News

Farm Bill draft released

The House Ag Committee unveiled the first draft of the 2018 Farm Bill this afternoon. The committee’s proposed bill would expand work requirements in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, increase the cap on the Conservation Reserve Program, and include funding for a Foot and Mouth Disease vaccine bank.

Chairman Michael Conaway told reporters nutrition program changes would incentivize work for SNAP recipients.

“The overall plan would say if you’re in that 18-59 age group and you’re not mentally or physically disabled, then you’re going to be required to participate in the program,” he says. “You’re going to be required to be working at least 20 hours a week or in some sort of a state-based training program.”

Proposed work requirements to SNAP have halted bipartisan work on the Farm Bill. Conaway says democrats and republicans did work together on the other titles and he remains committed to getting a Farm Bill done on time.

Ranking member Collin Peterson released a statement that that said Conaway is putting farmers that rely on the farm bill at risk in pursuit of “partisan ideology on SNAP.” He says this move could jeopardize future farm bills.

The bill would also allow farmers to switch from the Agriculture Risk Coverage to the Price Loss Coverage program. Conaway says the ARC program payments would be based on automated data to reduce disparities in payments.

The Food Research and Action Center says the proposed changes to SNAP would lead to greater hunger and poverty in families across the country.

The National Pork Producers Council says the decision to authorize funding for the Foot and Mouth vaccine bank will help protect pork producers and the ag industry.

Ag Secretary Sonny Perdue says although there is still a lot of work to be done, he looks forward to a timely bill that will support farmers during a time of low commodity prices.

Here is a link to the Farm Bill draft.