WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Senator Heidi Heitkamp, a member of the Senate Agriculture Committee, today spoke on the floor of the U.S. Senate about the importance of protecting nutrition assistance for North Dakotans at risk of going hungry in the 2018 Farm Bill.

The Senate is expected to pass its bipartisan Farm Bill soon, which protects nutrition assistance for vulnerable Americans while expanding employment and training programs to help recipients secure and retain jobs, and maintains the strong, bipartisan rural-urban coalition that has made the Farm Bill possible for decades. By contrast, the House passed a partisan Farm Bill that would slash benefits for at-risk children, veterans, seniors, and disabled North Dakotans, and make it harder for struggling families to put food on the table. After the Senate passes its bipartisan bill, the House and Senate will work to pass a compromise bill before the current Farm Bill expires at the end of September.

“The Farm Bill has historically been a bipartisan effort that bridges the rural-urban divide in America by giving a safety net to our farmers and ranchers while protecting vulnerable Americans like kids, seniors, veterans, and those with disabilities from hunger. The bipartisan Senate Farm Bill, which I’m proud to have worked on, takes this pragmatic, commonsense approach, but unfortunately the partisan House bill plays politics with some of the most at-risk North Dakotans,” Heitkamp said. “Farm groups, hunger advocates, faith leaders, and nearly 1,500 concerned North Dakotans have reached out to voice their support for nutrition assistance in the Farm Bill, and I’m fighting to protect it as we advance the bipartisan Senate bill. As we work to reach an agreement on the two bills by the end of September, I hope the House will agree that playing politics with American families at risk of going hungry is not the way pass a strong, bipartisan bill for North Dakota. The Senate will keep working throughout August to get the job done, and I hope the House keeps working too so we can get a bill done by this important deadline.”

In her speech, Heitkamp highlighted the stories of North Dakota families who were at risk of going hungry because they lost their job, couldn’t find full time employment, or were struggling with a disability. Nutrition assistance helped them get through tough times and keep food on the table for them and their children.  

In 2016, there were 54,000 North Dakotans on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) – about 73 percent of whom were families with children and 33 percent of whom had family members who are elderly or have disabilities. More than one out of every seven Americans lives below the poverty line, and SNAP provides a critical food safety net for these food insecure families.

In North Dakota, nearly 80 percent of families on SNAP have one or more family members who work. Very few people, other than those with disabilities, the elderly or others who cannot work, stay on SNAP for longer than 3 months in a 3 year period. Half of those new to the SNAP program will leave it within 9 months as they become more financially stable. The average benefit per meal in North Dakota is $1.32.

Heitkamp successfully included many wins for North Dakota in the Senate Farm Bill. The provisions she fought for came about after spending years talking with farmers and ranchers about their priorities, including holding Farm Bill tours across the state in 2016 and 2017 after she helped write, negotiate, and pass the 2014 Farm Bill. The Senate Agriculture Committee – which Heitkamp sits on – passed the Farm Bill earlier this month with overwhelming bipartisan support. 

Provisions Heitkamp successfully worked to include in the bipartisan 2018 Senate Farm Bill:

• Her bill to fix the ARC-County Program to help farmers when commodity prices fall to damaging levels. Heitkamp introduced her bipartisan bill with U.S. Senator Joni Ernst (R-IA) in October 2017. It specifically responds to concerns from North Dakotans and would direct the Farm Service Agency to use the more widely-available data from the Risk Management Agency as the first choice in yield calculations so that county level data is more accurate and updated, calculate safety net payments so they reflect what’s owed to producers in the physical counties where their farms are located, and make payments more accurate. The bill builds on Heitkamp’s successful effort from 2015 when she got the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) to allow farmers whose land is across multiple counties to have their ARC-CO payments recalculated so those payments reflect what’s owed to them in the physical counties where their farms are located.

• Her Next Generation in Agriculture Act to provide funding and reform programs that help young and beginning farmers and ranchers enter and remain in the industry, build the next generation of farmers, and feed the country and the world. Heitkamp introduced her bipartisan bill with U.S. Senator Susan Collins (R-ME) earlier this year. It would provide permanent funding for beginning farmer and rancher training programs, create a permanent National Beginning Farmer and Rancher Coordinator and Agricultural Youth Coordinator at the USDA, direct state USDA offices to designate an employee as the state beginning farmer and rancher coordinator, and establish a next generation agriculture technology challenge competition. The average age of a farmer in North Dakota is 57 years old, according to USDA, and the percentage of new farmers has declined since 1982. Heitkamp’s bill would help cultivate the next generation of farmers and support rural economies.

