Congress has approved the fiscal year 2020 agriculture spending legislation. It includes $23.5 billion in discretionary funding, which is $451 million above Fiscal Year 2019 spending levels. South Dakota Farmers Union President Doug Sombke says its critical the government more money for agricultural research.
The ag spending bill also includes $1.5 billion in disaster funding that was set to expire at the end of the year. Sombke says while that federal assistance is needed farmers and ranchers would prefer to get their money from the marketplace.
He says it’s more important for the government to give farmers and ranchers the tools they have to have to keep operating.
Sombke says its positive Congress included $550 million in the spending bill for the USDA’s Rural Broadband Reconnect Pilot Program and fully funded the Farm and Ranch Stress Assistance Network.
