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In the United States, the farm bill is the primary agricultural and food policy tool of the federal government. The comprehensive omnibus bill is passed every 5 years or so by the United States Congress and deals with both agriculture and all other affairs under the purview of the United States Department of Agriculture. It usually makes amendments and suspensions to provisions of permanent law, reauthorizes, amends, or repeals provisions of preceding temporary agricultural acts, and puts forth new policy provisions for a limited time into the future. Beginning in 1933, farm bills have included titles on commodity programs, trade, rural development, farm credit, conservation, agricultural research, food and nutrition programs, marketing, etc.〔(CRS Report for Congress: Agriculture: A Glossary of Terms, Programs, and Laws, 2005 Edition – Order Code 97-905 ),〕 Farm bills can be highly controversial and can impact international trade, environmental conservation, food safety, and the well-being of rural communities. The agricultural subsidy programs mandated by the farm bills are the subject of intense debate both within the U.S. and internationally. In the 113th United States Congress both chambers took up separate proposed farm bills. The House version failed to pass on June 20, 2013. The Senate's proposed farm bill, the Agriculture Reform, Food, and Jobs Act of 2013 (S. 954; 113th Congress) (), passed the Senate on June 10, 2013. A new farm bill would replace the 2008 farm bill, known as the Food, Conservation, and Energy Act of 2008, which was set to expire in September 2013. On January 29, 2014, after a conference between the House and the Senate over the differences between their two farm bills, the House passed the Agriculture Act of 2014 (H.R. 2642; 113th Congress), a farm bill expected to be the final compromise. ==History of farm bills before 2000== The farm bill was first created during the Great Depression to give financial assistance to farmers who were struggling due to an excess crop supply creating low prices, and also to control and ensure an adequate food supply. The first farm bill, known as the Agriculture Adjustment Act (AAA), was passed by Congress in 1933 as a part of Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal.〔 The bill allowed farmers to receive payment for not growing food on a percentage of their land as allocated by the United States Secretary of Agriculture. It also enabled the government to buy excess grain from farmers, which could then be sold later if bad weather or other circumstances negatively affected output. The AAA also included a nutrition program, the precursor to food stamps. In 1938, Congress created a more permanent farm bill (the Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1938) with a built-in requirement to update it every five years.〔 In 1996, the first major structural change was made to the farm bill when Congress decided farm incomes should be determined by free market forces and stopped subsidizing farmland and purchasing extra grain. Instead, the government began requiring farmers to enroll in a crop insurance program in order to receive farm payments. This led to years of the highest farm subsidies in American history.〔 Direct payments also began in the late 1990s as a way to support struggling farmers, regardless of crop output.〔 These payments allowed grain farmers to receive a government check every year based on yields and acreage of the farm as recorded the previous decade.〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「United States farm bill」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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