Next Farm Bill: 500-Foot Viewpoint a Must for Dairy
Every five years. After going through an extensive process of being discussed and debated before being passed by Congress and then signed into law, this is how often a Farm Bill is updated. The current Farm Bill is set to expire in 2023, and Scott Brown, a dairy economist with the University of Missouri, says that he hears a lot of the 30,000-foot view of what needs to be done policy-wise, but he doesn’t hear the 500-foot view.
“Until we get to the 500-foot view, we won't get a 2023 Farm Bill written,” he says.
Brown applauds the Dairy Margin Coverage (DMC) program, saying it is much better than the original Margin Protection Program (MPP.)
“It still caps us at $5 million lbs., so for a lot of larger producers, it's not that great of a risk management tool,” he says.
However, he still says DMC is an inexpensive and easy risk management tool and most didn’t initially think DMC would trigger any payments. In fact, an August indemnity payment was triggered due to rising feed costs.
The Missouri dairy economist says that getting something changed in the next Farm Bill takes a lot of effort and a lot of numbers.
“There's a lot of members of Congress who might shy away from wanting to be engaged,” Brown says.
Mike North with ever.ag simply states that dairy policy is complicated.
“Especially with the House side finding members that understand or have that dairy background, there isn't very many, and so they're going to shy away from too much in the weeds, which just means we need to provide them with better information, the industry coming together,” he says.
North says that he has only seen one Farm Bill actually written on time in his entire career.
“The odds are we're not getting it on time,” he shares.
Factor in federal orders, depooling and make allowances, North says these are all big discussions that will require the dairy industry coming together to make their voices clearly heard in Washington and to state what they want in the new Farm Bill.
“Otherwise, it's going to be just another stamp and move on, and we'll keep it the way it was,” he says.
Dan Basse with AgResource Company concurs with North and says it is essential to have both the processing industry and dairy farmer voices heard.
“That's what makes the Central Market order so difficult,” he says.
With the industry now driven by components, Basse says the industry doesn’t want to transport water anymore.
“We all want to transport components and our federal orders are not structured that way,” he says. “But they're so complex that when I try to talk to someone in Congress, they get a headache, they don't understand.”
The current Farm Bill was signed into law in 2018 and is due to expire in September 2023. While that may still seem a long way away, unity in the dairy industry to create a 500-foot view will be essential in spelling success for dairy with the next Farm Bill.
