Farm Bill listening session Tuesday

The Montana Grain Growers Association is holding a listening session on the Hi-Line Tuesday with a discussion of the new Farm Bill on the agenda.

In a press release, the association says the focus of the 12 sessions being held this week and Thursday of next week is to give agricultural producers the opportunity to provide their ideas on key issues of the Grain Growers, and the agenda includes a time for a discussion of the Farm Bill’s Price Loss Coverage and Agricultural Risk Coverage programs which can be used as risk management tools,

The new nutrition and agriculture bill, passed and signed into law early this year after a two-year delay in Congress, replaces existing programs such as the Direct and Countercyclical Program and the Average Crop Revenue Election with ARC and PLC. Ag producers need to decide in which program, or combination of programs, they will elect to enroll for the five-year life of the bill. They also have the opportunity to make a one-time update on yields or to reallocate the farm’s base acres.

The latest timeline listed on the U.S. Department of Agriculture website says the period in which farmers can update yields or reallocate base acres started Sept. 29 and runs through Feb. 27.

The period in which producers can make the election for each farm number — tracts of land in an operation are assigned a number, and owners may have more than one farm number — in their operation to be covered by PLC or ARC is listed as from Nov. 17 through March 31. That election will be in place for the life of the 2014 Farm Bill, through 2018.

In the ARC program, the payment is based on actual revenue. If the price of a commodity and how many bushels per acre are produced, drops below a guaranteed level, the farm can receive a payment. The farmers also must decide on whether to use county-wide figures or individual figures for their farm.

The PLC program is based on price alone. If the price of a commodity drops below a guaranteed payment, the farmer receives a payment based on how low the price drops.

If a farmer enrolls the operation in countywide ARC, it can be in combination with PLC on some crops. If the farmer uses the farm-based ARC option, PLC cannot be used.

Actual enrollment in the programs is slated to start in mid-April.

Online tools also are available to help producers decide what options to use. Tools are accessible both at the USDA Farm Service website at http://www.fsa.usda.gov/arc-plc and at the Montana State University Extension Service website at http://www.montana.edu/farmbill.

The USDA Farm Service Agency, USDA Risk Management Agency and Montana State University Extension Service also have announced the dates and times of meetings on the Farm Bill starting in Belgrade Oct. 15.

In north-central Montana, the schedule includes meetings in Browning at the Blackfeet Tribal Conference Room from 9 a.m. to noon Tuesday, Oct. 28, with a meeting at the Shelby Coyote Club and Events Center from 2 to 6 p.m. that day. A meeting is set in Fort Benton at the Ag Center from 8 a.m. to noon Thursday, Oct. 30, with another meeting in Havre that day in the Montana State University-Northern Student Union Building Ballroom from 2 to 6 p.m.

Another meeting is set in Malta from 8 a.m. to noon Friday, Oct. 31, at the Great Northern Hotel and meetings are set Thursday, Nov. 6, from 9 a.m. to noon in the Jon Morsette Vocational Technical Center on the campus of Stone Child College at Rocky Boy’s Indian Reservation. That is followed that day with a meeting in Room 209 of the Returning Buffalo Building at Aaniiih Nakoda College at Fort Belknap Indian Reservation from 2 to 6 p.m.

Online: USDA Montana Farm Bill meetings: http://www.fsa.usda.gov/Internet/FSA_ile/2014mtusdamsufarmbillmtgs.pdf

Montana Grain Growers listening sessions

Tuesday, Oct 14

8 a.m. – Havre, Northern Ag Research Center, 3710 Assinniboine Road

1 p.m. – Malta, Great Northern Hotel, 2 S 1st St

6 p.m. – Wolf Point, Sherman Inn, 200 East Main St

Wednesday, Oct 15

10 a.m. – Plentywood, Montana State Bank, 200 N. Main St

3 p.m. – Sidney, Richland Co. Extension Office, 1499 N Central Ave

Thursday, Oct 16

9 a.m. – Baker, Red River Inn & Suites, 410 Montana Ave

4 p.m. – Harlowton, Harlowton Library, 13 South Central Ave

Friday, Oct 17

9 a.m. – Bozeman, Best Western GranTree Inn, Tamarack Rm.,

1325 N. 7th Ave

3 p.m. – Dillon, U of M Western Mathews Hall, Lewis & Clark Room,

710 South Atlantic St

Thursday, Oct 23

1 p.m. – Great Falls, Holiday Inn, Aronson Rm, 1100 5th St. South