Dairy Legislation Among Items Congress Expected to Deal With This Fall
September 7, 2011
Congress returns to Washington this week with a busy agenda, including a heavy focus on economic issues, such as the Obama Administration’s unveiling of a new job growth plan, and the first meeting of the congressional budget-cutting “super committee,” both set for tomorrow.
Dairy policy is also likely to be a lively topic, as House Agriculture Committee Ranking Democrat Collin Peterson prepares to formally introduce legislation modeled after NMPF’s Foundation for the Future package. Last month, Congressman Mike Simpson of Idaho’s second district, a senior Republican from one of the largest dairy states, announced he will be a cosponsor of the draft legislation, once it is introduced. The current draft is available online.
NMPF believes Simpson’s support is “an important step in demonstrating the bipartisan, national scope of the effort to reform dairy policy,” according to NMPF President and CEO Jerry Kozak. “We’ve come a long way in the past two years in devising a sensible compromise approach to new dairy policy. While still have a great deal of work ahead of us, the advent of legislation based on Foundation for the Future is a huge opportunity to make badly-needed changes in the status quo system.”
Peterson, along with Simpson, will now be seeking additional cosponsors, in both parties, to cosponsor the legislation.
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