- Author: Pamela Kan-Rice
The House and Senate have passed the compromise Farm Bill, sending the legislation to the president for his signature.
Capital Public Radio's Julia Mitric asked Glenda Humiston, UC vice president for agriculture and natural resources, what the Farm Bill holds for UC ANR and California.
"What's fascinating about the Farm Bill is, after all that hyper-partisan debate … it's really a lot of the same of what we already had," said Humiston, adding that it includes an increase of $25 million a year for research on specialty crops.
That's good news for California growers...
- Author: Pamela Kan-Rice
USDA Secretary Sonny Perdue held a town hall at World Ag Expo in Tulare on Feb. 13 to listen to suggestions for the upcoming Farm Bill. VP Glenda Humiston was among those present for the discussion.
Todd Fitchette of Western Farm Press wrote: “While trade, labor and regulatory issues may top the list of agricultural policy issues Perdue faces in Washington D.C., Glenda Humiston, Vice President of the University of California Agriculture and Natural Resources Division of the state's Land Grant university, stressed the importance of adequate research funding and federal definitions of rural versus urban, which she said is having detrimental impacts across...
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
Now that a half-trillion-dollar Farm Bill has been passed by the U.S. Senate and is headed for the House of Representatives, Madeleine Brand interviewed Dan Sumner, director of the UC Agricultural Issues Center, to get his take on the Senate action. The nearly six-minute interview aired on Southern California Public Radio's Madeleine Brand Show.
Sumner said the Senate's Farm Bill contains substantial changes in the dairy program, the biggest of which is removal of an ancient price support program. The program, in which the government would buy powdered milk, butter...
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
The common notion that the federal government is contributing to the obesity epidemic by providing billions of dollars in annual subsidies to farmers doesn't pencil out, according to UC Davis agricultural economist Julian Alston.
Alston was featured in a six-minute NPR story about farm subsidies yesterday. The story largely dispelled the theory that federal subsidies encourage farmers to grow too much grain, causing commodity prices to drop, making food cheaper and inviting people to eat too much.
Alston said improved agricultural productivity is...
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
The American Enterprise Institute got a great deal of media coverage this week after releasing the organization’s recommendations and detailed background information relating to the reauthorization of the U.S. Farm Bill in 2012.
The institute says that farms and farm households have no more need for federal programs that subsidize incomes and risk-protection strategies than any other businesses or households. Eliminating inefficient and outdated agricultural subsidies in the Farm Bill could save U.S. taxpayers more than $100 billion over the next decade while having little impact on the country’s food supply or its farmers’...
