WASHINGTON, D.C. — Farm and agriculture programs

escaped the White House’s sharp knife days ago,

after Congress passed and President Donald Trump

signed a $1.1 trillion appropriations bill for 2017, averting

another shutdown deadline and funding the federal

government though September.

 

The Senate approved the measure by a vote of 79-18

with three senators abstaining. Trump signed the package

last Friday. The White House had proposed cutting

more than $18 billion from the appropriations, but

Congress succeeded in getting most of the measure it

wanted.

 

Two days earlier the House had passed the bill without

$1.5 billion in funding Trump wanted to start building the

U.S.-Mexico border wall; however, Congress did approve

$343 million to repair border fencing and $1.2 billion for

new and expanded communications and surveillance

technologies and equipment, and border access roads.

Congress also approved more than $15 billion in new

defense spending to total $598 billion, including monies

for new ships and warplanes and a 2.1 percent pay

hike for the military. Funding was also approved for

NASA and $34.1 billion to the National Institutes of

Health and $8.8 billion for the FBI and other federal

law enforcement agencies.

 

The agreement, under Congressional negotiations for

the past several months, approved several billions of

dollars in USDA programs supporting farmers and the

agricultural sector.

 

Included was $3 million to fund a national campaign

to promote genetically modified organisms (GMO) in

food, pushed by more than 50 agricultural and food industry

groups. In late April the groups called on Trump

to launch the outreach effort, saying the campaign

was needed to convince the American public that GMO

foods are safe.

 

Funding was not approved for a proposed cottonseed

Title 1 program, but negotiators directed new USDA

Secretary Sonny Perdue to come up with a plan in 60

days to help cotton farmers.

 

Lawmakers fought off efforts by the White House to

eliminate the $182 million McGovern-Dole Food Education

program that has fed more than 3.4 million individuals

in 14 countries in recent years. More than

$20 million was set aside to assist 68,000 individuals

in local and regional programs.

 

In an argument to cut the program, the White House

said there was little evidence to prove the funding had

been effective.

 

The omnibus bill also increased loan money to the

Farm Service Agency to assist farmers hurt by decreased

access to credit and low commodity prices.

 

Funds for the program were depleted months ago.

Congress added a 33 percent increase to the USDA’s $49

million Rural Business and Cooperative Grant Program,

boosting it by $16 million. High on the chopping block

was abolishing $82 million to train migrant farm workers,

but Congress said “no” and funded the jobs programs.

 

More than $112 million was cut from the Food for

Peace Program, but lawmakers avoided efforts to scrap

the $363 million effort altogether. It is a 60-year program

maintained by the State Department that has

been vital to feeding billions in developing countries

and critical for national security, supporters said.

 

Several national farm groups, including the National

Farmers Union, the National Corn Growers Assoc. and

the National Cattlemen’s Beef Assoc., did not respond to

Farm World seeking comment after the vote. “We don’t

have anything to say about it,” a spokesman for American

Farm Bureau Federation said in an email response.