Agricultural News
No Surprise- Expect Farm Programs to Take Significant Cuts in 2012 Farm Bill Debate
Tue, 03 May 2011 3:45:57 CDT
These days in Washington when you talk about legislative issues, you always end up coming back to budget and the huge deficits that Congress and the Obama Administration is finally coming to grips with. The Director for Public Policy for the American Farm Bureau, Mary Kay Thatcher, says that colors almost everything that her organization is following on Capitol Hill these days.
That is especially true when you start talking about what the next farm bill will look like. Thatcher likes the idea of not getting in too big of a hurry in making final decisions on the 2012 farm bill- saying the plan advanced by Oklahoma Congressman Frank Lucas, who is Chairman of the House Ag Committee, has a great deal of merit. Lucas contends that it will be best to wait until we have a fresh Congressional budget number in April of 2012- which he hopes will yield a little more money for agriculture in the budget baseline than what might be handed over to the Committee to work with this year.
Thatcher adds that the "big enchilada" vote this spring on budget will clearly be the vote on raising the government's debt ceiling. She sees little chance of getting that debt ceiling raised unless Democrats agree to significant budget reduction measures being tied to the increase. She adds that all of the talk about the red ink that the government is swimming in means less money for ag programs when Congressman Lucas and Senator Stabenow attempt to write the 2012 farm bill.
Beyond the farm bill and the budget, we also visited with Thatcher about what Farm Bureau is hearing regarding the GIPSA rule process that USDA is pursuing and how to extend current levels of estate taxation that was acheived in December of 2010.
We talked with Mary Kay Thatcher about all of these issues at the 2011 National Association of Farm Boradcasters Washington Watch- and you can hear our conversation by clicking on the LISTEN BAR below.
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