RMA Drops Surcharge on Some Organic Crops
August 31st, 2010
On Tuesday, August 31, USDA’s Risk Management Agency announced that it would eliminate the 5 percent surcharge imposed on organic producers for certain tree crops and would offer an organic price election for cotton, corn, soybeans and processing tomatoes.
NSAC members and allies fought hard to remove unjustified barriers to participation in crop insurance programs for organic producers in the 2008 Farm Bill. USDA’s Risk Management Agency has required all organic farmers participating in crop insurance programs to pay a 5 percent surcharge. Adding insult to injury, organic producers are only reimbursed for the conventional rather than organic crop price when they suffer a loss.
In the 2008 Farm Bill Congress directed RMA to evaluate available data on risk of loss between organic and conventional systems and to determine whether the surcharge was justified. The Farm Bill also directed RMA to offer producers of organic crops an additional price election that reflects actual prices received by organic producers for crops.
The crops for which the surcharge is now being removed are figs, pears, peppers, prunes, macadamia trees, Florida citrus fruit, Texas citrus fruit, Florida fruit trees, and Texas citrus trees. The surcharge will continue for now on all other crops.
Also on Tuesday, USDA released three reports here, here and here which evaluate available data on risk assessment and organic prices. In its release USDA promises to continue to accumulate and evaluate data necessary to eliminate the surcharge and offer an organic price election on a wider range of crops.
This is a good first step but it would appear that USDA has yet to justify the surcharge as the 2008 Farm Bill requires and more progress needs to be made in providing appropriate risk management options to organic producers. Hopefully additional announcements will be forthcoming soon.
Livestock Market Concentration Workshop Held in CO
August 28th, 2010
On Friday, August 27, Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack and U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder, presided over joint USDA and Department of Justice hearings to examine competition in the livestock market. Held in Fort Collins, Colorado, this was the fourth in a series of workshops to discuss market consolidation and market transparency. According to the Greely Tribune, about 2000 farmers, ranchers and meat packers attended the hearing which included a round-table discussion with federal and state officials, two panels of farmers and ranchers and public testimony.
Videos and transcripts from the workshop will be available for review at a later date on this page on Antitrust Division’s website. Individuals seeking more information on the workshops can contact agriculturalworkshops@usdoj.gov or visit this web page.
Farmers Ask for Fair Markets and Contracts
August 26th, 2010
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In June, the USDA’s Office of Grain Inspection, Packers and Stockyards (GIPSA) issued a proposed rule that promises to finally rein in some of the worst anti-competitive abuses of meat packers and impose a measure of contract fairness for poultry producers. Lauded by NSAC and many major farm organizations the rules have the potential to begin to restore fair competition and contracts in livestock and poultry markets.
Hundreds of livestock producers and poultry growers have already sent in comments to the USDA in support of these rules.
A comment submitted by six neighboring beef producing families from Iowa said, “We hope that the proposed changes will help bring back competition in the cattle business and reduce the stranglehold of the meat packers. Vertical integration is killing independent producers financially… By entering into contracts with some cattle producers — or by actually owning cattle — they can process the cattle they control if and when cattle prices rise past survival mode for us producers. The result is that both consumers and independent cattlemen lose big-time.”
From a livestock producer in Wyoming: “Market manipulation by packers through cattle trading amongst themselves and granting preferential treatment to certain feedlots destroys our cattle business.”
A former poultry producer said, “Had these provisions been in place years ago, it would have protected me from the major financial loss that I experienced when my poultry company cancelled my contract without warning, after I had made significant investments in my poultry houses…I strongly support these provisions as well as all of the other important poultry provisions of the proposed rule.”
Opposition to the rule from packers, processors and their friends has also been fierce. The National Chicken Council, a DC-based lobbying organization for the nation’s poultry companies, is urging its member companies to distribute a document that provides misleading information about the rules to their growers. Poultry company personnel are delivering the papers to growers in person.
“The companies are using fear and intimidation to coerce growers to act against their own self-interest,” said Becky Ceartas, director of the Contract Agriculture Reform Program at the Rural Advancement Foundation International-USA, a member of NSAC. “Ironically, these regulations are designed to rein in these kinds of tactics.”
This is our best shot in decades to restore a level playing field for family farm livestock and poultry producers. We need to let GIPSA know that these rules are needed. You can learn more here, here and here.
EPA Releases Clean Water Act Strategy
August 24th, 2010
On Friday, August 20, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) released a draft strategy for improving clean water goals. The new draft strategy is open for public comment until September 17. A final strategy is expected before year’s end.
