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Shining Light on Farm & Food Policy for 20 Years.
Monday, November 25, 2024
Republicans narrowly pushed a tax bill through the House Thursday that would slash corporate and individual taxes while preserving and even expanding key benefits for farms.
Senator Ted Cruz has gotten headlines for placing a hold on Bill Northey’s USDA undersecretary nomination, but he hasn’t gotten what he really wants: a meeting at the White House and substantive changes in renewable fuel policy.
Farms could see different impacts on their federal tax returns under the varying and complex rules in the tax legislation that Republicans are seeking to push through the House and Senate.
There’s still confusion surrounding whether or not the Department of Agriculture is working to put together a contingency plan to help out farmers if the U.S. pulls out of the North American Free Trade Agreement, but experts say such a plan really wouldn’t help much in a worst-case scenario.
Opponents of industry mergers and modern farming techniques thought they had the perfect partners in the Obama Administration to more strictly enforce anti-trust laws and stop industry consolidation in agriculture. That didn’t happen.
USDA’s regulatory reform officer told Capitol Hill lawmakers Tuesday that the department has identified about 140 regulations as “possible options” for revision or repeal. Although she did not identify them, she said a “significant number” will be published in the fall Unified Regulatory Agenda that should appear any day now, if history is any guide.
Can manure be regulated under the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act? Nearly three years ago, a federal judge said yes, it can be, in a ruling that cast a spotlight on how the dairy industry manages its waste.
A USDA spokesman dismissed ethics concerns raised in a New York Times article about a meeting the head of the department’s Regulatory Reform Task Force had in May with members of the Southern Crop Production Association (SCPA), a CropLife America affiliate, and Kellie Bray, CLA's senior director of government affairs.
It was difficult for much of the U.S. ag sector to watch as President Donald Trump pulled the U.S. out of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) about 10 months ago and now the pain is sharpening as the remaining 11 countries appear to be on the verge of ratifying the massive trade pact without one of the founding members.
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