The annual convention of the Kansas corn, wheat, soybean, and grain sorghum associations was held recently in Salina, Kansas. A number of speakers covered topics including the markets, legislative and policy discussions.
Sara Wyant, editor of Agri-Pulse Communications, gave an update on the challenges and opportunities for United States agriculture in 2023. She looked at five topics during her session—mid-term election outcomes, changing political landscape, the upcoming farm bill, committee changes and what’s happening in rural America in general.
She said prior to the mid-terms, there were predictions swirling around about there going to be a “red wave,” but in reality it turned out to be more of a “pink dud.”
“It really could not materialize despite the fact that history would tell you that when a president’s approval ratings like Joe Biden were not very high, that certainly there’ll be a switch and a midterm election,” she said. “And that’s happened in most years. We just didn’t see it.”
There was a lot of action happening in both the House and Senate, and Wyant believes there are a couple of matters to watch. Despite the popularity of former President Donald Trump in rural America, she thinks it’s not nearly as cut and dry as it once was.
“But what we saw is that his negatives in so many parts of America, especially suburban America, where voters came out strongly, were so much higher, that people decided that Biden was a better (option),” she said.
Voters were also worried about abortion, inflation—especially on food and energy prices. Wyant said costs have moderated some, but there are still areas of the country facing high prices when it comes to energy needs.
“So there’s a lot of divide across America in terms of what issues are really motivating voters,” she said.
It was a tougher cycle for the Republicans in 2022 then Wyant thinks 2024 will be, mainly due to the number of Senate seats up for grab. Democrats will have 20 seats to defend compared to the 10 Republican seats.
“Still, I think it’s going to be very, very tight. It’s going to be Democrats going into this with a strong advantage, and potentially a lot of efforts by the White House and by the USDA, to make sure that they are trying to do everything they possibly can to attract voters,” she said.
Then there’s the leadership and committee rosters in the senate and house. It remains to be seen how it’s all going to play out, especially with the farm bill on the horizon.
“You’ve got Congressman Frank Lucas, who was chair during what became the 2014 farm bill. Only nine of the GOP members were around when the 2018 farm bill passed,” she said. “So what does that tell you? There’s a lot of room for education, not only for members of the committee, but for all of the members who are going to be voting on potentially a farm bill.”
Wyant said this gives commodity groups and their members an opportunity to go visit with members of both senate and house when in Washington, DC, or invite them out to help with the “steep learning curve” when it comes to agriculture.
Switching over to environmental issues, Wyant said Agri-Pulse opened an office in Sacramento four years ago, because what happens in California on the policy side has a way of moving across and impacting the rest of the country.
“There are some things that we have been writing about California in the last four years that just make you want to wonder why you would keep farming,” she said. “The multi-year drought has been a major factor out there, but they also are working really hard to phase out a lot of pesticides.”
There are already a significant number of regulatory burdens and farm worker wages have increased dramatically.
People are using a lot of tactics to try and shut down commercial agriculture in California, and Wyant and her staff watch it very closely. Drought and its affects are another thing they keep close tabs on.
Keeping an eye on the farm bill
When it comes to the farm bill, Wyant has been evaluating every one of them since 1980.
Nutrition was added in 1974, with conservation coming along in 1985, the organic title in 1990 and bioenergy in 2002. Looking over the titles, Wyant said many question the need for all of them, but it’s core to it. Most farmers she’s talked to know they’re going to have policy around the commodities, and don’t want crop insurance touched.
She believes there will be some minor changes around the edges in terms of giving producers more flexibility, and she sees not much change to ARC or PLC. There might be some changes in regards to reference prices and loan rates, but addressing higher commodity prices and sky high input prices needs to be evaluated too.
Rural America is also a different place, and when it comes to political clout in these areas and with rural voters, Wyant believes this will have longer term political implications. During COVID, many people wanted to be out in rural areas, but they also had to have broadband in order to work from anywhere.
On farm employment and opportunities are huge, especially for younger farmers.
“They want to be able to save up to get into agriculture and also be able to have health insurance and things that you might not be able to offer as a farm employer,” she said. “I also hear about health care, childcare, making sure there’s the ability to have good schools.”
However, last but not least is having a nice restaurant or place to gather in the rural community.
“I think as you look forward at all these policies, I’m really glad to hear that your thought leaders in these organizations that are represented here are already thinking in those ways,” she said. “I hope that you can utilize both federal funding, state funding and public private partnerships to accomplish those goals so that we can keep a very robust, rural Kansas and also make sure that we have the people to influence the policymakers to have successful initiatives in the future.”
Kylene Scott can be reached at 620-227-1804 or [email protected].
