The bad news? Payments from the program won’t arrive until late 2009.The new program was created as a part of the recently passed 2008 Farm Bill and will make funds available to farmers who suffer crop losses because of natural disasters. Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, said in a conference call with agriculture reporters Tuesday that he has received the assurance of the U.S. Department of Agriculture that the 2008 losses will be eligible for benefits from the program. That will be welcome news to Iowa farmers who have seen their crops devastated by flooding and storms this year.

“It will be just a matter of getting the program up and running,” said Grassley, explaining that the Department of Agriculture doesn’t yet have the regulations written for the program. “I’ll be watching its implementation very closely.”

“Relief through this fund won’t be immediate,” Grassley said, “but in the end, this is to ensure that payments are made to those who actually need help. And when you compare it to how long it sometimes takes Congress to pass ad hoc disaster assistance, this new approach might be quick.”

Grassley said he has toured many areas affected by floods, noting the widespread and “unprecedented” devastation on farms all around the state. “Flying over Iowa, I saw hardly a field that didn’t have ponding. A lot of fields had lakes. There’s hardly a speck of dry land — most fields were covered with water,” he said. “It’s going to be tough to recover. We’re working on a few things at the federal level that might alleviate some of the pain that farmers are feeling.”

Grassley can take partial credit for putting the new disaster program in place. The $5 billion trust fund was added to the farm bill by the Senate Finance Committee, where Grassley serves as the ranking Republican. It was part of a deal negotiated by members of the Senate finance and agriculture committees that allowed the new farm bill to be expanded above the original budget baseline.

“The disaster trust fund is split into five components, two of which should be applicable to Iowa and the circumstances we’re in,” said Grassley. “The first program is a supplemental revenue assistance program, which covers crop losses due to natural disasters.” Benefits will be based on a nationwide 12-month average crop price during the marketing year.

Grassley said the second component will provide emergency assistance to livestock producers. Disaster payments under the program will be based on farm losses that aren’t covered by crop insurance.

But there is a catch: To be eligible for the program, a farmer must have purchased crop insurance. “If you don’t have crop insurance, you don’t qualify,” said Grassley.

Approximately 8 percent of Iowa’s farmers do not currently have crop insurance, Grassley said.

Grassley urged farmers to register with the Federal Emergency Management Agency to have their losses documented and eligibility approved. Farmers can call 800-621-FEMA for information on how to get into the program. “Make out all the applications for the loan programs, or for these agricultural programs even if you think you aren’t entitled, so that you get into the system,” said Grassley.

Grassley also urged farmers to quickly get in touch with their insurance agents. “Call your insurance agent out and assess damage — find out if you can re-plant,” he said. “Obviously it’s too late for corn, but for us in my part of Iowa we can still plant soybeans if the fields dry out.”

“I’m not focused on simply kicking the ball down the field with another short-term extension,” said Harkin.
“We need to chart the course, set the schedule and wrap up the bill. We all know the main sticking points of the farm bill at this point. It’s time for people to come together and get the solutions and get this bill done. In order for that to happen it will require the leadership of this Congress to break the impasse over the farm bill.”

Harkin noted the fact that Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus, D-Mont., and House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Charlie Rangel, D-N.Y., have been working on a resolution to the funding and tax disagreements. “Resolving this $10 billion in funding and the tax issues are really in their court, not in mine,” said Harkin.

Later Wednesday, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., officially appointed the House members of the Farm Bill Conference Committee. The committee held its first meeting Thursday morning.

Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, quickly criticized the House proposal brought forth in the conference committee meeting. Grassley issued a statement early Thursday afternoon noting that the House proposal leaves out a tax provision that would benefit young and beginning farmers, as well as a provision that would provide tax relief for disabled and retired farmers.

“If the House really wants a farm bill, they didn’t start out very well today,” stated Grassley. “The Senate made investments in nutrition, energy and conservation all while providing important agriculture tax relief. Not only did the House leave out important tax provisions for young and beginning farmers, they also neglected to include relief from the self-employment tax on CRP (Conservation Reserve Program) payments for the disabled and retired.”

Grassley stated that the House proposal would result in some farmers seeing their Social Security or disability payments being slashed.

But controversial issues in the Farm Bill — such as farm program payment limits — have not completely faded away. Once the arguments about funding are settled, it'll be time for the Farm Bill conference committee to revisit policy reforms.

Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, said Tuesday that the House and Senate are close to reaching an agreement on the total budget for the bill. A debate about payment limits, Grassley said, won't occur until next week at the earliest.

That debate will come on the heels of the release of studies showing that the farm program reforms that were passed by the House and Senate won't accomplish their intended goals.

One of those studies was conducted by Dan Owens of the Center for Rural Affairs. Owens examined federal farm program payments in seven states, and after applying the provisions passed in the House and Senate versions of the Farm Bill, concluded that virtually no one would be affected by the reforms.

The elimination of the so-called "three-entity rule" was considered a major reform and was passed by both chambers of Congress. The rule allowed farm operations to literally double their take by claiming payments for up to three individuals or corporate entities.

But nothing was done to change the "spouse rule," which allows married couples to double their farm program payments. Owens studied how the elimination of the three-entity rule would affect farm operations in Iowa, Minnesota, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Kentucky, Georgia and Montana.

"As it is now, you can double your limit through either the three-entity rule or the spouse rule," Owens explained in an interview with the Iowa Independent. "So if you're married, you can double your limit. So what we looked at was how many people using the three-entity rule were actually married." Married couples would be allowed to simply switch over from the three-entity rule to the spouse rule and continue to get double the limit, said Owens. "So elimination of the three-entity rule would have no impact on those individuals."

Owens is critical of those who touted the elimination of the three-entity rule as major reform, particularly Sen. Kent Conrad, D-N.D., and House Agriculture Committee Chairman Collin Peterson, D-Minn.

"Conrad said it's the biggest reform bill of all time. It turns out that's simply not the case. We couldn't find anybody under the House bill that will be impacted by the removal of the three-entity rule — at all. Not a single person," said Owens. "You can't call it reform if nobody's going to be impacted at all. And in fact under the House bill, there were people who would actually get increases if that became the law. The house bill actually increases the limit on direct payments."

In studying the impact of the Senate-passed Farm Bill, Owens said he was able to find a total of five individuals who would be impacted by the elimination of the three-entity rule.

The Center for Rural Affairs study is not the only evidence that the reforms passed by the House and Senate fail to rein in large farm program payments to wealthy landowners.

Grassley released a report of his own on Feb. 5 that analyzed the adjusted gross income limits that were passed by the House and Senate. Grassley had pushed for an amendment to the Senate bill that would have capped farm program payments at $250,000 per individual. That effort failed, but the House and Senate passed provisions that would exclude individuals from farm programs if their annual adjusted gross income was above a certain level.

Grassley's analysis of the AGI limits showed that there are glaring loopholes that can be exploited by large farm operations. "The House and Senate farm bills left loopholes that a 9630 John Deere tractor could drive through," said Grassley. "It was reform in name only."

High-income operators could easily spread out their income among corporate entities or spouses to avoid the limits; reinvesting income by expanding the farm would also create deductions and allow wealthy operators to slide by the limits.

Another loophole noted by Grassley involves the possibility that wealthy landowners could simply change their rental agreements to exploit the system. "High-income landlords might shift from 'share rents' to 'cash rents,'" said Grassley. "Somewhere around 36 percent of those who would lose farm payments under the Senate and House AGI limits are share rent landlords who will in all likelihood keep the payments flowing by changing to cash rents, thereby shifting risk and capital requirements to farmers."

Owens said the Center for Rural Affairs is disappointed with the "false reforms" in the two versions of the Farm Bill and said that Grassley's analysis is further proof that nothing has really changed. "Grassley's analysis shows that in fact the AGI limits are not going to do anything either," said Owens. "The two big pillars of reform here, removing the three-entity rule and lowering the adjusted gross income limit on participation, don't really seem to accomplish much at all."

Owens said that farm programs are important and enjoy widespread support around the nation — but only if the programs are targeted to benefit small and midsized family farms. "When you're sending out these multimillion-dollar subsidy checks to mega farms, that undermines the support nationally for farm programs. People start saying we don't need a farm program. But we do need a farm program. We just need one that works a lot better than the one we've got now."

As urban millionaire landowners continued to cash fat checks from federal commodity programs, calls for reform were left largely unanswered last year as the House of Representatives and Senate hammered out their versions of the new Farm Bill. Some modest changes were included in both versions of the bill, but organizations pushing for reform were generally disappointed.

Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley, a Republican who often complains that 10 percent of the nation's landowners receive a whopping 73 percent of all federal farm-program benefits, has led the effort to direct more funding to small and medium-sized farm operations. Grassley has largely been thwarted in his efforts. Joining with Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., he fought unsuccessfully last year to place hard limits on federal farm-program payments in the Senate's version of the new Farm Bill. Grassley and Dorgan wanted to cap payments at $250,000 per year, but their amendment failed to reach the 60-vote threshold it needed to pass.

This week, Grassley vowed to keep the pressure on and push for payment limits, and he has a powerful ally in his corner: President George W. Bush.

As new U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Ed Shafer was being sworn-in Wednesday, President Bush used the occasion as an opportunity to reaffirm his veto threat of the Farm Bill. "It's critical for farmers and consumers to have a good Farm Bill in place, so Ed's going to work with members of both parties on a bill that spends people's money wisely, doesn't raise taxes, reforms and tightens subsidy payments — a Farm Bill that will benefit the entire economy," said Bush. "I'm confident we can come together to get a good Farm Bill, but if Congress sends me legislation that raises taxes or does not make needed reforms, I'm going to veto it."

In a conference call with agriculture reporters this week, Grassley said there is hope for some compromises as the House and Senate conference committee takes a fresh look at the bill. "With the alliance of the White House and the U.S. Department of Agriculture wanting tighter limits," said Grassley, "It gives me hope that we'll be able to tighten them up to some extent. But I'm here to tell you it's still an uphill battle."

It may be more than an uphill battle for Grassley — it may be a lost cause. The Senate's Farm Bill conference committee members were named this week, and most of those senators voted against the Grassley-Dorgan payment limits amendment in December.

Conference committee members who voted in favor of it include Grassley, Sen. Richard Lugar, R-Ind., and Senate Agriculture Committee Chairman Tom Harkin, D-Iowa.

Committee members who voted against the amendment include Sen. Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga., Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan., Sen. Blanche Lincoln, D-Ark., Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., Sen. Kent Conrad, D-N.D., Sen. Pat Leahy, D-Vt., Sen. Debbie Stabenow, D-Mich., and Sen. Thad Cochran, R-Miss.

The House of Representatives has not yet named its Farm Bill conference committee members.

Some Iowa political heavy-hitters joined forces in Washington, D.C., Wednesday to push for passage of the renewable fuels provisions in the 2007 Farm Bill.

Senate Agriculture Committee Chairman Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, was joined by Iowa Republican colleague Sen. Chuck Grassley and Iowa Gov. Chet Culver for a press conference in which they highlighted the importance of the renewable energy initiatives in the Farm Bill.

"With gasoline prices well above $3 a gallon and home heating oil prices near record levels, there is no longer any debate about the need to ramp up production of home-grown renewable fuels and energy," said Harkin. "That's exactly what the new farm bill does. And that's why I am fighting to end the procedural logjam and get the farm bill passed as soon as possible."

Culver said he was especially excited about the provisions to bolster research and development of new renewable energy sources in the farm bill. "I believe that diversity is the key when it comes to our energy future, and our energy security," said Culver.

The bill passed unanimously out of the Senate Agriculture Committee on Oct. 25, but passage of the Farm Bill by the full Senate has been bogged-down since Nov. 5 as senators have argued about the number of amendments that will be allowed for debate. A cloture motion to end the debate and force a vote on the bill failed to pass on Nov. 16. Another cloture motion has been filed this week, with a vote scheduled for Friday.
Click here to listen to audio of Harkin and Culver discussing the bill.
Photo courtesy Harkin Senate staff

But packer ownership of livestock may soon be brought to an end.

The Senate Agriculture Committee's 2007 Farm Bill, if passed in its current form, will ban packer ownership of livestock. The ban, pushed by Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, was passed as part of a large "En Bloc" amendment to the bill Wednesday.

In explaining to the committee why such a ban is needed, Grassley told a story about a CEO of a meat-packing company who told him his company owns livestock "because when prices are high we kill our own, when prices are low we buy from the farmer."

