captioning performed by vitac it would be done with little or no cost, which seems like a win-win all around. in conclusion, we appreciate the work of this committee both past and future and hope that you will continue these forest conservation programs to enable land owners like myself to

continue to be good stewards of our land. thank you and i look forward to your questions. >> thank you, mr. burke. please go ahead and proceed when you're ready, dye. >> state foresters deliver outreach, technical and financial assistance as well as wildfire protection in partnership with the u.s. forest service, nrcs and other usda agencies. my comments this afternoon, recommendations for the 2012 farm bill endorsed by state foresters that support the conservation and management of the nation's forest. my written statement includes a complete set of priority recommendations from nasf.

the development of statewide forest resource assessments and strategies was an important outcome of the 2008 form bill. these forest action plans provided analysis of forest conditions and trends in each state and delineate a priority role and urban force landscape issues and areas, common among the threats to forests identified in the forest action plan included forest pests, invasive species, fuel loads and wildfire, loss of forest to development, threats to urban and community forest. the forest action plans also provide long-term strategies for applying state, federal and other resources to where they can most effectively stimulate and leverage desired action and engage multiple partners. state foresters recommend that the 2012 farm bill provide the

necessary finance and analytical support to implement and update the forest action plans. nasf joins the forest and the farm bill coalition in supporting these recommendations that help implement the forest action plans. the coalition recommends, including strong provisions for forest and conservation programs, strengthening forestry outreach, education, research and inventory programs, combatting forest related invasionive species, improving forest market opportunities. included in the strong provisio provisions, nasf supports consolidation of conservation title programs providing forest land owners eligibility is maintained in a streamlined

program. we recommend the 10% cap on the number of forest acres enrolled in csp be removed to allow forest land owners the same access to the programmes enjoye by ranchers. fia provides essential data related to forest species composition, forest growth rates and forest health data and delivers baseline inventory estimates used in state forest action plans. nasf supports providing strategstr strategic direction for implementation fia programs, including completing transition

to fully implementing the program in all states, engaging state foresters and other users of fia data to reevaluate the list of core data variables and fostering greater cooperation between state foresters and the research station leaders. combatting forest related invasive species. the early plant pest detection surveillance improvement program of the usda plant, animal and health inspection service is vital to rapid destruction and response to invasive species. nasf supports continued authorization and funding. improving forest market opportunities, reauthorization of stewardship contracting authorities is essential to helping the forest service restore healthy forest

ecosystems and provide sustainability and employment opportunities in rural communities. nasf supports the reauthorization of stewardship contracting authorities, which is currently set to expire in 2013. these recommendations represent conclusions and consensus viewpoints driven by forest action plans authorized in part by the last farm bill. thank you for this opportunity and i stand ready to answer any questions you may have. >> thank you, mr. dye. mr. holmes, you're now the recognized for five minutes. >> thank you, chairman thompson and members of the subcommittee. on behalf of the national association of conservation districts, our 3,000 member districts and our 17,000 supervisors across this country, i thank you for this opportunity to be here today. i currently serve as a board member from the state of alabama for nacd as well as chairman of the nacd forest resources policy

group. my wife and i own homestead company, a sole proprietorship in marian, alabama where we are a tree farm operation. my family has used a variety of conservation practices over nearly 200 years, including cross venting, rotational grazing, padded water troughs and ascribed burning. we received our first farm plan in 1939 and have been a certified tree farm since 1941. we have a mix of pine and hardwoods on our property and in 1999 we reintroduced long leaf to our property. we currently have a forest management plan and a registered forester to assist us with our forest management. the importance of conservation cannot be stated enough. that's why nack supports the

passage of a 2012 farm bill. conservation districts throughout the country provide technical assistance to nine industrial private forest owners. since the program's creation, it has produced over 270,000 resource management plans for more than 31 million acres of private forest land, developing a sound resource management and conservation plans is the principal tenet to nacd. nacd is one of the four partners of the joint forestry team, including the forest service, nics and the national association of state forester. the template the team has developed serve as a guide.

our service chairman of the joint forestry team in 2010 saw first hand the value that the team provided to not just the stewardship program but to the forest industry as a whole. on my own land in the southeastern united states i have seen direct benefit of the forest stewardship program. my work with the long leaf pine restoration has been in part a product of the stewardship program. to date i have restored more than 700 acres of long leaf pine in an effort to restore this native tree to our forest. second, the forest legacy program has been an important part of conservation detective work by allowing land owners to help protect environmentally important forest areas from expansion and by engaging with the locally led process to develop conservation plans. while the senate 2012 farm bill

