U.S. Senate Passes 2013 Farm Bill; Focus Now Moves to House 

The Senate passed the 2013 Farm Bill Monday evening on a vote of 66 to 27. The $955 billion-dollar measure is 1,150 pages long and could affect U.S. farm and food policy for the next 50 years.

Among other remarks, Senator Debbie Stabenow, chairwoman of the Senate Agriculture Committee said, "This farm bill is the product of two years of hard work by a long list of talented people. And, as we vote today, we support 16 million people that depend on agriculture for their jobs. We are providing $24 billion in deficit reduction on a bipartisan basis. We are providing policies that will conserve our land and our water resources for generations to come." I have an audio overview of the vote with the final word from both Senators Stabenow and Cochran on the bill- click on the link at the bottom of this story.

The largest part of the bill is the food stamps and nutrition title which will cost $760.5 billion dollars over the next 10 years. The Senate bill changes rules governing eligibility and cuts spending by $3.9 billion compared to what would be spent if funding stayed at this year's level.

Probably the biggest change in the bill is the reduction of direct payments in the commodity programs. The cuts amount to $17.44 billion over the next ten years.   The bill will spend $41.3 billion on a variety of programs to protect farmers from sharp fluctuations in price. The program applies to corn, cotton, dairy, peanut, rice, soybean, and wheat producers.

You can read more(and hear that audio) on last night's passage of the farm bill by clicking here.  

The American Farm Bureau Federation today was one of several farm groups commending the Senate for quickly moving forward to complete work on the bipartisan 2013 farm bill, the Agriculture Reform, Jobs and Food Act. The bill provides needed risk management tools and a viable economic safety net for America's farmers and ranchers, according to AFBF President Bob Stallman.

"We appreciate the Senate's decision to protect and strengthen the federal crop insurance program and not reduce its funding, as well as the approval of a commodity program that provides farmers varied safety net options," Stallman said. "This approach to farm policy will encourage farmers to follow market signals rather than basing planting decisions on anticipation of government farm benefits. Most importantly, the program will be viable because the Senate stood firm on a budget savings level of $24 billion."  (Click here for more of Bob Stallman's statement.)

Stallman's praise was echoed by Colin Peterson, the top Democrat on the House Ag Committee, and he was optimistic the House would complete its work quickly and get a bill to the President by the August recess.  (You can read Colin Peterson's full remarks by clicking here.)

Numerous farm groups offered their applause for the bill.  You can read their statements by clicking on their names in the list below.

American Soybean Association

Growth Energy

National Association of Conservation Districts 

National Cattlemen's Beef Association 

National Corn Growers Association 

National Council of Farmer Cooperatives  

National Farmers Union 

National Sorghum Producers 

The Environmental Working Group, however, was not pleased with the Senate bill and called for massive changes when the bill comes up before the House. 

Scott Faber, EWG's Senior Vice President for Government Affairs, said:  "Senate leaders refused to permit consideration of other bipartisan reform amendments that would have better protected taxpayers, improved transparency in the crop insurance program and created a level playing field for family farmers. Consumers and family farmers deserve a better and more transparent farm bill than the one considered by the full Senate today. We look forward to the adoption of these important reforms when the House considers the bill later this month."  (You can read more from the EWG by clicking here.)

Wheat Harvest Gains Steam Across Texas and Oklahoma Following Last Week's Rains

Wheat harvest continues across southwestern Oklahoma following rains last week.  Harvest was eight percent complete by Sunday, according to the latest Crop Progress and Condition report.  That was 80 points behind the previous year, and 38 points behind the five-year average.  Fifty-three percent of the crop was in poor or very poor condition, 27 percent was in fair shape, and 20 percent was listed in good to excellent condition.

Canola was rated mostly fair to poor, with one fifth rated in good condition as harvest began. Canola was 76 percent mature and nine percent had been harvested by the end of the week, compared to 99 percent of canola harvested this week last year.  (Click here to read the full report for Oklahoma.)

In Kansas, the winter wheat crop was turning color on 22 percent of the acreage, behind 99 percent a year ago and a 67-percent average. A few fields were considered ripe, but totaled less than one percent, compared to 85 percent last year and a 27-percent five-year average.  The crop's condition was rated 26 percent very poor, 21 poor, 25 fair, 24 good, and four percent excellent.  (You can read the full Kansas report by clicking here.)

Wheat continued to mature in most parts of Texas last week.  Harvest activity increased in many areas. Some producers cut back on irrigation to let fields dry before harvest.  Thirty-one percent of the crop has been harvested, compared to 48 percent at this time last year and a five-year average of 35 percent.  Seventy-four percent of the crop was listed in very poor or poor condition, 25 percent was in fair or good condition, and only one percent was rated excellent.  (Click here for the full Texas report.)

You may also want to review the national Crop Progress numbers- lots of market watchers are paying lots of attention to the corn emergence numbers- while the cattle industry continues to watch improvement in pasture and range condition ratings- click here to check out this week's report.

Forage Production Lagging in Oklahoma

Derrell S. Peel, Oklahoma State University Extension Livestock Marketing Specialist, writes in the latest Cow-Calf Newsletter:

Typically hot weather is expected in Oklahoma for the next week or so. Oklahoma has seen remarkably little hot weather so far and that has forage production behind schedule in the state. Recent rains in much of the state have resulted in very green conditions but pasture and hay growth has been delayed, especially for warm season forages. Delayed hay production is a concern to cattle producers who have severely depleted hay supplies during the last two years of drought.   

