Tobacco Quota Buyout
CRS Report for Congress
Tobacco Quota Buyout
Jasper Womach
Agriculture Policy Specialist
Resources, Science, and Industry Division
Summary
Tobacco quota buyout legislation (Title VI of P.L. 108-357 (H.R. 4520)) terminated
U.S. tobacco farm price support (nonrecourse loans) and domestic production controls
(marketing quotas) after the 2004 crop year. An assessment on tobacco product
manufacturers and importers will generate about $9.6 billion over 10 years for
compensatory payments to tobacco quota owners and active tobacco producers.
Beginning with the 2005 crop, there are no restrictions on who can grow and market
tobacco, where it can be grown, and the amount that can be grown and marketed. (This
report will not be updated.)
Tobacco quota buyout legislation (P.L. 108-357, Title VI, Fair and Equitable
Tobacco Reform Act of 2004) eliminated federal farm price support for tobacco at the end
of the 2004 crop year. Tobacco quota owners and active producers will be paid about
$9.6 billion as compensation for lost rents and to aid in the transition to a free market
system. The payment rate to quota owners is $7/lb. on 2002 basic quota; the payment rate
to active producers is $3/lb. on 2002 effective quota. Payments will be made in equal
annual installments for 10 years. Farmers wanting faster payouts can assign their quota
buyout contracts to private financial institutions and receive discounted lump sum
payments. Money to pay for the buyout comes from new assessments on tobacco product
manufacturers and importers.
After about 65 years of supply control and price support, farmers are no longer
constrained as to who can produce tobacco, where it can be grown, how much can be
marketed, or how low the farm price can go. In their pre-buyout analyses, tobacco
economists anticipated a rapid consolidation of tobacco production onto substantially
fewer but larger farms located in the most economical regions. Total U.S. tobacco1
production was expected to increase.
1 Paul L. Hollis, Tobacco Buyout Affects Outlook for 2005 Crops, Southeast Farm Press,
December 29, 2004.
Congressional Research Service ˜ The Library of Congress
The tobacco quota buyout campaign gained momentum after farmers were joined by
some anti-smoking and public health advocates, as well as the Philip Morris USA
cigarette manufacturing company, seeking new authority for the Food and Drug
Administration (FDA) to regulate tobacco products. The FDA authority was introduced
as S. 2461 (DeWine-Kennedy) and H.R. 4433 (Tom Davis-Waxman) in the 108th
Congress. Legislative conferees on H.R. 4520 did not adopt the FDA provisions, though
the provisions had been included in the Senate version of the bill. There was opposition
from some cigarette manufacturers to the FDA provisions, and from those in Congress
opposed to giving the federal government expanded regulatory authority over private
businesses.
Payments to Tobacco Quota Holders
A tobacco quota holder was defined as the owner (as of October 22, 2004) of a farm
with a basic tobacco marketing quota or tobacco acreage allotment for the 2004 marketing
year. Each quota holder received a contract obligating the USDA’s Commodity Credit
Corporation (CCC) Tobacco Trust Fund to pay $7/lb. on the basic quota level established
for the farm for the 2002 marketing year. The payments would be made in 10 equal
annual installments of $0.70/lb. For those kinds of tobacco where the farm quota was
specified in acres, a 2002 poundage equivalent was calculated using the county average
yield for the 2001-2003 crop years.
In 2002 the national basic quota amounted to about 959 million pounds. So,
payments to quota owners could amount to $6.7 billion. According to USDA’s Farm
Service Agency (FSA) data, there were about 415,750 tobacco quota owners in 1999.
There were 56,977 farms producing tobacco in 2002, according to the Census of
Agriculture, and almost all of these farm operators also were owners of quota. Thus,
approximately 358,000 nonoperator landlords could receive quota buyout payments along
with the nearly 57,000 farm operators.
Payments to Producers of Quota Tobacco
Active tobacco producers received a contract obligating the CCC to pay $3/lb. on the
effective farm marketing quota for the 2002 marketing year. For those kinds of tobacco
where the effective farm quota was specified in acres, a 2002 poundage equivalent was
calculated using the average yield on the farm for the 2001-2003 crop years. A farmer
who produced quota tobacco in each of the 2002-2004 marketing years would receive the
full $3/lb. payment. The payments would be made in 10 equal annual installments of
$0.30/lb. For each of the three base years the farmer did not produce tobacco, the
payment is reduced by one-third.
In 2002, the national effective quota amounted to about 970 million pounds. Hence,
payments to quota owners could amount to $2.9 billion, which could be divided among
approximately 57,000 producers.
