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Wiesemeyer: draft features will be in farm bill

Veteran agricultural policy watcher Jim Wiesemeyer looks for many of the features of the draft 2012 farm bill to ultimately find their way into law.

“Billions are going to be cut initially, there will be more later, direct payments: you already know the regional impacts, but they’re going to be eliminated. Conservation program consolidation: the maximum acres for [the Conservation Reserve Program] is currently 32 million acres; they will go down to 25 million over a period of years,” said Wiesemeyer.

Wiesemeyer adds that there will be a move to a revenue assurance program subsidized by the government in return for the elimination of direct payments. Wiesemeyer, senior vice president of policy and trade issues at Informa Economics, calls that a step in the right direction for most commodities.

Wiesemeyer predicts budget-cutters will go after crop insurance premium subsidies because they account for 60 percent of the nearly $9 billion spent annually on crop insurance.

The NAFB News Service contributed to this article.