May 20, 2008

New Farm Bill not perfect, but has many positives for cattle producers: WOODALL

( Colin (CALL-UN) Woodall, is executive director of legislative affairs for the National Cattlemen's Beef Association)

The new Farm Bill passed by Congress last week is likely headed for a veto by President Bush. But National Cattlemen's Beef Association (NCBA) chief lobbyist Colin Woodall says he expects  votes will be sufficient to override the veto later this week.

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Woodall says the bill is far from perfect, but is legislation everyone in agriculture can live with. It's also by far the best alternative available at this time.

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He added that the Farm Bill makes improvements in the mandatory Country of Origin Labeling (COOL) law that was passed in 2002 – making it more workable and manageable for livestock producers before it goes into effect on September 30, 2008.

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The Farm Bill also approves state-inspected meat processing plants to ship product across state lines – a provision Woodall says is long overdue.

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Additional funding for the Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP) is also an important provision for cattlemen. This program has been popular with livestock producers, but lack of funding has created a backlog of EQIP applications.

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