Montana farmers deserve a clean Farm Bill

This fall, when farmers will be busy wrapping up their harvest and planning for next year, the current Farm Bill is set to expire. It would be nice to think that the Farm Bill — and its many ways of supporting family farmers and strengthening rural communities — is too essential to get dragged down by the political bickering and gamesmanship that has engulfed Washington, D.C. Sadly, it’s not, because that’s precisely what has unfolded in the U.S. House of Representatives.

The Farm Bill is a big deal, especially for rural Montana. It doesn’t just provide important safety net programs and risk management tools for producers, it provides needed stability to the entire agriculture industry and includes popular conservation provisions and programs that help prevent painful hunger in millions of Americans.

It’s often said that food brings people together, and for 85 years the Farm Bill has done just that.  It has brought together agriculture, conservation and low-income advocates in support of a bill that has broad implications for our entire food and agriculture economy.  Because of this impact — and its past success — the Farm Bill has regularly enjoyed support from a vast majority of Congress, regardless of party, and from city-dwellers and country-folk alike.

The House version of the new Farm Bill, which barely passed the House on its second try, is a train wreck that has destroyed the typical coalition of support. It is riddled with corporate giveaways and loopholes aimed at benefiting multi-national corporations at the risk of blowing up the entire Farm Bill and, with it, the farm and ranch economy it supports. 

Among the many troubling provisions is one that has long been pushed for by lobbyists for the big chemical companies. It would explicitly exempt their products from scrutiny for harm caused to endangered species like pollinators, which are essential to the success of many crops. Pesticides are intended to be poisonous, that’s the point, so it makes no sense to give these potentially harmful chemicals a special pass. They should face the proper review,

Other changes would drastically alter or outright cut successful voluntary farmland conservation efforts that help many family farms make ends meet as well as others that would substantially alter food and nutrition programs that help keep millions of American children from going hungry. These provisions are poison pills that will accomplish only one thing: to destroy the Farm Bill coalition and with it the Farm Bill as we know it.

The Senate version, by contrast, is a truly bipartisan bill that came from good, old-fashioned coalition building, the tried and true approach that has worked for 85 years. It has broad support from across the country and in the Senate, including from both Sen. Tester and Sen. Daines. It looks likely to pass the Senate later this month — setting it on a collision course with the House bill.

For the sake of our family farms and rural communities, our elected leaders need to let the Farm Bill be the Farm Bill and toss aside the loopholes and poison pills that have contaminated the House version in the conference committee.  Representative Gianforte, who supported the absurd House bill, would be wise to stand with Montana farmers here and start working for a better bill.

As Sen. Tester said recently, “Folks in Congress must check politics at the door and pass this responsible Farm Bill that invests in the families that grow the food that feeds the world.” 

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Adam Pimley is a consultant and advocate for responsible farm and conservation policy, and he helps manage his family’s farm in north-central Montana near Joplin.