Lawmakers Set To Focus On Farm Bill

Lawmakers in D.C. are setting the stage for Farm Bill talks to start this week.  Former House Agriculture Chair, and current member, Frank Lucas of Oklahoma says will begin mending the two versions of the Farm Bill right away.

“We still have a big old issue in the nutrition title, and there’s some differences in CRP acres and payments and that sort of stuff, how we handle CSP, but the bottom line really is, we gotta have a Farm Bill, we need it on the books before the end of September, I think we can get there, there’s work to be done, but we’re making progress.”

Lucas noted the current Farm Bill does not come to a halt on October 1^st, but rather starts to unwind.

“The quicker we can address the issue before then, the better off we’ll be.  Five years of certainty, but by the same token, if we have to do an extension, say a one year extension, as long as people can pick between PLC and ARC again, as long as we have a little flexibility there, we can survive that.  I just want, personally, to have the certainty, and that’s a five year Bill, not a one year extension.”

Lucas added changes to SNAP in the House bill, even if not approved in the final bill, reflect the research of a pilot program allowing greater flexibility in SNAP.

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