Nov 15, 2023

Budget provision includes one-year Farm Bill extension

Editor’s note: President Joe Biden has signed the bill; see the updated story.

A continuing budget resolution approved by the U.S. House of Representatives and Senate includes a measure to extend the Farm Bill for one year.

The budget resolution, passed by the House on Nov. 14, and Senate Nov. 15, was introduced by new House Speaker Mike Johnson and averts a Nov. 17 government shutdown.  President Joe Biden is expected to sign it by then.

Senate Agriculture Committee leaders Debbie Stabenow, D-Michigan, and John Boozman, R-Arkansas, along with House Agriculture Committee heads Glenn “GT” Thompson, R-Pennsylvania, and David Scott, D-Georgia, released a statement on the Farm Bill extension.

“As negotiations on funding the government progress, we were able to come together to avoid a lapse in funding for critical agricultural programs and provide certainty to producers,” according to the statement. “This extension is in no way a substitute for passing a 5-year Farm Bill and we remain committed to working together to get it done next year.”

The deadline to pass legislation to succeed the 2018 Farm Bill was at the end of September, when fiscal year funding authorizations expired; funding for programs on crop-year cycles expire at the end of the year.

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack previously said such an extension was critical if Congress didn’t pass a new farm bill.

“We don’t want the program to lapse, because if It were to lapse, there would be serious consequences to the farmers and also very serious consequences to the economy and to consumers,” he said during an interview with Rod Bain, USDA broadcast media announcer.