The Process and Path Forward for Passing a Bipartisan Farm Bill

Jim Monke, Specialist in Agricultural Policy, Congressional Research Service

• The Farm Bill has been enacted about every five years since 1933. While its scope has grown, the legislation is still mostly processed by the House Committee on Agriculture and Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry.
• The Farm Bill has a wide breadth. The titles of the 2018 Farm Bill (P.L. 115-334) were Commodities; Conservation; Trade; Nutrition; Credit; Rural Development; Research, Extension, and Related Matters; Forestry; Energy; Horticulture; Crop Insurance; and Miscellaneous.
• The 2018 Farm Bill will begin expiring at the end of this fiscal year, September 30, 2023, although expiration looks different across the different programs under the Farm Bill.
• If the Farm Bill expires, the law would revert to permanent laws from the 1940s, which are out of touch with current economic systems and needs.
• Historically, the Farm Bill has been less about political parties and more about regional or commodity-based constituencies. It is usually passed on a bipartisan basis.
• Farm Bills have stalled and been delayed in recent history, for example in 2008 and 2014. Before 1996, Farm Bills were enacted in the year the bill was introduced.
• For Farm Bill programs with discretionary spending, the Farm Bill provides an authorization for appropriation.
• For Farm Bill programs with mandatory spending, the Farm Bill provides both authorization for the program and funding. For these mandatory spending programs, the Farm Bill uses Congressional Budget Office (CBO) baselines and scores.
• A baseline is a projection of what future spending would be assuming current law continues, and it is a benchmark against which to measure the score, which refers to the expected fiscal change a bill would cause compared to current law.
• A positive score increases spending, a negative score decreases spending.
• CUTGO (i.e., “cut as you go”) and PAYGO (“pay as you go”) rules are designed to prevent a bill from increasing the deficit.  PAYGO requires that a bill not add to the federal deficit. CUTGO is more restrictive, in that it does not allow tax provisions to offset additional spending. This is not particularly relevant to the Farm Bill because taxes are not under the jurisdiction of the Agriculture Committees.
• Baseline funding for mandatory programs for the 2023 Farm Bill is $1.43 trillion for 10 years, from fiscal year 2024 to fiscal year 2033.

Jonathan Coppess, Associate Professor; Director of the Gardner Agriculture Policy Program, University of Illinois

• The political strength of the Farm Bill is in its coalitions. There is a set of interests around direct assistance for farmers, direct assistance for food for low-income households, and assistance to producers on conservation. Passing the Farm Bill is possible because of the votes that come together to support one or more of these three areas.
• The first Farm Bill was a part of the New Deal in 1933. It gave the Secretary of Agriculture broad authority to try to address the crisis and depression in agriculture.
• Following the Dust Bowl, additional legislation in 1936 was the first effort to incentivize conservation in agriculture.
• The 1949 Farm Bill addressed the fact that yields and production ability exploded after World War II because of new fertilizer, pesticide, and crop breeding technologies. The permanent authorities that would be reverted to if the current Farm Bill expires come from this time.
• The 1956 Farm Bill included the first version of the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP), which pays farmers to take highly erodible land out of production for three to 10 years.
• The Food Stamp Act was passed in 1964 in the wake of the first defeat of the Farm Bill on the House floor in 1962. Multiple political battles brought down the Farm Bill in 1962, and in order to get revised legislation for cotton and wheat passed, Congress paired up the votes for the Food Stamp Act and for the cotton and wheat bill. This formed the initial coalition that bridged the rift between rural and urban districts.
• The 1973 Farm Bill was the first one to combine food stamps and farm support policy.
• The 1985 Farm Bill created the modern set of conservation-related programs and compliance mechanisms for those programs.
• The 1996 Farm Bill was the most significant change to the law since 1933. It shifted the incentive structure so that farmers were growing crops based on the market versus based on what the federal government would pay them for acreage planted or specific crops.
• During the modern era, partisan fights over nutrition programs delayed the passage of the 2014 and 2018 Farm Bills.
• The implementation of the 2018 Farm Bill has been unusual because of the large amount of ad hoc and supplemental payments that have gone out to producers as a result of trade conflicts in 2018 and 2019 and the pandemic in 2020 and 2021.
• The Inflation Reduction Act (P.L. 117-169) is the first major investment in agricultural conservation programs outside of a Farm Bill.

Nadine Lehrer, Associate Professor, Food Studies, Chatham University

• The historical and geopolitical context in which each Farm Bill happens informs many of the key elements of the legislation’s evolution.
• Most policy change is incremental, with occasional bursts of change, often shaped by historical and situational context. This context can include commodity prices, trade interests, regional dynamics, party control, political dynamics, current events, public mood, and national crises.
• For example, the 2008 Farm Bill created significant biofuel provisions. In the years leading up to this Farm Bill, it looked like commodity reform might be the focus of the legislation, but World Trade Organization negotiations were suspended in 2006. Instead, a new Democratic Congress and rising gas prices led to increased interest in ethanol and a significant focus on biofuels in the Farm Bill.
• As the scope of the Farm Bill has increased over time, the number of groups working on its enactment and in coalitions with each other has led to increased stability of the legislation. Some important expansions include nutrition programs, conservation programs, sustainable and working lands programs, energy programs, and specialty crop programs.
• Conservation programs were initially focused on preserving agricultural soils for future production. Newer programs, like the Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP) and the Conservation Stewardship Program (CSP), place more of an emphasis on sustainable farming and ranching practices as well as working lands programs.
• Between the 1950s and 2000s, there was a proliferation of conservation programs, and in the 2010s, conservation programs started to be consolidated.
• The 2002 Farm Bill was the first to have its own Energy Title. Programs were reauthorized and expanded in the 2008, 2014, and 2018 Farm Bills. There was a shift from initial mandatory funding for some of these programs to more discretionary funding in more recent Farm Bills.

