Upcoming Barley Industry Events
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September 2019: September Marketing Seminar Fargo, ND 9/11; Craft Maltsters Guild Floor Malting Webinar 9/12
October 2019: Beer Institute Hill Climb and Beer Jobs Showcase 10/15-10/16
November 2019: Tri-State Grain Growers Convention Spokane, WA 11/13-11/16; Craft Maltsters Guild Equipment Vendor Webinar 11/14
December 2019: Montana Grain Growers Association Annual Convention Great Falls, MT 12/3-12/5; National Scab Initiative Meeting Milwaukee, WI 12/7-12/9; Prairie Grains Conference Grand Forks, ND 12/11-12/12
January 2020:
February 2020: Winter Meeting in DC 2/3-2/6; Craft Maltsters Guild Advanced Class in Craft Malt Production 2/3-2/6; Craft Malt Conference in Fort Collins, CO 2/7-2/8, Craft Maltsters Guild Annual Meeting 2/8; Canadian Barley Symposium and BRMBRI Triennial Meeting Winnipeg, AB 2/24-2/25
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March 2020: National Barley Improvement Committee, Washington, DC 3/8-3/11
April 2020: World Beer Cup San Antonio, TX 4/17-4/19; Craft Brewers Conference San Antonio, TX 4/19-4/22
May 2020:
June 2020:
July 2020:
August 2020: MBAA and ASBC World Brewing Congress Minneapolis, MN 8/1-8/4
September 2020: Great American Beer Festival Denver, CO 9/23-9/25
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Gordley Associates August Recess Updates
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--Signed Part 340 Comments Letter
--Attended Ag Transportation Coalition Meeting
--Will attend September Field to Market climate change meeting
--Met with Sen. Hoeven's staff regarding appropriations issues including Wheat & Barley Scab Initiative
--Joined letter to Armed Service Committee
--Joined America Grows Act letter
--
Warehouse Letter to Ag Appropriations Sub-Committee
--Submitted glyphosate comments
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USDA Opens Farm Bill ARC/PLC Sign Up for 2019 Crop
USDA announced today that the Farm Service Agency began accepting enrollment in the Agriculture Risk Coverage (ARC) and Price Loss Coverage (PLC) Programs for the 2019 Crop Year; and sign-up will last through March 15, 2020. Sign up for the 2020 Crop Year can begin as early as October 7, 2019 (once the 2019 election and enrollment are completed); with the sign up period ending June 30, 2020. Decision making tools to help producers choose between the ARC and PLC programs are also once again being made available through a partnership with USDA and the
University of Illinois and
Texas A&M.
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Ag Transportation Coalition Discusses Rail and Trucking Issues
NBGA was represented at a meeting of the Ag Transportation Working Group (ATWG) held on August 22
nd
at the offices of the American Farm Bureau Federation (AFBF). The group discussed transportation issues of mutual interest and concern, including changes to Hours of Service rules for truck drivers and railroad industry oversight. Representatives from the American Trucking Association (ATA) and AFBF provided updates on proposed changes to the Hours of Service rules that are intended to address concerns related to hauling livestock and perishable commodities. AFBF discussed their analysis that led to a petition being submitted on hours of service rules. ATA discussed the efforts to update the definition of “Agriculture Commodity” that is used by the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) in their application of hours of service rules and exemptions. Livestock and other ag industries are seeking to balance the need for more specificity while maintaining flexibility. The FMCSA issued a notice seeking public comment on the agriculture commodity definition. Comments are due on October 7
th
and the Ag Transportation Working Group plans to develop draft comments that a number of groups can sign onto.
The meeting also included remarks from Martin Oberman, a Commissioner on the Surface Transportation Board (STB), which provides federal oversight of the railroad industry. Commissioner Oberman provided an update on STB activities and his general philosophy on railroad oversight. Commissioner Oberman indicated his hope to promote competition and create leverage for rail customers where there currently is none. The STB recently held its first oral argument hearing in 6 years. The case involved New Century Ag of North Dakota in a dispute with CP over shuttle car access to the CP lines. Commissioner Oberman also touched on the Rate Reform Task Force, demurrage issues, and Precision Scheduled Railroading.
Additionally, the meeting included a presentation from USDA Ag Marketing Service on a new web-based data platform on transportation of ag products.
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NBGA Re-Submits Comments on Glyphosate to EPA
NBGA
re-submitted comments
to the
EPA
w
ith regards to the Agency’s ongoing registration review of glyphosate. The Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA), 7 U.S.C. 136a et seq., requires that the registrations of pesticides are to be reviewed every 15 years. Under FIFRA, a pesticide product may be registered or remain registered only if it meets the statutory standard for registration, i.e. when used in accordance with widespread and commonly recognized practice, the pesticide product must perform its intended function without unreasonable adverse effects on the environment; that is, without any unreasonable risk to man or the environment, or a human dietary risk from residues that result from the use of a pesticide in or on food.
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NBGA Weighs in on Soy Ingredients to Armed Service Committees
NBGA joined a group of 23 food and agriculture stakeholders in a letter to the Chairs and Ranking Members of the House and Senate Armed Services Committees. The Committees are working on the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2020 and the Senate version includes language regarding the formation of food ingredient policy at the Department of Defense (DOD).
