Food Safety Commission

The Farm Security and Rural Investment Act of 2002, also known as the 2002 Farm Bill, includes ten titles, addressing a great variety of issues related to agriculture, ecology, energy, trade, and nutrition. This act has been superseded by the 2007 U.S. Farm Bill.

The act directs approximately 16.5 billion dollars of funding toward agricultural subsidies each year. These subsidies have a dramatic effect on the production of grains, oilseeds, and upland cotton. The specialized nature of the farm bill, as well as the size and timing of the bill, made its passage highly contentious.

Debated in the U.S. House of Representatives during the immediate aftermath of the September 11th attacks in 2001, the bill drew criticism from the White House and was nearly amended. The amendment, which failed by a close margin, was proposed by Rep. Ron Kind (D-WI) and would have shifted money away from grain subsidies to conservation measures. Public debate over the farm bill continued, and the Senate proposed sweeping amendments to the bill, leading to a series of meetings from February through April. As a result, the current farm bill was not passed until May 2002, a few weeks after the 1996 farm bill had already expired.

Contents

Summary

Provisions included:
* Country-of-origin labeling for fresh beef, pork, and lamb

Spending tables

The following is the subsidies by crop in 2004 in the United States.

Source USDA 2006 Fiscal Year Budget

Titles

Passage of the bill

Proponents of subsidy expansion

* Rep. Larry Combest (R-TX), chairman of the House Committee on Agriculture, drafts and sponsors initial house farm bill. His proposal would spend the equivalent of the entire federal budget surplus for FY2001, and included $76 billion in new spending on top of the previous bill's spending, for a total of $171 billion.
* Rep. Terry Everett (R-AL), owner of of peanut crops, drafted $3.5 billion peanut provision i
Title I
* Sen. Tom Daschle (D-SD), Majority Leader, reassured South Dakotans that commodity subsidies would not be diminished as a result of heightened national security concerns. Credited with prioritizing the Senate version of the farm bill.

Shifting subsidies to conservation

* Rep. Ron Kind (D-WI) brought an amendment to shift $19 billion from commodities
Title I
to conservation
Title II
(amendment fails 10/4/2001, 200–226)
** Kind planned to re-introduce the content of his failed amendment in the next farm bill, with the Healthy Farms and Forests Act of 2006.
* Rep. Sherwood Boehlert (R-NY) co-sponsored the Kind amendment. He looked to Florida fruit and vegetable growers for support, because they received no subsidies in 2001. "The inability to persuade more Florida members to vote yes was a key to its defeat."
* Rep. Wayne T. Gilchrest (R-MD) also co-sponsored the Kind amendment.
* Rep. Leonard Boswell (D-IA) brought an amendment to put $650 million into renewable energy, which failed (10/3/2001)
* Sen. Tom Harkin (D-IA), senior Democrat on the Senate Committee on Agriculture, revised the House bil
(H.R.2646)
for passage in the Senate. After the passage of the House version, he told reporters about his ideas for "green" payments rewarding conservation methods.
* Rep. Gil Gutknecht (R-MN) spoke for many legislators who complained that this was a "farm bill not an environmental bill" (10/4)

Subsidy caps

The largest difference between the House bill and its Senate counterpart was that the total amount of subsidies received by an individual farmer was capped by the Senate. Voicing concerns that "millionaire farmers" were reaping all the benefits of the farm bill legislation, a coalition of farm-state Senators pushed for these limits.
* Sen. Charles Grassley (R-IA) was vehement about lowering subsidy caps from $500,000 to $225,000 "we don't want 10 percent of the farmers getting 60 percent of the farm bill."
* Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-ND) cosponsored the subsidy cap amendment.
* Sen. Ben Nelson (D-NE) supported subsidy caps "I believe, along with most Nebraskans, that our farm program should discourage consolidation in agriculture... These enormous payments do exactly the opposite."
* Sen. Blanche Lincoln (D-AR) and Sen. Thad Cochran (R-MS) opposed capping subsidies. Lincoln was the only Democrat in opposition. Cochran said the caps would be "catastrophic for southern farm interests"

Opposing overproduction

After September 11, the farm bill was considered problematic for three reasons. First, it would neither receive nor deserve the careful attention necessary during the aftermath of the terrorist attacks. Second, its expenditures would consume the entire budget surplus, money that could be necessary for the American invasion of Afghanistan. Finally, Secretary of Agriculture Ann Veneman opposed the new farm bill. On September 19, her office issued a report criticizing traditional agricultural policies and calling for a shift from subsidies to conservation. According to her assessments, commodity subsidies would lead to overproduction and expensive land. Her position was supported by various other groups and legislators.
* The White House Office of Management and Budget issued a formal manifesto (10/3) opposing the initial farm bill, calling it expensive and unresponsive to changes in agriculture.
* Sen. Richard Lugar (R-IN), a farmer with a modest operation, was outraged that the farm bill remained on Congressional agendas after the terrorist attacks. (Omaha Herald 9/27/01)
** Agreeing with Secretary Veneman and the White House, he argued that the farm bill causes overproduction so bad "we've got it coming out of our ears."
** Proposed 6 percent payment to cover premium on crop insurance instead of guaranteeing income. (1/21)
* Sen. Chuck Hagel

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