Agriculture: Previewing the 2002 Farm Bill (CRS Report for Congress)
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| Release Date |
April 9, 2001 |
| Report Number |
RL30847 |
| Report Type |
Report |
| Authors |
Geoffrey S. Becker, Ralph M. Chite, Jean Y. Jones, Jean M. Rawson, Jasper Womach, Jeffrey A. Zinn, Joe Richardson |
| Source Agency |
Congressional Research Service |
Summary:
Federal farm support, food assistance, agricultural trade, marketing, and rural development
policies
are governed by a variety of separate laws. However, many of these laws periodically are evaluated,
revised, and renewed through an omnibus, multi-year farm bill. The Federal Agriculture
Improvement and Reform (FAIR) Act of 1996 ( P.L. 104-127 ) was the most recent omnibus farm bill,
and many of its provisions expire in 2002, so reauthorization will be an issue for the 107th Congress.
The heart of every omnibus farm bill is farm income and commodity price support policy --
namely the methods and levels of support that the federal government provides to agricultural
producers. However, farm bills typically include titles on agricultural trade and foreign food aid,
conservation and environment, domestic food assistance (primarily food stamps), agricultural credit,
rural development, agricultural research and education, and marketing-related programs. Often, such
"miscellaneous" provisions as global warming, food safety, and animal health and welfare are added.
This omnibus nature of the farm bill creates a broad coalition of support among conflicting interests
for policies that, individually, might not survive the legislative process.
The scope and direction of a new farm bill will be determined by a number of contributing
factors, including financial conditions in the agricultural economy, the federal budget, and
international trade developments, among others.
Among the thorniest issues will be future farm income and commodity price support. The
Agricultural Market Transition Act (AMTA), Title I of the 1996 farm bill, was designed to provide
gradually declining fixed payments to producers of major crops (grains and cotton), while giving
them more flexibility to plant in response to market signals, among other provisions. However,
unanticipated, persistently low commodity prices and 3 years of multi-billion dollar ad
hoc emergency farm aid packages to supplement the assistance programmed through the 1996
law have
raised questions about its effectiveness. Many have expressed preference for a more reliable method
of supporting farm income than ad hoc laws, and are pushing for a variety of changes
to accomplish
that in a new bill. Questions of equity (e.g, who should get aid and how much), program cost,
impacts on trade competitiveness and the environment are among the considerations in this debate.
The economic prosperity of the U.S. farm sector is heavily dependent upon exports, so the
provisions of a new bill reauthorizing farm export and foreign food aid programs also will be of keen
interest. These provisions also might become a venue for providing guidance regarding farm sector
goals and objectives to U.S. officials negotiating a new multilateral round of agricultural trade
reforms, as well as several new bilateral and regional agreements. Moreover, the agricultural credit,
research, conservation, domestic nutrition assistance, and rural development titles will bring an array
of interests into the debate, and their issues and concerns could prove no less contentious.
