Public Comments Due in 11 Days for President Biden's Executive Order to Investigate Competition and the Intellectual Property System: Seeds and Other Agricultural Inputs

 

July 09, 2021

 

• Presidential Actions    

 

By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, and in order to promote the interests of American workers, businesses, and consumers, it is hereby ordered as follows:

 

Section 1. Policy.

 

   A fair, open, and competitive marketplace has long been a cornerstone of the American economy, while excessive market concentration threatens basic economic liberties, democratic accountability, and the welfare of workers, farmers, small businesses, startups, and consumers.

 

    The American promise of a broad and sustained prosperity depends on an open and competitive economy. For workers, a competitive marketplace creates more high-quality jobs and the economic freedom to switch jobs or negotiate a higher wage. For small businesses and farmers, it creates more choices among suppliers and major buyers, leading to more take-home income, which they can reinvest in their enterprises. For entrepreneurs, it provides space to experiment, innovate, and pursue the new ideas that have for centuries powered the American economy and improved our quality of life. And for consumers, it means more choices, better service, and lower prices.

 

    Robust competition is critical to preserving America’s role as the world’s leading economy.

 

    Yet over the last several decades, as industries have consolidated, competition has weakened in too many markets, denying Americans the benefits of an open economy and widening racial, income, and wealth inequality. Federal Government inaction has contributed to these problems, with workers, farmers, small businesses, and consumers paying the price.

    

Consolidation has increased the power of corporate employers, making it harder for workers to bargain for higher wages and better work conditions. Powerful companies require workers to sign non-compete agreements that restrict their ability to change jobs. And, while many occupational licenses are critical to increasing wages for workers and especially workers of color, some overly restrictive occupational licensing requirements can impede workers’ ability to find jobs and to move between States.

 

    Consolidation in the agricultural industry is making it too hard for small family farms to survive. Farmers are squeezed between concentrated market power in the agricultural input industries — seed, fertilizer, feed, and equipment suppliers — and concentrated market power in the channels for selling agricultural products. As a result, farmers’ share of the value of their agricultural products has decreased, and poultry farmers, hog farmers, cattle ranchers, and other agricultural workers struggle to retain autonomy and to make sustainable returns.

 

(i)                 The Secretary of Agriculture shall:

 

     (v)   to help ensure that the intellectual property system, while incentivizing innovation, does not also unnecessarily reduce competition in seed and other input markets beyond that reasonably contemplated by the Patent Act (see 35 U.S.C. 100 et seq. and 7 U.S.C. 2321 et seq.), in consultation with the Under Secretary of Commerce for Intellectual Property and Director of the United States Patent and Trademark Office, submit a report to the Chair of the White House Competition Council, enumerating and describing any relevant concerns of the Department of Agriculture and strategies for addressing those concerns across intellectual property, antitrust, and other relevant laws.

 

 

 

 

 

This executive order contains many subject matter in addition to seed, fertilizer, and retail ag supply. Broadband communication, telecommunications, freight rail, passenger air travel, boutique distilleries, hearing aids, and the list goes on, and on. It includes the following agencies and their leadership:   

(i)    the Secretary of the Treasury;

         (ii)   the Secretary of Defense;

         (iii)  the Attorney General;

        (iv)   the Secretary of Agriculture;

        (v)    the Secretary of Commerce;

         (vi)   the Secretary of Labor;

         (vii)  the Secretary of Health and Human Services;

         (viii) the Secretary of Transportation;

         (ix)   the Administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs; and

         (x)    the heads of such other agencies and offices as the Chair may from time to time invite to participate.

from The Patriot Post

 

A former Barack Obama official who is Joe Biden's current chief of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) actually referenced Rahm Emanuel's infamous statement. Referring to the current supply chain issues and growing concerns over the global food supplies,

 

Power stated: "Fertilizer shortages are real now because Russia is a big exporter of fertilizer. Even though fertilizer is not sanctioned, less fertilizer is coming out of Russia."

 

"As a result we're working with countries to think about natural solutions like manure and compost and this may hasten transitions that would have been in the interest of farmers to make eventually anyway."

 

She then seemingly said the silent part out loud, "So, never let a crisis go to waste." Power then called for Congress to act to "meet emergency food needs, so we don't see the cascading deadly effects of Russia's war extend into Africa and beyond."

 

This is classic leftist playbook stuff — leverage a crisis in order to gain political power. Raising fears over food shortages appears to be one of the latest tools the Biden administration will seek to use in its efforts to grab more power. As Joe Biden told NATO, "Yes, we did talk about food shortages, and it's gonna be real."