WASHINGTON, D.C. (Staff) – The United States government is getting tough with a special category of delinquent farm borrowers – those who owe the government more than $1 million.
“This is an embarrassing issue for us,” agriculture secretary Dan Glickman told the Senate agriculture committee last week.
At the end of March, 827 farmers with debts of $1 million or more owed the government close to $1.5 billion.
Glickman said the government wants to get those loans, with their accumulating interest, off the books.
At the same time, it is tightening the rules to make sure it never happens again. Senate committee chair Richard Lugar called it “a ticking time bomb” for the government.
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Many of the loans date from the 1980s and governments have been reluctant to write them off and add to the deficit.
Glickman said taxpayer exposure to bad farm debt has been reduced sharply in recent years as the economy has improved and many of the worst cases have gone bankrupt or left the farm.
But the club of largest debtors has been hard to clear up.
“I can assure you this is a high priority for us,” he said. “And it won’t happen again.”
