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The farm bill connects the food on our plates, the farmers and
ranchers who produce that food, and the natural resources – our soil, air and
water – that make growing food possible.
The farm bill is a package of legislation passed
roughly once every five years that has a tremendous impact on farming
livelihoods, how food is grown, and what kinds of foods are grown. Covering
programs ranging from crop insurance for farmers to healthy food access for
low-income families, from beginning farmer training to support for
sustainable farming practices, the farm bill sets the stage for our food and
farm systems. As a leading advocate for family farmers and sustainable
agriculture, it’s our job to make sure that this important bill is good for
farmers, consumers, and for the natural environment.
Every five years, the farm bill expires and is updated: it goes
through an extensive process where it is proposed, debated, and passed by
Congress and is then signed into law by the President. Each farm bill has a
unique title, and the current farm bill is called the Agriculture Improvement Act of 2018. It
was enacted into law in December 2018 and expires in 2023.
The original farm bill(s) were enacted in three stages during
the 1930s as part of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s New Deal
legislation. Its three original goals –
- to
keep food prices fair for farmers and consumers,
- ensure
an adequate food supply, and
- protect
and sustain the country’s vital natural resources –
- responded
to the economic and environmental crises of the Great Depression and the
Dust Bowl.
While the farm bill has
changed in the last 70 years, its primary goals are the same.
Our food and farming system confronts new challenges today, but
through citizen and stakeholder action for a fair farm bill, we can ensure
the vibrancy and productivity of our agriculture, economy, and communities
for generations to come.
Farm Bill Basics
- WHAT DOES
THE FARM BILL COVER?
- WHO IN
CONGRESS WRITES THE FARM BILL?
- WHAT
ISN’T IN THE FARM BILL?
- HOW MUCH
DOES THE FARM BILL COST?
- HOW DOES
THE FARM BILL PROCESS WORK?
- FARM BILL
WEBINARS
1. What does the farm bill cover?
The farm bill’s chapters are
called titles.
The numbers and the substance
matter of the titles can change over time. The 2018 Farm Bill, for
instance, has twelve titles.
Here’s what they’re called (and
what they cover):
Title 1: Commodities. The Commodities title covers
price and income support for the farmers who raise widely-produced and traded
non-perishable crops, like corn, soybeans, wheat, and rice – as well as dairy
and sugar. The title also includes agricultural disaster assistance.
Title 2: Conservation. The Conservation title covers
programs that help farmers implement natural resource conservation efforts on
working lands like pasture and cropland as well as land retirement and
easement programs.
Title 3: Trade. The Trade title covers food export subsidy programs
and international food aid programs.
Title 4: Nutrition. The Nutrition title covers the Supplemental
Nutrition Assistance Program [SNAP] (formerly known as food stamps) as well
as a variety of smaller nutrition programs to help low-income Americans
afford food for their families.
Title 5: Credit. The Credit title covers federal loan programs
designed to help farmers access the financial credit (via direct loans as
well as loan guarantees and other tools) they need to grow and sustain their
farming operations.
Title 6: Rural Development. The Rural Development title covers
programs that help foster rural economic growth through rural business and
community development (including farm businesses) as well as rural housing,
and infrastructure.
Title 7: Research, Extension, and Related Matters. The Research
title covers farm and food research, education, and extension programs
designed to support innovation, from federal labs and state
university-affiliated research to vital training for the next generation of
farmers and ranchers.
Title 8: Forestry. The Forestry title covers
forest-specific conservation programs that help farmers and rural communities
to be stewards of forest resources.
Title 9: Energy. The Energy title covers programs that
encourage growing and processing crops for biofuel, help farmers, ranchers
and business owners install renewable energy systems, and support research
related to energy.
Title 10: Horticulture. The Horticulture title covers farmers
market and local food programs, funding for research and infrastructure for
fruits, vegetables and other horticultural crops, and organic farming and
certification programs.
Title 11: Crop Insurance. The Crop Insurance title provides
premium subsidies to farmers and subsidies to the private crop insurance
companies who provide federal crop insurance to farmers to protect against
losses in yield, crop revenue, or whole farm revenue. The title also provides
USDA’s Risk Management Agency (RMA) with the authority to research, develop,
and modify insurance policies.
Title 12: Miscellaneous. The Miscellaneous title is a bit of a
catch-all. The current title brings together six advocacy and outreach
areas, including beginning, socially disadvantaged, and veteran farmers and
ranchers, agricultural labor safety and workforce development, and livestock
health.
2. Who in Congress writes the farm
bill?
