US Senate passes farm bill that cuts subsidies

JIM ABRAMS

Asso­ci­ated Press

WASHINGTON — The Sen­ate on Thurs­day com­pleted a five-year, half-trillion-dollar farm bill that cuts farm sub­si­dies and land con­ser­va­tion spend­ing by about $2 bil­lion a year but largely pro­tects sugar growers

The vote was 65–34. The mea­sure now goes to the Republican-led House where con­ser­v­a­tives are cer­tain to resist its costs.

Eighty per­cent of the farm bill sup­ports a pro­gram of food sub­si­dies that ben­e­fit some 46 mil­lion poor and low income families.

Farm sub­si­dies often become a stum­bling block in inter­na­tional trade nego­ti­a­tions. Devel­op­ing coun­tries say the sub­si­dies drive down prices reduc­ing the income they derive when these nations sell their products.

While trans­form­ing the sub­sidy sys­tem, the Sen­ate left intact the sugar pro­gram that for some 80 years has pro­tected beet and sug­ar­cane grow­ers and sugar refin­ers by con­trol­ling prices and lim­it­ing imports.

The pro­gram is opposed by con­sumer groups and food and bev­er­age com­pa­nies that use sugar. They say it dri­ves up costs and leads to con­fec­tion­ers relo­cat­ing over­seas. Amend­ments to either phase out or nar­row the scope of the sugar pro­gram both failed on close votes.

While over­all spend­ing on pro­grams cov­ered by the bill has climbed because more peo­ple are receiv­ing help buy­ing food, the com­mit­tee head, Sen. Deb­bie Stabenow, a Demo­c­rat, and the top Repub­li­can, Sen. Pat Roberts, said the bill would save $23 bil­lion over the next 10 years com­pared with spend­ing under the cur­rent farm bill that expires in September.

That comes from replac­ing four farm com­mod­ity sub­sidy pro­grams with one, con­sol­i­dat­ing 23 con­ser­va­tion pro­grams into 13.

The biggest change comes from elim­i­nat­ing direct pay­ments to farm­ers whether they plant crops or not. The pro­gram, which costs about $5 bil­lion a year, has lost much of its sup­port at a time of $1 tril­lion fed­eral deficits and when farm­ers in gen­eral are prospering.

The bill also pre­vents farm “man­agers,” often wealthy peo­ple who may not live or work on a farm, from receiv­ing sub­sidy pay­ments and gives greater help to fruit and veg­etable pro­duc­ers and healthy food programs.

Agri­cul­ture Sec­re­tary Tom Vil­sack praised the Sen­ate bill for mak­ing progress toward “pro­vid­ing a reformed safety net for pro­duc­ers in times of needs,” sup­port­ing agri­cul­ture research, con­serv­ing nat­ural resources, strength­en­ing local food sys­tems and pro­mot­ing jobs. He expressed hope the House “will pro­duce a bill with those same goals in mind.”

Rep. Frank Lucas, the Repub­li­can chair­man of the House Agri­cul­ture Com­mit­tee, said that while there will be dif­fer­ences between the House and Sen­ate approaches, “I hope my col­leagues are encour­aged by this suc­cess.” His com­mit­tee is sched­uled to meet on July 11 to vote on a House ver­sion of the bill.

Posted by AP News on Jun 22 2012. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Comments can be made below.