With respect to the AgriStability program, you're right. The reference period, if you will, is based on what we call the Olympic average. So we look at our producers' margins for the previous five years, drop the high and low, and average the remaining three.
We had an option to do that or to look at just the previous three years. We are bound by WTO rules, so we can report the dollars under the disaster portion of AgriStability as green for WTO purposes so that we can stay within the $4.3 billion that Mr. Miller referred to and meet our WTO obligations.
If we had our druthers, we'd probably be looking at a five-year reference period, looking at the previous five years, because when we've consulted with producers in the past, they said that's probably the best reference period you could use.
You don't want to go too far back because then you're not reflecting what the current reality is in the market, but you don't want to have it too short because then you have too much variation in your level of support.
So we said five years, and then we were bound by what the WTO requires so that we can report this money as green for trade purposes and not amber. Based on our analysis at that time, the Olympic average was found to be the best. We are staying with the Olympic average going forward under the AgriStability program.
There have been suggestions from both the hog and the beef industry to give producers the higher of the previous three years or the Olympic average. We are looking at that. It wouldn't benefit all producers, but we need to assess that from a cost and a principle standpoint. That's part of what the industry has proposed going forward.