| NEW! Honey:
To aid honey producers and
provide them with a safety net in times of poor market conditions, the new farm
bill creates a marketing assistance loan program similar to that of other
program commodities. The new program
provides producers with price support loans or loan deficiency payments with a
loan rate of $0.60 per pound.
NEW!
Specialty Crop Purchases:
Increases
carryover-spending authority for Section 32 commodity purchases. Directs additional commodity purchases by requiring not less than
$200 million of Section 32 funds per year to be used to purchase fruits and
vegetables and other specialty food crops. At least $50 million of that
amount is to be used for fresh fruits and vegetables for schools through the
Department of Defense’ Fresh Program.
* Market Access Program:
Increases the Market Access
Program (MAP) from $90 million to $200 million per year by 2006. This program
aids in the creation, expansion, and maintenance of foreign markets for U.S. agricultural products and
is very important to the fruit and vegetable industry.
NEW!
Technical Assistance Specialty Crop (TASC):
Creates a Technical
Assistance Specialty Crop (TASC) fund of $19 million over 10 year to address
the barriers to exports that U.S. producers of specialty
crops face. The purpose of TASC is to provide direct assistance through public
and private sector projects to facilitate increased exports of U.S. specialty crops within the
global marketplace.
NEW! Plant Health and Quarantines: Helps provide greater
protection to farmers
by streamlining the Animal Plant Health Inspection Service's ability to respond
to plant and animal pest and disease emergencies, and authorizes emergency
loans for producers affected by quarantines.
* Protection from Domestic Competition: Retains the planting
restriction on fruits and vegetables on program crop acres.
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