John Walt Boatright, director of government affairs for the American Farm Bureau Federation, discussed the record-setting rise in costs for farmers.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cProduction cost and input cost increases have been a major focal point over the past couple of years, where we see nearly\u00a0$500 billion, which is a record from 2000 to 2026 that has just been extraordinary,\u201d Boatright said.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Boatwright credited the One Big Beautiful Bill Act as a step toward remedying the situation, despite not solving the problem on its own.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cYou see overall estimated change\u00a0\u2014\u00a0$65 billion\u00a0in new investments<\/a>\u00a0\u2014\u00a0through this One Big Beautiful Bill Act,\u201d Boatwright said. \u201cHowever, it was not a normal farm bill process. They only chose to include certain aspects of the farm bill, and a lot of that were title and safety net changes.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n As a result, Boatwright emphasized the necessity of the Farm, Food, and National Security Act of 2026, or\u00a0H.R. 7567,\u00a0introduced<\/a>\u00a0in in the U.S. House of Representatives on Feb. 13.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWhat we believe is very valuable and important in the context of this proposal for the House Ag proposal for Florida \u2014 we see a lot of special crop research initiative\u00a0enhancements in this bill, and of that, there\u2019s a $30 million carve-out for mechanization and automation research,\u201d Boatwright said. \u201cWe see continued citrus disease research funding, which is so incredibly important to all of us here in the room, as we\u2019ve all fought hard for continued funding to help with our citrus greening pressures.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Jason Mahon, deputy secretary for the Florida Department of Commerce, expressed\u00a0particular optimism\u00a0for Florida\u2019s\u00a0agricultural technology (agtech), noting its new inclusion as a \u201ctarget industry\u201d in the department\u2019s target industry report.\u00a0According to the\u00a0report<\/a>, Florida\u2019s\u00a0agtech\u00a0industry has a GDP of\u00a0$77 billion\u00a0and an average wage is $128,862.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201c[The\u00a0agtech\u00a0industry met] the criteria that we needed to see to say that this has\u00a0high\u00a0impact. This is something that we want to support and be involved in,\u201d Mahon said. \u201cBy 2028, we\u2019re forecasting that we\u2019ll have another about 40,000 jobs in\u00a0agtech\u00a0in Florida.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Mahon said that the Florida Department of Commerce\u2019s goal is to increase in-state production of agricultural innovations.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cUltimately, we see a lot of these companies are producing really great products, like the collars that are going on cows to measure the temperature and what\u2019s\u00a0going\u00a0on in the dairy operation,\u201d Mahon said.\u00a0\u201cBut that collar is not made here \u2014 it\u00a0wasn\u2019t\u00a0created here. And we really want for more companies to say, \u2018Hey, I want to have a technological breakthrough, and I want to produce that in the state.\u2019\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Mahon then commended the innovations arising out of UF\/IFAS, which MREC director and professor Kirsten Pelz-Stelinski\u00a0further commented upon after Mahon\u2019s session.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re really interested in continuing that support for the ornamental greenhouse\u00a0industry, but\u00a0also expanding more into protected and controlled environment agricultural systems and automated plant productions, as well as developing more urban agriculture,\u201d Pelz-Stelinski\u00a0said.\u00a0\u201cWe are very unique in that we\u2019re located right by Orlando, and so this offers us an opportunity to sort of partner and become part of that new footprint of maybe smaller focus commercial agriculture and also thinking about space-based agriculture, because of our location really close to Cape Canaveral.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n![\"Attendees](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Attendees-listen-to-John-Walt-Boatwright-director-of-government-affairs-for-the-American-Farm-Bureau.jpeg\")
Photo by Sarah Merly Attendees listen to John Walt Boatwright, director of government affairs for the American Farm Bureau Federation.<\/p>\n
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