Dear friends and colleagues,

This quarter’s update is a short one. Congress spent most of the period away from Washington, first for the August recess and then for the pre-election break. The Senate has worked in just four of the last 12 weeks, and the House only two after Speaker Johnson canceled the last two weeks of the September session and sent members home until after the midterms.

Dear friends and colleagues,

This month, we’re excited to share meaningful progress on our risk modeling research. In addition to rotational diversity, we've completed modeling for cover crops and reduced tillage across our nine-state region. This work brings us one step closer to rewarding farmers for their soil health practices. By giving lenders, insurers, and government programs a tool to measure how these practices reduce risk, we can help them pass savings on to these farmers.

Dear friends & colleagues,

Harvest is underway across the Midwest as farmers weigh tight margins, weather predictions, and plan for next season. September brought movement on several policy fronts: the Senate Farm Bill finally cleared the Agriculture Committee, Congress averted an October 1 shutdown, and the upcoming midterms are set to reshape Ag Committee leadership. We break it all down below.

Dear friends & colleagues,

It's late summer, and across the U.S. farmers are deep into harvest decisions, watching weather, markets, and input costs closely. In Washington, agriculture policy had its own late-summer churn: the Farm Bill hit a real setback this month, not advancing from the Senate Ag Committee, and federal regulators spent much of August responding to a food system visibly under strain. We break it all down below.

Soil health, storytelling, and summer inspiration from the Land Core team!

It’s been a big summer for farm policy and farm stories alike. The Senate is still working through its version of the farm bill after the House version cleared committee back in the spring, farm bankruptcies recently hit a six-year high, and tumultuous weather and trade environments have put many farmers in a difficult financial position.

Dear friends & colleagues,

It's been a busy month at Land Core and in the agriculture policy world. We submitted comments to BLM on their proposed grazing rule changes, and while we support certain elements, including increased flexibility for producers, we also advocate that any rule changes be tied to an outcomes-based, regenerative management framework. We also published our analysis of the Senate Farm Bill and its potential impact on soil health, and sent our quarterly Bill Tracker Alert, which breaks down newly introduced and reintroduced bills, movement on tracked legislation, and other highlights from this quarter, that could affect soil health.

On June 23, Senate Agriculture Committee Chairman John Boozman (R-AR) released a discussion draft* of the Agriculture Act of 2026, following the passage of the House farm bill (the Farm, Food, and National Security Act of 2026) in April. Chairman Boozman has said a markup of the bill will occur before the Senate breaks for its August recess, but it has yet to be scheduled in the midst of the ongoing budget debate and the continued absence of Senator Mitch McConnell, a key vote on the Senate Agriculture Committee.

American agriculture is under real financial strain. Farm bankruptcies are up 46% since 2024. The country lost 15,000 farms in 2025. And average annual crop insurance indemnities more than doubled between 2015 and 2024, climbing from $6.7 billion to $14 billion.

These numbers point to an agricultural system under growing pressure, one where producers are absorbing more risk each year, and taxpayers are picking up more of the tab through federal crop insurance

Land Core is supportive of well-managed grazing on public lands as complementary to, rather than opposed to, maintaining healthy grassland landscapes. Across the West and the nation, leading ranchers are using regenerative grazing of livestock as a way to increase the profitability of their operations and provide quality livelihoods, as well as to heal degraded soil, restore wildlife habitat, and replenish dried-up rivers. Regenerative grazing and soil health practices can help foster healthy, resilient landscapes and economic prosperity for the communities that depend on our public lands.

Dear friends and colleagues, 

This quarter brought major movement on federal farm legislation with direct implications for soil health. 

As most of you know, on April 30, the House passed its version of the 2026 Farm Bill, the Farm, Food, and National Security Act of 2026 (H.R. 7567). The Senate followed on June 23 with the release of a discussion draft of its Farm Bill, the Agricultural Act of 2026, ahead of an expected committee markup later this month. T