The 2014 Farm Bill:
Like a Swiss Army Knife? by National Cattlemen’s Beef Association Immediate Past President Scott George, Cody, Wyo. Up until early February, the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association (NCBA), with offices in Centennial, Colo., and Washington, D.C., had been working on a farm bill, in part or in full, for over three years. It began in earnest when NCBA started working on the 2012 Farm Bill, which became the 2013 Farm Bill and was eventually signed by President Barack Obama as the 2014 Farm Bill. In that time, NCBA members had one very central guiding principal: We wanted a farm bill that would give rural America the certainty needed without impeding our members. That was it. There were a number of regulatory issues the House-passed farm bill provided to rural America. The original House version would have revised the Freedom of Information Act provisions and prevented the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) from releasing livestock producer’s personal information. We have long maintained that producers and their families live at their places of business and to turn addresses, telephone numbers and, in some cases, geographic coordinates over to anyone who has a computer is in effect reckless and poses serious agro-terrorism threats. Legislation preventing EPA from implementing the Spill Convention Control and Countermeasure rule was included that would put an end to forcing costly containment plans on all agticultural producers regardless of size. It also included language that would have ended the debate on the Grain Inspection, Packers and Stockyards Act (GIPSA) provisions from the 2008 Farm Bill, leaving producers the freedom to operate and market in ways that serve their bottom line. The King
Amendment to protect interstate commerce and prevent states from implementing costly production mandates on agricultural production methods was also included. Additionally, both bills included disaster assistance, providing relief for states hard hit by floods, drought, snow. Wildfire was also an area where NCBA staff worked hard to provide some certainty. Our heavy lift in the U.S. Senate came not on what was in their bill, but what was not in their bill. Namely, the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS)/UEP agreement or “egg-bill” that would have, for the first time, allowed U.S. Congress to mandate production standards on a segment of animal agriculture. Our membership strongly believes that producers are the best care-takers for their livestock and the ability to adapt and improve management practices cannot continuously improve if they are mandated in statute. This agreement had no place in legislation and would have handed the HSUS a major victory in the Farm Bill. As the authorization of a new five-year farm bill progressed over four years, so did the World Trade Organization (WTO) dispute Canada and Mexico filed against the United States over mandatory Country-ofOrigin Labeling (COOL). COOL has been a conversation in D.C. since the 2002 and 2008 farm bills. In 2012, the WTO determined that the U.S. COOL law violates our international trade obligations and prejudiced two of our largest trading partners – Canada and Mexico. Together, these countries accounted for $2.1 billion in U.S. beef exports, about one-third of all beef exports in 2013. Shortly after the ruling by the
32 California Cattleman March 2014
SCOTT GEORGE WTO, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) released an amended COOL rule, which requires all fresh meat products in the U.S. to be labeled with born, raised and slaughtered information. This amended rule was presented as a resolution to the WTO dispute, but it is nearly identical to language that was rejected by the USDA in the initial implementation of the COOL rule. It prompted an immediate reaction from both Canada and Mexico that this new rule does not resolve their concerns; and in fact heightened their concerns. Canada has created a list of U.S. products that will be subjected to retaliatory tariffs should Congress not fix this problematic regulation that has only increased costs throughout the meat industry. On Feb. 18, the WTO began hearing the oral arguments on the USDA new rule. Every day that passes without a Congressional fix to COOL is one day closer to retaliation from two of our largest export markets for our U.S. producers. In the end, the 2014 Farm Bill that emerged from the House and Senate Conference, in the form of a conference report, did not contain our regulatory priorities and did not fix the problematic COOL regulation. Some of the programs in the farm bill are important to the cattle industry – specifically the disaster and conservation programs. These