“(Reuters) – U.S. lawmakers are short on time and money to make the biggest cuts in agriculture in a generation and failure risks unintentionally driving up food prices and adding to an already onerous deficit.
Just as Congress took the country to the brink of an unprecedented debt default by haggling over whether to raise the debt ceiling, fractious Republicans and Democrats may wait this year until the last minute to agree to significant cuts to farm supports amid historically high crop prices.
The U.S. farm law, mammoth legislation that covers everything from food stamps to soil erosion, expires September 30.
Without a new law or an extension, a 1949 law — the bogeyman of farm bill showdowns — would automatically go into effect. It would limit plantings and have the government pay farmers up to twice what crops would sell for on the open market. Farm subsidies would rise by tens of billions of dollars and consumer grocery bills would rise while the economy is still struggling to recover from the recession.
There are fiscal and policy obstacles to a new farm law….”
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