The most recent USDA reports indicate that 69 percent of the first cutting of alfalfa hay was complete, compared to a 92 percent average for the same time. For other hay, 30 percent of the first cutting was completed, with 47 percent being average. Oklahoma pasture and range conditions included 33 percent rated poor to very poor, down slightly from 36 percent a week earlier. Warm weather will likely accelerate pasture and hay production in the coming weeks but delays so far may impact total annual yields. 

Click here to read more of Derrell Peel's analysis.
 

Conservative Coalition Tells Congress Food Stamps and Farm Programs Must be Separated

A coalition of conservative organizations opposed to the passage of the farm bill have written a letter to Congress demanding that the nutrition title be separated from the measure now under consideration.  It appears the House not have the votes to pass the farm bill as it currently stand and the groups who say they want to ensure that Congress members are made aware of conservatives' continued opposition to the bill.  

In part, the letter says, "In the coming weeks, the House is expected to consider H.R. 1947, the Federal Agriculture Reform and Risk Management Act of 2013, often referred to as the Farm Bill. However, less than 20 percent of this nearly $1 trillion piece of legislation actually contains agriculture-related programs. The remaining 80 percent is composed of food stamps-formally referred to as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). On behalf of the millions of members and supporters of our organizations, we urge you to support efforts to split the bill and allow lawmakers to consider agriculture policy and food stamps funding in separate pieces of legislation. 

"In 2000, 17 million individuals received food stamps, but by 2008 that number ballooned to nearly 31 million. Now, nearly 48 million individuals are on the program. Spending on food stamps has doubled since 2008, with taxpayers spending nearly $40 billion on the program in 2008 to an unprecedented $80 billion in 2012. Roughly 1 in 7 Americans are currently on food stamps, reflecting both the expansive growth of government and the troubling dependence of Americans upon it. Out of nearly 80 means-tested welfare programs, food stamps serve as the starkest example of government excess. Nearly everyone agrees that it is time to reform this out-of-control program."

You will find the full text of the letter and the list of signatories by clicking here.

Study Shows Agricultural Export Promotion Investment is an International Priority

U.S. farmers and ranchers are competing in a very active international agri-food trade environment with many countries that invest significant public and private funds through a variety of programs to develop markets and promote their products. That is a primary conclusion of a major study just completed on behalf of several U.S. agri-food export market development organizations by Agralytica Consulting, Alexandria, Va.

"This is the first study to take an in-depth look at both competing export market development programs as well as the source and amount of funding," said Shannon Schlecht, vice president of policy at U.S. Wheat Associates (USW), Arlington, Va. "Exports are vital to U.S. agricultural producers with 95 percent of consumers living outside our borders. The analysis was designed to give organizations like ours strategic, competitive information we can use to help make our export promotion plans more effective for the farmers, ranchers and small businesses we represent."

USW led a team of USDA Foreign Agricultural Service (FAS) cooperator organizations that directed the study. Funding came from a portion of the FAS Market Access Program (MAP) to encourage multi-market, cross-commodity projects that address common challenges and opportunities.

These organizations and Agralytica selected 12 countries and the European Union (EU) central government programs for in-depth study including desk research, in-person interviews and consultation with U.S. Agricultural Trade Offices in the target countries. The study provided new information about competing export development activities, program structure, funding and evaluation methods. 

Click here to read about the insights gained by the study. 

This N That: Field of TEAMS Continue, Manage for Profit Set for Wednesday and Superior Livestock Selling Early This Week

The efforts that we reported to you about yesterday to pick up debris in the tornado hit wheat fields in Canadian County continues- a large number of folks are hoped for today as the El Reno FFA and the American Farmers & Ranchers are joining forces starting at 8:30 AM at the Heaston Community Church just south of El Reno- these groups are coordinating their efforts with the Field of TEAMS to move the clean up effort along.  If you want to help anytime this week- there's still a lot of wheat acres to be walked- contact Levi Clifton at 405-301-1626.

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Manage for Profit is a seminar that has been organized and sponsored in part by the Red Angus breed association- it's a half day program that is free and is a prelude to the 2013 Beef Improvement Federation national meeting in downtown Oklahoma City the second half of this week. The Manage for Profit seminar speaker lineup is really a dandy and I am looking forward to interacting as the Emcee with speakers like Bob Weaber of Kansas State, Gant Mourer of OSU and John Butler of Beef Marketing Group- just a name a few- it's not just land grant types that will be talking but also some of the leading cattle producers in the US as well.  For last minute details- click here for the Red Angus website and details about Manage for Profit.

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It's called the Corn Belt Classic XV- but there are plenty of cattle from our part of the country that are included in this week's two day sale of the Superior Livestock Market.  The sale kicks off this morning and continues on Wednesday morning- about 54,000 head total are expected to sell. Jim Odle and his team crank things up with Superior Sunrise on RFD-TV and on line at SuperiorClickToBid.Com at 8:30 AM central time today- and 9:30 AM tomorrow. Click here for more details and you can always call them at 1-800-422-2117