Agricultural interest and climate interest groups clash over $1.4 trillion farm bill
Brady Knox
Video Embed
As the United States’s farm bill nears its expiration date, agricultural and climate interest groups have clashed over what should be in its replacement.
The new $1.4 trillion bill must be ready by its predecessor’s expiration date in September, though a number of major questions still must be answered. The primary areas of contention, according to the Hill, are whether the bill should incentivize “big” or “small” agriculture, how to handle farm waste, and how to balance interests best to allow it to pass in a divided Congress. Perhaps the most notable, however, is the battle over climate change legislation.
ANIMAL ACTIVISTS ARE TRYING TO HIJACK THE FARM BILL
Democrats have let known their intention to turn the farm bill into a climate bill focused on combating climate change.
“We’ve already started planning for the farm bill and how to push the policies that are great for farmers, great for soil health, and also great for the planet,” Rep. Kim Schrier (D-WA), co-chairwoman of the House Sustainable Energy and Environment Coalition’s Climate and Agriculture Task Force, told the Washington Post.
The task force aims to invest huge funds into sustainable forestry, conservation programs, and programs that research climate change’s effect on agriculture.
“I think this farm bill could really turn out to be a huge climate win,” said Ben Thomas, agricultural senior policy director for the Environmental Defense Fund.
Meanwhile, Republicans could attempt not only to reject the environmentalist propositions but to rescind $28.5 billion in agricultural incentives passed through the Inflation Reduction Act and the Environmental Quality Incentives Program.
Other Republicans are willing to entertain some climate change legislation, but only, in the words of Sen. Joni Ernst (R-IA), if it is “voluntary, incentive-based. and flexible.”
Preempting several angles of attack on the bill, House Agriculture Committee Chairman Glenn Thompson (R-PA) and ranking member David Scott (D-GA) released a joint statement on its progress on March 9.
CLICK HERE FOR MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER
“While additional funds are necessary, there is no piece of legislation that provides a better return on investment than the Farm Bill,” Thompson and Scott said in their statement. “In the wake of record inflation, a global pandemic, and geopolitical turmoil, American farmers, ranchers, foresters, producers, and consumers are suffering. The best way to support them is to pass an effective, bipartisan, and timely Farm Bill, and the letter considered today provides a sensible path forward.”
The House and Senate agricultural committees are set to continue hearings regarding the bill, with everyone from big agriculture lobbyists to climate change activists to child nutrition groups set to testify.