Senate Ag Committee uses EQIP funds for child nutrition
Farm and Ranch March 29, 2010 The U. S. Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry has approved Committee Chairman Blanche Lincoln’s Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010. The bill reauthorizes childhood nutrition programs and invests 4.5 billion dollars in new child nutrition program funding over the next ten years. Chairman Lincoln paid for a portion of the new spending with some Environmental Quality Incentive Program funds, one of the most popular conservation programs among farmers and ranchers the USDA has. The Ranking Republican on the House Agriculture Committee, Frank Lucas of Kansas, thinks the House panel will work to find a different funding source. Lucas: “I appreciate Senator Lincoln‘s efforts to address the needs of childhood nutrition. We all agree on that. But taking money of the EQIP program, the Environmental Quality Incentives Program, which is as our listeners are well aware of that basic cost-share conservation program that meets the environmental needs of this country. EQIP is oversubscribed in virtually every part of the country. There has never been as much money as there have been demands for the program. To strip money out of EQIP, which will make it more difficult for farmers and ranchers to meet many of the standards imposed on them by the EPA and everyone on down, is just unfortunate. An effort in the Senate Committee to take money from the Conservation Stewardship Program failed by one vote. I’m Bob Hoff and that’s the Northwest Farm and Ranch Report on the Northwest Ag Information Network. ?
