Domestic Energy Policy – Amended
THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED, NCBA supports national policy that:
1. Proactively supports environmentally responsible domestic exploration and extraction of all fossil fuel-based energy sources in any region of the U. S. that is found to hold reserves.
2. Brings immediate relief in the regulatory and permitting arena to expedite both new construction and renovation of existing refineries. 3. Leads to U. S. energy independence. 4. Reinforces NCBA ' s position as a leader in the coordination and resolution of environmental and natural resource issues.
Transportation – Amended
THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED, NCBA supports updating federal transportation legislation and regulations to facilitate producers’ abilities to operate in today’ s environment as follows:
• Create uniformity and reciprocity of farm exemptions for Class C licenses across all states.
• Create a uniform mileage exemption for farm use of vehicles over 26,000 pounds Gross Vehicle( current Class A Non-Commercial).
• Eliminate Commercial Driver’ s License( CDL) and Department of Transportation( DOT) number requirements for vehicle combinations for farm use only exemption.
• Provide opportunity for the purchase of permits by commercially licensed trucks hauling farm commodities up to the maximum allowed by states and no less than 100,000 pounds.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, under the regulatory definition of a“ covered farm vehicle,” NCBA supports changing the threshold for certain exemptions to a gross vehicle weight rating or gross combination weight rating of 36,001 pounds.
ACEP-ALE Funding – Amended
THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED, NCBA supports: 1. Increasing ACEP-ALE funding to meet the need. 2. Increasing the ceiling on the eligible federal share for ACEP conservation easement to 80 % of the easement value.
3. Allowing for ACEP-ALE funds to be used to cover transaction costs incurred by landowners and the eligible entity facilitating the transaction, as well as project startup costs.
Wage and Employee Standards / Davis-Bacon Exemption / Worker’ s Compensation / Unemployment Compensation – Amended
THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED, wages, benefits, and hours of employment should be by mutual agreement between the employer and employee.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, NCBA opposes arbitrary raises in the minimum wage.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, NCBA supports an exemption of agricultural activities from the provisions of the Davis-Bacon Act.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, NCBA believes each state should be allowed to exercise its own rights in enactment of state worker’ s compensation laws and opposes any federal Worker’ s Compensation Legislation affecting agriculture.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, NCBA opposes federal legislation extending unemployment compensation to agriculture.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, NCBA opposes unemployment deductions on family farm corporate members or other persons not eligible to receive unemployment compensation benefits.
National Labor Relations Act – Amended
THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED, NCBA shall work to protect agriculture’ s current exemption from this law and any similar future legislation.
Mexico Border Policy – Amended
THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED, NCBA supports reimbursement of property owners for damages caused by illegal immigrant activities.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, NCBA encourages Congress and relevant federal agencies to do whatever possible to secure the border.
USDA National Nutrient Database for Standard Reference – Amended
THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED, NCBA shall collaborate with USDA to update the database with popular beef cut data reflecting consumer eating habits and
www. NCBA. org encourages the use of current data by other government agencies and other groups issuing dietary recommendations with regard to beef.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, NCBA encourages USDA to represent data fairly and consistently across protein species in the database.
Imitation and Substitute Products – Amended
BE IT RESOLVED, in the interest of not misleading consumers, NCBA takes the position that manufacturers and distributors of products designed to imitate or substitute for beef and beef products should be prohibited in product promotion, advertising, or labeling from using pictures or pictorial facsimiles of beef and beef products, or cattle.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, NCBA opposes manufacturers and distributors being able to use terminology associated with beef, beef products, or cattle when promoting, advertising, or labeling their product.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, NCBA supports the definition of beef to only include products derived from actual bovine livestock raised by cattle farmers and ranchers and harvested for human consumption.
Dietary Recommendation Issues – Amended
THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED, NCBA:
1. Encourages USDA to frequently update and disseminate factual information based on sound science on the nutrient composition of the various beef cuts, information which includes data on the actual content of fat, saturated fat, cholesterol, protein, iron, B vitamins, zinc, and other essential nutrients in cooked beef cuts.
2. Encourages government agencies and health organizations to disseminate information on the actual nutrient content of beef, showing that numerous cuts of beef can be part of recommended healthy dietary patterns. 3. Encourages government agencies and health organizations to recognize and include beef in sound nutrition education programs.
4. Works with other organizations to continue to effectively inform health professionals and other nutrition information sources, including the news media, and with members of the food industries, in order to gain wider awareness of beef’ s actual nutrient density and its important role in providing essential nutrients in diets.
5. Encourages continued research on beef’ s role in nutrition, diet, and health.
Disaster Relief – Amended
THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED, NCBA takes the necessary steps to assure that livestock producers are included in every federal disaster relief program and that the criteria for disaster declarations for livestock producers be formulated based on standards applicable to regional situations.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, NCBA supports cattlemen and their local and state organizations in their efforts to receive timely and effective federal disaster assistance in these situations.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, the Emergency Livestock Assistance Program( ELAP) be continued but amended to allow greater flexibility by the state FSA committees to determine specific state eligibility criteria and implementation of the Livestock Assistance Programs. Assistance should be available to agricultural producers who suffered losses from fires when the starting of the fire was beyond the producer’ s control.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, the Secretary of Agriculture be allowed the authority to quickly implement ELAP and quickly obtain sufficient funding.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, NCBA aggressively pursues adequate funding, including FEMA funding, for livestock producers adversely impacted by disaster conditions.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, NCBA monitors the distribution of any disaster assistance funding to ensure the funds are directed to those producers directly impacted by the disaster conditions.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, NCBA will work with USDA and Congress to ensure that eligibility criteria for all livestock assistance and compensation programs be based on livestock and / or forage production losses and funding distributed on actual county losses.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, NCBA supports federal legislation to increase the payment limitations and adjusted gross income eligibility requirements and remove the arbitrary 4-level entity cap on payment attribution rules for all USDA livestock disaster programs to more fully compensate producers for disaster-related losses.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, when disaster assistance payments are made through a USDA program, if incorrect payments are made, the recipient should not be assessed penalties or interest on the returned payment.
NATIONAL CATTLEMEN 17