Members of Congress who sit on the
Senate and House Committees on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry hold the
primary responsibility of drafting farm bills.
·
The Senate
Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry
·
The House
Committee on Agriculture
3. What is not included in the farm
bill?
While the Farm Bill covers a swath
of key agricultural policy topics, there are some policy areas that are not
included, such as:
·
Farm and food worker rights and
protections
·
Public land grazing rights
·
Irrigation water rights
·
Food and Drug Administration (FDA)
food safety
·
Renewable fuels standards
·
Tax issues
·
School meals
·
The Women, Infants, and Children
(WIC) program
·
Some pesticide Laws
·
Clean Water Act
·
Clean Air Act
While these issues are directly
related to agriculture, they are not included in the farm bill because they
fall outside of the jurisdiction of the Agriculture Committees and are
instead considered under the jurisdiction of other committees. For example, Farmworker
Rights and Protections fall under the jurisdiction of the House Education and
Labor Committee and Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions
Committee.
4. How much does the farm bill
cost?
The 2018 Farm Bill is projected to
cost about $428 billion over the five years of the bill’s life, according to
the estimates from the Congressional
Budget Office.
While all of the farm bill funding
numbers are projections, some are more firm projections than others.
The costs of the bill’s three major groups of entitlement programs – the
commodity, crop insurance, and SNAP programs – depend on what happens in the
commodity markets and the general economy over the coming five years.
Therefore, actual costs could be higher or lower than the projections.
Source: USDA Economic Research Service Based on
Congressional Budget Office, Direct Spending Effects for the Agriculture
Improvement Act of 2018 (2018 Farm Bill), December 11, 2018
Less than five billion of the $428 billion projected for the
2018 farm bill is allocated for programs that fit under the “Other” category,
which includes many vital programs such as the Local Agriculture Market
Program (LAMP), the Farming Opportunities Training and Outreach (FOTO)
program, Organic Agriculture Research and Extension Initiative (OREI), and
the Specialty Crop Block Grant Program (SCBGP).
5. How does the farm bill process
work?
There are four main phases of the farm bill process, from
drafting the new legislation to putting the programs into effect on the
ground. Here’s how it works:
REAUTHORIZATION
First:
The Reauthorization phase, in which a new farm bill is written and
passed into law approximately every five years.
·
HEARINGS
Legislatively, it all begins with hearings (in Washington, DC and across the
country) – these are listening sessions where members of Congress take input
from the public about what they want to see in a new bill.
·
AGRICULTURAL COMMITTEES
House and Senate Agriculture Committees each draft, debate,
“mark up” (amend and change), and eventually pass a bill; the two committees
work on separate bills that can have substantial differences.
·
FULL CONGRESS / “THE FLOOR”
Each committee bill goes next to “the floor” – the full House of
Representatives or Senate. Each bill is debated, amended, and voted on
again by its respective body (House or Senate).
·
CONFERENCE COMMITTEE
After both the full House and Senate have passed a farm bill –
which can take a while, and may require a bill being sent back to committee
for more work before passage! – the two bills (House and Senate) go to a
smaller group of Senators and Representatives called a “conference
committee,” which combines the two separate bills into one compromise
package. Conferees are typically chosen mostly from House and Senate
Agriculture Committee members.
·
FULL CONGRESS / “THE FLOOR”
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.
·
LAST STEP: THE WHITE HOUSE
Once the House and Senate approve a final farm bill, the bill
goes to the President, who can veto it (and send it back to Congress) or sign
it into law!
APPROPRIATIONS
Once the farm bill is signed into
law, it’s time for the Appropriations phase: setting money aside in
the yearly federal budget to fund the programs in the farm bill. Rather than
a calendar year, the federal government operates on a fiscal year from October
1st to September 30th.
Some farm bill programs – called entitlements
– are written in such a way that their funding is guaranteed with ‘mandatory
money’ that will automatically support the program every year. An example
of an entitlement program is the Supplemental Nutrition Access Program
(SNAP). Other programs are authorized but funded through discretionary
spending – meaning agriculture appropriators must decide each year how much
funding (if any) to award a program. Because of budgetary constraints, not
every program can be structured as an entitlement and generally it is much
easier to include new programs in the farm bill if they are subject to
appropriations.
Though the farm bill expires and is
reauthorized every 5 years or so, the appropriations process takes place
each year.
