Note to Readers — This is the fourth in a series of posts on the 2012 Farm Bill reported out of the Senate Agriculture Committee on April 26. With respect to conservation issues, previous posts have covered the Conservation Stewardship Program and sodsaver/highly erodible land and wetland conservation. This post covers other conservation title programs. […]
Archives for April 2012
Path to the 2012 Farm Bill: Senate Markup – Sodsaver and Conservation Compliance
Note to Readers — This is the third in a series of posts on the 2012 Farm Bill reported out of the Senate Agriculture Committee on April 26. With much of the rhetoric and substance of the new, in-the-making 2012 Farm Bill revolving around the rapidly growing and expensive crop insurance title, major corresponding attention […]
Path to the 2012 Farm Bill: Senate Markup – Conservation Stewardship Program
Note to Readers — This is the second in a series of posts on the 2012 Farm Bill reported out of the Senate Agriculture Committee on April 26. Step Forward, Two Steps Backward for Conservation Stewardship Program First the good news: the Conservation Stewardship Program (CSP) remains part of the revised conservation title for the 2012 […]
Senate Committee Approves 2013 Agriculture Spending Bill
On Thursday, April 26, while the Senate Agriculture Committee was busy passing their version of the 2012 Farm Bill, the Senate Appropriations Committee was also meeting to approve the Fiscal Year 2013 Agricultural Appropriations bill. The spending bill covers the majority of the functions of USDA as well as the Food and Drug Administration. We […]
Path to the 2012 Farm Bill: Senate Markup – Beginning Farmers
Note to Readers — This is the first in what will be a series of posts on the 2012 Farm Bill reported out of the Senate Agriculture Committee on April 26. The Senate Agriculture Committee voted the Agriculture Reform, Food and Jobs Act — the proposed name for the 2012 Farm Bill — out of […]
Path to the 2012 Farm Bill: House Holds Hearing on Rural Development Programs
On Wednesday, the House Agriculture Agriculture Committee held a Rural Development hearing, the first of eight in preparation for the 2012 Farm Bill. Panel witnesses emphasized the importance of continued investment in rural communities and fielded questions concerning consolidation of numerous programs targeting rural development. Both panels touched on the need for investments in water, […]
House Hearing on Farm Bill Conservation Programs
On Thursday, the Subcommittee on Conservation, Energy and Forestry of the House Agriculture Committee held a hearing on conservation programs in the next Farm Bill. Among the witnesses was Carl Homan of Homan Dairy Farm in Centre County Pennsylvania, who testified on behalf of the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition. Mr. Homan spoke about how the […]
For Immediate Release: NSAC Comments on Senate Farm Bill Markup and Passage
For Immediate Release April 26, 2012 Contact: Ferd Hoefner, 202-547-5754 NSAC Comments on Senate Farm Bill Markup and Passage Washington, DC – The Senate Agriculture Committee voted a new farm bill out of committee today by a vote of 16-5. The committee bill saves $23 billion over the next ten years according to budget estimates. […]
House Sets Government Funding Allocations
On April 19, we reported that the Senate Appropriations Committee had approved discretionary spending allocations for the coming 2013 fiscal year. The size of the total spending pie, as laid out by the Committee, was completely consistent with the levels set by law in the Budget Control Act of 2011. Today, the House Appropriations Committee […]
Guest Blog: Insuring and Financing Healthy Farms
Editor’s Note: We want to thank Jeffrey O’Hara from NSAC member the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) for his contribution. Dr. O’Hara is an agricultural economist in the Food & Environment Program at UCS; his expertise includes local food systems and community development. Farm policy has historically disregarded whether domestic crop production is aligned with […]
Former NRCS Chiefs Support Conservation in Crop Insurance
On Friday, April 20, four former Chiefs of USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) wrote a letter to the leadership of the House and Senate Agriculture Committees in support of reattaching highly erodible land and wetland conservation requirements to federal crop insurance subsidies. This letter comes nearly one month after two former U.S. Secretaries of Agriculture […]
USDA Releases Food Hub Resource Guide
Last Friday, April 20th, Deputy Secretary Kathleen Merrigan announced the launch of USDA’s online food hub resource guide. Food hubs, which can concentrate multiple producers’ processing, distribution, and marketing efforts at a single site, attract local consumers and allow smaller-sized farms to compete in larger markets. The new guide acts a resource for small and […]
Path to the 2012 Farm Bill: Senate Draft Farm Bill – Local Food and Rural Development Drilldown
