Thursday American Farm Bureau President Bob Stallman was in the Hoosier state to keynote the Indiana Farm Bureau District 3 fall meeting and help pay tribute to retiring director Kendall Culp.
Stallman also talked about the 2012 Farm Bill. Right now he is skeptical that it will get done before the November election.
“Highly skeptical,” he said. “Then the question becomes what happens with the so called expiration September 30th and that’s not as much of a cliff as some have tried to indicate. Congress can extend a few provisions that are necessary but the reality is for most of the crop stuff you can go into whenever the first crop is planted in 2013 as sort of the deadline. And if you remember in 2008 we actually signed in to law the 2008 Farm Bill, which was applicable to 2008, in May of 2008. So Congress knows how to do the extension thing as necessary and can even consider it a new Congress.”
Stallman won’t make predictions but he does believe a new bill will pass either in the Lame Duck session or in a new Congress. He remains firm that a one year extension of the current bill is an idea nobody likes.
“I think that has a huge set of problems with it, number one from a budget standpoint. What happens to the budget in the end of that year extension. We’ll have a lot less budget to deal with. It creates a lot of uncertainty for producers, and frankly the politics of it aren’t real good because there’s going to be a huge fight over parts of the budget, primarily the nutrition part, that could really create some problems.”
September 12th in Washington the coalition Farm Bill Now will hold a rally on Capitol Hill. Stallman will help emcee and their simple message will be directed at the leadership in Congress.
“We’re tired of the delays. Congress has a responsibility to take care of a new Farm Bill and pass it, in whatever form they end up doing it, but they have a responsibility to govern and they should pass it and they should pass this Farm Bill.”
The fall meeting was in the Shively Club overlooking Ross Ade Stadium and earlier in the day Stallman learned more about the Purdue College of Agriculture while meeting with Dean Jay Akridge. He met with students and members of the Collegiate Farm Bureau, and he visited Fair Oaks Dairy and the construction site for the Fair Oaks Pig Adventure.
Indiana Farm Bureau District 3 includes Benton, Carroll, Cass, Clinton, Jasper, Newton, Tippecanoe, and White counties.[audio:https://www.hoosieragtoday.com//wp-content/uploads//2012/08/Bob-Stallman-visit-to-Indiana.mp3|titles=Bob Stallman visit to Indiana]