NCC Leads Farm Bill Fight

ED: This story is excerpted from the cover story of the May issue of Cotton Grower magazine.

 

The political climate in Washington D.C. has been one of division and gridlock in recent years. Since the mid-term elections of 2010, the Republicans have held a comfortable majority in the House of Representatives, though the Democrats retained control of the Senate by a narrow margin. President Barack Obama will continue to hold control of the Executive branch through January 2013, when he will either be gearing up for a second term, or leaving office following the November 2012 elections.

 

With Capitol Hill so evenly split, it would be easy to blame any gridlock on partisan politics. But in the case of the 2012 Farm Bill proceedings – or, more accurately, the lack of Farm Bill proceedings – the 112th United States Congress is not to blame.

 

“Let me emphasize how important it is, in order to pass this Farm Bill, for the agriculture industry to present a united front,” said U.S. Representative Mike Conaway (R-TX). Conaway made his remarks while speaking at the 55th Annual Meeting of the Plains Cotton Growers, a group with significant interest in the development of an effective Farm Bill.  Unfortunately, “united” is one thing the U.S. agriculture industry is not, at present.

 

As members of the PCG learned that day, the cotton industry’s biggest opponent in the Farm Bill debate isn’t Congress, or Brazil, or the WTO. Cotton’s greatest challenge comes from other agriculture interest groups in the U.S., who suddenly find themselves competing for the same slices of a smaller Farm Bill pie.

 

During his speech, Conaway outlined the obstacles Congress faces in passing a Farm Bill for 2012. Conaway acknowledged the across-the-board budget cuts that many on the Republican side of the aisle would like to accomplish during the 2012 fiscal year. He referenced a budget that passed the House of Representatives in late March that is a full $2 billion less than what President Obama proposed earlier in the year. The gap between those two numbers will be difficult to overcome, and House Republicans realize that.

 

“The House won’t move a bill if they know it has no chance of passing in the Senate,” Conaway said, before mentioning that the timing for a Farm Bill is not ideal right now. “Moving a stand-alone Farm Bill across the floor is fraught with danger.”

 

Conaway says House Republicans are working to ensure that any cuts to the Farm Bill come out of the nutrition side of that piece of legislation, and not from the safety-net features that are designated for American farmers. Still, groups like the National Cotton Council can see the writing on the wall when it comes to a dwindling budget and their Farm Bill prospects.

 

“(Congress) is going to start to cut into the safety net that is out there for U.S. agriculture, and that’s going to be disturbing for most of us,” said Mark Lange, President and CEO of the NCC. “But the commodity groups aren’t giving Congress a unified voice.”

 

Lange does not mince words when describing the threat to U.S. cotton from other interest groups.

 

“I can speak for cotton because it’s my crop. I don’t mind telling you that the grains and oilseeds groups are trying to take your money,” Lange told the PCG crowd. “Not just your money, but they’re trying to take the money that’s been designated for rice, peanuts and cotton. 

 

“But if they think we’re going to just roll over and say ‘Well go ahead, we think that’s fair,’ well, I don’t think so.”

 

Lange acknowledged that representatives from Congress have approached the NCC asking for direction, and a “unified voice of agriculture” in helping to create the Farm Bill.

 

“I’m sorry, as long as grains and oilseeds are going to try and steal $700 million annually in support from rice, peanuts and cotton to enrich their programs, (ag interest groups are) not going to speak in the same voice. It’s not going to happen, and it will just make Congress’s job more difficult,” Lange said.