Sakeenah Shabazz, Policy Director, Berkeley Food Institute

• The Farm Bill is incredibly extensive, covering commodities, conservation, trade, nutrition, credit, rural development, research, forestry, energy, horticulture, crop insurance, and other miscellaneous topics.
• The Farm Bill has a specific structure that can be helpful when you are trying to break up the legislation and find what you are looking for:
  • The table of contents shows the authorizing language and date passed;
  • The title refers to the primary policy area;
  • Subtitles reference back to older, existing public law;
  • Parts indicate a division within a subtitle; and
  • Sections lay out the purpose of programs, the agency responsible for them, definitions, amendments, and program administration.
• Many important programs fall under the Miscellaneous Title (Title XII), including livestock, agriculture and food defense, and historically-underserved producers.
• While the Farm Bill covers many areas, it is also important to note what the Farm Bill does not cover. For example, farmer and farm worker labor issues are covered by the Department of Labor; public land grazing is overseen by the Department of the Interior and the Bureau of Land Management; water access and rights falls under the Department of the Interior; food safety is covered by the Food and Drug Administration; air quality is under the Environmental Protection Agency; and both school meals and the Supplemental Program for Women, Infants, and Children are under the Department of Agriculture but are reauthorized by the Child Nutrition Reauthorization.
• The U.S. Department of Agriculture is responsible for implementing most Farm Bill programs, so it is very involved in the reauthorization process.
• There are many interest groups that get involved in the process and communicate their priorities to members of Congress. Some of these groups include trade associations, universities and land grant institutions, banks and insurance providers, farmer nonprofits, think tanks, and Tribal groups. Some topics that these groups focus on include anti-hunger and nutrition, public health, conservation and environment, racial justice, biofuels, rural and economic development, and supply chain.

Bart Fischer, Research Assistant Professor and Co-Director of the Agricultural and Food Policy Center, Texas A&M University

• A large portion of the federal budget runs on “autopilot,” meaning that the spending is not renegotiated year after year (e.g., social security, Medicare, and Medicaid).
• The Farm Bill is not on autopilot. It needs to be reauthorized every five years, which gives it an interesting dynamic—with both benefits and challenges.
• The Farm Bill, because it is passed so reliably, can sometimes become a place where members of Congress add amendments that are not directly related to the titles of the Farm Bill because it is a vehicle to get certain priorities enacted.
• The conversations about the debt ceiling will likely affect the backdrop of the Farm Bill and could delay it, as happened in 2012.
• Four titles—nutrition, crop insurance, conservation, and commodities—account for most of the mandatory spending in the Farm Bill.
• Spending is projected to increase dramatically from 2018, with program costs jumping between 10 and 80 percent.
• Some programs in the Farm Bill do not have a baseline, but are rather a one-time infusion from Congress. There is an expectation that these infusions will happen in each successive Farm Bill, but if there is not new money, they would need to get paid for by cutting somewhere else.
• In 2018, the number of programs without a baseline was cut in half, so Congress now has fewer of these programs to figure out funding for.
• The Inflation Reduction Act included significant support for agricultural producers. CBO expects the USDA to cut a check for up to $15 billion over the next 10 years.
• Narrow majorities in the House and Senate probably make a bipartisan Farm Bill more likely.
• The last two Farm Bills that ended up partisan in one chamber still ended up bipartisan in the final legislation that went to the president.
• About 215 members of the House, or about half of the chamber, have never voted on a Farm Bill.

Q&A

What factors will enable Congress to pass the 2023 Farm Bill?

Monke

• Congress will need to figure out what it wants to do with Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) reforms.
• Debt ceiling talks will provide an important backdrop to the Farm Bill negotiations this year.

Lehrer

• Because this legislation is so expansive, it is critical to many stakeholder groups.
• The Farm Bill goes right through the middle of all the debates, controversies, and collaborations that happen in Congress.
• Try to take a long view of the process versus the day-to-day news cycle.

Shabazz

• The Farm Bill is the Super Bowl of food and agriculture policy.
• There are so many interests involved that it creates space to engage with coalitions and members of Congress that do not usually collaborate.

Fischer

• Congress needs to find a balance on risk management tools for farmers.
• Facts matter and there is a lot of misinformation about what is or is not in the Farm Bill. It is important to be communicating about what is in the Farm Bill and what it does for producers and communities.

What are some of the key challenges for USDA programs that seek to serve a diverse agricultural sector?

Fischer

• It is critical to ensure that there is equity in the safety net across farming practices.

Shabazz

• A key challenge is making sure that farmers have access to technical assistance benefits.

Lehrer

• The diversity of constituents gives strength to the Farm Bill.
• This bill brings up fundamental questions about the government's role in society and regulation.

What do you know now that you wish you had known when you first began working on the Farm Bill?

Monke

• Embrace the breadth of the process and examine how your specific piece fits into the larger context of the legislation.

Lehrer

• This is a long game, despite the fireworks and drama that come with the process.
• Pay attention to the history of Farm Bill legislation—policy is always building upon itself.
• These bills are not necessarily “rational,” but instead they grow and evolve over time.

Shabazz

• Keep a wide perspective. Some helpful resources include the Food Research and Action Center (FRAC) and the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition.
• Diversity of coalition matters, including old and young farmers and urban and rural communities.

Fischer

• Assume best intentions, be willing to be patient and work with legislators, and engage in the process.
• Do not be afraid to ask questions.

Compiled by Madeline Dawson and Isabella Millet and edited for clarity and length. This is not a transcript.