U.S. to Give Away $2 Billion in Surplus Corn, Wheat to Spur Exports of Farm Products

Agriculture Secretary John R. Block said Wednesday that the United States will give away $2 billion worth of government-owned surplus corn and wheat to stimulate overseas sales of American farm products.

“We will be going on the attack in the international marketplace,” Block told a news conference, adding that the export subsidies will be targeted to recapture markets taken from U.S. farmers by the subsidies of other nations.

Sen. Edward Zorinsky (D-Neb.) said the program represents “get-evenism” for other nations’ unfair trading practices.

Details of the three-year program will be announced by June 1, Block said. They will stipulate that the commodity giveaways--in the form of bonuses to purchasers or exporters--must result in additional export sales that would not otherwise have been possible, and must be targeted to markets identified as those taken away from the United States through unfair trade practices.

The announcement was made to fulfill a promise made by the Reagan Administration last week, when the White House was seeking a Senate majority for a Republican 1986 budget plan.