Next week is a big week for the 2013 Farm Bill.  Both the House and the Senate Agriculture Committees will be debating and voting on their respective versions of the 2013 Farm Bill next week.

The Senate Agriculture Committee will markup its farm bill on Tuesday, May 14, at 10 AM.  Chairwoman Stabenow (D-MI) released her draft bill yesterday, and amendments to the bill were due this afternoon.

The House Agriculture Committee will markup its farm bill on Wednesday, May 15, at 10 AM.  The draft bill was released today, and amendments are due by close-of-business on Monday.

The draft bills that the House and Senate Agriculture Committee leaders have released include many of the same provisions that were included in last year’s House Committee-passed and Senate-passed bills, respectively.  There are some big differences, especially in the new House bill.  We will provide further analysis on the details of the drafts next week.

It is expected that both Committees will vote to pass the bill out of committee, and then each bill heads to the floor of its respective chamber for further debate.  Senate Democrats continue to say that they are aiming to bring the bill for debate on the Senate floor before Memorial Day, anticipating that the Senate will spend much of June debating immigration reform, though that timing may still shift.  The House GOP leadership has included debate of the 2013 Farm Bill in its summer schedule, and there are indications that leadership would like to get a bill passed out of the House by July 4th  recess.

If the House and the Senate stick to this schedule, then there will be enough time for the two chambers to negotiate a compromise and pass a final bill by September 30, when the current farm bill extension expires.  There are many challenges to meeting that deadline, but two important steps in the process will happen next week when the Agriculture Committees debate their bills.