02/09/05 Congress gets to deal with ag budget

The Bush administration wants to cut about 587 million dollars per year from ag spending. The President proposed a cap on farm program payments of 250 thousand dollars per year, elimination of the three-entity rule and five- percent program payment cuts across the board. On Capitol Hill the budget got a cool reaction from many farm state lawmakers on both sides of the aisle. Senator Mike Crapo says the 2002 Farm Bill was supposed to be a blueprint for the future. CRAPO "We gauged that all out and we built the entire farm program around that and that's very involved in our international trade relations and a lot of other factors. I think it would be wrong to upset that apple cart right now." Crapo predicts that Congress will make major changes to the ag budget. American Farm Bureau Federation's Mark Maslyn says its going to be interesting to watch the regional differences among members of the House and Senate. MASLYN "Some of these proposed cuts impact some regions differently than others. So it will be a fascinating exercise to watch how that is choreographed." Roughly one in four Idaho farms, 28 percent, receive some kind of subsidy. The USDA says nearly 71 hundred Idaho farmers received 151 million dollars in subsidies in 2003. Today's Idaho Ag News Bill Scott