LegiStorm

Summary:

The farm bill is an omnibus, multi-year law that governs an array of agricultural and food programs. It provides an opportunity for policymakers to periodically address a broad range of agricultural and food issues. The farm bill is typically reauthorized about every five years. Recent farm bills have been subject to various developments, such as insufficient votes to pass the House floor, presidential vetoes, or—as in the case of 2008 and 2014 farm bills—short-term extensions. The current farm bill (the Agricultural Act of 2014, P.L. 113-79) has many provisions that expire in 2018. The 115th Congress has begun but not finished a new farm bill. An initial House vote on H.R. 2 failed by vote of 198-213, but floor procedures allowed that vote to be reconsidered, and it passed by a second vote of 213-211. The Senate passed its bill as an amendment to H.R. 2 by a vote of 86-11. Conference proceedings officially began on September 5, 2018, but have not yet reached agreement. The timing and consequences of expiration vary by program across the breadth of the farm bill. There are two principal expiration dates: September 30 and December 31. The 2014 farm bill generally expires either at the end of FY2018 (September 30, 2018), or with the 2018 crop year. Crop years vary by commodity, but the first to be affected by a new crop year is dairy, whose 2018 crop year ends on December 31, 2018. The possible consequences of expiration include minimal disruption (if the program is able to be continued via appropriations), ceasing new activity (if its authorization to use mandatory funding expires), or reverting to permanent laws enacted decades ago (for the farm commodity programs). For example:  An appropriations act or a continuing resolution can continue some farm bill programs even though an authority has expired. Programs using discretionary funding—and programs using appropriated mandatory funding like those in the SNAP account—can continue to operate via appropriations action.  Most farm bill programs with mandatory funding (except the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), the farm commodity programs, and crop insurance) generally cease new operations when they expire (e.g., the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP), and Market Assistance Program (MAP)).  The mandatory farm commodity programs would begin reverting to permanent law beginning with the 2019 crop year, for which dairy is the first to be affected, beginning on January 1, 2019.  Crop insurance is an example of a program with mandatory funding that is permanently authorized outside of the farm bill and does not expire. “Permanent law” refers to non-expiring farm commodity programs that are generally from the 1938 and 1949 farm bills. A temporary suspension of permanent law has been included in all recent farm bills, but reverting to permanent law would occur if the suspension expires. The commodity support provisions of permanent law are commonly viewed as being fundamentally different from current policy—and inconsistent with today’s farming practices, marketing system, and international trade agreements—as well as potentially costly to the federal government. Among the mandatory-funded programs that are usually the focus of the farm bill, there are two subcategories that may affect congressional action—some have baseline beyond FY2018 and some do not have baseline after FY2018. In an expiration, both categories of mandatory programs can face similar disruption when their authorizations expire. But the difference in having or not having a baseline is important if Congress considers an extension to deal with an expiration. Providing funding for those programs without baseline could make extension more difficult if budget offsets are needed to keep an extension budget-neutral.