Grassley has sought to pass such a ban for many years, and came close to achieving just that in 2002, the last time Congress wrote a Farm Bill. In that bill five years ago, a ban on packer ownership of livestock passed in the Senate but was removed in conference with the U.S. House of Representatives.

But this year the House looks a lot different than it did in those early years of the Bush Administration. Time will tell if representatives now favor such a ban more than their predecessors.

Under the provision passed Wednesday, packers could no longer "own or feed livestock directly, through a subsidiary, or through an arrangement that gives the packer operational, managerial, or supervisory control over the livestock, or over the farming operation that produces the livestock." Packers will be left with a 14-day window to own livestock before slaughter. Most small, independent meat-packers will be exempted from the ban, as well as farmer-owned cooperatives in which members own, feed or control the livestock themselves.

In a conference call with reporters Thursday, U.S. Undersecretary of Agriculture Mark Keenum said that he expects a lot of debate about the packer ban. "We think it's going to be very controversial," said Keenum. He said it is certain to be a "conferenceable" issue between the House and Senate.

Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, and Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., held a press conference Tuesday to explain the details of a planned amendment that would cap the amount of money a farmer can receive in federal farm program payments.

The Farm Bill will be taken up tomorrow by the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry. Grassley and Dorgan will not propose their amendment in the committee. Rather they will wait until the bill goes to the full Senate to put their amendment up for a vote.

A series of compromises have been reached under the leadership of Iowa's other Senator, Democrat Tom Harkin, who chairs the ag committee. But the proposed bill reportedly does not include a cap on the amount of federal dollars that a farmer can receive through the bill's many commodity programs.

"The payment limits language that's been released by the agriculture committee is simply the status quo, from my point of view," said Grassley. "What's even more disconcerting is that we've been hearing that the mark considered on Wednesday will include provisions similar to the House bill."

The U.S. House of Representatives passed its version of the 2007 Farm Bill in July. The House bill would exclude from federal farm programs any individual who makes more than an average of $1 million in adjust gross income over a three-year period. It would not, however, cap payments to individuals who are eligible for payments.

"These reforms are window dressing, and they don't accomplish much at all. We need a clean vote on real reform," said Grassley. "We need a real, hard cap, not a fig leaf that's being proposed." Grassley warned that the adjusted-gross-income approach to limiting farm program payments is vulnerable to "subterfuge."

Dorgan, who has long sided with Grassley on the subject of limits to farm program payments, explained that he and Grassley are strong supporters of a "farm safety net," but he said "that safety net, regrettably, has become in many cases a set of golden arches for some of the largest corporate 'agri-factories' in our country. And a substantial amount of money goes to some of the largest corporate farms."

Current law allows substantial money to go to "people that never lived on the farm, never laid eyes on the farm," said Dorgan. He said many are not involved in farming in any way.

Dorgan explained that their amendment will attempt to accomplish three goals: establish a payment limit of $250,000 per farm; require that those receiving farm program benefits be "actively engaged in farming"; and that payments must be attributable to a person and not a corporate entity.

The Bush Administration has also called for caps on farm program payments, something that may aid Grassley and Dorgan's efforts this year.

These reforms are not new to Grassley and Dorgan, who led a similar effort when the 2002 Farm Bill was being written. That effort resulted in a victory in the Senate in 2002, but the payment limits were removed when the Senate Farm Bill went to conference committee with the House.
An audio recording of Grassley and Dorgan's press conference is available here.

The bill, which covers a wide variety of federal initiatives from commodity and rural development programs to the food stamp system, was expected to be finished in the summer. Now it’s the middle of October, and the Senate Agriculture Committee has yet to hold a hearing.

The U.S. House of Representatives, with much infighting and backbiting, passed its version of the Farm Bill in the last week of July. The Senate was supposed to follow up quickly and hammer out its version, but as weeks became months, some have begun to wonder if the 2007 Farm Bill may become the 2008 Farm Bill.

Iowa farmers are now running full steam ahead in harvest mode, hauling in what is expected to be a record crop of corn. And once those fields are harvested, decisions must be made for next year. Decisions must be made about fall tillage, fertilizing and pest control, and the federal farm programs play an important role in that decision-making process.

