FARRM Bill Amendments: What Made the Cut

John Davis

More was proposed than adopted, but in the end, the Federal Agriculture Reform and Risk Management Act, better known as the FARRM bill, moved out of the House Agriculture committee with 43 amendments (see a complete list of what was approved, defeated, withdrawn and tabled here from our friends at Agri-Pulse.com).

One of the more significant amendments that passed kills the controversial Grain Inspection, Packers and Stockyards Administration (GIPSA) rulemaking issue that caused so much consternation for the livestock industry. The GIPSA amendment, introduced by Reps. Michael Conaway (R-TX) and Jim Costa (D-CA), reins in what some lawmakers saw as the USDA overstepping its authority from the 2008 Farm Bill in dealings between meatpackers and producers. “The rulemaking went well beyond the intent of the 2008 Farm Bill and threatened livestock and poultry marketing as we know it,” Conaway told the committee. He added that it particularly threatened value-added marketing opportunities. But Conaway found resistance from Ranking Member Rep. Collin Peterson (D-MN), who said, “You are opening up one huge can of worms with this, and I don’t think it’s smart.” Peterson also pointed out that this is a non-starter in the Senate. Despite his misgivings, the amendment passed by a voice vote.

Listen to the debate on the measure here: Debate in House Ag Committee on GIPSA amendment Read More

AFBF, Audio, Farm Bill, GIPSA, USDA

Committee, Ag Leaders React to FARRM Bill

John Davis

As Cindy already noted, it took nearly 15 hours, but members of the House Agriculture Committee were able to pass their version of the Federal Agriculture Reform and Risk Management Act (FARRM) Bill. Committee Chair Rep. Frank Lucas (R-OK) and Ranking Member Rep. Collin Peterson (D-MN) praised the bipartisan legislation:

“This is a balanced, reform-minded, fiscally responsible bill that underscores our commitment to production agriculture and rural America, achieves real savings, and improves program efficiency, said Chairman Frank Lucas.

“The House leadership needs to bring the farm bill to the floor for a vote. We should not jeopardize the health of our rural economies which, by and large, have remained strong the last few years. Our nation’s farmers and ranchers need the certainty of a new five year farm bill and they need it before the current farm bill ends,” said Ranking Member Collin Peterson.

But the USDA is not pleased about cuts to the nutrition title of the bill. “Unfortunately, the bill produced by the House Agriculture Committee contains deep cuts in SNAP, including a provision that will deny much-needed food assistance to 3 million Americans, mostly low-income working families with children as well as seniors. The proposed cuts will deny 280,000 children in low-income families access to school meals and reduce farm income across rural America. These cuts wouldn’t just leave Americans hungry – they would stunt economic growth. The bill also makes misguided reductions to critical energy and conservation program efforts,” said Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack in a statement.Read More

AFBF, Farm Bill, NAWG, NCBA, USDA

Oh, Sweet Pea

Melissa Sandfort

Have you seen the drought map of the U.S. lately? It’s not good to see much dark orange, red or dark red and unfortunately, those are the colors that envelop most of the map. The July 4th holiday news reported that 25 states were in drought alerts and 20 states cancelled fireworks celebrations, and for good reason. It’s just depressing.

The cracks in our front yard have reappeared, my garden burned up and it looks like most people’s sweet corn fields are headed that way. What little corn is there, the coons have scavenged.

But in the midst of the crunchy brown grass when it seems like the only green thing that will grow are weeds, here lies my Sweet Pea bush blooming with purple and white flowers. Against the background is a small, steel wagon wheel and last year, the climbing tendrils barely reached the top of the wheel. This year, I have to move its arms to mow so I don’t cut the ends off!

The good part? I have only watered it twice the entire summer. The bad part? It’s on the west side of the house so the only people who get to enjoy it are people who come to our back door or drive all the way back to our shop. And that’s not many!

Until we walk again …

Uncategorized

FARRM Bill Passes out of Committee

Cindy Zimmerman

They said they would get the Federal Agriculture Reform and Risk Management Act out of committee in one business session come “hell or high water” and they did it.

