While much of the country has been focused on the national debt, consistent job loss, and a sluggish economy, rural America has been booming, and it has looked as though the agricultural sector was once again in a position to lead us to recovery.

But 2011 brought some unexpected weather anomalies, causing farmers and ranchers throughout Texas to shift their attention to the skies where, according to a recent article in the Washington Post, Mother Nature has chosen to unleash her equivalent of the country's spiraling debt crisis.

Texas farmers have experienced the longest drought on record. The Panhandle finally saw rain after almost a year-though many farmers in other areas are still waiting-but even then, the nourishment they had hoped for fell short. The damage had already been done and the National Weather Service confirmed everyone's worst fear: Despite the recent rainfall, "widespread significant improvement in the ongoing drought is not expected."

Seventy percent of the state is now experiencing "exceptional drought"-the worst, as drought classifications go. The lack of rain combined with excessive heat (the city of Austin experienced 90 100-degree days this year), massive dust storms, and wildfires have rendered much of America's largest agricultural engine useless.

And it's not just Texas. Oklahoma, Louisiana, New Mexico, and Kansas are all working with withering crops, cracked fields, and starving cattle-conditions that had led to an industry-wide domino effect that's picking up speed.

The drought has led to $5.2 billion in agricultural losses, according to Texas AgriLife Extension Service economists. Many ranchers and farmers will have to sell some or all of their herds just to keep them alive. Growers gave up on dryland crops months ago, and even yields from some irrigated crops have fallen 60 percent.

It's circumstances like this one that remind us the only thing certain in agriculture is uncertainty. That's why when uncertainty strikes, we need strong farm policy to prevent the damage going from industry-wide to nationwide.

The American people and their security are tied to agriculture's ability to function, and farm policy provides farmers and ranchers the backstop they need in order to keep our food system the most abundant, affordable, and safest in the world.

The farm programs that have been put in place over the years are meant to build confidence among lenders who might otherwise find a farming operation to be too risky, provide insurance to farmers who wouldn't have been able to bounce back after something like a devastating drought, and most importantly, keep food on tables all across the country in spite of these uncertainties in rural America.

Today, we are three and four generations removed from the farm. But just because we're not experiencing this modern-day dustbowl first hand, doesn't mean it can't reach us. There are just 210,000 farmers holding the thin green line between a safe and abundant domestic food supply and importing our food like we do our oil.

These farmers are hurting now, but they've gotten through droughts before and they will again, as long as we maintain strong farm policy to help get them back to work and this country's economic engine back on track.

Of that, we're certain.