Two King Amendments Included in Farm Bill
Washington, D.C. - Congressman Steve King released the following statement after the House Agriculture Committee passed its version of the 2012 Farm Bill, H.R. 6083, the Federal Agriculture Reform and Risk Management (FARRM) Act of 2012. King gained two legislative victories last night when two amendments he offered during the Committee's markup of the bill were adopted.
The first amendment prohibits states from enacting laws that place onerous conditions on the means of production for agricultural goods that are sold within its own borders but are produced in other states.
"I am pleased that the Committee passed my amendment, the Protect Interstate Commerce Act (PICA) because states are entering into trade protectionism by requiring cost prohibitive production methods in other states," said King. "PICA blocks states from requiring 'free range' eggs or 'free range' pork but covers all agriculture products listed in section 206 of the Agriculture Marketing Act of 1946. By 2014 California will require only 'free range' eggs be sold and the impact of their large market would compel producers in every other state to invest billions to meet the California standard of "means of production." PICA will ensure that radical organizations like the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) and PETA are prohibited from establishing a patchwork of restrictive state laws aimed at slowly suffocating production agriculture out of existence."
The second requires the Secretary of Agriculture, Tom Vilsack, to take action within his jurisdiction to support efforts to increase the storage capacity in the Missouri River reservoir system that is dedicated to flood control and to increase the channel capacity of the River.
"The Committee also passed my amendment to direct the Secretary of Agriculture to support efforts to provide increased flood protection to those devastated by last year's historic flooding along the Missouri River," said King. "The amendment 'directs the Secretary of Agriculture to take action to promote immediate increased flood protection for farmers, producers, and other agricultural interests in the Missouri River basin'." This will protect those in the Missouri River Basin from future serious downstream flooding. I've introduced stand alone legislation, H.R. 2942, to require the Army Corps of Engineers to do this, and through this amendment to the Farm Bill, we've given the Secretary of Agriculture very clear direction to join in the effort to see that this is accomplished.
I want to congratulate Chairman Lucas and Ranking Member Peterson for putting together a Farm Bill that received wide, bi-partisan support from the House Agriculture Committee by passing by a vote of 35-11. This is a good bill that will cut spending, offer farmers and producers more choice in the federal support they receive for the work they do, and bring long overdue reform to nutrition programs to weed out waste, fraud, and abuse. The House Farm Bill now has the momentum to claim floor time before the August Recess."