Comments may be read and made here.
According to the draft, “Despite our best efforts and many local successes, our aquatic ecosystems are declining nationwide. The rate at which new waters are being listed for water quality impairments exceeds the pace at which restored waters are removed from the list.”
The document sites clean water inventories that name the main sources of water degradation as agriculture, stormwater runoff, habitat, hydrology and landscape modifications, municipal wastewater, and air deposition.
For agriculture, attention in the strategy focuses on using the “total maximum daily load” (TMDL) program to address agricultural “nonpoint” sources, targeting pollution from livestock operations, and coordinating USDA farm bill conservation funding with EPA funding available through the 319 Program and the Clean Water State Revolving Fund to foster improved nutrient management.
Scattered within the nine page document are broadly-worded suggestions that the Administration will pursue legislative and regulatory changes. For instance:
“We will support legislation and consider adminstration action to restore the WCA protections to wetlands and headwater streams…”
“Propose changes to the federal water quality standard regulations that would clarify and strenghten antidegredation regulations to protect high-quality waters.”
“Implement current regulations for concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs) and propose new regulations to more effectively achieve pollutant reductions necessary to meet the Chesapeake Bay TMDL.”
“Propose a national rule which will streamline the regulatory authority to designate an animal feeding operation (AFO) as a concentrated animal feeding operation (CAFO).”
“Develop NPDES permit requirements to reduce pesticide discharges to waters of the U.S.”
The strategy does not get into specifics about when or how such regulatory changes would be forthcoming.
No specific mention is made about strengthening the weak and loophole-laden existing CAFO regulations other than the Chesapeake Bay-related recommendation.
The strategy closes with some thoughts on linking clean water action with sustainable communities, an Administration priority.
For instance, it suggests EPA would “implement policies and help direct national attention toward more sustainable water management practices that better integrate traditionally siloed areas such as: water quantity, quality, energy requirements, carbon emissions, development and land use at the watershed/aquifer level. Building on synergies within the water sector, integrated approached can allow communities to more sustainable manage water infrastructure and supply costs and investments and adapt to climate change, as well as potentially reduce overall energy consumption…”
National Organic Program News
August 24th, 2010
The August edition of the National Organic Program newsletter features stories on the National Organic Certification Cost Share Program and its new program manager, as well as news on the upcoming National Organic Standards Board (NOSB) meeting in October. The NOP also released news this week on the use of methionine in organic poultry production.
Cost Share Money Still Available
National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition member groups and allies recently had a conference call with Betsy Rakola, the new cost share program manager (and a graduate of the Agriculture, Food and Environment program at Tufts University), to discuss ways to increase outreach for the program.
NSAC helped create and win funding for the program during the last two farm bill campaigns.
Once certified by an accredited certifying agent, organic farmers and handlers may be reimbursed up to 75 percent of the costs related to certification, not to exceed $750 annually.
The article correctly notes that the program originated “when Congress designated funds to alleviate the financial burden of organic certification. Recognizing the increased costs for those participating in the organic market, the program was intended to make certification more affordable.”
Funding is still available in the current fiscal year.
“It’s important for producers and handlers to take advantage of this opportunity before the fiscal year ends,” noted Rakola. “Sept. 30 is rapidly approaching, so individuals seeking reimbursement should work with their state agencies and certifiers to submit a complete application as soon as possible.”
NSAC members are pleased to know that Rakola intends to streamline service to state agencies, improve program reporting, institute better guidance and training, and increase outreach.
To participate in the program, contact your state agency. Contact information can be found here.
NOSB in October
The next NOSB meeting is set for October 25-28 in Madison, Wisconsin. The meeting is open to the public, with public comment scheduled for the 25th and 27th. To sign up to make comments, contact Lisa Ahramjian at 202-690-3962.
The agenda includes proposed recommendations on nanotechnology, apiculture, use of animal healthcare products, the “made with” organic claim, and updates to the NOSB Policy and Procedures Manual and New Member Guide.
Discussion documents include animal stocking rates; animal handling, transit, and slaughter; and nutrient vitamins and minerals.
Methionine in Organic Poultry Production
Revised Senate Food Safety Bill Includes Important Amendments
August 13th, 2010
The Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee released a copy of the “manager’s amendment” to the FDA Food Safety Modernization Act (S. 510) which is, in essence, the bill as reported out of the HELP Committee late last year as modified by a long and arduous set of negotiations that have taken place since that time to work out particular issues.