Obtaining Lump Sum Payments
Provisions were made in the law allowing contract payment recipients to assign the
annual payments to financial institutions (called successor-in-interest transfers by FSA).
This enables financial institutions to make lump sum payments to the quota holders and
active producers. The financial institutions are allowed to discount the contracts to cover
their costs of borrowing as well as administrative overhead. By regulation, the maximum
allowable discount rate is the prime rate on the first workday of each money plus 2%
rounded to the nearest number. CCC then makes the annual payments to the financial
institutions to which the contracts have been assigned.
Assessments on Tobacco Product Manufacturers
and Importers
The cost of the tobacco buyout is covered by assessments on tobacco product
manufacturers and tobacco product importers. The assessments will be collected by the
CCC on a quarterly basis during each of the 10 fiscal years from FY2005 through
FY2014. The assessments began with the calendar quarter ending December 31, 2004.
The amount to be collected each fiscal year is the amount needed to cover the year’s
expenditures associated with the quota buyout program — about $1 billion per year.
The assessments are apportioned according to the gross domestic volume share of
the market held by each class of tobacco product. By law, the initial shares for FY2005
were as follows: cigarettes, 96.331%; cigars, 2.783%; snuff, 0.539%; roll-your-own
tobacco, 0.171%; chewing tobacco, 0.111%; pipe tobacco, 0.066%. Each year the
allocation will be changed to mirror shifts in market shares. Each manufacturer and
importer’s pro rata share of the domestic market becomes its contribution to the total
collection. Assessments and collections are done quarterly. If domestic cigarette sales
remain constant at the 2004 level of 19.4 billion packs, the annual buyout program cost
will amount to about 5¢ per pack.
Subsequent to the 1998 Master Settlement Agreement between the major cigarette
manufacturers and the State Attorneys General, the manufacturers signed a Phase II
agreement to pay $5.15 billion to the tobacco producing states. The payments were to be
made over a 12-year period corresponding to a declining scale from 1999 through 2010.
An estimated $2.0 billion in remaining Phase II obligations are now offset by the tobacco
quota buyout assessments. The states most adversely affected by the loss of Phase II
payments will be Pennsylvania and Maryland (at about $9.3 million and $13.5 million
respectively) because these states will not receive quota buyout payments. They receive
no buyout payments because many years ago the tobacco producers decided to forgo the
federal tobacco subsidy program.
Disposal of Loan Pool Stocks
Farm market prices for U.S.-grown tobacco in 2005 and subsequent years are
expected to fall below the mandatory support levels that applied to 2004 and previous
crops. Therefore, tobacco previously put under price support loan (called loan pool
stocks) likely will not be sold at prices high enough to cover the loan principal plus
interest. It also is possible that no-net-cost funds previously collected from producers and
leaf buyers will not be adequate to cover the losses. The buyout legislation anticipates
this development and specifies that such losses in excess of funds previously set aside in
the no-net-cost accounts are to be covered by money from the Tobacco Trust Fund. (A
detailed explanation of the previous support program is in CRS Report 95-129, Tobacco
Price Support: An Overview of the Program.)
Administration of the Tobacco Quota Buyout Program
The tobacco quota buyout program is administered by the FSA through the same
network of county offices that administered the tobacco price support program and the
emergency Tobacco Loss Payments. The records in these county offices are used to
determine the distribution of payments. Also, quota holders and producers were required
to complete applications with sufficient information to demonstrate each applicant’s
rightful claim to payments.
The CCC established a revolving Tobacco Trust Fund to receive tobacco product
assessments and to make quota owner and producer payments. The Tobacco Trust Fund
also will reimburse the CCC for losses associated with the disposal of existing association
loan pool stocks and inventories connected to prior price support activities. Total
expenditures from the Trust Fund are limited to $10.14 billion and must be completed by
January 1, 2015.
Tobacco Quota Holder and Producer Transition
Payment Estimates, by State
(million $)
StateQuota HolderPaymentsProducer Transition PaymentsTotal QuotaBuyout Payments
North Carolina$2,751.9$1,190.9$3,942.8
K e ntucky $1,735.9 $733.1 $2,469.0
T e nnessee $527.9 $239.6 $767.5
South Carolina$508.3$216.4$724.7
V i rginia $458.3 $208.4 $666.6
Georgi a $429.4 $182.9 $612.3
Florida $83.9 $35.7 $119.6
Ohio $74.1 $34.0 $108.1
Indiana $60.5 $27.0 $87.6
Wisconsin $44.3 $19.0 $63.2
Missouri $22.3 $9.7 $31.9
West Virginia$14.2$10.5$24.8
Alabama $3.3 $1.4 $4.6
Total $6,714.1 $2,908.6 $9,622.7
Note: Based on basic and effective quota data from USDA’s Farm Service Agency.
