Agriculture Appropriations
On July 9th, the House passed the FY 2010 Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act (H.R. 2997). The bill makes key investments in public health, food safety, rural communities, conservation and other priorities. The Appropriations bill is also fiscally responsible -- targeting dollars to high-priority needs and eliminating five programs and cutting funding of an addition 35 programs.
Read a summary from the House Appropriations Committee>>
View a list of programs cut or terminated in the bill>>
Read Amendments to the bill submitted to the Rules Committee>>
Protecting Public Health
- Food and Drug Administration: Provides nearly $3 billion, 14 percent more than 2009, to help FDA improve the safety of domestic and imported food and medical products. With this, the FDA will be able to conduct 1,150 more foreign and domestic food inspections, do 20,000 more examinations of imported food, and conduct 3,300 more examinations of imported drug products, for example.
- Food Safety and Inspection Service: Provides over $1 billion for the first time in history, 5 percent more than 2009, for inspection of meat, poultry and egg products, helping to ensure the safety of these products.
Helping Those Hardest Hit by the Economic Crisis
- Nutrition for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC): Provides more than $7.5 billion to provide proper nutrition to mothers and their children to up to an additional 700,000 women, infants, and children -- bringing WIC participation to over ten million people. It also sets aside $125 million for the upcoming WIC reauthorization, including a number of program improvements such as: increasing fruit and vegetable vouchers, implementing the electronic benefit transfer system, and expanding breast feeding peer counseling program.
- Commodity Supplemental Food Program: Provides $180 million, nearly $20 million over 2009, to provide nutritious food to over a half million low-income women, infants, children, and elderly citizens struggling with rising food costs. To ensure that more families receive much-needed support during this economic downturn, the bill expands this critical food assistance in 32 current states and in 6 new states with USDA-approved feeding plans. These new states are: Arkansas, Oklahoma, Delaware, Utah, New Jersey, Georgia.
- Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP): Provides more than $61 billion, nearly $7.4 billion over 2009. This includes an initiative to increase elderly participation, as only an estimated 30 percent of eligible seniors participate in SNAP.
- International Food Aid (P.L. 480 Title II and McGovern-Dole): Includes nearly $1.7 billion, $464 million above 2009, for the P.L. 480 Title II Grants Program to meet emergency and non-emergency humanitarian food needs in countries stricken with natural disasters and political strife. And nearly doubles funding (to $199.5 million) for the McGovern-Dole International Food for Education and Child Nutrition Program to support education, child development, and food security for some of the world’s poorest children.
Reinvesting in Rural America
- Rural Development: Provides more than $2.8 billion, 4 percent more than 2009, for USDA programs key to rural communities such as rural housing, water projects, community facilities and economic development efforts. These programs not only sustain our rural communities, but also create new opportunities for growth and development in the nation’s small town economies. This builds on the strong base provided by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act and makes substantial investments in rural communities. The bill provides funding for programs that help house families ($8.7 billion), invest in rural businesses ($1.2 billion), and support new community facility infrastructure ($542 million for community facilities, and $9.3 billion for the rural utilities programs).
- Animal and Plant Health: Provides $881 million to fund programs that protect American agriculture against animal and plant diseases.
- Agricultural Research: Provides nearly $1.2 billion for the Agricultural Research Service and $1.3 billion, $31 million above 2009, for the National Institute for Food and Agriculture (formerly called CSREES) for important agricultural research.
- Farm Service Agency: Provides $67 million to fully fund the continued modernization of the Farm Service Agency’s information technology networks and databases in order to provide more effective and secure service for the nation’s farmers.
Conservation
- Conservation Programs: $980 million, 8 percent above the President’s request and 1 percent above 2009, for the Natural Resources Conservation Service to improve service in the field, deliver conservation to protect the environment, and upgrade aging dams at risk of catastrophic failure.
- Rejects Cuts in Priority Conservation Efforts: Restores cuts to valuable conservation programs, including the Resource Conservation and Development Program and the Watershed and Flood Prevention Operations Program. The bill rejects $267 million in cuts to priority farm bill conservation programs, including the Wetlands Reserve Program, Farmland Protection Program, and Wildlife Habitat Incentives Program.
Oversight and Enforcement
- Commodity Futures Trading Commission: Provides more than $160 million, 10 percent above 2009, to enhance oversight of the commodity futures markets. The increased resources will provide for additional staff and improved technology to better secure the markets from improper speculation.
- Livestock Competition: Provides nearly $24 million to assure fair competition and trade practices, safeguard farmers and ranchers, and to protect consumers and members of the livestock, meat, and poultry industries from unfair, deceptive, discriminatory and monopolistic practices. These funds provide staff to strengthen enforcement, investigative and compliance activities.
Fiscal Responsibility
- The 12 Appropriations Bills Are Fiscally Responsible -- $10 Billion Below the President’s Proposed Budget: The budget adopted by the Congress in April required a cut in discretionary spending in FY 2010 of $10 billion below President Obama’s budget. As a result, the 12 FY 2010 appropriations bills overall must be $10 billion below the President’s budget.
- This Bill Eliminates 5 Programs and Cuts Funding below 2009 For Another 35 Programs – Achieving Gross Savings of $735 Million: The Agriculture bill is fiscally responsible, targeting dollars to high-priority needs, while eliminating 5 programs and cutting funding below 2009 for another 35 programs. For example, the bill provides no funding for the National Animal Identification System, which has received $142 million since fiscal year 2004, without putting into operation an effective system to provide needed animal health and livestock market benefits.
Other Important Policy Items
- Imported Poultry Products from China: Prohibits USDA from moving forward with a rule to allow potentially unsafe poultry products from China into the U.S.
- Country of Origin Labeling (COOL): Fully funds the costs to continue overseeing country of origin labeling for fresh fruits and vegetables, meats and other products.
- Inspection Pilot Program: Prohibits the Food Safety Inspection Service from implementing a pilot program to inspect certain facilities using a risk-based model until it implements changes recommended by the USDA Inspector General.