The manager’s package has the support of HELP Chairman Tom Harkin (D-IA) and Ranking Member Mike Enzi (R-WY) as well as the four lead sponsors of the underlying bill, Dick Durbin (D-IL), Judd Gregg (R-NH), Chris Dodd (D-CT), and Richard Burr (R-NC).
The manager’s amendment will be adopted if and when the bill comes to the Senate floor in September when Congress returns from its summer recess.
The full manager’s package is available at http://help.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/WHI10337.pdf.
The Congressional Budget Office has scored the Manager’s package version of the bill as costing $1.6 billion over the next five years.
In releasing the new version of the bill, Senator Harkin said, “For far too long, the headlines have told the story of why this measure is so urgently needed: foodborne illness outbreaks, product recalls and Americans sickened over the food they eat. This 100-year-old plus food safety structure needed to be modernized. I am pleased that after a great deal of time and effort from members on both sides of the aisle, we have a strong, bipartisan proposal that will overhaul our current food safety system – a system that right now fails far too many American consumers. I am confident that the remaining details will be worked out and am hopeful that the measure will come to the Senate floor as soon as possible.”
Most sustainable agriculture and family farm groups think the Senate bill is a very significant improvement over the companion bill passed by the House of Representatives (HR 2749) last year. We’ve been able to help make substantial improvements in the Senate bill through the HELP markup and in changes that will be adopted as part of the manager’s amendment when the bill comes to the Senate floor. Assuming the Tester amendment (see below) can be worked out and agreed to before Senate floor action, we will be able to support the Senate bill. However, we strongly oppose the companion House measure, and stand ready to defend the Senate bill in conference with the House should that prove necessary.
The Managers package includes the following important improvements to the bill as reported out of committee last year:
- The amendment sponsored by Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT) pertaining to farms that engage in value-added processing or that co-mingle product from several farms. It will provide the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) with the authority to either exempt farms engaged in low or no risk processing or co-mingling activities from new regulatory requirements or to modify particular regulatory requirements for such farming operations. Included within the purview of the amendment are exemptions or flexibilities with respect to requirements within S. 510 for food safety preventative control plans and FDA on-farm inspections.
- The amendments sponsored by Senator Michael Bennet (D-CO) to reduce unnecessary paperwork and excess regulation. The Bennet language pertains to both the preventative control plan and the produce standards sections of the bill. FDA is instructed to provide flexibility for small processors including on-farm processing, to minimize the burden of compliance with regulations, and to minimize the number of different standards that apply to separate foods. FDA will also be prohibited from requiring farms and other food facilities to hire consultants to write food safety plans or to identify, implement, certify or audit those plans. With respect to produce standards, FDA will also be given the discretion to develop rules for categories of foods or for mixtures of foods rather than necessarily needing to have a separate rule for each specific commodity or to regulate specific crops if the real food safety issue involved mixtures only.
- The amendment sponsored by Senator Debbie Stabenow (D-MI) to provide for a USDA-delivered competitive grants program for food safety training for farmers, small processors and wholesalers. The training projects will prioritize small and mid-scale farms, beginning and socially disadvantaged farmers, and small food processors and wholesalers. The program will be administered by USDA’s National Institute for Food and Agriculture. As is the case for all of the provisions in S. 510, funding for the bill and for this competitive grants program will happen through the annual agriculture appropriations bill process.
- The effort championed by Senator Barbara Boxer (D-CA) to strip the bill of wildlife-threatening enforcement against “animal encroachment” of farms is also in the manager’s package. It will require FDA to apply sound science to any requirements that might impact wildlife and wildlife habitat on farms.
- An amendment proposed by Senator Sherrod Brown (D-OH) to amend the traceability and recordkeeping section of the bill that will exempt food that is direct marketed from farmers to consumers or to grocery stores and exempt food that has labeling that preserves the identity of the farm that produced the food. The amendment also prevents FDA from requiring any farm from needing to keep records beyond the first point of sale when the product leaves the farm, except in the case of farms that co-mingle product from multiple farms, in which case they must also keep records one step back as well as one step forward.
Not in the package but still under serious negotiation for inclusion in the bill when it reaches the floor of the Senate is an amendment by Senator John Tester (D-MT) to exempt food facilities with under a certain annual gross sales threshold from preventative control plan requirements and to exempt farmers who primarily direct market product to consumers, stores or restaurants from the bill’s produce standards regulations. Our expectation is this amendment will be successfully negotiated over the coming weeks and will be accepted as part of the final bill once the bill reaches the Senate floor.
