Bill Huffman
Director - Government Relations

The Friday Report

March 26, 2010

The House Agriculture Committee is moving forward with its plan for hearings on the next Farm Bill. The Senate approves a new child nutrition program and Federal EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson meets with agriculture commodity groups in a bid to build relationships with the regulated community.

Farm Bill Hearings

House Agriculture Committee Chairman Collin Peterson and ranking Republican member Frank Lucas have reached agreement on a timeline and schedule for hearings on the next Farm Bill. There will be ten hearings with the first to be held by the end of this month or early April in Washington, D.C. We understand there will be three hearings in Washington and seven field hearings. We expect one of those field hearings to be held in California. These hearings are a prelude to the Committee writing a new Farm Bill to be effective at the end of 2012. Chairman Peterson wants to finish the hearings by the end of June; the Committee will then draft a bill which Mr. Peterson hopes to have off the floor of the House of Representatives by the end of 2011.

As we’ve reported before, there will be a great deal of budget pressure on agriculture expenditures because of the very large Federal deficits. Peterson has said that his Committee may have to look at a new way to provide a “safety net” for agriculture as they move forward.

Child Nutrition

The Senate Agriculture Committee passed the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act, a new program to reauthorize the child nutrition programs that are administered by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. The bill includes a $4.5 billion increase in funding over 10 years to pay for the school, after-school and summer meal programs and to improve the nutritional quality of those meals.  The principal author of the legislation was Senator Blanche Lincoln, D-Arkansas, and Chairperson of the Senate Agriculture Committee.  The bill subsequently was approved by the full Senate and now goes to the House of Representatives.

The bill fell short of President Obama’s fiscal year 2011 budget proposal calling for a $10 billion increase over 10 years to meet his goal of ending childhood hunger by 2015.

Under new Congressional “pay-go budget rules”, the $4.5 billion increase would be offset by a $1 billion decrease in school food purchases, a $1.2 billion decrease in grants to state to teach food stamp recipients healthier eating habits and a $2.2 billion decrease in the authorization level for the Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQUIP), which is used by many farmers and ranchers to address environmental problems.

As could be expected, the Environmental Working Group criticized the shift of funding from the EQUIP program saying that any offset should come out of direct payments and crop insurance to pay for the increases for child nutrition.

It should be noted that nutrition programs, including the school lunch program, utilize about 83 percent of the total USDA budget on an annualized basis.

Federal EPA Reaches Out to Commodity Groups

California rice producer Frank Rehermann, Chairman of the U.S. Rice Producers’ Group, participated this week in a meeting with other commodity group leaders and Federal EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson along with Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack.  The meeting was called by Administrator Jackson in an effort to reach out and build relationships with commodity groups who are regulated by various Federal EPA policies and regulations.

In a conference call this morning, Rehermann said the meeting was held at the request of EPA “to establish a dialogue and working relationship on key environmental and regulatory issues”. 

Among the issues discussed were EPA’s spray drift labeling; the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System; pesticide permitting issues under the Clean Water Act, Endangered Species Act consultation as part of the pesticide re-registration process; regulation of certain greenhouse gas emissions; and other issues.

EPA Administrator Jackson acknowledged concerns from agricultural groups regarding spray drift guidance and permit issues but pledged a willingness to continue a cooperative dialogue with commodity leaders as well as ensuring better communication between EPA staff and the various commodity groups which have staff that specialize in environment regulatory matters.

Hopefully this will lead to a better way of finding workable solutions to these troublesome environmental issues.