It took nearly 15 hours to go through some 100 amendments and did not end until just shy of 1:00 am Eastern time, but the final roll call vote to recommend the FARRM bill to the full House was 35 to 11. Amendments added to the bill in committee included a repeal of the controversial GIPSA provisions in the 2008 bill, one that requires USDA to resolve country of origin labeling under WTO ruling, and another that uses the Commerce Clause to prevent states like California from forcing regulations on other states when it comes to agricultural production.

The House bill is already very different than the Senate version and the first official comment on it came from the National Corn Growers Association, which is disappointed that it does not include a more viable market-oriented risk management program. “We support moving the legislative process forward and urge Speaker Boehner to schedule time for full House floor consideration before the August recess,” said NCGA President Garry Niemeyer in a statement. “However, we feel there needs to be significant changes made to the legislation. Our farmers will be working with members of the House of Representatives to ensure those changes are included in a final package.”

Have to give recognition to the tireless tweeters who covered the whole process from start to finish – including @AgriPulse, @Ron_on_RON, and @ChrisClaytonDTN. Great job to all! Hope you are sleeping in this morning.

Farm Bill

Corn Market Commentary

Chuck Zimmerman

Corn growers got the world market viewpoint today at the Wyffels Hybrids Corn Strategies from Bill Tierney, Chief Economist, AgResource Company. I spoke with him after his presentation. China was a market he spoke about and I was fascinated to learn that the average holding of corn there is about 10-12 feet wide by about 60-100 feet! Bill says, “When you have such a small level of production which contributes very little to farm income the incentive to make investments in yield enhancing technology, better seed, better fertilizer, just isn’t there.” As he puts it, “Farming’s not big business in China.”

I asked him about the current domestic corn crop situation in light of today’s USDA World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimate. He says that although USDA’s average corn yield estimate was lower than market expectations it was relatively close to models his company follows. He says that with the weather we’ve been having and the direction the corn crop is going those estimates will be even lower. He thinks USDA did their job right on this estimate.

Bill says the highs we’ll see in the market will probably come in the next two to four weeks, “It will probably come when the market feels confident that the damage to the crop has stopped.” He doesn’t think the market feels that way yet. He says they think this will be a multi year high. Listen to my interview with Bill to get more of his thoughts and a recommendation for growers to consider: Interview with Bill Tierney

2012 Wyffels Hybrids Corn Strategies Photo Album

Agribusiness, Audio, Corn

House Committee Considers Farm Bill Amendments

John Davis

Last month, we told you about how the U.S. Senate had trimmed the number of amendments in the Senate Agriculture Reform, Food, and Jobs Act of 2012, better known as the Farm Bill, from 300 down to 73. Today, the debate moved to the House, as the House Agriculture Committee was adding and subtracting the lower chamber’s own amendments (about 100 so far) to the overall legislation, which members there have named the Federal Agriculture Reform and Risk Management Act or FARRM.

The first amendment to come up would have made major changes to the dairy program and eliminated the market stabilization program for milk pricing in the current Senate version of the Farm Bill. Reps. Bob Goodlatte (R-Virginia) and David Scott (D-Georgia) proposed a safety net for dairy producers without requiring them to participate in a supply management program.

Goodlatte argued that their amendment is more in line with the overall Farm Bill making its way through Congress and would actually provide more support for smaller family dairy farms. Scott, the co-sponsor on the amendment, said the main point is that it would keep milk and dairy products affordable for consumers. “The stabilization program that our amendment would take out would artificially reduce the supply of milk throughout this country, thereby, increasing milk and dairy product prices for consumers,” he said, adding that economic times are too tough to do this. Read More

Audio, Dairy, Farm Bill

Developing Corn Hybrids For Adverse Conditions

Chuck Zimmerman

It is the 6th year for the Wyffels Hybrids Corn Strategies road show. We’re sitting in a comfortable tent in a corn field. Can’t find a better place to hold a conference like this.

I visited with Bill Wyffels, President, to find out what’s new from Wyffels. He says they’ve introduced thirteen new corn hybrids from 96 to 117 day relative maturity and numerous products that have all the refuge built into the seed bag. Bill says they make sure they’ve got the best genetics for farmers to choose from to help them during challenging growing conditions like we’ve seen again this year in the corn belt. He says that for years they’ve been developing hybrid technology that allows plants to better withstand adverse conditions.

