Farmers have until Feb. 27 to update yields and reallocate base acres at local USDA offices. page 8
U.S. House OK’s Section 179 break Monday, February 16, 2015
BY DEANA STROISCH FarmWeek
The U.S. House of Representatives Friday approved permanently extending Section 179 small business deductions at the $500,000 level. The 272-142 vote in favor of HR 636 — America’s Small Business Tax Relief Act of 2015 — came after Illinois Farm Bureau issued an action request last week urging members of Congress to Richard Guebert Jr. pass the measure. “Once again, the House has voted overwhelmingly to make an important tax provision permanent, and this early action is what our annual meeting delegates wanted to see,” said IFB President Richard Guebert Jr. “That several hundred Farm Bureau members took time to make contacts and tell their stories really helped drive home the importance and urgency of this issue to our congressional delegation.” The legislation now heads to the Senate and could ultimately
face a presidential veto. The White House opposes the bill, arguing the tax break would add $79 billion to the deficit during the next 10 years. IFB leaders believe a permanent tax extension would provide certainty for farmers and small business and allow economic expansion. According to a “Sense of the Delegate Body” resolution passed during IFB’s annual meeting in December, “failure to extend these provisions represents a tax increase, and repeated failure to extend them permanently injects instability and uncertainty into the economy and weakens confidence in the job market.” In December, Congress passed a temporary, retroactive extension that applied to purchases from Jan. 1 to Dec. 31 of last year. The deduction limit dropped back to $25,000 as of Jan. 1. “Illinois Farm Bureau urges the U.S. Senate to take up the House bill and permanently address Section 179 sooner rather than later,” Guebert said. “We really hope it doesn’t come down to another one-year, eleventh hour retroactive extension of last year’s provisions. That’s just counterproductive.”
ALL IN THE FAMILY
Three sections Volume 43, No. 7
Tim Jolly, right, and his wife, Cheryl, plan to restore their two-story farmhouse in rural Chenoa and pass it on to their son, Andrew, who has an interest in farming. See story on page 4. (Photo by Cyndi Cook)
IFB to host Nutrient Loss Reduction Strategy webinar Illinois Farm Bureau will host a March webinar on a statewide strategy to reduce levels of nitrogen and phosphorous in Illinois rivers, lakes and streams. The Nutrient Loss Reduction Strategy offers a suite of practices and programs to reduce nutrient losses in urban and rural areas from point sources that include specific sources, such as sewage treatment plants, and nonpoint sources that are diffuse, such as runoff from farm fields, and residential and urban areas.
The webinar will start at 8 a.m. March 12 and feature Lauren Lurkins, IFB director of natural and environmental resources. All Farm Bureau members are encouraged to be involved and register in advance. Please use the following link to register before March 12 {http://bit.ly/1KU4mgR}. For those unable to participate, the webinar will be recorded and posted later on the IFB website at {www.ilfb.org/resources/ill-nutrientloss-reduction-strategy.aspx}.
Senators seek end to Cuban trade embargo
BY DEANA STROISCH FarmWeek
Periodicals: Time Valued
If you don’t have spring planting fever, you will after reading the special section inside, featuring stories on weather and inputs.
The days of open outcry trading appear numbered as electronic trading rules grain markets. page 14
The longstanding trade embargo with Cuba would end under legislation introduced last week by a half-dozen U.S. senators, including Illinois Democrat Dick Durbin. The Freedom to Export Cuba Act of 2015, if signed into law, would make all legal U.S. products available for export to Cuba for the first time since 1961. It also would repeal the United States’ prohibition on Cuban imports and remove Cuba’s designation as a “state sponsor of terrorism.” “Lifting the trade embargo will open new markets for businesses and farmers in
Illinois and across America,” Durbin said. “But normalizing trade and travel relations with this country just 90 miles off our coast is about more than that — it’s about opening Cuba to new ideas, new values and improved human rights that our 50year-old policy of isolation could not achieve.” The bill would not repeal human rights, reporting requirements or property claims provisions of previous legislation. It also doesn’t address the travel ban, which could be repealed under other pending legislation. In addition to Durbin, co-sponsors include Mike Enzi, R-Wyo.; Jeff Flake, RAriz.; Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn.; Patrick
Leahy, D-Vt.; and Debbie Stabenow, DMich. Illinois Farm Bureau supports efforts to normalize relations between the two countries with the goal to ultimately end the trade embargo. A group of Illinois farmers traveled to Cuba in 2012 as part of IFB’s annual Market Study Tour. According to analysis by Texas A&M University, Illinois ranks 6th in the nation in terms of “lost opportunities” to agriculture because of the Cuban embargo. “We said it in 2012 upon our return from Cuba and we’ll say it again today. Our farmers support an end to the embargo against Cuba” said Adam Nielsen, IFB’s national legislative director. www.facebook.com/illfarmbureau