Call For A WTO Panel & Limiting Payments

Call For A WTO Panel & Limiting Payments. I'm Greg Martin with today's Northwest Report.

The U.S. is trying to get Indonesian trade barriers and sanctions lifted. US Trade Representative Michael Froman has requested a WTO Panel to challenge the restrictions which if lifted would be a big boost to northwest states like Oregon. Rep. Kurt Schrader says they depend on trade.

SCHRADER: We rely on trade for 20% of the jobs in our state. Large, small companies, farms, ranches are all supported by trade. We're a very trade dependent state and we see great opportunities if we can get trade agreements right and if the administration will enforce them.

Yesterday, USDA announced a proposed rule to limit farm payments to non-farmers, consistent with requirements Congress mandated in the 2014 Farm Bill. The proposed rule limits farm payments to individuals who may be designated as farm managers but are not actively engaged in farm management. In the Farm Bill, Congress gave USDA the authority to address this loophole for joint ventures and general partnerships, while exempting family farm operations from being impacted by the new rule USDA ultimately implements. The current definition of "actively engaged" for managers, established in 1987, is broad, allowing individuals with little to no contributions to critical farm management decisions to receive safety-net payments if they are classified as farm managers, and for some operations there were an unlimited number of managers that could receive payments.

That's today's Northwest Report. I'm Greg Martin on the Ag Information Network of the West.