2007 Farm Bill Items of Interest

The 2007 Farm Bill Reauthorization was introduced in the House of Representatives on September 13th.  The Farm Bill offers many opportunities for non-industrial private forest landowners, other than direct cash subsidies, including the furtherment of woody biomass as a renewable energy source.  Covering such issues as energy, nutrition, conservation, and rural development - the farm bill is an omnibus multi-year authorizing law for major food and farm programs.  The current farm bill, the Farm Security and Rural Investment Act of 2002, will expire in 2007, necessitating action by Congress.

As one of the largest private forest landowner organizations in the country, we believe the following items in the 2007 Farm Bill are important to non-industrial private forest landowners:

• The concept of carbon sequestration by trees is very important to NIPF landowners who find traditional commodities are market-saturated or are restrained by regulation/statute.
• Current biomass definitions in statute and regulation are by-product and residue based, rather than commodity based as they should be.
•  Continuing support for McIntyre-Stennis and Renewable Resources Extension Act (RREA)
•  Improve “technology transfer” to non-industrial private landowners, including quantifiable metrics of: 
       How are research needs assessed? 
       How are science findings delivered?  
       How is progress measured?

Submitted by Frank Stewart, the FLA contract lobbyist; if you have questions or comments please direct them to him at FMS@Washington-Resource.com