Alan Ammons, a corn and soybean farmer and agricultural real estate salesman in Monroe County, said it’s important for farmers to know soon what those farm programs will be like.
“We fertilized on my place right behind the combine, with the plan that we’d plant corn next year,” said Ammons. Now he’s just hoping the 2007 Farm Bill doesn’t result in “some wild new ramification in the program that would tell us that we didn’t want to do that on all those acres.”

But Ammons said most farmers in his area are probably assuming that strong prices for corn and soybeans will continue through next year, which lessens the concern about a government safety net. “Right now, I doubt that it will matter so much with the corn and soybean prices the way they are.” Nonetheless, Ammons said, with the extremely high prices farmers are paying for seed, fertilizer and equipment, those high commodity prices still result in slim margins for the farmer. “A farmer can get out on a limb a long, long ways,” said Ammons, and he has to hope that “either weather or the government farm program doesn’t come along and chop it off behind you.”

The Senate Agriculture Committee, chaired by Iowa Democrat Sen. Tom Harkin, has been delayed mostly by financial constraints. Last week the Senate Finance Committee, after a long and public argument about funding for the Farm Bill, finally came through with an additional $17 billion.

Harkin immediately scheduled committee hearings to get started, only to postpone them several hours later. This week the Congress has been on recess, so it won’t be until next week when Harkin will finally get to gavel his committee to order. But just getting started with the committee process doesn’t mean the bill will be finished quickly.

The ag committee process could take a full week or more, and then the bill must go to the full Senate where it could get delayed again. And once a Senate bill is passed, the House and Senate must then convene a conference committee to resolve the differences between their two bills.

It could be well into November or later before a farm bill ever reaches the desk of President George W. Bush, who, by the way, has already threatened a veto.

In an interview with Iowa Independent, Iowa Farm Bureau National Policy Advisor Mark Salvador said his organization is very concerned about the late farm bill. “We’ve spent a lot of time scratching our heads thinking about what this means,” said Salvador. “There are several programs that expired on Sept. 30. Those include conservation programs and rural development and energy, things like that. We are concerned about the continuity of those programs, there’s no doubt about that.”

But Salvador said that given target prices, long range prices and today’s relative strength in the commodity market, “people are producing for the marketplace and I don’t think there’s that much consideration given to the safety net today.” He noted, however, that while it’s not a huge issue here in Iowa, “the winter wheat guys have already planted their crop or are just wrapping that process up. I know the wheat industry is very interested to know what kind of law they’re going to have to work with.”

The American Farm Bureau Federation and more than 60 other organizations came together to write a letter to senators urging them to end the gridlock and finish the farm bill. Those groups include such varied interests as the National Farmers Union, Pheasants Forever, America’s Second Harvest, the United Methodist Church and A Jewish Response to Hunger.

Harkin spokesperson Kate Cyrul told Iowa Independent in an e-mail last week that the 2002 Farm Bill provisions that expired on Sept. 30 have been extended. “The Senate passed what’s called a CR, or Continuing Resolution, which provides stopgap funding until Nov. 16. Basically, any provisions of the farm bill that run on a fiscal year, say the Food Stamp Program, for example, are covered under the CR,” said Cyrul. She said that the committee will begin its farm bill hearings as soon as possible.

Iowa Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley, who serves on the agriculture committee and the finance committee, said this week in a conference call with reporters that he expects the ag committee to get started next week.

“Senator Harkin took a stand months ago that we all knew was clear, that he wasn’t going to bring a bill up until he knew exactly how much money he was going to have,” said Grassley. “It took us in the finance committee a while to put together our package, which obviously, we just voted out last Thursday.”

Update: Harkin spokesperson Kate Cyrul today stated that the week of Oct. 22 is a “strong possibility” as the date when the Senate Agriculture Committee will convene to vote on the farm bill.

Nonetheless, Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley is leading a call to help thousands of them in southern states who for years were discriminated against as they tried to participate in federal agriculture loan programs. And Grassley, a Republican, has a key Democratic senator as an ally in his efforts: Barack Obama.

Grassley is a member of the Senate Agriculture Committee that is slowly crafting its version of the 2007 Farm Bill, and he has called on committee leadership this week to include legislation in the bill that would help African-American farmers who were denied entry into the Pigford v. Glickman settlement.

That 1999 settlement ended a discrimination lawsuit between African-American farmers and the U.S. Department of Agriculture. But years later the issue is not resolved. As many as 22,000 farmers filed claims in the Pigford settlement, and about 15,000 of them received compensation.

