There were cheers across Acadiana and the rest of Louisiana last week when the U.S. House approved the Agriculture and Nutrition Act of 2018, also known as the 2018 Farm Bill, which would replace the current Agricultural Act of 2014.

The House’s Farm Bill was sent to the U.S. Senate where, hopefully, it will pass and help sugar cane farmers and others in the sugar industry, a pleased Jim Simon said in a prepared statement Friday afternoon, a day after the action taken by the House. The New Iberian is general manager of the American Sugar Cane League.

The House maintained current, no-cost sugar policy in the 2018 Farm Bill, Simon said.

“Having a strong safety net in place for the next five years is very important to Louisiana’s sugar cane producers. It creates a stability for producers to obtain the financing necessary to grow and process sugar cane on a large-scale basis,” he said.

“Now we call on the Senate to treat our farmers fairly and ward off any attempts that would hurt the national sugar industry or bankrupt our growers and idle our mills.”

The Senate could vote as early as this evening on the 2018 Farm Bill, less than a week after the House narrowly passed its version, 213-211, to the delight of the sugar industry, both sugar cane and sugar beets, and soybean industry here and across the United States.

Unlike the House’s acrimonious and highly partisan debate, the Senate got off to a resounding, amicable start to its farm bill discussions by voting 89-3 on a procedural motion Monday for the legislation that maintains the structure of the 2014 law and preserves many programs that are close to running out of money and legalizing the production of industrial hemp.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell emphasized keeping the bill bipartisan.

“The Agriculture Committee has continued its tradition of addressing the needs of America’s farmers and ranchers with the serious bipartisanship they deserve, and today the needs are great,” McConnell, R-Ky., said.

Facing declining income, he said, “Growers and producers need certainty and stability. That’s what this bill would help provide.”

Senators began filing amendments to the bill Monday. However, relatively few amendments are expected to get votes.

Senators behind the scenes, according to reports, are jockeying for the right to offer a range of amendments, including proposals by U.S. Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, to tighten commodity payment rules, and Richard Durbin, D-Ill., to impose a means test on crop insurance premium subsidies.

“The leader of the Senate wants to get it done before we go home for Fourth of July and I do, too, want to get it through,” Grassley said Tuesday.

The current five-year Farm Bill, which expires in September, is worth approximately $489 billion, though nutrition programs account for about 80 percent of that total, the Republican from Iowa said.

Grassley noted the House version requires recipients of Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits would be required to work or do job-training for at least 20 hours a week, unless they are pregnant or caring for a young child or for a person with serious health issues. Those requirements have been a major sticking point between Republicans and Democrats, he said.

“They are not in the Senate bill,” Grassley said, “and they won’t be in the final bill that goes to the president of the United States because we have to get a bipartisan bill with work requirements in it.”

The House, he said, needs to “back down,” according to Grassley, or the Farm Bill may need to be extended into 2019.

On Tuesday, Sen. John Kennedy, R-La., submitted an amendment to reduce food stamp fraud that would attach his Fraud Reduction Identification Act to the Senate Farm Bill. The amendment implements the simple step of requiring food stamp recipients to show photo identification in order to combat fraud and abuse.

“Taxpayers lose billions of dollars every year to welfare fraud. When $75 billion a year is being stolen from hard-working Americans, then you have an enormous problem. We can’t sit idly by while people abuse taxpayers’ generosity,” Kennedy said in a prepared statement. “Requiring food stamp recipients to show a photo ID is a simple step that will reduce fraud. At the very least, we’ll ensure that food stamp benefits aren’t being used to support criminal activity.”

On Wednesday, the Senate inserted a proposal by Kennedy to reauthorize the National Flood Insurance Program for six months into a substitute version of the Senate Farm Bill. The program extension, co-sponsored by Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-La., now is in H.R.2, the substitute Senate Farm Bill.

“This is huge news for homeowners from Houma to Plain Dealing and all the points in between. The National Flood Insurance Program is on the brink of expiring at the worst time possible. It’s the middle of hurricane season, and we haven’t even got to August when the worst hurricanes typically hit,” Kennedy said. “This six-month deal will give us time to work on a longer reauthorization and much-needed reforms. It will also ensure that Louisiana families don’t have to worry every time it rains.”

The House’s action last week was met with accolades from the sugar cane industry, the soybean industry and others.

American Soybean Association President John Heisdorffer, a soybean farmer from Keota, Iowa, said, “Farmers need the long-term certainty and stability that passing a new five-year farm bill will provide. Right now, the economic future of our industry is clouded by low crop prices and farm income, and by volatility in foreign markets. We call on the Senate to follow suit and pass its version of the farm bill next week so Congress can complete the 2018 farm bill in July.

“With key programs including crop insurance, farm support programs and export promotion funding for market development programs on the table, ASA urges Congressional leaders to continue pushing forward for final approval.”

Rep. Clay Higgins, R-La., last week voted for the Agriculture and Nutrition Act of 2018. Higgins said he worked with the House Agriculture Committee to preserve the zero-cost U.S. sugar policy, which provides critical support to Louisiana sugar cane farmers and millers.

“The 2018 Farm Bill is righteously focused on putting American farmers and American agriculture first. It’s good for sugar. It’s good for rice. We protected the critical programs that Louisiana farmers rely upon, allowing them to continue to compete and win on a global scale. This bill works for Louisiana and is a win for America,” Higgins said in a prepared statement after the House passed the bill June 21.