At this year’s fall Capitol Ag Tour in DC, Tony St. James with All Ag All Day spoke with Senator John Boozman of Arkansas.
As the Ranking Member of the Senate Ag Committee, he offered his thoughts on the next Farm Bill saying there is still work to be done, and current world events could shape the outcome over the next few months.
“We’re going to need to be tweaking it and I don’t know exactly how much because I don’t know what the world is going to look like in the next three or four months. You know, we’re in uncertain times, this issue with Ukraine. It sounds like the Russians are going to acquiesce and open the port. We don’t really know that for sure, though. Even in doing that, they seem to slow things down. The ability of the Ukrainians to get their harvest to market, get it out of the country, primarily half of it goes to Africa, is going to be a real challenge. Two, their ability to plant for the next growing season is also a challenge. So that’s going to affect world food prices. All of these things, I think are going to affect the next Farm Bill as to what we need to do to make sure that the safety nets are in place.”
Boozman says he is optimistic this Congress can accomplish some goals still left on the table and adds it is a good sign the Farm Bill is getting attention right now so they can anticipate any problems down the road. The current Farm Bill expires next September.
