Ag program critics offer suggestions for farm bill reform

Longtime critics of the farm bill safety net this week offered a long list of suggestions for what they called "simple reforms" to crop insurance and farm subsidies.

The Environmental Working Group held what it called a virtual "Future of Farm Subsidies" summit Sept. 5.

"The problem is not lack of funds, it's a lack of proper priorities," said one of the speakers, Josh Sewell, senior policy analyst for the budget watchdog organization Taxpayers for Common Sense. "We now need to focus farm programs on those truly in need and be sure they are fiscally responsible and reform (programs) to foster resilience, instead of dependence on taxpayer subsidies."

Suggested reforms include:

Reduce premium subsidies from 65% to 40%, and ensure they go to "people who live and work on farms."

Install a "reasonable" means test to ensure assistance is going to farms that need it.

Lower the income level to receive crop insurance subsidies.

Reduce guaranteed profit margins for approved insurance providers from 14.5% to below 10%, and eliminate administrative and operating expense reimbursement to make crop insurance providers more competitive.

Shift taxpayer funds to environmental protections, conservation practices and climate-smart practices.

Strengthen nutrition assistance programs to encourage healthy eating.

Create subsidy payment caps on "wealthy, large-scale farming operations" and emphasize aid and debt relief to "working family farmers," especially Black and other socially disadvantaged farmers.

Phase out subsidies to absentee interests.

Increase transparency.

Define success based on outcomes.

However, many of the reforms proposed by the groups have already been undertaken, a representative of a national agriculture organization told the Capital Press.

Parameters exist in every program, with means testing to ensure larger, wealthier farmers don't receive assistance they don't need, and to better reach medium and small farmers, Chandler Goule, CEO of the National Association of Wheat Growers, said.

"There are plenty of backstops out there to make sure every producer has the ability and can be eligible for whatever program it is they qualify for," he said.

But, he said, no program is perfect.

"I think we can always look at efficiencies and what products are being made available," Goule said. "There's always room for improvement."

Speakers during the summit argued against raising crop insurance reference prices, a top priority for wheat farmers in the new farm bill.

"By pushing up reference prices, you're basically pushing up the guarantee of being below that and the payout," said Jerry Theodorou, director of the finance, insurance and trade policy program for the R Street Institute think tank. "(Crop insurance) has become an exceptionally and unnecessarily generous program."

The federal government is the only entity large enough to back a crop insurance program, and producers still pay a portion of the premiums, NAWG's Goule said, adding that crop insurance is different from most other types of insurance.

Private insurance companies know that 4 million drivers won't wreck on the same day, he said, but they know one hurricane can destroy thousands of crops.

"They can't guarantee that that last hurricane that came through Florida wouldn't go up the coast and destroy five states," he said.

Groups such as EWG and Heritage Foundation offer "skewed" data and are funded by special interest groups, he said. Agriculture is an easy target for their fundraising efforts.

"The price tag and deep pockets behind them is the main reason you have to pay attention to them, not because their information is accurate or correct," Goule said.

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