Tag Archives: Jake matthews

Heavier Truck Weights Now Allowed in Georgia to Haul Agricultural Goods

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Atlanta, GA

With input costs up across the board, farmers are looking for any way to cut their spending in order to stay out of the red. It’s a concern the Georgia Farm Bureau legislative team is well aware of, as they recently helped push a new bill, which increases the maximum weight of trucks hauling agricultural goods, through both the House and Senate.

“You know, this is going to benefit and impact a farmer’s bottom line at the end of the day. If they can carry more weight per truck, more weight per trip, that’s less trips that they have to take to get the same amount of goods from A to B,” says Jake Matthews, Government Affairs Specialists for GFB. “That’s a direct benefit to a farmer’s bottom line really, and with transportation costs being so high these days, this is really going to make an impact on that and help out in that sense.”

Not only will it be advantageous to their budget, but it also gives the farmer a little piece of mind knowing it can help protect them against future disasters.

“Timeliness in getting a crop up and out of the field is really important these days. You know, when you have a severe weather event coming through, the ability to get your crop harvested and out of the field in a timely manner is really important. If severe rain is coming; a bad hurricane or storm, being able to carry more weight is going to allow you to get your crop out more quickly, more efficiently, and hopefully be able to minimize some of the effects of a severe weather event like that,” says Matthews.

The bill’s passing didn’t come without some opposition citing both road safety and degradation concerns. However, being just a four-thousand-pound increase, it should have minimal impact and could actually be a benefit in the long run.

“We’re really not talking about a ton of weight there, but we are talking about over the course of a year, that little bit of added weight is going to have major implications for the farmer, for folks hauling forest products.” says Matthews. “When you spread that out across the year, that starts to add up on the trips and the savings benefits. At the end of the day, you’re going to take a lot of trucks off the road, because it takes less trucks to haul the same amount of products now, and less trucks on the road has a number of benefits from a safety benefit to just traffic congestion and that sort of thing.”

This bill also puts Georgia famers on an even playing field with surrounding states as a majority of those have already adopted similar legislation.

“Most other states are at least eighty-eight thousand pounds or above, in some cases ninety thousand pounds, and it varies state to state on if that’s blanket across the board for all commercial trucks or if that’s just for ag and timber products,” says Matthews. “Even though it varies state to state, the overwhelming majority allow at least eighty-eight thousand pounds for a five-axle truck when hauling some sort of agricultural commodity.”

While plenty of time and hard work went into getting this bill through legislation, it will only serve as a place holder, with the long-term solution still down the road.

“The bill does sunset after two years,” says Matthews. “That sunset was put in place to kind of get us forward with the higher weight, put us on a an even playing field with the other states, but then allow us to come back and take another look at it and see what’s working and what’s not as we go forward. We think we’re going to be able to address it here in the upcoming years and get something more permanent in place.”

By: Damon Jones

Gathering Brings GFB Members Directly to Lawmakers

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Atlanta, GA

Once a year in Atlanta, grassroots advocacy comes to life as Georgia Farm Bureau members gather for a chance to hear about the important ag issues being debated and for a chance to meet with their representatives – something GFB President, Tom McCall says shows just how important the agriculture industry is to those that represent them.

“When we have this every year, it lets our people get to know their elected people and they can work together with them, and they get to know them and when they call them, they’ll listen to them more than they would if they was just somebody cold calling,” says McCall. “It’s people who are here on their own dime. They’re not getting paid. They left their farm, they left their business to come and support Farm Bureau and the policies that we push for.”

The annual event couldn’t have come at a better time as there are several bills this legislative session that would have a direct impact on the state’s agriculture industry, such as House Bill 189 – a bill that would increase haul weights by for trucks hauling agricultural goods – something Jake Matthews, Governmental Affairs Specialist with GFB says would be great for farmers and producers when transporting commodities that have variable weights.

“Currently in the state of Georgia, you can haul eighty thousand pounds on a five-axle truck,” says Matthews. “Agriculture for a long time, has been granted an exemption for that where they can actually haul up to eighty-four thousand pounds; that’s actually a five percent variance on top of the eighty thousand pounds, and what that’s for really is to account for just the unpredictable nature of hauling ag commodities. When you start getting into moisture content of certain commodities as well as fluctuating live-weight of cattle for instance, that variance is really important to make sure there’s some give there, for farmers and folks hauling their product, to have some give there as they can’t really tell how much that truck’s going to weigh unless they’re weighing it. So, having that variance is good to account for those sort of things.”

According to Matthews, the measure would also help create an even playing field with other states in the region.

“When you look at our surrounding and neighboring states in the Southeast, you got a number of states that have higher truck weights; allowable haul weights than we do. Some of those states, those higher weights are specific to agriculture, kind of how we have it here in Georgia right now. Other states, it’s across the board, so there’s definitely a little bit of variation to how different states do it, but if you look at it holistically, Georgia is behind on the amount of weight that we can haul as compared to our neighboring southeastern states,” says Matthews.

Matthews says the measure would also be more economical for farmers and producers when transporting their commodities – as more per load results in fewer trips.

“We believe that increasing those haul weights is really a direct benefit to farmers’ bottom line. If you can carry more on one truck, you’re going to be able to have fewer trips to move your product and like I said, that will be a direct benefit to farmers’ bottom line,” says Matthews.

By: John Holcomb