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Today, we ll discuss a brief overview of The Farm Bill that includes defining what it is; describing what programs and topics are covered in it; how the the bill is reauthorized, what types of program are funded and how much they receive, and lastly I ll mention upcoming proposals being submitted for the 2018 Farm Bill. 2
How does one describe a legislation that covers a broad range of topics and includes many complex pieces? As President Obama said in 2014, It s like a Swiss Army knife. But, to be more specific than just calling the Farm Bill a Swiss Army Knife, in the United States, the Farm Bill is known as the primary agricultural and food law run by the federal government. The farm bill got its start in 1933 as part of President FDR s New Deal legislation. It was created in response to the economic and environmental crises of the Great Depression and the Dust Bowl. Its three original goals were first to keep food prices fair for farmers and consumers, second, ensure an adequate food supply, and third protect and sustain the country s vital natural resources. The comprehensive bill is passed every 5 years by the U.S. Congress. This is referred to as the reauthorization process which we ll go over next. Topics in the Farm Bill range from food assistance programs to farm commodity crop prices and income supports, conservation, farm credit, trade, research, rural development, bioenergy, and foreign food aid. 3
How does the Farm Bill become law? That s also a long and complicated process, but I will try and break it down to the very basic parts. The first begins with Farm Bill hearings (in Washington, DC and across the country). Hearings are essentially listening sessions where members of Congress take input from the public, industry, and advocates about what they want to see in a new bill. After the hearings, the House and Senate Agriculture Committees each draft, debate, amend and change (referred to as marking up ) their own bill. These House and Senate Ag committees often work on separate bills that can have substantial differences. Once each Ag Committee is ready for the House or Senate to vote on their bill, it will go up for a full floor vote. That means, the entire House or Senate members debate the bill, make amendments, and vote on it again. After both the full House and Senate have passed their version of the farm bill which can take a while, and may require a bill being sent back to committee for more work the two separate bills (House and Senate) go to a smaller group of Senators and Representatives called a conference committee. In conference committee, members will work to combine the two separate bills (the House Bill and Senate Bill) into one. The combined version of the conference committee s farm bill then goes back to the House and Senate floors to be debated and potentially passed. Once the House and Senate approve a final farm bill, the bill goes to the President, who can veto it or sign it into law! 4
So how much funding do programs get? As you can see, food and nutrition assistance programs have always been the largest programs in the Farm Bill. Since the 1990s, you can see that food assistance programs in the Farm Bill have continued to grow, and rose sharply after the recession in 2009. At that time, President Obama approved stimulus funding to increase aid to families suffering in the economic downturn, but this funding has begun to decline slowly during the recovery. 5
In terms of the projected costs of the Farm Bill for the next several years, you can see that nutrition and food assistance programs comprise nearly 80% of the Farm Bill s funding. However, this may change depending on what Congress decides to do in the upcoming 2018 Farm Bill. 6
President Trump s fiscal year (FY) 2018 budget proposal includes: 21% cut to USDA s discretionary funding ($47 billion over 10 years). Such a significant reduction would force USDA to lay off thousands of staff members across the country, and according to the Trump budget plan, include the elimination or severe reduction of many food, farm, and nutrition programs. Some of the biggest cuts proposed for FY 2018 include: $193 billion from the SNAP) over 10 years. The majority of the savings from the SNAP cut ($116 billion) would be made by block-granting the program to states, effectively putting them on the hook to match as much as 25 percent of the program s costs by 2023. Putting additional restrictions on the eligibility of able-bodied adults would make up $49 billion of the total cut, and a new application fee on retailers who participate in the program would represent $252 million of the cut. This fee would include not only brick and mortar retailers, but also farmers markets interested in expanding access to healthy, local foods for SNAP families. This budget proposal is also unique in seeks to reopen the farm bill to make a wide range of changes to food, farm, and agricultural policies. Many opponents of the budget have confidently asserted that the President s proposal would be dead on arrival in Congress. 7
So how can you keep up with official proposed legislation? Just go to www.govrack.us and select Food and Agriculture. You can then write a topic name in the search button. In this example, I wrote SNAP. You can also narrow down information by whether the legislation has been proposed in the house or senate, who the committee is, and who the co-sponsors are. 8
