Lawmakers Launches Effort to Extend MILC Until Farm Bill is Resolved

By CnAgri2012-09-17 20:01:11 Print

Sixty lawmakers are calling on their colleagues to take action on extending federal dairy safety net programs until a new farm bill is put in place. Rep. Reid Ribble of Wisconsin and Vermont Congressman Peter Welch are joining Sens. Patrick Leahy, Vermont, and Olympia Snowe, Maine, in urging Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and House Speaker John Boehner to extend the Milk Income Loss Contract program on a temporary basis before the current farm bill expires on September 30.

In a letter to Sen. Reid and Rep. Boehner, the lawmakers added that as of September 1, the MILC program began to provide coverage at a reduced level, which makes it unlikely for the program to be triggered even in these times of high feed prices.

"Most concerning to us is the change in the program's feed cost adjuster, which was created in the 2008 Farm Bill to address volatile swings in feed prices," the letter said. "This change in particular has put our farmers at far greater risk as this year's drought continues to impact much of the country and drive up the cost of feed. In addition, instead of offering dairy farmers coverage at 45 percent of the difference between the target price and the actual price, the program now only provides coverage at 34 percent of this difference. The program's volume cap has also declined, falling from 2.985 million to 2.4 million pounds per dairy farmer."

The memo continued to say that the current Senate-passed farm bill and the House Agriculture Committee's version both move to eliminate the MILC program in favor of a new policy. But until a new bill is enacted and USDA has a dairy program in place, the lawmakers would like to find the necessary offsets to maintain the MILC program at its previous coverage levels for the duration of any extension of current policy.

"Dairy farmers across the country have benefited from the MILC program during difficult times and we fear that failure to maintain the program at its previous levels will saddle dairy farmers with significant risks as their feed prices continue to skyrocket," they say.