Farm Bill: Fight is Far From Over

(IDFA) – As work on a final Farm Bill continues to move slowly through Congress, the broad coalition that was formed in opposition to dairy supply management needs to remain engaged and inform their senators and representatives about the dangers of imposing production limits on our industry.

“The overwhelming and bipartisan support for the Goodlatte-Scott amendment sent a strong signal to the Senate that the controversial proposal to artificially increase dairy prices must be dropped if there is going to be a Farm Bill passed this year,” said Jerry Slominski, IDFA senior vice president for legislative affairs and economic policy.  “But, the fight is far from over as the Senate bill still includes such a program.

Late last week, the Senate officially asked that a conference committee be formed to negotiate the Farm Bill, noting that its version has significant differences from the House-passed Farm Bill.   Senate Agriculture Committee Chairwoman Stabenow (D-MI) announced that the ratio of Senate Democrats to Republicans would be 7-5, but did not name the Senate participants.

It is expected the appointed conferees will closely follow seniority on the committee, which means likely Democrats on the conference committee will be Chairwoman Stabenow, Pat Leahy (VT), Tom Harkin (IA), Max Baucus (MT), Sherrod Brown (OH), Amy Klobuchar (MN) and Michael Bennet (CO).   The likely Republican conferees, if chosen by seniority, will be Ranking Member Thad Cochran (MS), Mitch McConnell (KY), Pat Roberts (KS), Saxby Chambliss (GA) and John Boozman (AR).   This list could change slightly, due to other factors such as leadership positions. The exact conferees will not be known until a formal announcement.

A conference of the House and Senate Farm Bills seems unlikely to happen until after the August recess.  House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) is not expected to name his conferees for the House bill (H.R. 2642) until after the Republican leadership has determined how to move forward on a separate nutrition bill that will include changes and savings from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP).   Although traditionally part of the Farm Bill, the nutrition title was removed and placed on a separate track so that the House could pass the agriculture portion.

The House bill includes the Goodlatte-Scott amendment language that removed the divisive dairy supply management proposal from the bill while retaining an effective and expanded revenue insurance program for producers.  The Goodlatte-Scott amendment was approved by a 291-135 margin that included a large majority of Republicans and nearly half of the Democrats.