Summary of the Tobacco Quota Buyout Legislation
Fair and Equitable Tobacco Reform Act of 2004, Title VI of P.L. 108-357
Adopted by Congress as Title VI of H.R. 4520, signed into law October 22, 2004.
Total Payments and Other Spending
Total payments to quota owners and producers, as well as costs related to
disposition of loan pool stocks, are limited to $10.14 billion. There is no additional
spending for community assistance or other activities. [Sec. 627]
Funding Sources
Payments to quota owners and active producers, and expenses related to disposal of
existing price support loan stocks, are from a Tobacco Trust Fund created in the
CCC. Trust Fund revenues are from quarterly assessments on tobacco product
manufacturers and importers. Cigarettes pay 96.331% in the first year, other
tobacco products share the remainder. [Sec. 625] Cigarette manufacturer Phase II
producer payment obligations of about $2.6 billion for 2005-2010 end under
provisions of the Phase II agreement.
Payment Timing
Payments to quota owners and producers are made in 10 equal annual installments
from FY2005 through FY2014. [Sec. 622(e) and 623(d)] Advance payment options
likely will be available to owners and producers from financial institutions to which
they assign their contracts. [Sec. 624(e)]
Quota Owner Payments
Quota owners (numbering about 416,000, including about 57,000 active producers
and 359,000 landlords) as of the date of enactment are to be paid $7 per lb. on
marketing year 2002 basic quota, divided into 10 equal payments of 70¢ per pound.
[Sec. 622]
(Estimated cost = $6.7 billion)
Active Producer Payments
Active producers (numbering about 57,000), who raised tobacco in 2002, 2003, or
2004, are to be paid $3 per lb. on 2002 marketing year effective quota, divided into
10 annual installments of 30¢ per pound. Payments are reduced by 1/3 for each year
tobacco was not grown by the producer. [Sec. 623]
(Estimated cost = $2.9 billion. Nearly all producers own some quota.)
Assignment of Payments
Holders of contracts to receive payments may assign them to financial institutions.
The CCC will then make annual payments to the financial institutions. [Sec. 624(e)]
Production Controls and Restrictions
Marketing quotas and acreage allotments are terminated. [Sec. 611 and 612] There
will be no restrictions on who can produce tobacco in 2005 and future years, or
where it can be produced. Production likely will be consolidated onto fewer and
larger farms in the most economical regions. Total production is expected to
increase.
Price Support
Price support loans and no-net-cost assessments are terminated. [Sec. 612] Market
prices are expected to decline by 20-30%.
Disposal of Loan Pool Stocks
Loan pool stocks acquired under previous price support operations will be sold by
price stabilization cooperatives and the CCC. Losses in excess of no-net-cost
account funds are to be reimbursed from the Tobacco Trust Fund. [Sec. 641] An
estimated $517 million should be available for this purpose from the Trust Fund
after subtracting buyout expenditures from total funds.
Tobacco Inspection and Grading
Mandatory inspection and grading of imported tobacco is eliminated. [Sec. 611(b)]
Inspection and grading of domestic tobacco will continue at designated auction
markets as long as 2/3 of the growers selling at the market the previous year vote
their approval.
CRS Reports
CRS Report RS20802, Tobacco Farmer Assistance.
CRS Report 95-129, Tobacco Price Support: An Overview of the Program.
CRS Report RL31790, Tobacco Quota Buyout Proposals in the 108th Congress.
Other Resources
“Tobacco Transition Assessments; Final Rule.” Federal Register, vol. 70, no. 27
(February 10, 2005), pp. 7007-7014.
“Tobacco Transition Payment Program; Final Rule.” Federal Register, vol. 70, no. 63
(April 4, 2005), pp. 17150-17165.
North Carolina State University, Tobacco Economics,
[ h ttp://www.ces.ncsu.edu/dept s/agecon/tobacco_econ/] .
University of Kentucky, Tobacco Economics Online,
[ h ttp://www.uky.edu/Agriculture/TobaccoEcon/] .
University of Tennessee, Tobacco Policy and Economics,
[ h ttp://www.agpolicy.org/tobacco.html] .
USDA, Economic Research Service, Tobacco Briefing Room,
[ h ttp://www.ers.usda.gov/Briefing/Tobacco/] .
USDA, Farm Service Agency (FSA), Tobacco Information,
[ h ttp://www.fsa.usda.gov/tobacco/] .