Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell is warning that funding for a new farm bill is likely to be tight in the wake of last month’s debt ceiling agreement. “New spending is going to be hard to come by,” McConnell told reporters Tuesday at an event in Kentucky with Arkansas Sen. John Boozman, the top Republican on the Senate Agriculture Committee.
“We passed an agreement with the debt ceiling to put a cap on spending, and so a lot of additional spending in this farm bill seems to me is unlikely,” said McConnell, R-Ky.
Keep in mind: The debt ceiling agreement included limits on spending through annual appropriations bills, and House Republicans are now trying to cut the domestic spending measures for fiscal 2024 even more. It’s not clear whether that effort could spill over into the farm bill debate.
Boozman suggested there are some significant challenges that need to be addressed in the next farm bill, including the increased cost of farm inputs. “At the end of the day, we want a product that makes it such that our farmers are successful,” Boozman said.
Boozman has said repeatedly he won’t support a farm bill that doesn’t provide for an increase in the Price Loss Coverage program’s reference prices.
USDA’s Taylor: Russian wheat exports boom as country hinders Ukraine shipments
USDA Undersecretary for Trade and Foreign Agricultural Affairs Alexis Taylor on Tuesday slammed Moscow for threatening to cut off Ukraine’s primary avenue for grain exports at the same time Russia is exporting record amounts of wheat.
Taylor, speaking at the National Council of Farmer Cooperatives’ annual Washington conference, highlighted a recent FAS analysis that predicted Russian wheat exports would reach a record 45 million metric tons for the 2022-23 marketing year, a 36% increase from the previous year and 3.5 million tons more than the record set in 2017-18.
Russian inspectors who are part of the United Nation’s Joint Coordination Centre in Istanbul continue to hinder the pace of Ukrainian grain exports through Odesa as Moscow threatens to end the Black Sea Grain Initiative on July 18.
Lawmakers call for PFAS funding in farm bill
A bipartisan group of 16 senators and House members sent a letter to the leaders of the House and Senate Agriculture Committees on Tuesday, asking that funding to address PFAS contamination be included in the upcoming farm bill.
The lawmakers asked for two measures to be considered for inclusion in the farm bill: the Healthy H20 Act, which provides funding for testing, treatment and remediation of PFAS in water supplies; and the Relief for Farmers Hit with PFAS Act, which provides financial assistance to farmers affected by PFAS contamination.
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The letter's signers included Sens. Tammy Baldwin, D-Wis., Susan Collins, R-Maine, Angus King, I-Maine, Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., Ben Ray Luján, D-N.M., Tina Smith, D-Minn., Maggie Hassan, D-N.H., and Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., and Reps. Chellie Pingree, D-Maine, Gwen Moore, D-Wis., Michael Lawler, R-N.Y., Elissa Slotkin, D-Mich., Mark Pocan, D-Wis., Jared Golden, D-Maine, Betty McCollum, D-Minn., and Melanie Stansbury, D-N.M.
Brazil’s main corn harvest on the move
Brazil’s primary corn harvest in the Center-South of the country reached 9.3% complete as of Thursday, up from 4.7% the previous week, according to the consulting firm AgRural. Most of the harvesting is being done in the state of Mato Grosso, but work is being hampered by rains. The harvest was about 20% complete at this time last year.
Harvesting may be slower than normal, but AgRural still expects a bumper crop. The company has raised its forecast this year for all three corn harvests to a record 127.4 million metric tons.
Animal feed industry generates $267.1 billion in sales
The U.S. animal food industry will generate $267 billion in sales this year, employ 760,000 full and part-time and contract employees and pay $18.5 billion in taxes, according to a new study released by the American Feed Industry Association.
The top five states for feed and pet food sales this year will be California, Missouri, Texas, Iowa and Kansas. Missouri has the largest number of animal food manufacturing employees with over 54,350, followed by California, Texas, Iowa and Pennsylvania. The states with the most feed mills: Texas with 647, Iowa with 376, Minnesota with 347, Wisconsin with 263 and Pennsylvania, home to 258.
“We’ve always said that animal food manufacturing is at the intersection of plant and animal agriculture, uniting crop farmers and animal producers, but now we see that intersection is actually the main artery in town, driving economic value throughout rural and urban communities,” said AFIA President and CEO Constance Cullman.
He said it: “So I think you know, our goal and our mantra at USTR is there is no commodity too small to spend time advocating on its behalf.” - Chief U.S. Agricultural Trade Negotiator Doug McKalip, speaking about India’s recent agreement to end retaliatory tariffs on chickpeas, lentils, almonds, walnuts and apples.
He added: “There is no international marketplace out there that is too small to not spend time trying to open up that market. I think farmers in America proved time and time again if you get that window open for market access, they will drive through it with the superior product and with high quality and reliability.”
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