The nation’s agriculture community is pulling together its resources to make another push to urge lawmakers to pass a new, bipartisan Farm Bill by the end of 2024.
With the legislative calendar tightening up, leaders from the national soybeans, corn, wheat, cotton and rice growers united Sept. 10-11 for a Legislative Fly-In to Washington, D.C. Jamie Beyer, a director with the Minnesota Soybean Growers Association (MSGA) and the American Soybean Association (ASA), was one of five farmers selected to represent the nation’s nearly half-million soybean farmers. The fly-in marked the first time in decades that all the major commodity groups combined for joint Hill Visits. Earlier in the week, MSGA joined more than 300 national and state groups in sending a letter to congressional leaders calling on them to pass the Farm Bill before year’s end.
Beyer said advocates were assigned a singular, narrow task.
“Our only message is: ‘We need the Farm Bill passed in 2024,’” she said. “It has to get done. We’re emphasizing that all of us in agriculture are affected by this.”
ASA’s 2024 Farm Bill priorities include:
• Improving the Title I farm safety net to be more responsive and predictable
• Expanding trade promotion programs to help grow and diversify agricultural markets
• Protecting and enhancing crop insurance to assist with volatile weather and crop loss
• Maintaining the farmer-financed soybean research and promotion checkoff
• Building biobased market opportunities to promote soy utilization
• Providing biofuel opportunities to help the nation become energy independent
• Enabling greater access to voluntary conservation programs to meet demand
• Investing in research for innovation and competitiveness
• Enabling greater access to voluntary conservation programs to meet demand
Beyer said the importance of protecting and expanding the safety net has never been more important.
“Crop insurance is not an optional tool for most of us. It’s necessary for us to get operating loans. Many of us take out operating loans more than once a year,” she said.
Inflation has also eaten away at farmer profitability since the 2018 Farm Bill went into law.
“Inflation is only hitting the expense side for farmers,” she said. “Inflation is not resulting in any pay increases for us, so when prices are stagnant or falling and inflation is putting pressure on inputs, we get the squeeze.”
During meetings with legislators and their aides, including Sen. Tina Smith, Beyer heard cautious optimism expressed on the bill’s prospect. After years of listening sessions and crafting priorities, farm groups have no desire to restart the process in 2025.
“If you’re not keeping policies up to date with current standards, you run the risk of repeating those types of crises,” Beyer said. “So, it’s important to modernize policies, and we’re ready to see those improvements enacted.”
With the 2024 election less than eight weeks away, the most likely window to pass a new Farm Bill would take place during a lame-duck session from mid-November through December.