The farm bill includes language
that authorizes programs and sets the maximum funding levels for each program
for the years covered by the farm bill. However, authorized funding isn’t the
same as appropriated funding and appropriators may choose to provide funding
well below the maximum amount that was authorized. The Sustainable
Agriculture Research and Education (SARE) Program, for example, has been
authorized at $60 million per year since it was first introduced in 1985, but
has not yet been funded above $37 million per year.
 1.
First, the president’s budget
proposing how funding should be allocated to various federal programs is sent
to Congress for their consideration. The House and Senate budget committees
then draft and negotiate a concurrent budget resolution. The concurrent
budget resolution provides appropriations committees with a framework for
making funding decisions and sets a ceiling on how much funding is available
to the appropriations committees for determining which programs receive
discretionary funding.
2.
Next, the process moves to the
House and Senate Appropriations Committees, responsible for determining
program-by-program funding levels across all areas of the US Government.
Oftentimes, appropriators use the President’s budget as a starting point for
negotiations and decisions, but very rarely do they simply accept the
president’s recommendations.
3.
Within the House and Senate
Appropriations Committees are Agricultural Appropriations Subcommittees – the
people responsible for designating farm, food, and rural development program
funding. The Subcommittees get input for their funding decisions in a few
ways:
·
by holding public hearings and
inviting testimony from experts and agencies
·
by requesting and considering
funding requests from all legislators and staff (both on and off committee);
·
And by meeting with constituents
and advocates of programs to discuss funding priorities
4.
From this input, the subcommittee
staff puts together a proposed agriculture appropriations bill that the
subcommittee will review and make changes (aka amendments), and approve the
bill through a process called “markup”. Once passed by the subcommittee,
these bills are submitted to the full Appropriations Committees, where they
go through another round of review and changes – “full committee markup”.
5.
Once a bill has been marked up by
the full Appropriations Committee, following subcommittee markup, the bill is
brought to the full floor of the respected chamber of Congress for
consideration. During the full floor passage, members of Congress can also
make further changes to the bill, via amendments, prior to final
passage.
6.
Much like with the farm bill,
differences in House and Senate appropriations bills get sorted out via a
small group of legislators called the conference committee. Legislators have
until the end of the fiscal year (11:59 pm September 30th) to reconcile their
chamber’s respective bills, write a single compromise bill, and pass it on
the full floor of both the House and the Senate. After Congressional passage,
the bill is sent to the White House and is signed into law by the President.
Because the appropriations process is such a contentious process, this
deadline is not often met, and lawmakers must then pass a “continuing
resolution”, which maintains existing funding levels from the previous fiscal
year so as to prevent a government shutdown.
RULEMAKING
Happening concurrently with the
annual appropriations process is rulemaking. After Congress passes a farm
bill, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) is responsible for writing
the actual rules for how these programs will be implemented on the ground.
This phase is called Administration (or Rulemaking).
Wins for sustainable agriculture in
the farm bill require vigilant attention during this phase to ensure the
rules implement programs in a way that reflects the intent of Congress – and
of the farmers and advocates who helped shape the bill!
·
Advocates and experts check in with
agency staff at USDA, track the status of particular programs, and share
their input.
·
Grassroots individuals have a major
role to play during this stage, by commenting on USDA’s proposed rules for
farm bill programs.
·
Proposed agency rules are published
in the Federal Register and are usually open for public comment from 30-90
days. When rules are posted, NSAC and its member groups will provide example
comments that grassroots individuals can use in formulating their own
responses.
OUTREACH AND
EVALUATION
And always, when program funding is
appropriated and rules are set in place for implementation, it’s time
for outreach and evaluation!
Here is the true test of program
success: do farmers, ranchers, and grassroots organizations use the program?
Does the program accomplish its goals and reach the people it is meant to
reach on the ground? Is it having an impact?
At this phase, grassroots organizations
and USDA both promote funding opportunities, requests for grant proposals,
and sign-ups for programs. Spreading the word is important to make sure
everyone hears about programs and can access the information needed to
participate.
And following up on the successes
and challenges of specific farm bill programs is another key step in
improving our food and farming system. By sharing evaluation and
feedback on farm bill programs, farmers and constituents give lawmakers and
agencies the information they need to fix any problems in the bill, and to
work towards building a better farm bill for everyone.
6. Farm Bill 101 Webinars
In 2017, NSAC co-hosted several
webinars in partnership with the Southern Sustainable Agriculture Working
Group to take a deeper look at some of the programmatic areas of the farm
bill and identify ways one can become involved in “agvocacy!” We are in the
process of recording updated webinars for the 2023 Farm Bill cycle and will
add links when they are ready.
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