framework now includes a program cap of $200 million annually, i do not believe this cap will be a negative impact on being able to successfully carry out responsible conservation. insects continue to be wreak direct havoc on our forest. insect infestation and disease have a direct impact on our members and furthermore put their livelihood? danger due to the loss of timber and the increased risk of wildfire. conservation districts feel that more needs to be done to address this mounting problem and the farm bill framework we have seen is a step in the right direction. in conclusion, these farm bill programs show a track record of success and every dollar spent has seen a return. the forest title is critical in

ensuring the health and sustainability of our forests for generations to come. i am happy to answer any questions you or the subcommittee may have. thank you, sir. >> thank you, mr. holmes. now i yield to the gentleman from florida, mr. sutherland, for the purpose of an introduction. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i'd like to thank up for the opportunity to hold this hearing, to review forestry and the energy programs within the 2012 farm bill. as many people may not be aware, my moment state of florida's highest valued agriculture product is trees. over $16 billion is infused into the florida's economy from the manufacturing and distribution of forest products each year. florida's products industry and forestry supports many communities in our congress an district and currently over 133,000 employees of florida's forest industry and it just provides an enormous economic

bedrock to our community. the appalachia national forest resides in my congressional district. i am proud today to welcome a witness from our district. it's an honor to welcome richard schwab from perry, florida with over 22 years of experience in the forestry industry. he's representing over 500 businesses in florida and south georgia, as well as the american loggers council. i commend mr. schwab to his commitment of strengthening the future of forestry for his family and our community. i yield back. >> thank you, mr. schwab. go ahead and proceed with your five minutes. >> congressman sutherland, thank you search for your opportunity to be here. >> just give me a second here. i apologize.

i do want to do a housekeeping thing. i introduced mr. costa for the purpose of unanimous consent request. >> thank you for your courtesy and thank the witnesses on an issue that is important for the subcommittee to deal with. unfortunately have i to go but i'd like to have unanimous con isn't to submit testimony from land state alliance from the iowa natural heritage foundation on giving states more conservation options for implementing the usda forest legacy program and i have some questions also that i'd like to submit for the record and have unanimous consent on that and thank my colleagues for the courtesy and would like to submit that for the record. >> without objection. thank you. >> thank you very much. and we need to work together for all of the right reasons.

thank you so much. >> apologize, mr. schwab. go ahead and start over with your five minutes of testimony. >> thank you, chairman thompson. appreciate that. i'm richard schwab. i've worked in the forest industry in the last 22 years. i've been trained by the florida's best guidelines practices. i'm here to represent my family's small business. we're a timber harvestry company in florida. our first concern is directed toward the forest inventory analysis program as well. the fia program is the best resource that we have available to measure outcomes and plan for the future of forests. the data is also be used to create jobs today.

i personally work with other companies to help develop their new markets in our region of the country. these new markets are established and located in part based on the available fia data. we would ask you to reaffirm the u.s. forest service program to enhance the program's efficiency and effectiveness. we would like to talk about the stewardship contracting program. it offers the use of alternative contracting measures. stewardships contracts -- my familiar lip's small business has worked on two stewardship stales in florida since they were first authorized. it was great to see hef yus from the timber sales used on two different national forests in florida at the same time. we urge congress to permanent live reauthorize the stewardship contracting authority in the

2012 farm bill. next we would ask to you reauthorize the national institute of food and agriculture renewable assets extension act. maintain the current funding level. i have personally seen these crops and am very excited about the future growth of different forced crops. without extension, i don't know if this research would happen today. >> section 8401 is a provision for qualifying timber contract options. since the passage of the 2008 farm bill, it would be safe to say our segment of the economy is in a state of economic depression. contracts are now priced too high to be able to harvest without incurring financial --

>> these small family-owned businesses need additional time on these contract as we continue to wait for our markets to recover. please extend. there are also areas in the energy title of the 2008 farm bill that we have the attention of our harvesting community. first being the definite of t the -- we need as broad a base definition for removal in any energy policy. two-thirds of our production is now based on producing chips for renewable information think. we also don't faefr any favor that would allow for the

manipulation of ex -- bcap is a prime example of a well intentioned program gone aright. it experienced nothing but major market disruptions and extra paperwork. there was no new facilities or markets developed as a result of the bcap program temperature pfs a disaster for our business and other businesses in the timber harvesting community. the last program i would like to address is the biobased markets program. we would like to sees language in the 2012 farm bill that would create parity by inserting language that would focus on

products that apply apply regardless i entry into the marketplace. i'm currently working on a pilotel not plan. they will take waste water and using this to produce and. the company saw a need, realized what it took to explain the needs. i'll be happy to answer any questions you might have. >> thank you, mr. schwab. now i represent mr. goergen for five minutes of testimony. >> thank you very much. i'm the society of american foresters chief executive officer and executive vice president. i really appreciate the opportunity to be here today to talk with you about some very important perhaps and really an important part of the american economic picture when we think

about forests and i'm very pleased with this panel, wuch of what i would like to tell you this morning has been said by my colleagues here today, which is outstanding and i'll try to save as much time on your busy schedules as i can. we represent more than 12,000 people across the country who have dedicated their lives to the professional management, care and protection of america's forest. these folks have really committed themselves to ensure the forests of united states are taken care of and managed in the best possible way. some of the programs contained in the farm bill are very important to their ability to do their jobs. we heard about some of them today and i'll touch on them as well. there are also some other items i'd like to discuss with you as well. and also the damaging beatle issue we have, particularly in

parts of the united states. i really want to talk about the success of a program that started out as a pilot program, we're going to see how things work, maybe sure the tool is something that can be used on the ground and the formest service and land management can benefit from and be a again benefit for the taxpayer as well. we also would like to investigate for permanent reauthorization of stewardship contracting and really it a big success fore. we treated over half a million acres in the united states with stewardship contracts at this point in time. we awarded somewhere over 900 contracts just in the last five years and we continue to increase those contracts. at many as 200 were conducted last year in 2011. with the authority expiring in 2013, we're concerned in it's not term nntly reaupermanently

reauthorized. many of you on land understand what happens when you have a project being done on your particular land, someone comes in to do some forest management to reduce fire risk on your property, maybe there was a a. >> them i'm thinking it -- they had a separate contract for that. and this allows them to put it all together, select good contractors and get the work done. when i think about western pine beetle, the mountain pine beetle, i have to tell you it's a very sad sfor. ips 1997 bark beatle mortality has devastated more than 47 million acres across the u.s. the forest service estimate up

to 100,000 dead trees are killed by beatles alone, fall to the ground every day. in southern wyoming and northern colorado. 100,000 trees falling every day that have been damaged by these beetles. we have got to do something and do something soon. much of the forests in the west have created a perfect storm for us and we need to doing is about this a critical and rapid fashion. we're encouraged by many in congress who are calling for increased -- >> i'd also like to tauch on broad recommendations for the barn bill.

the 2012 farm bill, we're really hoping that the committee will pay close attention to the recommendations of the forest and the farm bill coalition, which we very much support. we understand the budget pressure that you're under. this is a very difficult time to be thinking about spending money. but some of these programs are really quite critical. really doing what we can to improve market opportunities for forests and focus on this fantastic green building material that we have in the united states. thank you very much for your time and i look forward to your

yes yes questions. my first question is for you. we appreciate your observations. we are in difficult challenges. i think one of the unique opportunities we have and our subcommittee and agriculture committee is the forest can be a great source of revenue given all the public lands that have been secured and continue to be setting some of those idle with just tremendous resources for this country cab great return on investment with -- if we are promoting the proper healthy management, which includes harvesting. i need a little more clarification. you talked about your remarks on the stewardship contracting authority. what takes the authority unique and or different from other contracts? >> it's really interesting. you talk about the forest service in particular and the asset that they have and it really is an asset.

if you read a book named kauffman in the 50s called "the forest rangers," he talked about the fact that the committee returned money to the treasury every year. it's a tremendous asset we have. stewards are able to address more than one need under one contract and keep money locally to get that work done. they're able to actually use the sale of forest products on part of a technical forest stand and use some of that money to improve something somewhere else. if the forest service wants to make a camp ground, they can sell timber over here, build a recreational system over there. they can use assets on the ground and improve work

somewhere else in their forest. the fact of the matter is this authority can really help the agency and help the congress in terms of trying to ensure that the assets that we have in our forests are used in the best possible way. >> thanks. >> mr. burke, you mentioned that right now the usda's biobased markets program dongt recognize products made from your forest as biobased. can you tell us why this is the case in. >> the way the legislation has been incorporated with the regulations that have been drafted, there's language that requires there be a new product with a certain date. if you look at products that come off of my farm, an example would be hardwood that's made into palleths, there are pallets that come from overseas made of

hemp which compete and get what a federal agency would have to procure over and instead of the product that's made locally on my farm. i think that's an unintended consequence of the legislation and my recommend lags is that the playing field be leveled soap all biobased products would create more jobs and stimulate the economy. that's particularly important in the forest industry at this time because they're still struggling with one of the worst down turn since the depression. >> have i concerns the current rating system utilized by the environmental design, commonly known as lead, disadvantages forest products. do you agree with this? is that your observation? >> well, i think that what we would like to see is, again, a level playing field.

so that procurement can be lead or comparable or other recognized sustainable resources. we would like to see a level playing field with respect o procurement across all of those categories. >> i've seen data suggesting that in pennsylvania we've lost over 13,500 jobs in the forestry sector in the last few years. and i appreciate you mentioning actually i will soon be introducing legislation to fix the biobase markets program to better recognize forest products. i'm obviously with the goal that this fix will help bring back or at least stabilize our job losses, not just in the state of pennsylvania but throughout the country. i appreciate your earlier remarks. i wonder if you would agree that's a