Congressional Republicans who opposed the Inflation Reduction Act, the main funding mechanism for President Joe Biden's climate policy, would like to move the IRA's funding for climate-related farming practices into the farm bill, which could permanently boost funding for conservation programs.
Republicans also hope to provide more flexibility in how the IRA conservation funding can be used. Under the IRA, the funding is specifically targeted toward practices that could improve soil carbon, reduce nitrogen losses or reduce greenhouse gas emissions
.“A lot of stuff that we do in the conservation title in the farm bill would accomplish those same objectives and it would stretch our farm bill dollars further,” said Sen. John Thune, R-S.D.
But moving that funding would require support from Senate Ag Chairwoman Debbie Stabenow, an IRA champion hesitant to budge on the bill’s climate provisions. Moreover, due to the Congressional Budget Office's budgeting rules, shifting the money from the IRA into the farm bill could result in a loss of some of the IRA funding.
Stabenow sits in a prime negotiating position with the Senate Ag Committee's top Republican, John Boozman of Arkansas, and House Ag Chairman Glenn “GT” Thompson, R-Pa.: The IRA is already law. The conservation program funding exists outside of the farm bill, which means it does not have to be revisited in the next farm bill from the House and Senate Ag committees.
But the chance to permanently increase the baseline for conservation programs may yet have some appeal to Stabenow, according to Ferd Hoefner, a policy consultant who was the longtime policy director for the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition.
“By moving it to the farm bill baseline, it becomes permanent money rather than money that disappears in 2031,” Hoefner said.
Under congressional budget reconciliation rules used to enact the IRA, the funding in that law has no effect on program levels after 2031. However, lawmakers believe CBO could allow them to permanently boost conservation program funding levels by moving the IRA accounts into the farm bill.
Adding the dollars to the farm bill may be a tough sell for Stabenow, especially if Republicans are keen on applying them to conservation practices more broadly. She has defended the language in the IRA tying funding to carbon sequestration and greenhouse gas reduction practices. She previously pushed back on Republicans’ demands for the funding to be applied across a more comprehensive set of conservation practices, telling Agri-Pulse that she feels the options presented by both the IRA and the existing rules for farm bill conservation programs “provide the flexibility to cover farms all over the country.”
“There’s basically enough flexibility there to meet all our growers’ needs,” Stabenow said.