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We hope you’re having an excellent end of summer, and are looking forward to the fall. Given the roller coaster of politics we are all on with this election season, some policy work is on pause, waiting to see how things shake out. That said, we are still tracking Farm Bill & Ag Appropriations news, submitting comments on agency actions like input on the 2027 Census of Agriculture to USDA NASS, and engaging in strategic planning to ensure soil health is recognized, valued and advanced across a wider breadth of agencies at USDA and beyond.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s National Agricultural Statistics Services (NASS) recently requested information for content requests for the 2027 Census of Agriculture.

Land Core submitted comments and recommendations, building on the organization’s leadership around the importance of soil health practices and their ability to provide subsequent risk reduction, economic, and environmental benefits.

While there hasn’t been as much Farm Bill activity recently, the House and Senate Ag-FDA Appropriations bills both passed and await floor time — we’ve added these to our Federal Bill Tracker and outlined below. We’ve also continued to track Core Soil Health bills introduced since the beginning of the summer.

We hope you had a fun and safe Fourth of July holiday! Land Core was back in DC this month for a busy week of meetings on the Hill continuing to focus on soil health as a central need for US agriculture. We also hosted our first virtual informational session about the Soil Health Risk Model and accompanying online tool for policymakers! Additionally, Land Core recently submitted comments to USDA based on a Request for Information about biofuel feedstocks.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture recently sought public input on “Procedures for Quantification, Reporting, and Verification of Greenhouse Gas Emissions Associated With the Production of Domestic Agricultural Commodities Used as Biofuel Feedstocks.” Land Core submitted comments and recommendations, building on the organization’s leadership around the importance of consistent outcomes verification protocols in soil health (and related GHG) measurement, monitoring and reporting. The recommendations also weigh in on the diversity of crops that can be used for biofuels feedstocks while building soil health, and soil health practices that should be considered by USDA.

We hope your summer is off to a good start! In the past month there has been more Farm Bill activity, including the release of the Senate Ag Minority leadership framework. The House Appropriations Committee also released the Ag-FDA spending bill and held a markup. Below you can find an overview of this recent activity, as well as a summary of our latest Federal Bill Tracker alert, including some new tracker features!

Land Core commends the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) for building upon the Growing Climate Solutions Act (GCSA) of 2021. The Department’s leadership on this topic sends an important signal to the agricultural community. We appreciated the opportunity to provide input on the proposed framework.

The last few months have seen a flurry of activity, as the House Agriculture Committee released their full Farm Bill text, and the Senate Agriculture Majority and Minority leaders both released summaries of their Farm Bill proposals.

It has been another busy month here! Let’s start with an overview of some significant political activity. Following the release of a detailed Farm Bill proposal by the Senate Agriculture Committee earlier this month, the House Farm Bill was introduced on the 17th and went through markup on the 23rd, including some progress on our SOIL HEALTH Practices bill, which is now officially on the record for consideration in the final farm bill!

We have quite a bit of news to share from this past month! First, Farm Bill proposals are (finally) being released, which is creating renewed momentum and opportunity. Below, we've provided an overview of the Senate and House versions of the bill, as well as Land Core's soil health-related priorities that were included in the Senate leadership bill. We’re also pleased to share our recently submitted FY25 Agriculture Appropriations request.

The beta version of the online, interactive Risk Model Soil Health Tool is now available! The development of this tool would not have been possible without the brilliant team from the Schmidt Center for Data Science and the Environment (DSE) at the University of California, Berkeley.

By supporting voluntary financial incentives that complement existing conservation programs, farmers can be encouraged to adopt practices that prioritize soil health and long-term sustainability… We urge Congress to prioritize the following report language and program requests for the U.S. Department of Agriculture in FY25.

We're thrilled to share that our team’s first academic manuscript, titled “Diversified crop rotations mitigate agricultural losses from dry weather,” has been submitted for peer review! In the meantime, the "pre-print" manuscript is available on agriRxiv.

Happy Spring! Land Core recently spent National Agriculture Week (March 17-23) in DC discussing soil health legislation and ag-appropriations priorities. How did you celebrate National Agriculture Week? Send us an email or tag us in your posts to let us know!

In the past month, little movement has occurred on the Farm Bill. In the Senate, Senators Debbie Stabenow (chair) and John Boozman (ranking member) have publicly expressed that they are still negotiating key aspects of the Farm Bill and don’t expect to release a draft until after the 2024 Presidential Election in November.

It's been another busy month here at Land Core. With a recent trip to DC, uncertainty around the Farm Bill, and the upcoming National Ag Week in March, we've been heads down with policy and advocacy work. We have also shared some takeaways from the recent House Agriculture Committee hearing and the 2022 USDA Census of Agriculture.

We hope you are having a great start to the new year! 2023 was pretty momentous for Land Core and the soil health movement in general. In case you missed it, we are excited to share highlights from this past year, and our goals for 2024, in our year-in-review which you can find below.  That said, the Farm Bill, which will set the legislative framework for the next five years of US agriculture, is still in limbo. While farm groups advocate for the importance of a bipartisan Farm Bill to be passed prior to the ramp up of this year’s general election, there is also the need for continued outreach for other top soil health priorities.

Happy New Year! We are pleased to share Land Core’s 2023 year-in-review, highlighting organizational accomplishments and progress for the soil health movement. We are immensely grateful to all the farmers, partners, coalition groups, and funders who make this work possible, and we look forward to all 2024 has to offer.

We added 9 bills in October and 14 in November to the Soil Health Bill Tracker. For bills introduced prior to October, 39 bills added at least one co-sponsor, showing that those bills have traction and support as we near the introduction of the Farm Bill.