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In the beginning of April, Congress voted down a bill that would have had a tremendous affect on the agriculture community of Whitman County.

The bill, proposed by President Obama, would have put a revenue cap on eligibility for government subsidies for farmers.

Any farmer who received more than $500,000 in revenue would be ineligible for direct payment from the government.

Direct payments are payments that are paid to farmers for their production costs, said Mike Mandere, the county executive director for the Whitman County Farm Service Agency, part of the Department of Agriculture.

With a growing budget deficit in the government, direct payments are becoming more and more controversial, Mandere said.

“There is an argument that we should only pay when crop prices are down,” he said.

There are about $5 billion in direct payments nationwide each year, with about $15 million in Whitman County alone, Mandere said. On any given year, about 95 to 97 percent of the approximately 1,700 farms within Whitman County are receiving some sort of government subsidy.

A report released by the Environmental Working Group stated that Washington State was 22nd nationally in direct payments nationally in 2007, with about $168,436,777 being spent statewide.

Another report by EWG said that direct payment amounts have stayed consistent over the last ten years, varying little.

This would completely change if President Obama had passed the bill.

Some of these farmers are reluctant to take government money.

“We would love not to have subsidies,” said David Weitz, the manager at the Steve and Kevin Mader Farm in Pullman. “We don’t want to have to take a check from the government, we would like to do our own thing.”

“There is such a high input to agriculture, with fuel, fertilizer and everything, that money is extremely useful,” Mandere said. “I would hate to see these payments go away.”

Sometimes subsidies are not needed, but more often than not they are, Weitz said.

“In the good years it makes sense not to have them,” he said. “But the problem is in the bad years they are the only thing that keep a guy farming. The good years don’t always carry over into the bad years. I would say that in a five-year period, three out of five years is bad. Then you have one mediocre year and one good year. Subsidies are highest when sales are at their worst, it goes hand in hand.”

Weitz said that a political world market has created the need for government subsidies.

“If we could have free marketing and take our crops and deal with them as we can, we wouldn’t need the checks,” he said. “But there are limits on where we can and cannot sell and that means we kind of need help out.”

The current test for eligibility is income, rather than revenue, Mandere said.

“Revenue is different than income,” he said. “Revenue is just what the farmer brought in. It doesn’t take into account the fuel, fertilizer and seed cost that can be very expensive. Income is what the farmer made minus the cost, it is the more appropriate test.”

The current test was put in place in June of 2008, Mandere said. There are three portions of the test in place now, one is if the farm income exceeds $750,000, another is if the person makes more than $1 million in non-farm income and one has to do with a conservation project, he said.

The Conservation Reserve Project was started in order to give farmers an option other than farming with their land. Farmers have an opportunity to take their land out of production for 10 to 15 years and let it sit in order to reduce erosion and allow for the growth of wildlife, Mandere said.

“There is a lot of support from both the Democrats and Republicans,” he said. “It is an interesting program and a hot topic among the agricultural community.”

There are about 1 million acres of farmland in Whitman County and about 200,000 of those is engaged in contracts with CRPs. That is approximately 20 percent. There is a law that each county is not permitted to exceed 25 percent of their farmland in CRPs, Mandere said.

The actual portion of the USDA budget that goes to direct payments is very small, about 5 percent, he said. Another 15 or 20 percent goes to conservation payments. The majority of the budget goes towards urban uses like free lunches for kids in school and food stamps.

“The Farm Bill is rapidly losing the farm,” he said.

As for local food prices, a change in subsidy prices would only affect the larger corporations, not local produce providers, said Scott Metzger, the produce manager at the Moscow food co-op.

One report, from the Farm Service Agency, showed a portion of the subsidies that were given out in Whitman County in 2008. Of the portion that had already been counted and filed wheat subsidies were the highest portion of government spending, earning about $772,708 countywide. Barley was second with $139,518. General aid, for deficiencies or farm problems was about $61, 745 and other grains brought in about $28,621.

“Farm subsidies affect farm behavior of local agriculture,” said Steve Kobs, the manager at the Moscow food co-op. “Production decisions would be affected not retail prices.”

Mandere emphasized, however, that not only farmers were benefiting from farm subsidy payments.

“We see the benefits in the grocery store,” he said. “The philosophy is to keep a cheap and plentiful supply. The government provides these programs to keep farms in business to keep the price of food down.”

“This is an interesting topic to delve into,” Mandere said. “It is part of our history back from the New Deal with President Roosevelt.”