Talks Yield Progress On Farm Bill

Agreements on conservation and nutrition helped move House and Senate negotiators closer Wednesday to agreement on a long-overdue farm bill. The measure also includes a guaranteed $200 million to help restore the Everglades.

Lawmakers, however, still had to wrestle with serious disagreements over the future of dairy programs before finishing work on the bill, which would end traditional crop subsidies in favor of fixed-but-declining payments to farmers.

“This legislation changes agricultural policy more fundamentally than any law in 60 years,” said Sen. Dick Lugar, R-Ind., chairman of the Senate Agriculture Committee.

Lawmakers were also working on how to meet a key demand by Senate Democrats that some kind of permanent farm law be in place - a guarantee that farm programs won’t be allowed to simply vanish after the pending farm bill ends in seven years.

Efforts were still under way to resolve disagreements on the peanut program between House enemies of the program and senators who want to reverse some of the House-passed changes.

But the agreements on conservation and nutrition helped win support from the administration and urban senators who worry about those issues.

“The 2 million farmers are important, and this bill will serve them well,” said Sen. Patrick J. Leahy of Vermont, senior Democrat on the committee. “But we cannot forget that farm policy affects the over 250 million of Americans who are concerned about the environment, conservation and important nutrition programs.”

Among those provisions is a guarantee that food stamps will be authorized for two more years. Although the program will be changed in welfare legislation, supporters want a bargaining position against efforts to weaken funding.

The two sides also agreed to save the Conservation Reserve Program, which pays landowners to idle land that is highly erodible or otherwise environmentally sensitive.

Thirty-six million acres would be kept in the program.

The government would guarantee $200 million to clean up environmental damage caused by sugar growers to the Everglades, and seek an additional $100 million through the sale or swap of other federal property in Florida.