Washington, D.C. (RFD News) — Ahead of the Senate’s Farm Bill draft text release on Tuesday afternoon, Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley said the bill text includes several of his proposals aimed to support American farmers and ranchers.
Grassley says the draft includes legislation to help family farmers address rising input costs, as well as the Farmland Security Act, which would increase transparency on foreign ownership of U.S. agricultural land.
Cattle groups are also working to ensure their priorities are included in the Farm Bill.
R-CALF USA CEO Bill Bullard told AgInfo.net that the organization wants lawmakers to address unpriced formula contracts.
“The price is determined after the cattle are delivered in the future and it’s linked directly back to this cash market that they have just removed the cattle from. If they are then incentivized to lower the cash market price because doing so lowers the price of 100% of the cattle that they procure, we want the Senate in the Farm Bill to prohibit those types of unpriced formula contract that gives the meatpackers undue leverage over the price of cattle.”
Bullard also says R-CALF USA is advocating for mandatory country-of-origin labeling to be included in the Farm Bill, along with ending or reforming the beef checkoff.
