The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) issued a report, “Options to Reduce Budgetary Costs of the Federal Crop Insurance Program,” on 22 December. This is an exercise in presenting Congress with budget options, which the CBO does occasionally. It is essentially a laundry list of ways that Congress can reduce crop insurance spending via the farm bill. The options put forth would reduce spending by $47.5 billion over the next 10 years.
The report was not requested by any specific member of Congress, which is how many such efforts originate. However, these options follow a number of crop insurance reform plans introduced in Congress. The three biggest cost savings are: 1) eliminating the harvest price option; 2) reducing premium...
What You Need to Know Today: A third U.S. border crossing (Columbus, New Mexico) has reopened to Mexican cattle imports following nearly two years of restrictions related to New World screwworm. The reopening could gradually improve feeder cattle availability, although more than 60 confi...
Yesterday, the USDA’s Agricultural Marketing Service (AMS) released a new report of negotiated cash purchases of cattle under the mandatory price report. The report included Colorado, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Texas, and Kansas. The goal of the report was to solve the confidentiality issues e...
Key Takeaways: U.S. soybean crushing began in 1911 and saw its most rapid expansion during the 1930s amid the broader agricultural and technology revolutions of the time. After peaking in the early 2000s, the soybean crushing industry went through a downturn as poor crush margins forced...
