I have a couple of things. You mentioned the frustration with the complexity and delivery of the program. Unfortunately, that comes with the program. If you want a simple program you make a flat acreage payment or per head payment or whatever. That's the simplest delivery program. But it's also the easiest to be capitalized. It loses its benefit but continues to be an expense for the government. That's why we've never recognized that as a recourse. You have to find the balance between fairness, equality, and complexity, and that's what we're all struggling with.
As far as the research, Eric is absolutely right. Most barley research is on malt, essentially provided by the malting and brewing companies. Government and public spending has almost completely disappeared as far as feed barley research, and it is continuing to drop. We're hearing more reports that they're trying to get out of it completely. This is a concern for us, as barley growers.
Your question goes to efficiency and productivity. Do we get more by producing more, or are we better off with what we have and doing a better job of it? That's an ongoing question. As long as it translates into efficiency, the more productive you are then the more per acre you can produce and the better off the whole sector, the whole value chain, should be. We're the fundamental building block of the rest of the value chain. The more efficient and productive we are the more it creates opportunities for everybody else, whether it's the biofuel, the cattle-feeding fractionation, or whatever.
But it's the drop in public research money and fundamental support for that type of policy that is our concern. We see it dropping and continuing to drop.