• Her priority to protect and expand crop insurance. Crop insurance is a critical part of the farm safety net, and Heitkamp has been fighting to protect it so farmers have the certainty they need to get through tough times. Heitkamp worked to make sure the 2018 Farm Bill would improve access to crop insurance for veterans, beginning farmers, and fruit and vegetable growers, and she fought against the administration’s proposed cuts to crop insurance.

• Her priority to expand export opportunities for North Dakota agriculture producers. With 95 percent of the world’s consumers living outside the U.S., Heitkamp has been fighting to protect and expand export promotion programs to help North Dakota farmers sell to the world. She fought to make sure the Farm Bill would expand USDA programs to help farmers find new global markets for their goods.

• Her amendment to boost trade with Cuba. Heitkamp and Boozman successfully included their bipartisan amendment to allow USDA to use its existing export market development programs to create, expand, and maintain a strong Cuban export market for U.S. agricultural producers and processors— at no additional cost to U.S. taxpayers. This change in USDA policy would provide some needed relief from low American commodity prices by fostering a new, reliable trade relationship, boosting agricultural export revenue, and increasing export volume for American farmers and ranchers. This builds on Heitkamp’s efforts to boost trade with Cuba going back to 2015, when she first introduced legislation to lift the ban on private banks and companies offering credit for agricultural exports to Cuba.

• Her provision to support a foot and mouth disease vaccine bank. Heitkamp fought to secure funding in the Farm Bill for a new National Animal Disease Preparedness, Response, and Recovery Program, as well as National Animal and Veterinary Countermeasures Bank, with a priority put on foot-and-mouth disease. The threat of disease is a constant threat over a rancher’s operations, and the need for a rapid response system is crucial for our food system to be able to address any outbreaks of disease such as foot and mouth. This vaccine bank will help protect North Dakota’s livestock industry and our national food system.

• Her proposal to help farmers and ranchers in crisis. Heitkamp secured support for state departments of agriculture, state extension services, and non-profits to establish helplines, provide suicide prevention training for farm advocates, create support groups, and reestablish the Farm and Ranch Stress Assistance Network. These provisions were included in the bipartisan FARMERS FIRST Act, which Heitkamp helped introduce in April to address the alarming rate of death by suicide among agricultural workers.

• Her reforms to make nutrition assistance more accessible in Indian Country. The Farm Bill includes a provision derived from Heitkamp’s Tribal Food and Housing Security Act to help tribes like Spirit Lake provide nutrition assistance to low-income households and children who are at risk of going hungry. This provision waives most or all of the match requirement for administrative costs to run the Food Distribution Program on Indian Reservations (FDPIR) programs, which many tribes use to provide healthy, affordable food options to low-income individuals and families. In Fiscal Year 2016, there were 5,661 participants receiving nutrition assistance from the FDPIR on North Dakota tribal lands.

• Her provision to support rural Native American communities. Heitkamp successfully included an amendment to establish a permanent Rural Development Tribal Technical Assistance Office to provide technical assistance across all areas of rural development funding. The provision, part of her Tribal Food and Housing Security Act to ensure Native American communities are supported in the 2018 Farm Bill, would support rural business and community development, housing, rural infrastructure like electric and telecommunications services, and rural hospitals and health care.

• Her provision to provide greater certainty for the current Tribal Promise Zone designees, including the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa Indians and the Spirit Lake Tribe. Heitkamp successfully added this provision, which was part of the CROPS for Indian Country Act that she cosponsored, during markup to ensure that four Tribal Promise Zones continue to have access to resources and technical assistance from federal agency partners.

In addition to her work on the Farm Bill, Heitkamp has been successfully fighting to improve disaster assistance programs for North Dakota farmers and ranchers. Earlier this year, her bill to improve disaster assistance to livestock and honeybee producers by permanently removing the funding cap for the Emergency Livestock Assistance Program (ELAP) was signed into law.

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