a variety of threats facing small farmers, including foreign ownership of farmland and ranchland, and the state's power situation.
"As Texas energy policy is formulated and the Texas electric grid evolves, our $20.2 billion agriculture economy must have a seat at that table."
3NEWS spoke the farming and ranch community about issues they feel need the attention of lawmakers.
"The small farmer has had it extremely difficult lately,” said Banquete rancher Tracy Wright. “So they need help. And they work extremely hard to try and produce the food that we eat."
Some believe the rules have driven the small farmer out.
"We're losing the family farms,” said Nueces County Texas A&M AgriLife Extension agent Jamie Lopez. “The smaller family farms are struggling every year. We're losing more and more."
From pricing protection to a sustainable water plan, farmers are concerned about many things the legislature can help with, including foreign ownership of Texas farmland, with Miller stating that land ownership must not fall into the hands of foreign governments, which could impede farm and ranch production.
"Whether it be for a cattle ranch or a crop farm, the Texas Legislature must ban this in 2023."
He also encouraged the farm-and-ranch community to reach out directly to elected representatives before the 140-day session comes to an end to have concerns such as these addressed.
"Making sure crop insurance is covered,” Wright said. “Making sure that when we hit droughts -- which everyone knows the last two, three years have been horrible for our entire area for drought -- that we have some help along the way."
And the lack of consistent rainfall significantly affected local farmers last year, Lopez said.
"We probably had about a 60 percent loss or failure rate in our cotton last year,” he said. “So even though the commodity prices were high, with the lack of a good yield, farmers still did not fare as well as we should have."