Big increases for Democratic priorities of conservation and nutrition
Senate farm bill priorities are expected to exceed the $1.51 trillion farm bill baseline by $20 billion and possibly more.
Details: While the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) has still not released scoring for either the proposed House or Senate farm bill proposals, talks with veteran farm bill analysts signal around $13 billion to $14 billion in budget authority becomes available in fiscal year (FY) 2025 and FY 2026 that can be moved into the IRA. It is assumed that spending is moved into the farm bill baseline for the Senate’s climate-smart guardrail programs with an offset. Then they propose as much as $13 billion in other conservation spending in CRP and ACEP. The grand total is up to $27 billion in new mandatory conservation spending on top of a baseline of $60 billion, with some amount, $14 billion or so, offset by IRA unobligated balances.
Bottom line: It appears the $5 billion Stabenow promised for the safety net via a pledge from Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) is mostly spent elsewhere as detailed below. (Of note: Republican sources on the Senate Finance Committee say they do not know details about the $5 billion Schumer promised and they were given no opportunity to suggest programs for that funding.)
Big Senate farm bill tilt to conservation and nutrition. Veteran farm bill analysts say Stabenow’s proposals (which are not yet in legislative language form and thus no CBO scoring) signal:
- Very little funding increases and perhaps a decrease for some Title I farmer safety net spending. Some analysts calculate an increase of around $1.6 billion in ARC/PLC changes over 10 years, but others believe the Senate Democrat bill does not add money for some crops in the commodity title or crop insurance title. Why? They add benefits but then subtract benefits to pay for them, i.e., increase in reference price for a few crops but then a 20% payment band is applied, and this move pays for the slight improvement. Even within the commodity title, Stabenow’s framework appears to benefit Midwestern crops, but details are needed on the changes to the escalator formula they allude to. Even with the 5% increase in Reference Prices, analysts think that the PLC payment band and the AGI changes will take money out of the baseline for peanuts, cotton, and rice, while the ARC changes and the escalator changes benefit corn and soybeans. But it is too soon to assert that definitively.
- Some analysts estimate the new crop insurance/SCO funding in the Senate bill at around $1 billion, but the Senate summary has a reference to offsetting this cost from delivery support for area-based policies.
- Senate farm bill analysis does not include funding for marketing assistance loans or base acre changes.
- Increases for dairy program spending over 10 years is pegged at $550 million.
- A huge $8 billion in new nutrition spending is forecast beyond the $1.51 trillion baseline spending over 10 years.
- Conservation funding in Stabenow’s proposals would get a total of around $87 billion over 10 years, around $27 billion above the $60 billion in the farm bill baseline. This includes changes made for the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) and higher CRP acreage cap.
Republican farm-state lawmakers and farmers are also anxious about a Senate proposal that would make reduction of greenhouse gas emissions and building soil carbon a goal of the Regional Conservation Partnership Program, or RCPP, which pays groups of farmers to address environmental challenges together, and use RCPP grants to support efforts to convert concentrated animal feeding operations to “climate friendly” operations, such as managed grazing.
Paul Neiffer who writes the Farm CPA Report (link), today reviewed one Stabenow proposal that he says will not achieve her objective “and even penalizes the farmers they are trying to help.”
In Sec. 1104 dealing with payment acres, the following wording is used:
“Restricts commodity program payments from being made on land owned by an individual or legal entity for which the average Adjusted Gross Income (AGI) exceeds $700,000 to discourage further investor purchases, which would restrict, for the first time, wealthy investors and absentee landlords from benefitting from farm safety net programs intended to support the active farmers that are taking the risk and producing the crops.”
Neiffer says: “This appears to indicate that if any person owns farmland and their AGI is over $700,000, then no payments are allowed. A farmer who is cash renting the ground and their AGI is under $700,000 would be prevented from receiving any payment solely due to the landowner’s AGI being over $700,000. It seems that the Democrats want to punish the landowner for having high AGI, but the reality is that the farmer is being punished. The farmer whose AGI is under $700,000 and would normally know that they will receive a payment from FSA for farming this ground and is willing to pay a little extra currently has a little bit of an advantage over a farmer who is over the AGI or payment limit.”
Neiffer continues: “Wealthy investors and absentee landlords already get no direct benefit from farm program payments if their AGI is over $900,000. This would reduce that limit from $900,000 to $700,000. Also, technically the limit would be $1.4 million in community property states and in separate property states, the higher income spouse would simply gift the land to the lower income spouse to get under the limit.”
If this rule is passed and works the way Neiffer thinks it will work, “the farmer with low AGI will now be at a disadvantage in trying to cash rent this ground. The farmer with higher AGI or over the payment limit will now be in better position to cash rent the ground.”
Neiffer’s bottom line: “The Democrat Senate proposal appears to want to help the ‘farmer with dirt under their fingernails’ (farmer with lower AGI), when in fact, they will penalize that farmer. This is the law of unintended consequences, and it will not work the way they desire. Now we may be wrong about the meaning of this proposal but based on a literal reading of the summary and conversations we had, we think this is what they want. If this were to pass it would only penalize ‘active farmers that are taking the risk and producing the crops.’ We hope they reconsider before they penalize the farmers they are trying to help.”
Bottom line: This is complicated stuff, but these issues ARE complicated and need airing out to get a full and true understanding of where all the farm bill projected spending may be provided, including some major policy differences between the Senate and House farm bill proposals.