The farm bill that goes to the House floor for a final vote today is coming under attack from U.S. trading partners, with some experts warning that it could severely damage the economies of poor countries and set back the Bush administration's efforts to strike free-trade agreements. Compared with the old legislation, it drastically increases some federal subsidies to American farmers who grow crops such as wheat and soybeans, which compete in world markets against farm products from Australia, Brazil and other countries. Supporters say the measure is needed to stabilize the U.S. farm economy after years of depressed world commodity prices. But by giving American farmers no incentives to curtail their output at a time of slack global demand, the bill may depress prices worldwide for many products and hurt the most impoverished nations, according to the critics. "This is an appalling signal to the world and the farm bill is very, very bad for international agriculture," Warren Truss, Australia's agriculture minister, was quoted as saying on his country's national radio network. The United States, he said, "is telling other people to lower subsidy levels but not doing the same thing itself." The farm bill is the product of weeks of House-Senate negotiations. Since its broad outlines were made public last week, it has come under attack not only from foreign trade officials but also from environmental groups and fiscally conservative members of Congress. The opponents plan to offer a last-ditch motion today to send the bill back for further work. But with the six-year measure stuffed with new money for New York apple growers, Midwest dairy farmers, agribusinesses and rural interests in almost every county, the Democrats face an uphill battle. The Senate could also vote on the bill today. The bill has put the White House in a bind. It would be politically destructive in an election year for the president to oppose the bill, and officials have indicated he will sign it. But the administration preferred a bill that would have emphasized helping farmers through trade rather than subsidies. In launching a new round of global trade negotiations last November in Doha, Qatar, U.S. officials persuaded developing countries to join partly by dangling the prospect of lowered farm subsidies, especially in Europe, and improved access in the world's richest agricultural markets. Washington has used similar inducements with Latin American nations to start negotiations on a Free Trade Area of the Americas stretching from the Canadian Arctic to the tip of Tierra del Fuego. Officials of the European Union, whose system of subsidizing farmers has long been condemned by institutions like the World Bank for harming Third World agricultural producers, described the measure as the latest example of Bush administration hypocrisy on trade. European Commission President Romano Prodi, who meets with President Bush today, is already incensed over Bush's decision to raise tariffs on steel imports. "At a time when all developed countries have accepted the direction of farm support away from trade and production-distorting measures, the U.S. is doing an about turn and heading in the opposite direction," said Franz Fischler, the EU agriculture commissioner. "We cannot negotiate on the basis of 'Do as I say, not as I do.' " Pedro de Camargo Niego, Brazil's agriculture vice minister for production and commercialization, was quoted as saying that "unfortunately, agricultural policy has entered an obsolete route [in the U.S.] . . . Not even the Europeans, who export with strong subsidies, use that type of instrument approved last week." A senior Senate Agriculture Committee aide, however, defended the bill. "We expect this bill will stay within our commitments under the Uruguay Round" that resulted in a multinational trade agreement, he said. If it appears the subsidy limit will be exceeded, he noted, the secretary of agriculture has authority to adjust the subsidies. The Uruguay Round limited subsidies tied directly to the production of commodities -- such as supports for dairy, sugar, corn, wheat, soybeans and peanuts -- to $19.1 billion annually. The official calculated that in 2001, the U.S. figure was about $11 billion. Even if farm prices decline to much lower levels, he estimated, the subsidies would not go above $16.7 billion. He said that under the new bill, U.S. indirect subsidies (such as crop insurance payments) should also stay well below a $10 billion ceiling set in the current trade agreement. But some members of Congress were skeptical. Reps. John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) and Calvin M. Dooley (D-Calif.) said in a joint statement there was "little doubt that we will exceed these limits," and warned that other provisions "will trigger retaliation from our most important trading partners -- Mexico and Canada." That was a reference to a requirement to label meat, fish and produce by country of origin starting in two years. Some said the provision, a top priority of U.S. livestock producers, could strike at U.S. imports of young Canadian hogs and Mexican calves, thousands of which are imported and raised to maturity in the United States. But a congressional aide noted that other countries use similar labeling. "We're just asking for honest labeling, we're not discriminating" against foreign countries, he said. The farm bill would provide record subsidies to American farmers, in the form of fixed payments and additional federal income support when prices of basic commodities fall below prescribed levels. For the first time, soybean farmers would be eligible for fixed payments based on the acreage they planted from 1998 to 2001. Also new is their eligibility for a supplemental payment from the government if they sell their crop for less than a $5.80 a bushel "target price." Under the previous farm bill, soybean growers were entitled only to government loans equivalent to $5.26 a bushel. If the crop sold for less than that amount, the loan was forgiven. Under that plan, federal outlays to U.S. soybean growers reached $3.8 billion in 2001. The incentives encouraged an unprecedented expansion of soybean plantings, from 62.5 million acres in 1995 to 74 million acres last year. The bill also increases subsidies for U.S. dairy and peanut growers, and establishes new government subsidies for growers of lentils, dry peas and small chickpeas, which are grown in the northern Great Plains. By not taking a tougher line on subsidies, analysts said, the administration risks undermining its plans for the Americas trade pact and a broad-ranging accord to lower trade barriers among members of the Geneva-based World Trade Organization. The bill means the United States "stands in violation of its commitments" to the world's developing nations, said Jo Marie Griesgraber, policy director for Oxfam America, the U.S. chapter of the international aid organization. "What it does is promote products so that we can sell them below market prices overseas, and put poorer producers out of work -- people for whom this is a life and death matter." Several environmental groups were also critical of the bill's failure to provide stricter limits on payments to large farmers. Washington-based Environmental Working Group charged that it will do nothing to put an end to huge government payments to large agribusinesses under the Commodity Certificate Exchange Program. Based on a new analysis of U.S. Department of Agriculture records released yesterday, it estimated that 85 percent of the $2.2 billion certificate program went to farmers and large agribusinesses in just four states: Arkansas, Mississippi, Texas and California. The Arkansas-based Riceland Foods cooperative, which has 9,000 members, collected $221 million in federal payments in 2000 and 2001, it said.:
