Algona, Iowa (RI) — Tom Harkin — the Iowa Democrat who served 40 years in the U.S. House and Senate — has had a change of heart about the ethanol industry.
As a Senator, Harkin pushed for federal policies to expand the use of ethanol, and in 2010, Harkin blasted the EPA for delaying regulations to let gasoline with higher amounts of ethanol be sold. Harkin now says that while ethanol has its place in the marketplace, it will not solve all the problems in the ag sector.
Harkin, who is 85, served in Congress during the Farm Crisis. By the end of the 1980s, 300,000 US farms had defaulted on loans.
Harkin says farmers got overextended with high-interest-rate loans for combines and other farm equipment — and that led to farm foreclosures in the 1980s. An ISU economics professor estimated that in every year during the Farm Crisis, nearly 2.5% of farmers left the business. Harkin made his comments during a “Chautauqua Talk” last month in Algona hosted by Kossuth County Democrats.
KIWA Staff Photo