Listen to my interview with Bill here: Interview with Bill Wyffels

2012 Wyffels Hybrids Corn Strategies Photo Album

Agribusiness, Corn

Kansas Wins Race to Sell 15% Ethanol

Cindy Zimmerman

Kansas wins the prize for the first state to sell 15% ethanol-blended gasoline (E15) under the Environmental Protection Agency waiver.

The nation’s first E15 gallons were pumped at the Zarco 66 “Oasis” station in Lawrence, Kansas on Tuesday and, not coincidentally, the first customer to buy it was Jere White, Executive Director of the Kansas Corn Commission. “We were there when the last sticker went on,” said White. “We wanted to be there to pump the first gallons into a non-flex-fuel car under the waiver.” White fueled up a 2010 Chevy Camaro with E15 priced two cents a gallon less than E10.

Listen to interview with White here: Jere White with KS Corn Commission

Scott Zaremba is owner of Zarco 66 stations and pleased to be the first to offer consumers real choice at the pump in the form of E15 ethanol fuel. “We just whole-heartedly believe that alternatives are what we need to be moving toward to lessen our dependence on foreign oil and also being able to have cleaner burning product,” said Zaremba. He is offering the E15 as one of the choices at the station’s blender pump, which was one of the first installed in the state in 2008.

Zaremba also plans to offer E15 at a second Zarco 66 in Ottawa, and an announcement on that is expected soon. A formal grand opening for the pumps is planned for Wednesday, July 18.

Listen to interview with Zaremba here: Zarco CEO Scott Zaremba

It has been just over a month since the EPA gave final approval for the sale and use of E15 ethanol blends in light duty vehicles made since 2001, and over three years since the waiver was first requested.

Uncategorized

Wyffels Hybrids Does 2012 Corn Strategies

Chuck Zimmerman

Wyffels Hybrids is kicking off a series of Corn Strategies sessions this year in Vincent, IA. Here’s the team this morning getting ready for the tent capacity filled crowd that’s here on Harmon Farms. What a contrast I’ve seen in corn yesterday to today. The corn here looks great. Although I’m sure there are local farmers here who would like it to be even better. The corn in north central Illinois I saw yesterday was pretty well “toast.”

We’ve got a strong program taking place in a nicely air conditioned tent that includes speakers like Dr. Michael Swanson, Chief Economist, Wells Fargo; Arlan Suderman, Market Analyst, Farm Futures Magazine; Bill Tierney, Chief Economist, AgResource Comapny and one of my favorites, Dr. Fred Below, University of Illinois. I’ll have lots of interviews to share in coming days.

You can find photos from today’s event here: 2012 Wyffels Hybrids Corn Strategies Photo Album. I’ll add a lot more later today when I get to some better internet access although it’s pretty good using my Verizon Razr out here in a corn field!

Agribusiness, Corn

Weather Taking Toll on Crops

Cindy Zimmerman

This is what the corn looked like near Bloomington, Illinois yesterday – and it looks much worse in other areas.

The USDA World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimate report out this morning did, as expected, lower corn yields as a result of the hot and dry conditions throughout much of the growing region this summer. “Dreadful,” said USDA Outlook Board Chairman Gerry Bange earlier this week as they were working to come up with the estimates. “There’s no other way to describe this other than just horrible.”

The projected U.S. corn yield was lowered 20 bushels per acre to 146 bushels reflecting the rapid decline in crop conditions since early June and based on that and reduced harvested area based on the June 29 Acreage report, WASDE reduced corn production prospects by 1.8 billion bushels from last month. “Persistent and extreme June dryness across the central and eastern Corn Belt and extreme late June and early July heat from the central Plains to the Ohio River Valley have substantially lowered yield prospects across most of the major growing regions,” the report says.

Soybeans are getting hit as well. WASDE is now projecting soybean production at 3.050 billion bushels, down 155 million as increased harvested area is more than offset by reduced yields. Harvested area, estimated at 75.3 million acres in the June 29 Acreage report, is 2.3 million above the June projection. The soybean yield is projected at 40.5 bushels per acre, down 3.4 bushels from last month.

Corn, Soybean, USDA