Agricultural policy that bolsters community economic development serves as a cornerstone of NSAC’s advocacy. Within this framework, we support strong Rural Development programs that target small business development and job creation. Similarly, NSAC recognizes the economic opportunities inherent in food produced for local markets and thus urge Congress to address infrastructure and information barriers to […]
Path to the 2012 Farm Bill: Senate Draft Farm Bill – Research Drilldown
In sum, the research title of the recently released draft Senate farm bill was not a strong one for sustainable agriculture. NSAC and its member organizations had several proposals for how to strengthen the focus on research that benefits and is relevant for organic and sustainable production systems, contained in our platform, Farming for the […]
Path to the 2012 Farm Bill: Senate Draft Farm Bill – Beginning Farmer Drilldown
Overall, while beginning farmers did not fair too poorly in the Senate draft farm bill that was released by the Senate Agriculture Committee last week, they were certainly far from being the highlight of this legislative package. There were some small wins for beginning farmers in the draft conservation and credit titles, which included provisions […]
Path to the 2012 Farm Bill: Senate Draft Farm Bill – Organic Drilldown
The Senate’s draft farm bill released on Friday builds on the what we know was included in the Super Committee farm bill proposal from last fall with a few but not all important funding and policy improvements. The Good The best news on the organic front is that the draft farm bill provides mandatory funding […]
Path to the 2012 Farm Bill: Senate Releases Draft Farm Bill
This afternoon the Senate Agriculture Committe released its draft of the 2012 Farm Bill. In the summary of the draft that Chairwoman Stabenow (D-MI) released, she said that the bill achieves $23 billion in savings, which matches the Committee’s proposal for the Super Committee last fall. The Committee is scheduled to mark-up the draft bill […]
Groups Tell Senate to Support Beginning and Socially Disadvantaged Farmers
On Thursday, April 19, NSAC along with nearly 200 other organizations from across the country, delivered a letter to Senators Debbie Stabenow (D-MI) and Pat Roberts (R-KS), Chair and Ranking Member of the Senate Agriculture Committee, urging them to support funding in the new farm bill for two key programs that support the next generation […]
Senate Divvies Up Discretionary Funding Pie for 2013
On Thursday, April 19, the Senate Appropriations Committee approved discretionary spending allocations for the coming 2013 fiscal year. The size of the total spending pie was completely consistent with the levels set by law in the Budget Control Act of 2011. The agricultural appropriations slice of the pie was set at $23.357 billion, nearly the […]
House Agriculture Committee Passes Budget Reconciliation Bill, Announced Farm Bill Hearings
On Wednesday, April 18, the House Agriculture Committee passed a budget reconciliation bill on a partisan vote that proposes to cut $33.2 billion from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) over ten years. In its fiscal year (FY) 2013 budget resolution, the House Budget Committee directed the House Agriculture Committee to cut $33.2 billion over […]
15 National Organizations Deliver Conservation Compliance Letter
On Monday, April 16, a group of 15 national conservation, agriculture, wildlife, and renewable energy organizations sent a letter to the Chairs and Ranking Members of the House and Senate Agriculture Committees in support of reattaching conservation compliance requirements to federal crop insurance subsidies. In the letter, the 15 organizations urged Senators Debbie Stabenow (D-MI) and […]
Request for Applications for Farm to School Grants
On April 17, USDA announced new funding that aims to provide fresh, healthy food for children in schools across America, and to bolster and sustain local farmers and ranchers. The agency said today that $3.5 million in funding will be available to help local school districts organize and implement Farm to School programs. These critical […]
Federal grants aim to bring local food to school tables
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE April 17, 2012 MEDIA CONTACT: Helen Dombalis, 202-547-5754 Federal grants aim to bring local food to school tables Program aims to sustain and grow local food producers while nourishing America’s schools WASHINGTON – The United States Department of Agriculture today announced new funding that aims to provide fresh, healthy food for children […]
Participation in Organic Certification Cost-Share Program Increases
In its annual report to Congress on the National Organic Certification Cost-Share Program delivered last week, USDA’s National Organic Program showed that there was an increase of over 20 percent in program usage between Fiscal Year 2010 and Fiscal Year 2011. This is in part due to improved communication about the program and to the […]