So what do we know so far about some of the largest federal food and nutrition assistance programs in The Farm Bill? The most talked about program has been SNAP, but none of the proposals submitted in Congress have suggested cuts, making it a block-grant program, or restricting the type of foods that SNAP recipients can purchase. However, several bills have been proposed that allow SNAP recipients to purchase certain multivitamin or dietary supplements; changing some of the work requirements, allowing students that are caregivers to be eligible for SNAP, to expand the program, and to provide for a standard medical expense deduction under SNAP. In addition to changes to the SNAP program, this past year, new rules went into effect for stores or retailers that accept SNAP. The final SNAP Retailer Rule went into effect January 2017, but in May 2017, the federal government approved a federal budget that that reopened a new SNAP Retailer Rule public comment period to discuss the definition of the term variety. However, most recently (July 2017), the USDA s website published a revision to the definition of variety reverting it back to the original rule, meaning that retailers only need to carry 3 varieties of a staple food items instead of 7. 9
SNAP-Ed is the education arm of SNAP and it s purpose is to educates low-income indivdiuals and families to eat smart and move more through integrated strategies across multiple sectors and across the lifespan. EFNEP provides nutrition education to low-income families with young children, pregnant women, and school-aged youth through a series of lessons taught by paraprofessionals and volunteers, many of whom are local to the population. So far, there have been no official proposed changes to SNAP-Education or EFNEP. The good news is, these nutrition education programs tend to be bi-partison because they focus on individual education. Based on recent visits with various Congressman and women, there have been no suggested to cuts to these programs. 10
The Local Food and Regional Market Supply Act (The Local FARMS Act) was introduced by Sherrod Brown (D-OH) in the Senate, and Representatives Chellie Pingree (D-ME), Jeff Fortenberry (R-NE) and Sean Maloney (D-NY) in the House. The Local FARMS Act would solidify funding for a number of already successful local foods system programs in the Farm Bill. The bill brings together the Farmers Market and Local Food Promotion Program and the Value-Added Producer Grants Program to streamline support for farmers markets, farm to retail marketing, local food infrastructure projects and producer-owned enterprises. It stabilizes money for the Organic Cost Share Certification Program, which assists farmers in transitioning to organic production. The bill helps farmers manage additional costs to meet new food safety rules and regulations, while also provide additional training. The bill would make it easier for schools to procure locally- and regionally-produced food. And it would expand the ability of rural development and farm service agency grants and loan programs to be used to support livestock, dairy and poultry supply chain infrastructure. 11
Senators Leahy (D-VT) and Cochran (R-MS) and Representatives Fortenberry (R-NE) and Fudge (D-OH) introduced the bipartisan Farm to School Act of 2017. This bill would increase annual mandatory funding from $5 million to $15 million as demand for this program is nearly 5x higher than current available funding. It would also improve program participation for beginning, veteran and socially disadvantaged farmers and ranchers by providing technical assistance and research to a broad range of potential applicants, the grant program will encourage increased awareness of and participation in farm to school activities among all agricultural producers. It asks to expand the grant program s scope by including early care and education sites, summer food service program sites, and after school programs in the program. Lastly, the bill increases access among tribal schools to farm-fresh and traditional foods, especially from tribal producers. 12
The Senate Agriculture Committee approved a markup of the Child Nutrition Reauthorization (CNR) on January 20 th. The new bill is called the Improving Child Nutrition Integrity and Access Act of 2016. The HHFKA mandate that all grains be 100% whole grain rich has been decreased to 80% whole grain rich. Basically this means that kids will be eating grains that are 40% whole grain. Schools get more time to implement sodium Target 2 limits, and there is a hold on the final sodium target limits until further research. But, most importantly, the mandatory serving of fruit or vegetable remains intact! 13
Most of the programs' authorities to operate are in statute permanently (i.e., without expiration dates). Also, many of the programs' authorizations of appropriations are permanent; these include NSLP, the School Breakfast Program (SBP), and the Child and Adult Care Food Program (CACFP). These programs with permanent authorizations of appropriations continue, without issue, with appropriated funding (currently provided by P.L. 115-31). A number of programs' authorizations of appropriations ended after September 30, 2015. These include SFSP, WIC, WIC Farmers' Market Nutrition Program (FMNP), and State Administrative Expenses. Programs with an expired authorization of appropriations can continue to operate so long as funding is provided. FY2016 appropriations law (P.L. 114-113) and the FY2017 CRs allowed these programs to continue to operate. Operations currently continue under the FY2017 omnibus appropriations law. 14
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As of now, advocates and lobbyists in Washington, DC are hearing that the House Ag Committee has made progress in writing their version of the 2018 Farm Bill, and they are hoping to get it to the House floor this year. The Senate Ag Committee is a bit further off, proposing a bill maybe early next year. Bottom line, discussion about the 2018 Farm Bill are happening now, so if you want to be a part of it now, please refer to my other slides, or contact me if you have specific questions. 16
Today s session was supposed to provide a brief overview of the 2018 Farm Bill. To put it in a different perspective if the Farm Bill was a buschel of apples, today, we just covered one slice of he apple. If you re interested in learning more, here a few resources. 17