Section 358 of the Senate Bill, "Clarification of Food Ingredient Requirements for Food or Beverage Provided by the Department of Defense," would establish a formal process through which public stakeholders would be permitted to provide input on the formation of food ingredient policy. The letter asks for the Conference Report to include the Senate language.
The provision stems from a 2017 announcement by the Department of Defense that several ingredients deemed safe by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) would be prohibited from food products used by DOD.
The Department's abrupt decision immediately reverberated through the food supply chain and made clear that a transparent, science-based process must be applied when the Department considers future ingredient limitations.
It is important that the DOD be required to provide public stakeholders the opportunity to comment in a manner much like in civilian regulatory agencies, such as the FDA and U.S. Department of Agriculture. Public transparency would provide departmental leadership with useful information as it formulates ingredient-level subsistence policy and provide needed predictability and, for the food and agriculture supply chain, information from which to develop products to meet the evolving needs of the military.
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Common Ground on Climate Action Across Agricultural Supply Chain
From the Paris Climate Accord, to the U.N. Sustainable Development Goals, to the Green New Deal, the topic of climate change evokes no shortage of urgency, emotion and heated public debate. In addition, many global companies have established ambitious, science-based greenhouse gas reduction goals with looming deadlines. The agriculture community finds itself caught in the middle – as a source of greenhouse gas emissions, as a solution for carbon sequestration and as the industry most at risk from increasingly volatile weather patterns. NBGA will join Field to Market on September 12th for a Cross-Sector Dialogue to explore steps the agriculture sector can take to become more resilient to climate change while communicating sustainability benefits to consumers and the value chain.
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America Grows Act
On August 8th,
Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL) debuted
the
America Grows Act.
Modeled after the successful
21st Century Cures Act
for the NIH which passed in 2016, the
America Grows Act
authorizes a 5% inflation-adjusted annual increase for the next five years for basic and applied agricultural research in the following USDA REE agencies: National Institute for Food and Agriculture (NIFA); Agricultural Research Service (ARS); Economic Research Service (ERS); National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS).
The bill represents an opportunity to draw attention to the critical need for additional agricultural research funding to meet the many challenges facing producers and consumers. NBGA has singed a letter of support with other agricultural groups.
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Part 340 Plant Breeding Comments Submitted to USDA-APHIS
The National Barley Growers Association joined several other farm organizations in
submitting group comments to USDA-APHIS
regarding the Agency’s Part 340/biotech regulatory framework rule; which included some common base-level principles which support making certain new plant breeding techniques (such as gene editing) exempt from the GMO regulatory licensing process, as described by
Secretary Perdue in a statement
issued last year.
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USDA Releases Methodology Report for MFP Payment Calculations
Signup Continues Through December 6
The U.S. Department of Agriculture released on August 22
nd
its
Trade Methodology Report
for the 2019
Market Facilitation Program
(MFP) payment calculations. As feared, crops that did not have tariffs imposed upon them, such as barley, canola, and sunflowers, did not receive credit for a loss in the calculations. As a result, acres for these crops were entered in at zero. However, due to the effort to include barley in the MFP was still partially successful as barley acres will receive the calculated county payment rate.
Sign-up for the MFP program is currently now in progress at local FSA offices through December 6, 2019. MFP payments will be made in up to three tranches (or portions), with the second and third tranches evaluated as market conditions and trade opportunities dictate. If conditions warrant, the second tranche will be made in November, and the third in early January. The first payments already began being issued last month, and will be comprised of the higher of either 50 percent of a producer’s calculated payment or $15 per acre.
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US/Japan Reach Free Trade Agreement "In Principle"
The United States and Japan have reached a free trade agreement “in principle” with the final signing occurring as early as this month during the meeting of the United Nations General Assembly in New York,
according to remarks
made by President Trump and Japanese Prime Minister Abe on August 25th at the G-7 conference in France. Japan is an important export market for U.S. agriculture; being the third largest market for U.S. barley, the second largest for U.S.
corn and sorghum
, and the second or third largest market for U.S.
wheat
. However, both the
Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP)
and
EU and Japan's Economic Partnership Agreement
that have gone into effect this past year, have placed U.S. agricultural products at an increasing disadvantage with competitors, which is why agricultural groups petitioned USTR to have any agreement reached with Japan match or coincide with the reductions or eliminations included in those free trade agreements.
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Warehouse Letter to Ag Appropriations Sub-Committee
The National Barley Growers Association joined several other farm organizations in writing a letter to the Senate Agriculture Appropriations Sub-Committee Chairman Hoeven and Ranking Member Merkley supporting the
President’s fiscal year 2020 budget for the USDA Agricultural Marketing Service for U.S. Warehouse Act (USWA) activities, which will support information technology (IT) system updates and enhancements
which will enhance the
fundamental purpose of the USWA, which is to protect producers who choose to store their commodities in
facilities which are licensed under the Act.
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EPA Issues Glyphosate Guidance
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)
announced
it was issuing guidance to registrants of
glyphosate to ensure clarity on labeling of the chemical on their products. EPA will no longer approve product labels claiming glyphosate is known to cause cancer because it is a false claim that does not meet the labeling requirements of the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA). The EPA went on to say that the State of California’s Proposition 65 has led to misleading labeling requirements for products such as glyphosate because it does not conform to EPA’s comprehensive evaluation of glyphosate.
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National Barley Growers Association
(202) 548-0734
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