In a press release this week, Grassley stated that as many as 75,000 did not have their claims heard because of a filing deadline mistake. A September article in the Hill reported that about $730 million has been paid out in claims as a result of the Pigford settlement. Grassley said that black farmers in the South should get fair consideration of their case, "and up to this point, the Department of Agriculture hasn't allowed it to happen."

The farm bill passed by the House of Representatives in July includes a provision that would allow a new review to individuals whose Pigford settlement claims were denied. Grassley and Obama have been pushing for similar legislation in the Senate bill.

"I had hoped we could settle this without legislation, but enough is enough," said Grassley. "If we don't pass legislation thousands of victims of discrimination continue to be denied an opportunity to even have their claims heard."

Grassley and Obama's bill, named the Pigford Claims Remedy Act of 2007, is similar to the House-passed language introduced by Rep. Bobby Scott, D-Va., and Rep. Steve Chabot, R-Ohio.

Grassley's letter this week to Senate Agriculture Committee Chairman Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, and ranking member Sen. Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga., states that there is "more than enough in funding to provide a robust legislative fix to the problems with the Pigford claims process."

Grassley, a Republican who serves on the Senate Agriculture Committee, said this week his top priority for the farm bill is to significantly lower the amount that individuals can receive in federal farm program payments. He hopes the Senate's bill does a lot more to lower payment limits than the House of Representatives bill passed July 27.
He characterized the payment limitations passed by the House as "laughable."

In a conference call with agriculture reporters this week, Grassley explained that there are many areas where the Senate farm bill will be similar to the bill passed by the House. But he detailed several specific areas where he will push for a different approach in the Senate bill.

"This month I've told Iowans that I hope the Senate bill will contain a real legitimate payment limitation, with a hard cap of $250,000," said Grassley. "That's to counteract the laughable figure that's in the House bill."

The House version of the farm bill would exclude from federal farm programs any individual with an annual adjusted gross income of $1 million. Grassley has called for a simple cap of $250,000 as the amount that an individual can receive in farm program payments. He has been joined by Democrats and Republicans in calling for a lower limit, and the idea is supported by the Bush administration.

Grassley said his second priority is to implement a ban on meat packers owning their own herds of livestock. The fact that large corporate meat packing operations own their own livestock herds makes it difficult or impossible for an independent farmer to find a fair market for his animals. "I'd actually like for this to be a part of a bigger 'Competition Title' that would include provisions from a bill that I announced about a month ago, called the Agricultural Competition Enhancement Act," said Grassley.
The competition act was introduced by Grassley in July and is co-sponsored by Wisconsin Democrat Herb Kohl and South Dakota Republican John Thune.

Improving the fairness of markets for livestock producers has been difficult, as Grassley explained that similar provisions were passed by the Senate in 2002 but ultimately defeated when the 2002 farm bill went to conference committee. Grassley said he is hopeful that the competition provisions will make it into the final farm bill this year, as the makeup of Congress has changed significantly since the last time the farm bill was written. "I think that we're going to be able to get it through the Senate. But again, I can't speak for the House of Representatives," he said.

Grassley said another priority he will fight for in the Senate version of the farm bill is a ban on mandatory arbitration in agricultural contracts. He explained that hog farmers often raise animals under contract with a large company and have few options when a contract dispute arises. "I'm not against arbitration, just mandatory arbitration," said Grassley. "I hate to see it be the only way to resolve disputes, because a farmer ought to have access to the courts. Under mandatory arbitration, a farmer doesn't have that court of last resort if he thinks the mandatory arbitration was unfair."

Grassley said he also hopes that the farm bill will solve a longstanding claim by African-American farmers who were unfairly left out of farm programs. He said he'll work to provide "a remedy for African-American farmers who were inadvertently left out of the previous farm legislation. This goes back maybe 10 or 15 years, but it's still not too late to help some of them. It was supposed to help the African-American farmer get justice from the U.S. Department of Agriculture when they were cheated."

Other priorities listed by Grassley include continued support for value-added agriculture initiatives and more support for cellulosic energy development.

The Senate Agriculture Committee is expected to begin writing its version of the 2007 farm bill in September. Iowa's other senator, Democrat Tom Harkin, is the chairman of the Senate ag committee.