At the National Association of Farm Broadcaster’s Washington Watch event in Washington, D.C., the group of farm broadcasters had the chance to talk with Senator John Thune. Farm Director KC Sheperd is featuring comments from the South Dakota Republican as he talks about the challenges the 2023 farm bill has presented so far.
The current baseline for this upcoming farm bill, Thune said, is 1.5 trillion dollars. The 2018 farm bill, he added, operated close to the 800-billion-dollar range.
“We have never been anywhere close to that range before,” Thune said.
Eighty to 85 percent of those 1.5 trillion dollars, Thune said, will go toward the nutrition title. While both sides of the aisle have different opinions on what should be prioritized, Thune talked about how they must meet in the middle if the bill is going to pass in a timely manner.
“The other components that directly affect production agriculture aren’t the big part of that spending, and the big reason for the increase in the CBO baseline didn’t have to do much with the commodity title or crop insurance or the conservation title,” Thune said. “It had more to do with this decision that was made by USDA to dramatically expand the side of the SNAP program administratively.”
As support is built for farm bills, Thune said one of the only things that grabs the attention of those who are not agriculturally focused is the nutrition title.
Thune said this farm bill could likely not be completed until 2024.
“It has happened before,” Thune said. “We have done extensions of the existing farm bill when we weren’t able to execute on getting the one that we were working on in time for the deadline. So, that is entirely possible.”
Thune said the debt limit and overall budget debate will also have an impact on the time frame that the farm bill is completed.
“If the debt ceiling debate happens mid-July or late July, which is kind of what right now the current thinking is, that doesn’t give us a lot of time to write a bill within the budget parameters we have to work with,” Thune said.