We also continue to note and emphasize the additional provisions NSAC helped secure when the bill was marked up in Committee last year. Those changes included:
- requiring FDA and USDA coordination (including with respect to organic farming);
- limiting recordkeeping for farmers to just the initial sale to the first purchaser of the crop; and
- language in the produce section directing FDA to create rules that are appropriate to the scale and diversity of the farm, that take into consideration conservation and environmental standards established by other federal agencies, that do not conflict with organic certification standards, and that prioritize high risk crops.
Still pending is an amendment from Senator Feinstein (D-CA) banning the use of Bisphenol A (BPA) in all food and beverage containers. The Grocery Manufacturers Association and other industry groups have come out strongly against the measure. Negotiations are ongoing to work out compromise language, but it is unclear to us what the status is of those talks.
Senators Support USDA’s Comprehensive GIPSA Proposed Rule
August 13th, 2010
On Friday, August 13, twenty-one Senators from joined on a letter to USDA Secretary Vilsack in support of a proposed rule to clarify and strengthen the protections for farmers and ranchers provided in the Packers and Stockyards Act.
The letter was sponsored by Senators Tom Harkin (IA) and Tim Johnson (SD). A copy of the letter can be found here.
USDA’s Grain Inspection, Packers & Stockyards Administration (GIPSA) issued the proposed rule on June 22 to carry out the 2008 Farm Bill’s amendment of the Act and rulemaking directives. Some Representatives, aligned with meat and poultry packers and processors, criticized the proposed rule at a House Agriculture Subcommittee hearing on July 20. They opined that the proposed rule went beyond USDA’s authority. The Senators’ letter makes clear that the proposed rule is well within the authority granted to USDA by the letter and intent of the Act.
Moreover, as the federal agency charged with implementing the Act, GIPSA has the responsibility to issue regulations that clarify the intent of the Act for the courts. In turn, the federal courts have the duty under well-established principles of federal administrative law to defer to the agency’s reasonable interpretation of the Act. The Senators also urged USDA to issue the final rule as expeditiously as possible.
NSAC joined with over 200 organizations representing farmers, ranchers and rural communities in support of the measures in the 2008 Farm Bill that require GIPSA to increase protections for farmers and ranchers under the Packers & Stockyards Act.
Today we issued a press release in appreciation of the support of the Senators for these long overdue improvements to the GIPSA regulations, which will help restore basic fairness and market transparency for livestock and poultry farmers and ranchers in their dealings with packers and processors.
You can help to ensure that Congress supports a strong GIPSA rule by meeting with your Representative and Senators over the August congressional recess. Many of them will be attending meetings and public events in their home states. Be sure to say thank you to the Senators who signed onto to the letter. For more information, check out our NSAC Action Alert on congressional support for the GIPSA proposed rule.
Signing the Senate letter were Senators Harkin, Johnson, Grassley, Dorgan, Feingold, Conrad, Leahy, Burris, Landrieu, Tester, McCaskill, Kaufman, Kohl, Baucus, Rockefeller, Franken, Brown, Wyden, Bennet, Sanders, and Mark Udall.
USDA Grants for Renewable Energy Systems Feasibility Studies
August 6th, 2010
On Friday, August 6, USDA announced that $3 million in FY2010 funding is available for grants to conduct feasibility studies for renewable energy systems for agriculture producers and rural small businesses. The grants are part of the Rural Energy for America Program (REAP). Grant applications must be submitted to your state Rural Development office by 4:30 pm on October 5, 2010.
The grant applications must be from the agricultural producer or rural small business that is the prospective owner of the renewable energy system, not from the entity conducting the feasibility study who is not the owner. The maximum funding for a single grant is $750,000.
In the application selection process, grants of smaller amounts for small agricultural producers and small rural businesses will be given a higher priority.
More information on the required application contents and process for applying is provided in the Federal Register notice available here.
Senate Passes Child Nutrition Bill
August 5th, 2010
On Thursday, August 5, the Senate passed a child nutrition program re-authorization bill by unanimous consent.
The bill provides a 6-cent per meal increase in school lunch reimbursements, expands school meal eligibility, and establishes stronger nutrition standards for all foods sold in schools. It also includes $40 million in mandatory funding for the Farm to School competitive grants program, a measure that NSAC has helped champion.
The Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act passed after an intensive effort by its chief sponsor, Agriculture Committee Chair Blanche Lincoln (D-AR) and other Senators to get the bill done before the Senate adjourns for a month-long summer recess. The First Lady also weighed in with a Washington Post op ed in favor a Senate action earlier in the week.
