Concerns over Farm Bill grow

Sep 21, 2018

The conference committee has until Sept. 30 to pass the new bill

By Diego Flammini
Staff Writer
Farms.com

Industry reps worry the federal government won’t pass a new Farm Bill the current one expires at the end of the month.

The Farm Bill Conference Committee, which includes 47 representatives and nine senators, have until Sept. 30 to put the new piece of ag legislation in front of President Trump.

The committee’s only meeting so far took place on Sept. 5.

Members of the committee are not confident they can reach a unified bill in only nine days.

“I don’t think we’re close and, unfortunately, it’s just taken a turn over the last week or so,” Joni Ernst, a Senator from Iowa, told Radio Iowa yesterday. “I was very optimistic. I’m going to remain optimistic, but it’s starting to wane right now. We could be looking at a one-year extension.”

An extension would extend the 2014 Farm Bill’s authority for the year.

Two items appear to be holding up the bill’s progress.

The budget for the 2018 Farm Bill needs to be corrected as it is overallocated. And committee members are still at odds over possible work requirements for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, John Hoeven, a North Dakota Senator, told WZFG yesterday.

U.S. farmers want some certainty about the farm bill, whatever its outcome is.

“There’s certainly a desire from the hinterlands out here for congressman and senators to get together and get a farm bill so we know what we’re dealing with,” Don Koehler, executive director of the Georgia Peanut Commission, told WTOC yesterday.

“We don’t get finished with one crop before farmers have to look at financing and what we need for next year.”

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