Farm Bill Passes Senate Conrad to Serve on Conference Committee February 13, 2002 Washington – The U.S. Senate today approved a comprehensive new farm bill to replace the failed "Freedom to Farm" policies, and provide a better deal for North Dakota farmers than a bill approved in the House, Senator Kent Conrad said. "This bill keeps all the provisions important to North Dakota producers, provisions we wrote in the Senate Agriculture Committee," said Conrad. "We've strengthened it further on the floor of the Senate, adding disaster payments for farmers who lost crops to drought and moisture, or who suffered crop quality losses. We limited payments to the largest of producers, strengthened the sugar program, supported livestock producers over packers. This is a strong bill for North Dakota and the nation." The bill passed on a bipartisan vote of 58-40. Conrad, who helped write the bill in the Senate Agriculture Committee, will be one of just seven Senate conferees on the House-Senate conference committee that will iron out the differences between the Senate bill and the House bill, which passed last fall. "The need for good farm policy could not be more pressing. We're entering our fifth straight year of rock bottom crop prices. We've had too many years of bad policy and bad prices. It's time for a change," Conrad said. Among the highlights of the bill cited by Conrad were: • $2.4 billion in disaster aid for farmers who suffered natural disasters. The aid will include prevented planting and quality loss due to excessive moisture. • a maximum limit of $275,000 in farm program payments per year per operation, approximately half the level allowed under the house bill. • a ban on most meat processors from owning cattle, hogs or sheep, in the two weeks prior to slaughter. • an increase in the wheat loan rate to $3.00 per bushel, 42 cents higher than both current law and the House-passed farm bill which allows loan levels to drop. • a new "all-barley" loan level of $2.00 per bushel. • establishment, for the first time, of an income support program for pulse crops such as dry peas, lentils, and chickpeas. • repeal of the current sugar loan forfeiture penalty and the sugar marketing assessment. -more- Conrad farm bill release Page 2 • CRP continuous wetland sign-up made permanent, with increased eligibility up to ten acres. • an option for farmers – at the farmer's choice – to update farm program bases and yields to reflect actual production during the years 1998 through 2001. • an increase in funding for USDA trade programs of more than $1 billion. • additional funding for conservation cost-share and related programs. • country-of-origin labeling requirements for imported meat. • vastly improved rural development programs. • a renewable energy title. "The House bill was a good beginning, but this bill is even better for North Dakota. I'll work to preserve strong farm programs for our state in the conference committee. Rural America can't wait any longer," Conrad said.