In a major change in how the $4.5 billion bill is paid for, the version passed today removes a controversial multi-billion dollar cut to the Environmental Quality Incentives Program and replaces it with a similarly controversial shortening of the time frame for the temporary increase in SNAP (food stamp) benefits included last year as part of the economic recovery bill.
Overall, the Senate bill is less generous than a $10 billion measure originally suggested by the White House and also less than the pending $8 billion House version of the legislation. However, to date, the Senate bill is the only one of the three proposals that is paid for with the required offsetting budget cuts or tax increases.
NSAC joined other organizations that support farm conservation and environmental programs in praising the Senate for dropping the earlier plan to pay for nutrition improvements with farm bill conservation money.
Some anti-hunger groups are quite naturally upset and opposed to the substitute SNAP offset. For instance, the Food Research Action Center (FRAC) put out a statement opposing the bill saying “it will increase hunger in America by cutting SNAP benefits. This bill, if enacted, will do more harm than good.”
Nutrition and public health groups on the other hand generally backed the bill and praised the Senate for passing it.
Action will now turn to the House, where the Improving Nutrition for America’s Children Act has been approved by the Education and Labor Committee and is awaiting House floor action. First, however, an offset package to pay for the measure must be developed.
Rep. George Miller (D-CA), chief sponsor of the House and Chair of Education and Labor, commended the Senate for its action today, calling it an important step forward.
NSAC will continue to urge the House leaders and sponsors to avoid cuts to food stamps, conservation or other farm bill funding when developing its offset package, and instead to close regressive tax loopholes that benefit the wealthy and distort the economy.
Time is running short for final action. The current child nutrition provisions expire on September 30.
While the House is being called back into emergency session next week to deal with a bill to provide aid to the states for education and medicare, a bill that also uses an additional reallocation of SNAP recovery bill dollars as part of its offset package, it currently seems unlikely they would deal with the child nutrition bill at that time.
If so, they will only have about two weeks once they return from the summer recess to take action, or Congress will be forced to extend the sunset date in current law.
If a final bill passes and gets signed into law with a major increase in funding for school and related feeding programs, it will be the first federal funding increase for school meals in three decades.
Grassley-Feingold Re-Introduce Commodity Cap Bill
August 4th, 2010
On Wednesday, August 4, Senators Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and Russ Feingold (D-WI) introduced legislation to reduce farm program payment limits and close the loopholes that are being used by mega farms to game the system and soak the taxpayer.
The Rural America Preservation Act (bill number not yet assigned) would cap commodity payments at not greater than $250,000 a year for any one farm. It would reduce the annual cap on direct payments from $80,000 to $40,000 per farm and the annual cap on counter-cyclical payments from $130,000 to $60,000 per farm. ACRE payments would be scaled back by comparable amounts. Marketing loan gains and loan deficiency payments would be capped at $150,000 per farm per year.
Under current law there is no limit at all on marketing loan gains and loan deficiency payments and no effective limit on direct and counter cyclical payments or an the ACRE payment option.
The new bill proposes to close a variety of loopholes that allow mega farms to collect far higher payments than current law would otherwise seem to allow. One of the major ones would force USDA to adopt a measurable standard to determine whether recipients are actively engaged in farming.
The 2008 Farm Bill provided USDA with the opportunity to adopt just such a measurable standard, but the Obama Adminstration made the political decision last January in issuing the final rule to keep the current loophole locked in place and thus to continue providing high six and seven figure annual payments to the nation’s largest farming operations.
The new bill is patterned very closely on previous versions of the same bill offered by Grassley with Senator Byron Dorgan (D-ND) as the principal Democrat on the bill. Dorgan is retiring from Congress this year, opening the door to Feingold moving up to become the lead Democrat on the measure in its latest iteration.
The Dorgan-Grassley bill won majority votes on the Senate floor in each of the past two farm bill debates, but did not in either instance become part of the final farm bill adopted into law.
NSAC and NSAC member groups have worked very closely with the bill’s champions on the development and advocacy of this bill over many years. We continue to urge its adoption.
In introducing the bill, Senator Grassley noted, “The farm program was never intended to help big farmers get bigger, instead it was created to help those who couldn’t withstand the political whims of Washington or the fierce reckonings of Mother Nature.”
Added Senator Feingold, “For too long large agribusinesses and non-farmers have gamed the limits on farm subsidy programs, taking limited and critical resources better used to support our family farmers that are facing numerous challenges in the current economic climate…Our legislation is a common sense, bipartisan approach to support… family farms, while saving taxpayer dollars.”