Great Falls Tribune: Farm interests list priorities for 2012 bill
U.S. Sen. Jon Tester got a smorgasbord of ideas Friday when he asked a panel of 10 folks from different aspects of farming for ideas about what’s right with the current Farm Bill and what could be cut back when it’s rewritten in 2012.
“There will be some cost-cutting efforts to reduce federal spending in D.C., and rightly so,” Tester said.
He predicted some ag programs will be trimmed and a few will be eliminated, but there will be no across-the-board 10-15 percent cuts. “And it will be difficult to get much expansion,” he said.
Several farm groups and a Hutterite colony farm boss strongly supported steady, direct farm payments to producers and crop insurance that fills in the income gap during years of bad production or prices.
