Leaders of the House and Senate Ag committees insist they’ll move ahead as quickly as possible next year to write a new farm bill. But they’ve effectively given themselves until the end of the next year under the farm bill extension that easily passed the House Tuesday as part of the stopgap spending measure.
House Ag Chairman Glenn “GT” Thompson, R-Pa., says the committee will continue to work with USDA staff and the Congressional Budget Office on crafting key provisions for a new bill. “The House will continue to do its due diligence,” he told Agri-Pulse after the 336-95 vote on the stopgap bill and farm bill extension. He has said it will be January at the earliest before the committee moves legislation.
Senate Ag Chairwoman Debbie Stabenow, D-Mich., warns that the prolonged appropriations process, which is now going to extend into February or beyond, could delay work on a farm bill. But she told reporters Tuesday her committee could go forward with a bill without waiting on House Ag.
Keep in mind: Neither committee appears to be close to an agreement on some key issues, including changes to commodity programs. It often takes a hard deadline for lawmakers to cut deals on the more difficult issues.
IPEF trade pillar announcement delayed
The Biden administration will not be announcing the completion of the trade pillar for the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework as planned this week because of concerns voiced by lawmakers like Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, a government source tells Agri-Pulse.
The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative had set an unofficial deadline to complete the trade pillar – and the agriculture chapter it contains – this week after the conclusion of the seventh round of negotiations that ended Sunday in San Francisco.
USTR Katherine Tai, who was in San Francisco Tuesday, did not mention IPEF in a speech she delivered to a meeting of trade ministers.
“This thing’s not dead,” the source said. “A lot of chapters are far along. It’s just a matter of when we can announce it.”
Western Caucus members seek answers on WOTUS
Members of the House of Representatives’ Western Caucus are lending their voices to an effort by industry and about half the states in the nation to get EPA and the Army Corps of Engineers to trim back their definition of “waters of the U.S.”
Following on the heels of new lawsuits that challenge the agencies’ attempt to comply with the Supreme Court’s Sackett decision, 71 caucus members led by Rep. Dan Newhouse, R-Wash., have written to EPA and the Corps in an attempt to find out how they plan to implement Sackett.
Courtney Briggs of the American Farm Bureau Federation, who also is chair of the Waters Advocacy Coalition, said in a caucus news release that “when given the opportunity to deliver the clarity long sought by the regulated community, the federal government instead chose to push forward with a revised WOTUS rule that is mired with vague terms and ambiguous language.”
Among the questions posed by the lawmakers: How will Corps offices interpret the phrase, “relatively permanent” waters.
AFBF and other trade groups filed an amended complaint in Texas Monday, along with the states of Texas and Idaho. Two other farm groups, the North Dakota Farm Bureau and the Cass County (N.D.) Farm Bureau, filed an amended complaint in North Dakota, along with 24 states.
See today’s Agri-Pulse newsletter for more on the new lawsuits.
More bad news in climate assessment released by government
Yet another report has issued dire warnings about the impacts of climate change on the world – including agricultural productivity.
The federal government’s National Climate Assessment said lower corn yields in the Midwest “are linked to rapid shifts between wet and dry conditions and stresses from climate-induced increases in pests and pathogens.” Between 1981 and 2016, corn yield losses from flooding “were comparable to those from extreme drought.”
In addition, “extreme heat and more intense wildfire and drought in the Southwest are already threatening agricultural worker health, reducing cattle production, and damaging wineries.”
Sustainable agriculture practices can help. “Crop production could be more resilient to climate changes if soils were healthier than at present, but the speed with which such a transformation is possible using an agroecological approach remains unknown,” the report said. “Future water availability has a major impact on soil health, and forecasting this will be a challenge.”
Lawmakers seek better accounting of specialty crop trade barriers
Senate Finance Committee Chairman Ron Wyden of Oregon and top Republican Mike Crapo of Idaho on Tuesday unveiled new legislation to compel USDA and USTR to produce a more comprehensive and detailed annual report on all of the trade barriers facing specialty crop exporters.
Reps. David Valadao, R-Calif., Elissa Slotkin, R-Mich., and Suzanne Bonamici, D-Ore., will be introducing a similar bill in the House, Crapo said in a statement.
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“The world is hungry for grown-in-the-U.S. blueberries, potatoes, wine and other produce,” said Wyden. “But all too often our farmers and producers are stymied by unreasonable blockades in foreign markets. Our bipartisan bill will help rural Americans by identifying unfair foreign trade barriers and creating specific plans to cut through that red tape.”
The Senate bill – the Specialty Crops Reporting on Opportunities and Promotion Act – is cosponsored by Sens. Jim Risch, R-Idaho, Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., Susan Collins, R-Maine, and Angus King (I-Maine).
Kanter touts DOJ’s recent ag work in House Judiciary hearing
Jonathan Kanter, the head of the Justice Department’s Antitrust Division, touted the consent decree the agency signed with Koch Foods last week that halted the company's assessment of ‘exit penalties’ on poultry growers that leave for other competitors as an example of its work on agricultural consolidation during a House Judiciary antitrust hearing on Tuesday.
“These issues matter,” Kanter said, as he rattled off a list of other agricultural lawsuits the agency has filed, including one against Agri Stats. He also said he has been visiting with farmers to hear their concerns.
“I think we have been more active with respect to protecting farmers and family farmers than we have been in over a century,” Kanter told lawmakers.
Phillip Brasher, Steve Davies and Noah Wicks contributed to this report. Questions, comments, tips? Email bill@agri-pulse.com.
