{"id":18863,"date":"2024-07-25T07:30:31","date_gmt":"2024-07-25T14:30:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/calcanstaging.kinsta.cloud\/?p=18863"},"modified":"2025-09-12T05:11:28","modified_gmt":"2025-09-12T12:11:28","slug":"house-and-senate-farm-bill-proposals-for-climate-friendly-agriculture","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/calclimateag.org\/es\/house-and-senate-farm-bill-proposals-for-climate-friendly-agriculture\/","title":{"rendered":"Lo que se incluye (y lo que falta) en las propuestas de ley de la C\u00e1mara de Representantes y del Senado para una agricultura respetuosa con el clima"},"content":{"rendered":"

As the 118th Congress enters its final few months of business before election season, the U.S. House and Senate have made some long-overdue progress on reauthorizing the next farm bill. The 2018 Farm Bill, which expired in September 2023 and temporarily extended until September 2024, is a package of legislation reauthorized roughly every five years that shapes almost every aspect of federal agricultural policy.<\/span><\/p>\n

In early May, Chairwoman Stabenow (D- MI) of the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry released a 94-page summary farm bill proposal, titled <\/span>The Rural Prosperity and Food Security Act of 2024 (RPFSA).<\/span><\/a> Senate Agriculture Committee Republicans also released a <\/span>much less detailed summary<\/span><\/a> of their proposal. Until a deal can be worked out, the Democrats, who have a slim majority and need 10 Republican votes to overcome a filibuster, are unlikely to attempt advancing a bill.<\/span><\/p>\n

In late May, the US House of Representatives Committee on Agriculture advanced Chairman Thompson\u2019s (R – PA) approximately $1.5 trillion farm bill proposal, titled <\/span>The Farm, Food, and National Security Act of 2024<\/span><\/a> (FFNSA). The FFNSA passed out of committee with all Republicans and four of the Democrats voting in favor. There are currently no plans for Speaker Mike Johnson (R- LA) to bring the bill to the Floor for a general vote, and if he did, he likely would not have the votes to pass it.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

With only a few business days left in this Congress, it is unlikely that they will pass a final farm bill before the election in November or December. It is becoming increasingly likely that they will postpone it until next year.<\/span><\/p>\n

In the meantime, it is worthwhile for climate and sustainable agriculture advocates to take a look at what was in both proposals and start thinking about a late-game strategy for securing some wins. Though many existing programs in the Farm Bill are highly relevant to climate change, such as those that assist farmers in adopting soil health practices, the Farm Bill as enacted in law does not explicitly address climate change or greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions at all. The House and Senate proposals put forth this year would change that, but most notably the Senate Democrat\u2019s proposal has quite a bit to be excited about.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

This blog will focus on the provisions in the farm bill proposals that are explicitly related to climate change. However, many other issues covered by the farm bill, such as land access, support for historically underserved farmers, organic agriculture, local market development, and farm safety net reform are also central to creating a more climate-friendly and resilient agriculture system.\u00a0 For a deeper dive into these topics, please see the analysis from our partners at the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition (<\/span>Senate summary<\/span><\/a> and House bill parts <\/span>1<\/span><\/a>,<\/span>2<\/span><\/a>, and <\/span>3<\/span><\/a>), the <\/span>National Young Farmers Coalition<\/span><\/a>, and the <\/span>Native Farm Bill Alliance<\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

Breaking It Down<\/h2>\n

Inflation Reduction Act Funds<\/b><\/h2>\n

The biggest climate-related news in this farm bill cycle is centered on the fate of the remainder of the $19.5 billion that was secured in the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) for climate-smart agriculture. The IRA infused this funding into existing programs administered by the USDA Natural Resource Conservation Service (NRCS) that support farmers in adopting a variety of on-farm conservation practices. Throughout the farm bill debate there have been many legislators, in both chambers, who desired to reallocate this <\/span>historic funding<\/span><\/a> towards other purposes. CalCAN and our allies worked hard to ensure<\/span> this did not happen.<\/span><\/p>\n

That hard work paid off in the Senate Democrats\u2019 proposal, which protects all unobligated IRA funding and moves it into the farm bill\u2019s baseline funding for the Conservation Stewardship Program (CSP), the Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP), the Agricultural Conservation Easement Program (ACEP), and the Regional Conservation Partnership Program (RCPP) while maintaining the requirement that funds be spent addressing climate change.<\/span> Increasing the baseline for these programs ensures that they have increased funding moving into the future after all the IRA funding is spent.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The House bill also rolls the IRA funding into the baseline of NRCS programs, although it disappointingly removes the critical climate change mitigation guardrails. Removing the climate guardrails on IRA funding could drastically slow the adoption of crucial climate-smart agricultural practices in California, leaving the state’s agriculture sector more vulnerable to the impacts of climate change. <\/span>Last year, California\u2019s demand for IRA climate-smart agriculture funding was more than <\/span>three times<\/span><\/a> the available funding. CalCAN will continue to advocate to Congress to ensure that the final Farm Bill includes this funding and maintains the climate mitigation requirements.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Wins for Climate in the Senate Democrats\u2019 proposal<\/b><\/h2>\n

In a major win for the the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition (NSAC) and its member groups such as CalCAN, our multi-year efforts to uplift the <\/span>Agricultural Resilience Act<\/span><\/a> as the framework for addressing climate change in the farm bill successfully helped shape Chairwoman Stabenow\u2019s Senate Ag Committee farm bill proposal.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Improvements to NRCS Programs\u00a0<\/b><\/h3>\n

Conservation Stewardship Program (CSP)<\/b><\/p>\n

The Conservation Stewardship Program (CSP) provides comprehensive conservation assistance for farmers and ranchers who enroll their entire operations in the program to achieve higher levels of stewardship through continued improvements. In the Senate proposal, wins for climate in CSP program include:<\/span><\/p>\n